When I looked back at him, I knew that from now on, things would be different. With the dancing and the lift and the glimpses of each other’s beautiful, backward things and whatever had happened just now, something had shifted between us for good. Or bad. I didn’t know which it would turn out to be.

Despite that, I smiled. “See you tomorrow.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

OPENING NIGHT WAS ONLY seven weeks away, which meant rehearsals ramped up. Mrs. Sorenson blocked scenes with the whole cast, shouting and gesturing maniacally. Ms. Langford named me official dance captain, which meant I had to run through all the routines with the chorus, so I hardly had any downtime.

Jude and I were never alone, which was frustrating. I mean, we talked. We laughed. We even had another Vamp rehearsal to learn the rest of the dance, which, as Ms. Langford said, was all about contact. One move involved Jude catching my leg by his ear, then dipping me low. When Jude gripped my leg, clutching the leg warmer he’d made me, it somehow felt more intimate than if he had touched my skin. And every time I came back up, stopping six inches away from his face, he always had this look. This lips-parted, brows-wrinkled, pupils-dilated look.

Like he was a second away from closing the distance between us. And if Ms. Langford and Mrs. Sorenson hadn’t been a foot away, adjusting and commenting, I would have done it for him.

By Friday night, it had been almost two weeks since Fly Zone, and I had a permanent feeling of exasperation lodged in my stomach. Tomorrow morning, I was meeting Jude, Margot, and Ethan for breakfast at Waffle Country before the first Saturday rehearsal, but that wasn’t enough. So I grabbed my phone to text Jude.

Need a ride to breakfast and rehearsal tomorrow? I typed, leaning against my headboard.

That’s ok, I have to stay til 2 and don’t want to hold you up. The knot in my stomach tightened. Then the blinking dots appeared. Are you coming to the rink?

Right. A bunch of musical people were going to the Galleria ice rink after rehearsal. I thought about it for a second. Yeah. You?

Good. Yeah I’m going.

Cool. See you at breakfast.

Well. That was probably the most pathetic series of text messages ever. I tossed my phone onto my bed and my mind drifted somewhere unpleasant.

This was kind of a pattern, wasn’t it? Jude and I would have some moment together. Something that etched itself into my brain. The scars. Winter Formal. The lift. Fly Zone. Then one of us would hit the brakes. I’d avoided him after the scar thing. He’d literally stepped away from me in the parking lot after the first Vamp rehearsal, when we’d been standing so close.