A Poised Nuisance (Lithe Book 1) Read online

  Kai was not there, but his ballet slippers were—right next to the chair he was sitting on, clearly new and unused. They had faced Lara like an invitation, tempting her to come closer, to do something she shouldn’t, and Lara hadn’t blinked as she’d bent down to his shoes, ghost-colored glass in her hands. She’d taken his left shoe, allowed herself to feel the silkiness of its material, and placed the glass inside.

  Then she’d done the same with his right.

  When Kai stepped back into the room, Lara had sat on a chair at the opposite end of the room, watching him. His usual, careless demeanor seemed to have disappeared, his shoulders tense, the brown of his eyes darker—distant. She wondered who he’d been speaking to.

  Kai hadn’t noticed the glass placed into his slippers; hadn’t noticed as he slipped both slippers on slowly, his shaky hand tying them up to his calves. Slowly, he’d stood up, and Lara had waited.

  Kai had grunted in pain—his mouth open as he fell to the floor, his eyes shut—then had quickly torn the slippers from his wounded feet, the pain blinding him. Lara had watched the blood leaking from the soles.

  Kai had pulled a single piece of glass from the shoe; it was red—the red of death, of vengeance. He’d looked up at Lara and, impulsively, she’d smiled. A sweet, sinister smile, pulled from the deepest core of her body.

  Something in Kai’s eyes had changed immediately. He’d looked angrier than she’d ever seen him—angrier than the time she’d purposefully texted him the wrong time for practice a few months before; angrier than the time she’d made some childish remark about his dead parents the day after he had opened up about them.

  “What,” he’d said, speaking through his teeth, his breath loud, “did you do?”

  Lara’s smile had turned innocent; it was the smile of an angel, of a cheery child. She hadn’t been sure if she should outright confess—if she wanted to secure the hatred between them, to make it purely irreversible and impossible to fix.

  “I wanted this part,” she’d said. “So I made sure I got it.”

  Lara had placed the broken glass into his slippers for one reason—only one. It was the same reason she hated him, the same reason his pain satisfied her.

  Kai was better than her. At dancing, at maintaining calm. He was the perfect child, the person her mother yelled at her to be. Kai was the representation of everything she could not be—and everything she wanted to be.

  Lara stared at Kai’s foot as he covered it, drowning in the memory of his pain. She wondered if each time he went to put on his shoes he grimaced at the thought of something in there, waiting to hurt him.

  She hoped he did. She hoped when he thought of taking something that was meant to be hers, he remembered his scars. His blood.

  Kai noticed Lara staring and looked up to meet her gaze, his face sour. “Do your scars still hurt?” she asked.

  He stood up, laughing dryly as he shook his head. “Your slippers are on the wrong feet,” he said—without looking down.

  Lara looked at her feet and nearly cried out in frustration, humiliation surging beneath her veins. Instead, she laughed in return, hands moving quickly to fix her slippers. Her heart pounded acid; her veins drank fire.

  Kai, his laughter still sounding, walked away.

  A few seconds passed. “You’re quiet today,” a blonde girl said to Lara. Lara didn’t know her name.

  She said nothing, only looked up to blink at the girl.

  “Everyone, get up,” Dunne demanded. “Kai, come over to me.”

  Kai obliged, walking gracefully to where she stood just offstage. Lara crossed her arms.

  Dunne was wholly consumed by Kai and his dancing; her favoritism was undeniable and infuriating. Lara hated their relationship, hated that he was idolized for doing the bare minimum. She wanted to shove him; to slap her hand across his face and let him see into her unbeating heart—let him read through her past, through her efforts. Ballet may not have come naturally to her—she hadn’t woken up one morning and found grace within her toes like Kai must’ve—but she tried. She tried so goddamn hard to learn, to better herself, while he sat on stage idling, knowing things would come his way because he’d always been good—he could always dance.

  Lara had spent her days and nights dancing for hours on end; she had been growing blisters between her toes since she’d first stepped foot into an old, mildew-smelling ballet studio around the corner from her childhood home. Kai hadn’t.

