Heiress. Legacy. Dynasty.
Old money so old, it’s on the wall.
She’s not my girl. She never was. She belongs to this—this marble, this glass, this practiced charm that knows exactly how to stage-manage a narrative.
I look at her, and for the first time, I don’t recognize her at all.
Laughter ripples down the hall. Champagne clinks. A violin phrase floats from somewhere below.
And I just stand there, smiling like a good prop while something in my chest tears.
Julian is already pivoting us politely back toward the box. People are starting to drift to their seats. A chime rings: five minutes to curtain.
Joy—Josephine—reaches for my arm.
I offer it. Because that’s what’s expected and I don’t want to cause a scene. We walk back toward the box under chandeliers that drip light.
Maybe she was going to tell me, some weak voice in me offers. Maybe she tried. Maybe I didn’t listen.
No.
She chose not to tell me. She knew exactly what she was doing.
I lean in, voice low, just for her. “Josephine?”
She flinches like I slapped her. Her smile never moves. “I didn’t have a vote,” she whispers through her teeth.
“A vote?” My mouth tastes bitter. “You didn’t have a vote about your own name? Or about telling me what it is?”
“It’s complicated?—”
“You should’ve told me your name,” I hiss, still smiling for the hallway. “Before you let me fuck you, Josephine.”
Her breath catches. Her eyes shine wet. “Wesley?—”
“Not here.”
My hands are shaking. I drop her arm.
We slip back into the box. The house darkens around us. The chandeliers rise again, planets lifting. The orchestra swells into Act II.
Onstage, Papageno bumbles across a painted forest calling for his mate—comic, desperate, foolish. The audience laughs.
I don’t.
Beside me, she sits rigid. Silent tears cut tracks through her mascara and catch the spill of stage light. Not dramatic. Not noisy. Just breaking quietly, inches from me.
There’s a part of me that wants to reach for her. Pull her in. Tell her we’ll figure it out.
But it’s not “figure it out.” It’s not a little white lie.
She didn’t just forget to tell me. She built a scene for me to fall into and edited out the parts where I’d realize she was from a different world.
My jaw locks. I stare straight ahead. My chest hurts like someone’s got a hand around my ribs and is squeezing.
But boys don’t cry. Right?
Papagena appears onstage in a burst of color. The music swells, bright and hopeful—two fools finding each other at last.
