The Devil’s Bride

Chapter 1: The Weight of Scarcity

My legs burned as I held the final arabesque. My toes screamed inside the worn pointe shoes I’d repaired with duct tape twice this month. Looking at the studio mirror, I saw a girl who looked too thin, too tired, and completely out of place in this world of tulle and perfection.

“Again,” Madame called out, her voice sharp and unforgiving. “Moore, you’re drifting. Fix your line.”

I fixed it immediately. That was what I did. I fixed things until they broke me.

Sweat dripped down my back as I pushed through the last combination. In the corner, the other dancers giggled while packing up their things. Their designer gym bags and fresh manicures felt like a silent mockery of my life. I was still using the same faded black tote bag I’d had since I was sixteen.

“Big plans this weekend, Moore?” Lila asked, her voice sweet enough to hide the insult. “Or are you playing nurse again? My boyfriend is taking me to the elite sky-lounge at the Vance Corporate Tower tonight, so I desperately need to know there's a world outside your depressing apartment.”

I forced a calm smile, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Just helping at home. You know how it is.”

“Yeah,” Lila sighed, slinging her luxury bag over her shoulder. “We know. It must be rough… being the only one still stuck in the slums while the rest of us are actually living.”

The words stung more than the blisters on my feet, but I didn’t let her see it. I refused to give her the satisfaction of watching me cry. What was there to say anyway? They had wealthy parents who paid for lessons, beautiful apartments, and futures handed to them on silver platters. I had a mountain of medical bills, two younger half-siblings to feed, and a body that was one bad landing away from ending my only real talent.

The bus ride home took forty-five minutes. I stood the entire way, clutching the metal pole while my calves throbbed. I mentally ran through the brutal math of my life like a repetitive script. Forty-two dollars in checking. Twelve dollars in my purse. Rent is six hundred. I am drowning.

The cheap lavender soap I’d used this morning had long faded under layers of sweat. When I finally pushed open the door to our cramped two-bedroom apartment, the smell of boiled rice and heavy worry hit me immediately.

“Moore, thank God you’re back.” My thirteen-year-old brother, Tim, looked up from his schoolbooks, his eyes wide with fear. “Mom’s been coughing again. Really bad this time.”

Annastasia—my stepmother, and the only mother I’d known since I was eight—was curled up on the couch. Her face was dangerously pale, her hand pressed tightly to her chest. She tried to smile when she saw me, but it quickly turned into a violent coughing fit that shook her whole body.

I dropped my bag and rushed to her side, kneeling on the threadbare rug. “Breathe, Mama. Slow, deep breaths. Where’s your medicine?”

“Ran out… yesterday,” she wheezed, gasping for air. “I thought I could manage until the weekend.”

My stomach dropped into a hollow pit. Her last prescription had cost more than our weekly groceries. I rubbed her back, murmuring comforting words while my mind raced through the numbers I couldn’t escape. Rent was due in six days. Tim needed his school fees. Nine-year-old Talia needed a new uniform. My ballet studio payment was already weeks late. And now this.

I helped her lie down properly, propping old pillows behind her back. Her skin felt scorching hot, and the coughing was only getting worse.

“Mama, we need to go to the hospital right now.”

“No insurance,” she whispered, her eyes filling with a crushing guilt that broke my heart. “We can’t afford it, sweetie…”

I lifted my chin, forcing my voice to sound completely firm and steady for her sake. “I’ll find the money. Don’t worry about the cost. Just hold on.”

Tim watched me, trying so hard to look brave, while Talia peeked from the bedroom door, tightly clutching her worn teddy bear. I walked into the tiny kitchen and gripped the edge of the cracked counter until my knuckles turned white. My reflection in the dirty window looked like a ghost.

I needed a miracle. If we had just one miracle, Annastasia could get the heart surgery the doctors kept talking about. The kids could eat properly. I could actually breathe for once.

But miracles didn’t happen to girls from the slums. We survived on cheap lavender soap, duct-taped shoes, and sheer stubbornness.

Suddenly, Annastasia’s coughing turned into a wet, terrifying rattle. She gasped frantically for air, clutching her chest as her eyes rolled back into her head.

“Tim, get her coat!” I shouted, adrenaline erasing all the exhaustion in my muscles. “We’re going now. I don't care what it costs!”

We half-carried her down the stairs and begged a passing taxi to take us to the city's public hospital. By the time we burst through the emergency room doors, my clothes were stained with her sweat, and my hands were shaking uncontrollably.

I rushed straight to the admissions desk, crying out for help. The receptionist didn't even look up from her computer screen. Her voice was completely flat and cold.

"Admissions requires a fifty thousand dollar deposit upfront for non-insured cardiac emergencies," she said indifferently. "No exceptions."

Fifty thousand dollars. I couldn't even afford fifty.

The room spun. I fell to my knees on the cold hospital tile, clutching my head in total despair while my mother gasped for air on a nearby gurney. I was completely trapped, with no way out.