Lyra and I both stared at him. Lyra lowered her phone to give herself a clearer view of Anders’ face. We were a united front again, just like we’d been during our last weeks on the show, and I wasn’t going to lie: it felt incredibly good. Lyra had never met Verity Price, would probably be appalled by Verity’s world, but she had been Valerie’s best friend. Even compartmentalized and held apart as my two worlds were, that mattered to me.

“You asked Jessica for contact information for Valerie, and you believed one, that she’d have it, and two, she’d give it to you accurately, without being an asshole about it?” Lyra planted her hands on her hips. “Did you fall and hit your head after you were eliminated, or did you just think the spirit of brotherhood would suddenly move her to not be a horrible human being?”

“She’s not that bad,” I said, with no real heat.

“Uh, excuse much? She called you a fake redhead on camera when they did alumni week. She tried to sue the show when they let Emily come back after she was eliminated, because they hadn’t let her come back. She’s awful. She’s always been awful, she’ll always be awful, and the fact that Anders listened to her for like, a second, makes him awful.” Lyra directed a glare at Anders, who squirmed. “How dare you get mad at Valerie because of something Jessica did? That’s like, awful squared.”

“Valerie still changed her number without telling anyone,” said Anders—a defensive rearguard action if I had ever heard one.

“My old phone got disconnected because someone blasted the number over Twitter,” I said.

Anders and Lyra exchanged a look before saying, in unison, “Jessica.” Then they were laughing, and I was laughing, and all was right with the world.

A chime rang through the lobby, shaking dancers out of their conversations and warmup stretches. I wrinkled my nose and turned to Dominic, who’d been looking increasingly confused during our conversation. He’d just been dropped into a world he didn’t understand, complete with preexisting social connections and rivalries. He was doing the sensible thing and staying quiet. I loved him even more for that. Common sense is less common than you’d think.

“You can come in for this part; we’re encouraged to bring friends and family to the producer meeting, since it makes the audience look fuller,” I said. The instructions had been clearly spelled out on the last prep email from the producers. “You’ll have to leave after the showboating, but at least this way you can get a look at the judges and our host.”

“I understand,” he said solemnly.

Lyra grabbed my arm, tugging me toward the theater doors. “Come on, come on, Val. We want to get good spots on the stage!”

As if they weren’t going to arrange us according to their own plan? This was all staged. Every bit of it. I was just surprised there weren’t cameras here in the lobby—at least not cameras I could see. I glanced around, suddenly paranoid, and resisted the urge to check my wig.

Then Anders grabbed my other arm, signaling that all was forgiven, and the two of them lifted my feet off the ground and toted me into the future.

As I’d expected, the stage was marked with little pieces of tape, each with a name written on it. They were mixing the seasons, turning us from five sets of four into a mob of twenty dancers. We milled around the stage until we found our names. Then we stepped off again, waiting in the wings where the cameras wouldn’t pick us up.

A statuesque blonde rose from the front row of seats and made her way onto the empty judges’ podium. She walked with the easy sway of someone who’d been drinking since she got out of bed. I knew she wasn’t drunk: she was just tall, wearing impractical shoes, and incredibly loosely jointed. I knew that, but I still held my breath as Brenna Kelly climbed the stairs, waiting for a fall that never came.

“Are we rolling?” she asked, glancing toward a production assistant. Whatever answer she got, she nodded, and said, “On my count, then. Five, four, three, two . . .” She stopped talking and smiled, an expression that took her from attractive to stunningly beautiful. It was directed at the camera, and hence, at America. “For five years, you’ve tuned in to watch as America’s most talented and hardest working dancers took to our stage. You’ve seen their triumphs and their tragedies, their flights and their falls, and after every season, you’ve asked ‘what happened to my favorites?’” Her smile softened, turning almost maternal. “I know I’ve often asked that question myself. Often enough, in fact, that someone listened, and said ‘why don’t we find out?’”