Dance With Me (Kian Lawley & Ricky Dillon / O2L) * ON HOLD *

Prologue

PROLOGUE

Life is a lot like dancing.

You step out on stage, the music starts, and off you go.  You have one chance.  One chance to pour your heart, your soul, all your hard work into each and every movement you make.  One chance and it’s all over.

Sometimes you stumble.  Sometimes you fall.  Sometimes you forget what comes next, but you can’t stop.  You just make it up as you go along and hope it turns out for the better.  And sometimes you get hurt.

Life works the same way.  You’re thrust into this world naked, cold, and alone.  A spotlight shines on you and everyone is watching, waiting to see what you do next.  And it’s up to you to learn the steps you need in order to make this life the best it can absolutely be.  After all, you’ve only got one chance to live.

But life is never as simple as it appears on the surface.  In the middle of your routine, the rhythm changes.  Your dance partners come and go.  The steps become more difficult, more challenging.  Many people fear the changes that come, but when it comes down to it, you’re left with two options: conquer or be conquered.  That’s life.

You get sucked in, and soon it’s impossible to tell what you choose to do, and what life tells you to do.  Sometimes you have no choice but to go along with the music and hope for the best.

But the best isn’t always the final outcome.

In life, you get hurt.  A lot.  People lie, cheat, and do almost anything to come out on top.  After all, life has winners and losers, just like a dance competition.  And to some people, winning is all that matters.

Winning used to matter to me.  I wanted to be the best, the star.  Dance was my life and for many years, it was all that mattered to me.  All I needed to be happy was an empty stage, a spotlight, and a soothing melody to carry my soul and my feet.

However, life has a funny way of remixing your music and sending you spinning onto a new and unexpected path.  My surprise twist?  Two boys.

They entered my life, joined me on stage, teaching me new steps I had never known existed.  One was wild, the other gentle.  Our stories wove their ways within each other’s in intricate ways, bonding the three of us to each other in unanticipated ways.

As our dance unfolded, the music accelerated to a breakneck pace, where only the strongest—the best—could survive.  Did I survive?  I’m not sure.  Dance is so ingrained in my life that it is only natural that I come out on top.  But can a person conquer their dance—or more importantly, their life—if they lose the people closest to them in the process?

Are your loved ones really any different from your favorite pointe shoes?  Or are our lives so dependent on our friends and family that a person would die just as quickly without them as they would without oxygen?

Are we better off to simply turn off the music and walk away?  Or do we fight for our right to be happy?

After all, William Butler Yeats once said, “How can we know the dancer from the dance?”