But disgust and horror can’t seem to form. Instead, something in my chest loosens a fraction.
He saw me when I was strong. He didn’t stop wanting me when I became injured. He chose me at my peak and stayed when the descent began. When the vultures started circling and I began to lose all value in my world.
He saw me at my best, and still wants me even though we both know there’s nothing left of who I was.
I push myself up and limp to the barre, resting my fingers lightly on the smooth wood. I test my weight carefully, listening to my body the way I should have months ago. The pain flares, sharp and immediate, and I hiss through my teeth.
No amount of willpower can fix this. No amount of sacrifice will bring it back. My body is telling me, screaming at me, to stop.
I straighten slowly, shoulders back, chin lifting out of old habit. The posture feels natural, ingrained deeper than thought. I’ve always known how to stand tall, even when everything else was falling apart.
Is that really so different from what he’s offering?
Another structure. Another set of rules. Another way to belong.
The difference is that ballet only loved me as long as I was able.
Avros knows exactly what I am. What I was. What I’m losing, and he wants me anyway.
My reflection stares back at me, eyes red-rimmed, face pale, but still unmistakably mine. I look older than twenty-four. Like I’ve crossed some invisible threshold and can’t pretend I don’t understand the cost of survival anymore.
He gave me a choice; a brutal one wrapped in truth.
Walk back into a world that already decided I’m finished, where men like John get away with hidden violence and womenlike me are expected to smile through it. Work through it. Destroy ourselves and who we are for it…
Or stay.
Rest.
Let myself be claimed by something that doesn’t pretend to be gentle, but doesn’t lie about what it takes either.
My fingers curl around the barre as I imagine walking away, leaving this space behind, and the thought doesn’t feel like freedom. It feels like another kind of loss.
How long can I keep sacrificing my life for something that I was never enough for?
I take a deep breath and look towards the door that will take me back into the main part of the converted barn. My new home. My new life with a man I feel like I know, but don’t.
Life before today was lonely. Routine, and work, and never slowing down.
Maybe it’s time for a change.
Avros
Dead weight has a way of reminding you how much effort life takes to maintain. Muscles slack. Joints useless. The man who once took up space with entitlement and arrogance is reduced to something that fits into a large suitcase in the back of my car, folded and silent.
I don’t rush.
Rushing creates mistakes.
The night air is cool as I drive from the estate, roads narrowing, streetlights thinning out until there’s nothing but darkness and trees. The place I chose is far enough away that no one will find him. It’s been used before. It will be used again, in my line of work.
I stop where the ground dips low and the earth is soft from recent rain.
John doesn’t deserve ceremony. He doesn’t deserve anger either. Men like him thrive on being important to someone, even in death, and I won’t give him that.
I work quickly and efficiently. When it’s done, I wash my hands in bottled water and take a moment to breathe, grounding myself before I get back in the car. The smell of soil and metal fades as I pull away, leaving nothing behind that connects him to Emma. Or to me.
The drive back to the estate is quiet, my mind already moving ahead. She’s alone in the studio now, grieving the only life she’s ever known. I gave her space on purpose. Grief needs room to settle, to be acknowledged, or it turns into something poisonous and bitter.