  Dunne and Kai chatted for a few seconds, the students waiting anxiously on stage. Lara watched as Kai left her side, smiling to himself. She scoffed.

  “I’m putting you in pairs to test out your chemistry for the recital,” Dunne said, pulling a clipboard from the floor. She began reading names. “Harry and Lily. Evelyn and Ty. Lara and Kai—”

  “Excuse me?” Lara interrupted. Kai’s jaw ticked.

  “Yes, Lara?”

  “You’re kidding,” she said, laughing. “Me and Kai? I must’ve misheard you.”

  “No, you heard me clearly. May I continue? Or would you like to finish your little tantrum outside?”

  “You—”

  “Shut up, Lara,” Kai snapped from beside her. She hadn’t noticed him closing the distance between them. He was just a few inches away from her now, and the nearness was startling. Lara felt the urge to step back, but somehow, she knew that Kai would notice her apprehension. She did not want to give him the pleasure—the confirmation—of knowing he affected her in more ways than one.

  So, Lara raised her chin, ignoring his close proximity. “Stay out of this,” she hissed.

  “Do you think before you speak?” he whispered. “Do you realize the trouble that you would’ve gotten into if you’d finished that sentence?”

  “You don’t even know what I was going to say,” she said, unwilling to break the eye contact they held.

  “Your lack of awareness is insufferable. I’m ninety-nine percent sure that whatever vile words that were about to come from your lips were going to be irreversible—idiotic,” he said, tearing his gaze from hers. “I know you.”

  Lara stared ahead, shaking her head. It was laughable—the confidence that oozed from him as he said those words. “You don’t,” she said quietly, almost a whisper.

  Kai narrowed his eyes at the sound of her voice, his hand coming up to cover his ear as if to hide from her whispers. Lara wondered if her voice was as unendurable to him as his was to her.

  “Let’s begin!” Dunne yelled, interrupting their silent argument. Lara looked up to the ceiling and took in a deep breath.

  Begin, Dunne had said, when Lara could only wish for the end.

  September 2018

  IT WAS THE FIRST DAY of classes at Juilliard. The freshmen were overjoyed, excited for new possibilities, new experiences; the upperclassmen simply dreading another year of classwork, of essays and exams. They laughed at the innocence of the freshmen as though it wasn’t something they craved.

  Lara had ultimately been admitted to Juilliard’s prestigious dance program—much to her relief. She informed her mother a few minutes after the email came into her inbox but found no reaction there.

  Lara had expected nothing less.

  She was standing in the room of her ballet class, listening to the ramblings of the newly introduced professor Madame Dunne.

  “I am so very excited to teach you all!”

  Lara rolled her eyes. Dunne’s French accent was unbearably obvious, and Lara hated colonizers.

  “Now, let us begin with introducing ourselves. Young man, why don’t you begin?”

  “I’m Kai. Kai Reeves.”

  Lara turned her head. She expected to see him around, possibly in a few classes, but hadn’t prepared for him being here, now, in her very first class. She raised her hand. “I’ll go now,” she said.

  “Great,” said Dunne. “And you are—”

  “Lara Blake,” she interrupted.

  “Thank you, Lara,” she said, smiling. “Now, since you two were t
he first to introduce yourselves, why don’t you be the example for our partner activity?” She pointed to Lara and Kai, her fingernails painted a lime green. “I’d love to work on trust, since we will be seeing a lot of each other in the next four years.”

  Trust. Lara let out a snort. She hadn’t trusted anyone in years, and she wasn’t about to start now. “I’d rather not.” Kai looked her up and down, his eyes burning as he took in her appearance.

  “It wasn’t a question,” said Dunne. “Now, come on. Stand before me.”

  Kai obeyed, his feet scuffing the floor as he stopped across from Dunne. It was as if he’d moved to agitate Lara—and it worked. Lara crossed her arms, reluctantly following Kai’s sluggish steps.

  “Alright,” Dunne said, “let’s start with something simple. Lara, can you do a plié?”

