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Griffin breathed in.
The air felt cleaner. Life felt lighter.
Lucas Mooneyham was locked up.
Ben Campbell was gone—awaiting trial.
No more threats.
No more bad guy.
Life, finally, was his again.
It was June 2nd, 2025.
Harper was nearly at the end—39 weeks along, with two babies shifting quietly inside her. Her stomach had grown round and firm, stretched tight with the weight of life, but to her quiet relief, the changes hadn't taken over everything. Her face still looked like hers in the mirror.
She had spent the entire second semester online. Logging in from the couch or her bed, turning in assignments between bouts of nausea or exhaustion, she had somehow made it through. It wasn't easy—nothing about this year had been—but she'd kept going. Now, with summer break here, a strange calm had settled in. The hardest part, in some ways, was yet to come—but the school year, at least, was over.
She was officially a senior.
A senior in high school.
And soon, she'd be the mother of twin girls.
Zoey was back at dance—but this time, it was for the love of it. Not as an escape. Not because she needed to get away from the tension that used to fill her house every time her father walked through the door. Now, when she stepped into the studio, it wasn't with heavy shoulders or a clouded mind—it was with purpose, passion, and relief.
She was dancing for herself again.
And then the message came.
Spotlight Dance Magazine—the most prestigious name in the industry, the one every serious dancer dreamed of—had reached out. They wanted to do a follow-up interview, to talk about her return, her resilience, her growth. And as a quiet gesture of support, they offered to send her a new 2024 Spotlight of the Year plaque. A fresh one. One untouched by what had happened.
They didn't have to. But they did. And it meant more than she could say.
Wyatt, Topher, Mrs. Dunn, and Mrs. Campbell could finally exhale, too. The weight that had hung over their lives for so long was gone, and for the first time in what felt like forever, they could return to something close to normal.
Sarah and Jess were both navigating life as single parents now. Sarah had made her position clear—if Ben didn't get his act together, the divorce papers she filed would stand. It was a hard line, but a necessary one. That shared experience, that quiet strength in choosing stability over chaos, only brought the Campbells and the Dunns closer. What had once been two separate families was beginning to feel like one.
