The Artist and The Dancer

Chapter Fifty-Six: Backstage.

Thank you to @Jasmine63 for the pretty cover at the top!!❣️

Chapter Fifty-Six: "Backstage."

"I NEVER GOT to ask you a question." I said to Zen, walking through the rows in the large auditorium. I zipped down my team sweater at the heat in the room. One full day in Rosario, Argentina was pretty cool for everyone after opening ceremonies. We got the chance to explore a bit of the city last night, looking at the architecture and thanks to Ravi, being dragged to try different foods.

Eduardo had been able to use his advantage in the Spanish language to 'connect with his Argentinian roots'. And some of his family members specifically his cousins which whom one of them looked to be exactly like Octavia had asked for, came to watch us yesterday and for the days the competition lasted.

"You're about to ask me a question as you walk into the same room where you're going to perform?" He drawled and the sound of something playing on a screen was in the background but I didn't ask about it.

"In like three hours," I told Zen with a roll of my eyes as I took a seat next to Eduardo and Winifred. "Now, Octavia?"

"What about her?"

"You asked her to prom?"

Eduardo leaned in so that he could speak loud enough for Zen to hear. "I want to know about that too."

Ravi sat down on the other side of me, grabbing the phone from my hand and tapping the screen to put it on speaker. As if we weren't in a room with what felt like a thousand people in it about to see the next performance. "Same."

"Who is that?" Zen asked, sounding highly confused.

"It's just Ravi."

There was a pause. "Who the hell is Ravi?"

"I go to your school," Ravi exclaimed. "I've been in at least one of your classes every single year."

"...What do you look like?" Oh my God.

My jaw dropped and Eduardo started laughing hard. Ravi on the other hand looked very annoyed. "I'm shorter than you by a bit. I swear you asked me for a pencil last week in our English class."

I could imagine Zen snapping his fingers when he realized. "Oh, that Ravi."

"How many Ravi's do you know?" Ravi asked flabbergasted.

"This is getting sad," I took the phone out of my friend's hand, taking it off speaker and holding it close to my ear. "You didn't answer my question."

"Maybe because I didn't have the chance to."

"Would you like to answer it now?"

"It's not like I like Octavia in that way. I only asked her because she's my friend and she was going anyway and I figured she'd want to have a date. I mean, it's Octavia. She wants to have someone walking her into the banquet hall that night."

"True." I could hear voices in the background and there was a voice I could pan out from the rest. "Is that Lucas?"

"Yeah. We were in the middle of a game when you called. He's playing against Joey right now and Joey is definitely losing bad."

"Shut the fuck up." I heard someone yell and Zen only laughed.

"You're at their house?"

"Actually, they're at mine. My foster dad was wondering why I never really invited anyone over and with Eduardo gone, the first person that came to my mind was Lucas since Greg had told me that he considers himself the 'video game legend' and I wanted to test the theory."