𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐡𝐲, 𝐞𝐦𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐞 ¹

fifty three.

CHAPTER FIFTY THREE
performance night

Royalty

next day

Royalty's performance was tonight, which was why she was at the club early in the morning with her backup dancers, learning new choreography for her completely new song. She wasn't doing Let Me Rock anymore. Instead, she was going to perform the song she had wrote as soon as she had gotten home yesterday. It had only taken an hour to write, and then she had rushed to Empire to record it.

The song was called Rather Be Single, and obviously it was about Blake. It was way more humiliating than Let Me Rock, which was why she couldn't wait for Blake to hear it. He was gonna be pissed.

She and her dancers continued rehearsing, but Cookie came walking in and they stopped. "Hey, mom."

"Hey, baby." She addressed the dancers. "Uh, why don't you ladies take five so I can talk to my daughter?"

They took a break.

"So how's the rehearsal going?"

"It's going great. We almost perfected the routine," Ro said. "I was nervous about performing, but now I'm excited."

"You really switched songs, huh?"

"Yeah. I'm amazed I was able to write this song and record it in less than 24 hours. Blake gave me all the inspiration I needed."

"I'm sorry he cheated on you, but I did tell you to leave that boy alone."

Yes she did. "I should've listened to you. But it's okay. I'm not heartbroken or anything. Blake is going to be the heartbroken one, trust me." Because she had a nice surprise for Blake towards the end of the song. A real nice surprise.

"He needs to be heartbroken. He also needs an ass whooping, so say the word, and your father and I will-"

Ro cut her off. "No. You're the only one who knows Blake cheated on me, and I want to keep it that way. I want this song to shock Blake and everyone else. It'll make the performance so much better."

Cookie respected her decision. "Fine, I'll keep my mouth shut. But after the performance, anything goes!"

Ro just started laughing because the only thing that was gonna go was Blake's sanity.

Jamal

It was almost showtime. Jamal was at Club Nirvana, and everyone was drinking and dancing, just having a good time. The first thing he noticed was that there were way more people there than last time. Like, triple the number.

"Wassup, Jamal!" a man said. It was that same man who had introduced them to the stage last time.

"Wassup. It's a full house tonight, huh?"

"Yeah, people go crazy for you Lyons."

"I see that."

He looked over at Jamal. "Don't tell me you're getting cold feet."

"Na. I feel alright."

"Good, because your performance is the most anticipated," he informed Jamal.

Jamal didn't believe that at all. "That's a damn lie."

"It's not. People loved your song, Mama. They loved how sentimental it was, and they want you to bring that same energy back tonight."

"But why? That song was sad."