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atop came into view in the distance, and I followed the posted signs to the employee lot.
    “Wow. I’m sorry…” I empathized with her career disappointment.
    “I thought you liked stories?” But that wasn’t really hers. What she had told me sounded more like the end of what she was used to, or at least the beginning of something unfamiliar. “Maybe you can put it in your show. I can act.”
    “Yeah?”
    “I manage to pull off Functional Adult, fooling many. Someone gives me paperwork every day and trusts me not to just shred it into confetti. So, yeah, I can definitely be the girl from across the hall, the dancer with a past. Maybe I’m into Sami and it’s a love triangle….dun-dun-dun,” she teased. “But I want some cred if you end up using any of my real storyline.”
    “Can’t use it if I don’t actually know it. Tell me what I missed in the middle tonight.” No way Ghost was going to get the final ask.
    She leaned into the window after she got out of the car. “Thanks for the ride…and for not being a serial killer.”
    “You’re welcome?” I said, laughing.
    “And consider me for a role. I might really need a new career.” She pushed back from the car. I smiled without answering and waved one last time as she disappeared into the castle. Nikki was doing what everyone always did when they found out about my show: throwing out random ideas about the plot, as if I didn’t have enough of that in my head already.
    Even just talking about the show with her made me nervous about the meeting tomorrow. Would those guys at Hillington Media even get my direction in the first place? Would they understand that Chuck wasn’t supposed to be a conventional hero, that I was intentionally exaggerating his flaws, and that the road to love wasn’t the comfortable, easy route the audience may have wanted?
    Shit. I probably needed to tone it down and make it safer. It was still early in the day. I had plenty of time to work on a few story arcs before we went out tonight.
    I reached into a cup holder and retrieved the baggie of pills I’d hidden beneath an old McDonald’s cup. I threw my head back and shook two pills into my mouth.

Chapter Four
    Nikki
    “I got the job!” I told my co-workers when we reached the Castles and Cupcakes parking lot.
    “What? I thought you said you bombed it?” Denise asked. She wriggled out of her costume in a large shadow by her car. “That’s why we spent the last hour mocking that choreography you showed us.” Two girls bumped me with their butts, imitating a dance move.
    “Quit! Or you won’t get the comedy show tickets, bitches!” I yelled. “And I did bomb it…” But during a break at work I’d faked enough fearlessness to call the coordinator with the company that held the audition today, to hopefully sell my other dance skills. I was really glad I did. Apparently the judges all agreed that I sucked, but they all had also commented on my ballet freestyle and how exceptional it was. After asking if it was original choreography (it was) and if I could do more (I could), the coordinator told me he didn’t have anything on my level, but he did have a job opening that a lot of other dancers he knew had turned down. He hadn’t bothered to ask anyone else. His sister was a high school teacher and in charge of the drama club. They were putting on West Side Story and they needed a choreographer for the musical numbers. He really sold it, though, when he added, “It pays.”
    “It’s a different job. Working with kids on a play,” I said to Denise as I got into her car. We waved goodbye to the others.
    “I thought we agreed Castles made us hate kids?”
    I laughed. “Yeah, we do …but money .” Okay, so it wasn’t the job I had barely wanted, but it was the one I had gotten. And it sounded like fun. I needed dance more than I needed a stage to dance on.
    When Denise and I got to the auto shop, Ghost was waiting at the counter inside. I groaned. I hated that I