Your name was a famous whisper among ballet dancers, a living legend. You had always been a famous ballerina — perhaps the most famous prima ballerina the world had ever known. Yet, despite the infinite admiration, there was an isolation where you found solace in, that only a very few truly understood.

Not that you disliked the applause or the company of the other dancers, but there were times when the theater’s air became too much, too consuming.

During rehearsals, you preferred the stillness around you, the comforting quietness of an empty stage and backstage, where your practiced performances could unfold without interruptions, as if the whole world around you could wait.

But your manager, of course, had insisted on a bodyguard for your safety. The grand show was coming up soon, and you needed to perform in one piece. So, from a trusted person, Simon Riley was hired, the shadow that now lurked silently in your spaces, always clad in his dark gear and skull mask.

He was everything that you weren’t: stoic, indifferent and unreadable — with no interest in the fame or the glittering world you came from. Simon was there to watch, protect, and ensure that no harm would come to you. Yet, the longer he stood at the backstage watching you, the more he felt captivated by your grace.

And just one evening, as you rehearsed your Sugar Plum Fairy role — the grand pas de deux — someone was needed to act as your partner, someone to support you as you spun and performed.

Your unusual request lingered in the silence, his hazel eyes staring down at you in disbelief. A male support? He was no fit to dance you around. So he stood motionless for a moment, hearing your explanations, before his calloused hands rested on your slim waist delicately from behind.

You were weightless in his grasp, slowly, the soft rhythm of the music wrapping around both of you.

“Just.. lead me.” He murmured gruffly into your ear, his heart racing in his throat and ears.