The light makes blue and purple puddles around us. We’re on a stage, behind a curtain. A swooping staircase climbs to nowhere. A chandelier hangs low, near a giant crescent covered in silver glitter. The ropes make sense, at least. I can see the door. I could escape before Ethan could get to me. My heart starts to steady.

“What is all this?” I ask, wiping my palm on my skirt.

“We’re doing Mame.” Ethan gestures to the crescent like a goofy game show host, big sweet smile, and I feel ridiculous for having any fear of him. I’m like frayed wires, sparking at all the wrong times.

“For Drama Club?” I ask. My heartbeat is almost normal again.

Ethan laughs. “For the drama department.”

“So, what exactly does that mean?” I ask, using a phrase Margo employs whenever she doesn’t want to let on how much she doesn’t know.

“Our students study acting, stage management, set design, or dramaturgy,” Ethan says in an announcer voice like he’s narrating an infomercial, “with the goal of working in professional theatre.” He kicks at a rope coiled on the floor. “I teach technical theatre and design.”

“That’s a thing people go to school for?” I set my guitar case on the floor and run my hand along the banister of the stairs. It looks like brass but feels like wood.

“Yup,” Ethan says.

“And you did this?”

“Well, my students did this,” he says, climbing into the crescent. He reaches for my hand to help me step into it too. There’s scaffolding and a seat hidden just behind the glitter. “I have a student who wants to do rig work, so we’re going all out for Man in the Moon, lowering Vera from the heavens.” He points to the metal walkways above us.

“You get paid to help students build things like this?” I shake my head, amazed.

“April,” Ethan says, “you get paid to travel around and sing songs to people.”

“It’s a way to get by.”

“Your way of getting by is a lot of people’s dream.”

“People dream of being rock stars. They don’t dream about living in their car.”

Ethan gives me his worried look again. “Maybe not, but they do dream of flying.” He points to the seat. “Sit.”

I do. I think I know where this is going and maybe you’re not supposed to climb in a moon with a guy you met on the street, but I survived the darkness just fine.