  “Of course I can do a plié,” Lara snapped. “Do you think I would be here if I couldn’t?”

  “Of course not,” Dunne said.

  “It’s possible,” said Kai.

  Lara stared at him, her fists clenching. There was something about him that revved her to an extent beyond imagination. It was the calmness in his composure, the way he held himself like he was beholding a regal crown.

  Kai looked to Lara, his gaze soaked in the same disinterest it had always been in, and shrugged.

  “Entwine your hands,” Dunne said. “And fall into a plié.”

  Kai reached for Lara’s hands first. She stared, unwilling to touch his skin. “I am not touching you,” she said, crossing her arms before her chest.

  “Lara—”

  “Can I speak to her? Outside?” asked Kai, dropping his hands to his sides.

  Dunne shook her head, confused. “I thought you two didn’t know each other—”

  “We’ll just be a minute.”

  And then Kai was grabbing Lara’s thin arm, pulling her out of the ballet studio, ignoring the stares of their classmates. Lara attempted to retrieve her arm, but Kai refused, unwilling to release his grip until they stood in the hall, alone.

  “What the hell is your problem?” Kai asked, the pale light from the window before him shining across his face, illuminating his skin. “I don’t even know you.”

  “You nearly stole my spot,” Lara answered immediately.

  “What?”

  “I was wait-listed; you were accepted,” she clarified.

  “How do you know—”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “All that matters is that you almost took what was mine. What had always been mine.”

  “You’re deranged,” he hissed. “Absolutely deranged.”

  Lara shook her head, a laugh rising from her throat. “Are you that oblivious? Doesn’t it strike you as odd that we’re both here, both at the same level?” She spat the words like they were venom. “They accepted us both when it should’ve been one of us. It should’ve been me.”

  Kai was entirely confused. “You’re missing my point. How would I steal something from someone I don’t know?”

  “Well, you know me now,” Lara said. “And you’re going to be sorry you do.”

  Kai took a step closer to Lara, his eyes narrowed. “If you’re this angry—this petty—then I think it wasn’t your spot to begin with.” He brought his hand to her face, gently tugging on the strands of midnight-colored hair. Lara flinched, and Kai let go.

  “I’ll see you inside,” Kai said and walked back to the rehearsal room. Lara looked down at her hair, the ends almost meeting her waist. She expected to see the print of Kai’s finger across the strands, a bloody mark painted on the darkness.

  A sick feeling twisted inside her guts as a raging fire melted underneath her skin. Kai Reeves, she thought, this is not the end.

  Lara cut off her hair that night, looking straight into the mirror as she told the hairdresser: To my mid-neck. Then, later: Layers, too.

  Kai’s touch fell from her shoulders by the hand of the hairdresser. She watched as each strand fell to the floor—piece by piece.

  September 2019

  IT WAS HOURS LATER—MIDNIGHT, Lara thought—and she was on her way home from a humid bar, where she’d taken shots and drank herself into a pit of bile and vexation and repugnance, all to avoid thinking of tomorrow’s classes.

  No stars lined the sky, Lara realized as she surveyed the night, only the full moon that hung expectantly, waiting for daybreak. Rain began falling on her face, dampening her dark hair.

  Shops lined the streets, nearly all closed except for a select few bars filled with drunks and college students—if one could differentiate the two—and Lara thought suddenly of her mother. They hadn’t spoken since summer, when Lara drove herself to the apartment she had bought just a few weeks before, and even then their words were few.

  Lara may have hated her mother, she may have felt a sick twist in her gut each time they met eyes or shared words, but she was still her mother. Her own diabolical, moody mother. She looked around, watching belligerent people stumble along the sidewalk, a few running through the street, sidestepping cars, and decided to call her somewhere quieter. Not her apartment though—she couldn’t wait.

  Her mind toppled as she tripped to a dark alley behind an old convenience store called Spring Mart and pulled her phone from her trench coat pocket. Pride bubbled in her chest as she noticed her ability to stay—what she thought was—coherent after drinking for hours.

