Chapter 18 - Break the Bow
Chaos erupted.
Some people ran.
Others froze.
Phones kept recording.
The Patron walked down the aisle while the orchestra stopped.
He looked almost human under the house lights.
That was the worst part.
Madame Voss shouted from the wing:
“Do not bow!”
Ava understood.
The performance had to end without surrendering the room.
The Patron climbed onto the stage.
“You wanted this.”
Ava said:
“I did.”
“You begged.”
“Yes.”
“You hated her.”
“Yes.”
Ava squeezed her hand.
“And I was wrong.”
The Patron smiled.
“Regret is not payment.”
“No.”
Ava looked at the audience.
Hundreds of faces.
Then she did the one thing no principal dancer would ever do after opening night.
She walked offstage.
The Second Ava shrieked.
The audience began clapping instinctively.
Ava stopped in the wing.
The swelling inside her returned violently.
Nora shouted:
“Don’t listen.”
Ava covered her ears.
The applause grew.
The copy pulled itself upright.
The Patron smiled.
Then Madame Voss did something unforgivable to theater tradition.
She turned on the house lights.
Full brightness.
No protected illusion.
She took a microphone.
“Please stop applauding.”
The audience hesitated.
Voss continued:
“This performance is over.”
Silence spread row by row.
The Second Ava collapsed.
The Patron’s face twisted.
Nora whispered:
“It’s working.”
Ava’s stomach flattened.
A black feather slid from beneath her costume.
The Second Ava crawled toward the stage edge.
It looked at Ava.
For one terrible second, Ava saw herself in it.
The need to be chosen.
The terror of becoming ordinary.
Ava stepped toward it.
Nora grabbed her.
“Don’t.”
Ava whispered:
“It’s me.”
“No.”
Nora held tighter.
“It was made from you. That doesn’t mean it gets to keep you.”
The copy reached out.
Ava did not take its hand.
The black-framed mirror from Studio C suddenly appeared upstage where no mirror had been.
The Patron screamed.
The copy was pulled backward.
So was the Patron.
Then the mirror cracked.
Twice.
And exploded inward without sending a single shard into the room.
Darkness swallowed them.
May you like
The frame fell empty.
Behind it stood only the brick backstage wall.
