POV: Kai
Six months after Darren's sentencing, life almost felt normal again.
Almost.
I stood in the doorway of the studio's main space, watching Elena lead a workshop for younger students. She was fourteen now, more confident, teaching them about music theory and performance anxiety. Twenty kids sat in a semicircle, hanging on her every word.
"The thing about stage fright," she was saying, "is that it means you care. It means what you're doing matters. So don't fight it. Use it."
One of the kids raised her hand. "But what if you freeze? What if you forget everything?"
"Then you breathe. Then you remember that mistakes are just proof you're human. And humans are way more interesting than perfect performers."
She'd learned that lesson the hard way. We all had.
"She's good," Nova sai
