299: Behind the mask

Avery's POVHe was standing three feet from me and he had no idea.The corridor was narrow and the backstage lighting was low and Liam Harrington was looking at Scarlett the way he had always looked at Scarlett, with the same attention he always gave her, the kind that made the rest of the room feel like it had stopped. And behind the mask and the wig, I was looking back at him through the eye holes and keeping my hands still."You should not be back here," I told him."I know," he said. "I asked them to tell you I was here. You could have said no."I could have said no. I should have said no. The staff member had come to the dressing room and said there was a man who called himself the one from the private room and everything in me said to send him away. I had walked through the door instead because I needed to see his face even though seeing it was the worst thing I could do right now. What was he doing back here? I needed to find out."The video," he said. "You have seen it.""I h

300: Becoming harder

Avery's POVLiam texted me a few minutes later."Are you done from work? I decided not to sleep over at Tate's place. I'm coming to pick you up by midnight as usual."There was no point arguing with him on that. I already knew I was going to loose.I changed faster than I had ever changed in that building.The wig came off and went into the bag. The mask came off and I folded it carefully the way I always did and put it on top of the wig. I pulled on my regular clothes and my jacket, looked at my face in the dressing room mirror, and thought about the fact that the man who had just stood a few feet from me and asked for my real name was currently driving home to the house next door to mine.I left through the back door.The walk to Crestwood community centre was cold and dark and I was nine minutes in before I noticed I had been walking faster than I intended. My brain could not keep up with what my legs were doing and I let them go because standing still felt worse. The cold helped.

301: Brooding

Liam's POVI stood in my hallway after dropping Avery home, leaned against the wall, and looked at the floor. I thought about Scarlett's voice telling me that some things cannot be taken back once they are said.She had been standing right there. Three feet from me. The mask covering the upper half of her face and the wig covering her hair and her eyes looking at me through the eye holes the way they had always done in the private room, with the attention she gave to things she had decided mattered. Except she had not been honest with me tonight. She had been kind and she had been careful and she had been deliberate about whatever she was protecting. But she had not been honest.I went to the kitchen and poured water and drank it standing at the sink.She most likely attended Crestwood. I was certain of that even though she had not confirmed it. The video was circulating on campus groups. The comments were coming from people who recognised the venue and the movements. She had not d

302: Push harder

Brianna's POVThe four of us met on a Tuesday evening at the same bar Nikki had chosen the first time because it was the only location all four of us had agreed worked.The post had been up for five days. I had been watching the numbers seriously.I tracked it methodically. The trajectory was what we had expected. It was not viral. Neither was it dead. it was moving at the speed campus content moved, fast enough to reach anyone in the Crestwood orbit within a week, slow enough that nobody outside it would care.Six hundred and forty-two shares. Two hundred and eleven comments. Three separate reposts to campus-affiliated accounts.The comments were the part I had been watching most carefully. Not for the count. For the quality. In the first forty-eight hours, most of them were emojis and venue tags,even though they were just tagging random step clubs. By day three, some people had said she looks familiar. By day five, someone had said she moves like someone I know and that comment ha

303: The message

Avery's POVLiam was in my kitchen fixing a sandwich when the message arrived. We spent more time at my place to avoid rubbing our relationship in Jade's face.It was Friday at half past five. He had come over after training to drive me to work as usual. He really insisted on being an intentional boyfriend to help me save gas money.I was standing at the counter putting things in my bag while he sat at the table talking about the away game next weekend when my phone buzzed.I picked it up expecting a text from Gerald or a notification from the squad group chat.It was a direct message from a social media account I did not recognise.No profile picture. No posts. No followers. The account had been created that day. The message was three sentences long.I read them."Avery?" Liam asked. "You still with me?"I looked up from my phone. He was mid-sentence and had noticed I was gone."Sorry," I told him. "Just a notification. Give me a second."I picked up my bag and my phone, went to the

304: Almost

Avery's POV I got through Friday's set. I do not know how. I stood on that stage for forty-five minutes with the message sitting in me and I moved and the audience gave back the energy. I came off, changed, walked back to the community centre, texted Liam, let him drive me home and said nothing the whole way. I was really getting exhausted with the back and forth and I was not sure I could take it anymore. I lay in bed until three in the morning not sleeping and then gave up and started assembling the words to end my misery instead. I spent all of Saturday trying to say them. Not the words themselves. I had the words. They had been in my head since three in the morning, the same sentence going around the same track, the way it did when you were terrified of saying it. Liam, I need to tell you something. That was the opening. Clean and direct. The kind of sentence he would hear and put down whatever he was doing and give me his full attention because that was who he was. He wo

Falling for My Best Friend's Brother의 모든 챕터: 챕터 301 - 챕터 306

299: Behind the mask

300: Becoming harder

301: Brooding

302: Push harder

303: The message

304: Almost