Endless Love

Chapter Thirteen

Grace's POV

I got out of the hospital by the end of the week. They had performed the operation and had fixed me up. I felt okay in myself, but my mind was hammering me all the time. The voices in my head were louder than ever. Staying in Louisiana just wasn't an option for me at that point and I had begged Mom to take me back home to New York. Thankfully they had been able to finish the episodes for AHS and she was free to come home and look after me.

When we got home to New York I immersed myself into ballet again. I would go every day after school and dance for hours on end even when I had no lessons. Mom would come and sit up in the gallery watching me. This was my therapy, Mom has attempted to persuade me to see a shrink but I quickly shut that down – I wasn't about to open up to a randomer about my problems, I barely spoke to Mom about what happened. All I wanted now was to live in a world where nothing was real and I could just play pretend all day through dancing. I had joined the school theatre group so I could start doing the school plays too. Every chance I could to be on stage I took and embraced harder than I ever had before. I took dance competitions more seriously and won nearly every time. Every time I would perform, I felt in control and alive like nothing could touch me, but all the other times I felt like there was this huge void within me..

Towards the end of the semester, Mom began trying to approach me on the subject of what we were going to do next school year. One night over dinner, she finally broke the ice around what she wanted to say

"So baby..." she took a sip of water "I was going to ask you what you were thinking about doing next school year"

"Go back to school" I said matter of factly, before shrugging

"Well of course" she said back, I could hear the annoyance in her voice "But I've been looking at performing arts schools in LA"

There was silence

"Right..."

"Sweetheart, the only way this is going to work for me and you to be together like we want is if we move to LA permanently"

There it was

I looked down at my plate, staring at all the food I hadn't touched

"Right, yeah. Umm okay"

"Look, I don't want to pressurise you into going to a performing arts school if you don't want to, but you really come alive on stage, and you want to take ballet more seriously – this is your chance"

I nodded my head

"Grace, come on why are you always so complacent these days? I'm trying to help you out" she had become seriously annoyed and now her voice was on the edge of raising to a shout

"It sounds good, when are auditions?" I ignored her bitching and diverted the conversation

She sighed "You need to take a look at the places I've picked and decide which ones you think you like and then go from there. Most of the auditions are around the same week. So maybe we could fly out and have a week there before finals?"

"Yeah that's cool" I smiled half-heartedly

She moved closer to me and held her arms out. I fell into them and held her close. I don't know what it was, talking to her annoyed me but being in her arms was still heaven.

"You're starting proper therapy as well" she whispered almost like she didn't want me to hear

I moved back "What?" I raised an eyebrow "No way, I've already told you ballet and theatre are fine therapy" my voice was crackly as tears made their way to my eyes