  Her hands shook as she pulled up her mother’s contact—her photo was the one she had posted on LinkedIn, not the one they had taken together. She tipsily stared into the eyes of her stern, Korean mother, the light of the screen illuminating her face—the only thing seen from the shadowy backstreet she had dumbly stepped into.

  A noise came out from behind Lara, shocking her from her reverie. It sounded close to a whimper, but she couldn’t be sure. When she saw the school’s large bell tower less than fifty feet behind her, its stones stacking up to support a rusted bell and an ominous half-there cross that had been broken by some drunken student, she realized she’d unintentionally made it back to campus.

  Thunder crackled in the sky as the noise came again, this time loud enough for Lara to hear. It was a voice, a man’s voice, pleading quite loudly. Lara ran toward the noise. “Hello?” she called out.

  Another voice sounded—more feminine and somewhat familiar—telling the boy to shut up, shut up! Lara let out a muffled snicker. She stayed put, her droopy eyes focused on the spot where she’d heard the voices, but could see nothing—only the stone arches of the tower that surrounded the bell.

  She nearly turned and left, tired and bored of the now uninteresting situation, but the woman’s voice came again. She spoke quietly, but Lara could hear it, the words vibrating across her skin, marking her in an inexplicable, unimaginable way. “Miserere oblivione delebitur.”

  That was all she heard before she saw it—the body. A boy fell from the tower, his arms scrambling for something to grab, for something to save him, his mouth gaping—not screaming, just open. Lara did nothing, just watched in utter horror as the young boy landed on the concrete, his limbs positioned sickly as though a child had just dropped a puppet. She could see scarlet pooling from his mouth as his eyes remained open, staring at her with fear caged within them. Lara’s mouth dropped open and she stepped back, feeling disgust but also fear— fear that she’d be seen here and someone would tie her to this. Lightning lit up the sky.

  She looked up to where he’d fallen from, searching for a face, for the person responsible, and found someone already glaring at her—the whites of their eyes shining in the dark of the night.

  Lara simply ran—she was drunk and clearly incapable, unsure of anything to do except run as fast as she possibly could, her heartbeat her only constant. She ran until she made it to her apartment building, until her lungs burned from the cold air and her clothes were soaked with rainfall. Shaking, she found her way to the stairs, climbing to the third floor—where she lived. She searched her pockets for her keys, found the
m, and dropped them to the floor, her hands trembling so intensely her eyes began to water. She hadn’t cried in years, but in that moment, with the memory of the boy coating her thoughts, she could have.

  Lara finally dragged open her door and headed straight to her empty bedroom—save for a bed. She hadn’t bothered to decorate and, for the first time, Lara felt uncomfortable in the bareness.

  She lay on the cold sheets of her bed, not undressing, not moving, only shutting her throbbing eyes. Her heart slowed—stopped—until she couldn’t breathe at all.

  The bell rung that night as Lara dreamed only of blood—of death.

  ANA POWELL HAD BEEN one of the three residing leaders of Lithe since her freshman year—since she’d been named the true leader, the metaphorical descendant of a kind of ill-tempered, distorted sorority with a philanthropy most would consider sadistic. The original founders—Annabelle Hall, Lillian Hart, and Elizabeth Brown—were three girls who loved both each other and themselves, who brought damnation upon those who bound them in chains and salvation to those who had been chained along with them.

  Four years ago, Ana had been a budding Juilliard freshman filled with hope and optimism for the year to come. She’d gone to a party one night—she had forced her friends to come along with her, telling them they’d miss out on the others thrown that year if they didn’t at least go to the first one—when Bella, a previous leader, had approached her. Bella alluringly strode toward Ana, no drink in hand, and whispered into her ear: Meet me in the guest room. Ana was drunk—almost as much as she was aroused—which made her agree, thinking she was about to participate in an anonymous, cabalistic hook-up.

  Ana moved to the bedroom, grabbing Bella by the hand and pushing her against the door, covering her mouth with her own. Bella kissed back her for a moment—their tongues sliding against each other—but stopped suddenly, remembering what she had originally been planning to do.