Even for the very best dancers, making it as a professional is no joke. Trying to make it as a person of color is the highest difficulty setting—I’ve seen the exhausting bullshit Taylor and Nevaeh have to push through every day from all directions. (We all almost collapsed and died of happiness when they both got their Tisch/NYU early acceptances.) What I deal with is trying to make it with no family money to help with bills or college, a mom whose debt has made me determined never to rack up my own, and a body nowhere close to the stereotypical dancer’s. Of course, they say that contemporary dance is a little more welcoming to all types of bodies, but in the real world, fat dancers still get laughed off some audition stages, if they get up there at all.

While Angles isn’t a guarantee of success, it feels like the best chance I’ll ever get. To prove to my mom that the professional dance world is where I belong, not chasing a career in LA—that’s her dream. Angles is the only vision I have of my future. I’ve already downloaded an Italian language app.

I suck in a deep breath. I know how to breathe through every moment and movement. I am the calm in the eye of the goddamn hurricane. But if I let myself think about this too much, it feels like I am being leveled.

“Addie—” Nevaeh says, and I know they’re all glancing at one another.

“It’s totally fine,” I say to them. “I don’t want to talk about it. It’s just—it’s that—it’s fine.”

I’ve made it through three intimidating auditions on campus—and so has Ellory. She and I are the two final senior contenders, out of all the schools in the country, because that is how irony works, I guess. The decision is supposed to come Monday, 9 a.m. Milan time, 2 a.m. central time. Which is just two days away. I put my face in my hands, demanding that my heart slow. I breathe in, and out.

“Addie?” Katherine asks.

I don’t want this to be my only chance. I’m afraid it’s my only chance. But more than anything, I just want it. I want to go. I want to meet Madame Rabei. I kind of want to make her love me. I have to get in.

“If you don’t get it—” Taylor says, like he’s reading my mind, and I look up.

“Taylor!” Katherine says sharply.