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Maybe it’s because the part of me that still can’t make sense of our breakup is trying to figure it out.
I never saw it coming, and he left me when I needed him most. That hurt me more than anything.
It all started when my father lost his job after his team’s designs for a new anti-virus software were stolen. Dad’s business partner took matters into his own hands to issue payback. He blamed my father for the theft, so he broke in one night when Dad was working and tried to kill him. My father was shot in the back, and his business partner was killed when they fought. Dad barely made it out alive. Now he’s in a wheelchair for the rest of his life.
Months before that happened, Jericho asked me to move to Boston to be with him after I graduated. Of course, I agreed.
The plan was for me to go in the summer so we could spend the time together, then I’d return to New York for Juilliard in the fall. He talked about traveling between Boston and New York until he graduated from MIT.
Those were all his plans.Hisideas. All to which I agreed. I was so in love with him that I would have said yes to anything, especially since it seemed as if he wanted a future with me.
Then my father’s accident happened, and Brielle, my evil stepmother, took control over everything.
When Dad started physio and it was clear he wanted Brielle’s company more than mine, I thought it was the best time to resume my plans with Jericho. But that’s when he broke up with me.
I rest against the wall, keep my focus on my girls as they dance, but in my mind’s eye, I can still see that sickly look of dark dread and deep disappointment on Jericho’s face that night he broke up with me.
When he dropped the bomb on me, and it was like I was talking to someone I didn’t recognize. Like the words were coming out of his mouth but someone else was speaking them.
Thinking back, I might have been able to deal with the breakup better if he hadn’t told mewe’dgrown apart and it was time to move on. What he meant washehad, and he wanted to move on.
To take things back a bit further, I might have deal with the breakup better if he didn’t continue our relationship after high school and if he hadn’t asked me to move to Boston with him.
All of it screwed with my head. I was ready to defy my father and live my life with Jericho, but it wasn’t meant to be.
I’m sure everything else that followed wasn’t meant to be either because nothing worked out.
Like starting over with Sasha. That was a fucked-up epic fail of a mistake.
I met Sasha while I was touring in Moscow. After Jericho, Sasha was the first guy I let back into my heart, but I never saw him for who he truly was until I was miles too late on our journey.
He was the dangerous, controlling asshole who took over my life with his fists and his rage. He forced me to give up my career with the Bolshoi Ballet.
Ratting him out to the police was supposed to be my way out, but my trouble with him had only just begun. His debtors came after me for payment to settle his substantial debts. When they realized I couldn’t pay, they kidnapped me, then contacted my aunt for a ransom of half a million dollars. Or they’d kill me. They nearly did when I tried to escape.
Aunt Gina is my mother’s older sister. She already treated me like a daughter because she was told she couldn’t have kids from an early age. When Mom died, Gina become a mother to me, so knowing I was in deep, deep, deep shit, she didn’t hesitate to gather all her savings, all her earnings from her marketing consultancy, and worst of all, she got a loan not just from the bank but a loan shark, too. All to save my life.
A month had hardly passed after she got me back when she suffered a stroke while driving. That’s when everything really went to hell.
“River, are you okay?” Bernard’s deep voice pulls me from the dark abyss of my thoughts, snapping me back to the present.
I straighten instantly when I realize everyone is watching and the music has stopped. For how long, I have no idea.
Great. Nice one, River.
I hope I didn’t look like I was bored or not paying attention.
Quickly, I plaster on a smile and shake my head at myself. “I’m so sorry. I was just thinking of some choreography I’d like to add to the routine.”
“No worries.” Bernard chuckles. “I’m sure the choreography will be as wondrous as what we did today.”
“It will. We’ll talk about that tomorrow.” I look from him to the class.
They smile back at me—believing me—and I give myself a mental pat on the back for my quick thinking to save myself.
“Class dismissed. You all did amazing,” I add in a chirpy voice.
“Thank you.” The girls coo in unison, giving me that dreamy look of esteem and awe they always have on their faces when I compliment them. That’s from my glory days. Everyone wants to be a prima ballerina. When you meet a person who is either doing what you aspire to be or has done it, that person seems like a god to you.
