The Final Act

I was not hiding. I was strategically waiting.

There’s a difference.

“Tessa!” Maya’s voice banged against the bathroom door along with her fist. “If you don’t come out right now, I swear I’m telling them you fainted in here!”

“I might faint!” I hissed back, staring at my reflection as it had personally betrayed me. “That’s a real possibility!”

I shouldn’t be here.

I should be in a quiet classroom somewhere, minding my business, being invisible like I’ve successfully done for the past three years.

Instead, I was locked inside a girls’ bathroom stall five minutes before auditions for the school play.

Auditions.

As in the stage. Lights. People staring.

As in humiliation but theatrical.

Maya knocked again, harder this time. “You wanted this!”

“I wanted snacks!” I shot back. “This is different!”

There was a dramatic sigh from the other side of the door. “If you had just gotten decent grades last year, you wouldn’t be fighting for extra credit through a school play.”

Low blow.

I opened the stall door and glared at her through the mirror. “My grades were decent.”

“They were average.”

“Average is emotionally stable.”

“Average doesn’t get you into the Monroe School of Arts you’ve been obsessing over since sophomore year.”

I groaned and leaned against the sink.

MSA(Monroe School of Arts).

The one with the beautiful theatre program and the huge stage and the acceptance rate that basically laughs at average students.

If I had done better academically, I wouldn’t need this performance credit boost. I wouldn’t be standing here, seconds away from voluntarily embarrassing myself in front of the entire drama department.

Maya crossed her arms. “This is your chance, Tess.”

“My chance to publicly combust?”

“Your chance to be seen.”

That part made me quieter.

Because being seen sounds nice in theory.

Until you actually are.

“I can’t do this,” I muttered, suddenly very interested in the soap dispenser.

“Yes, you can,” Maya said firmly. “You’ve been practising for weeks. You literally recite lines in your sleep.”

“That was one time.”

“It was three.”

I pressed my palms against the sink and inhaled.

Okay.

Fine.

Maybe I wasn’t terrible.

Maybe I was just… aggressively nervous.

“Also,” Maya added casually, “the theatre committee is there.”

I narrowed my eyes. “So?”

“So Klaus is there.”

My heart did something illegal.

“That’s irrelevant,” I said immediately.

Maya’s look said I was a terrible liar.

And unfortunately, she was right.

I shuffled backstage, heart thumping like a drumline, and tried not to notice anyone.

But then… of course… Veronica Steele spotted.

Of course, she was also auditioning, she'd do anything to get that lead role and we all know why.

Her eyes narrowed, and that smirk stretched across her face as she’d just discovered a secret only she could enjoy. “Well, well,” she purred, voice dripping with venom, “if it isn’t the school’s own… What's the word? Oh yes—bag of sack.”

I froze.

My stomach dropped.

And then she jabbed a finger at me. “Seriously, Tessa, how do you even fit through the door without… rearranging the furniture?”

Maya, who had been clutching my arm like I was about to vanish into thin air, took a step forward. “fuck off veronica”

“Or what?” Veronica laughed, sharp and cruel. “You’ll hit me?”

Maya’s jaw clenched. She sighed, realising diplomacy might actually be better here. Veronica smirked at her like she’d won some invisible battle and flicked her hair over her shoulder.

“I was leaving anyway, don't want your bad luck rubbing off on me” she tossed her hair over her shoulder “I have a lead role to play”

She stopped “oh and don't bother trying to audition, the likes of you have no place on the stage let alone the spotlight”

And just like that, she sauntered away, leaving me feeling like I’d been stripped bare in front of an invisible audience.

I pressed my palms to my face, trying to shut the world out.

I wanted to run. I wanted to hide. I wanted to crawl into the darkest corner of the theatre and never come out.

But worse… worse was the tiny voice in my head whispering the truth:

Look at you, Tessa. Fat. Ugly. Even if you knew the lines perfectly… you’d probably still get cast as a tree.

I sank onto the nearest chair, the script trembling in my hands. Maybe she was right. Maybe this whole thing was a terrible, horrible, no-good idea.

And just like that… I almost gave up.

Maya crouched down beside me, gripping my hands like I might disappear if she let go. “Tess… you can do this,” she said firmly, her voice soft but steady. “You’ve worked for it. Lines or no lines, you’ve got this. Just… don’t let them see you panic.”

I blinked at her, trying to believe her, trying to remember that somewhere under all the nerves, I could actually do this.

So, I stood up. Heart thumping like a bass drum in a marching band, I straightened my back, held the script close… and walked onto the stage.

For a terrifying second, the room was huge. The lights burned my eyes. I couldn’t see the judges clearly. And my knees? Absolutely committed to shaking like they had a personal vendetta against me.

I swallowed, took a shaky breath… and started.

The words tumbled out, awkward and messy at first, but gradually… they came. I stumbled over a line or two, flinched at some gestures, but somehow, I delivered. I did it.

When I finished, silence. Thick, suffocating, awkward silence. Nobody clapped. Not a single person. My stomach sank, and I could feel my face heating up like a live radiator.

And then… my eyes drifted to the judges’ seats.

Klaus.

Nicholas Hayes. The school’s living, breathing bad boy legend.

His piercing eyes were locked on me like he’d somehow seen every little flaw and every little triumph all at once.

And oh… did I feel every single one.

I swallowed hard, cheeks flaming red, and turned my gaze to the floor, wishing the stage would swallow me whole.