The acclaimed play Illicit Affairs will play its final performance at Broadway's Imperial Theater on Sunday, December 5th. The show's departure will make way for the upcoming revival of Mary Poppins, which is slated to open at the Imperial in the spring.

At the time of closing, Illicit Affairs will have played 16 preview performances and 272 regular performances.

"Can you explain to me why I just found out that I'm losing my job from fucking Instagram?"

After reading the post's caption over and over for several minutes of stunned silence, Cora and Rasmus had both gotten on the phone with their agents. Cora rubbed at her temple, realizing when Lucy didn't immediately respond to her outburst that she was lashing out at the wrong person. She tried to take a breath and try again.

"I'm sorry," she mumbled, her voice thick and her eyes stinging with tears. The snowy wind wasn't helping; she tried to pull her coat tighter around her. "But also, what the hell?"

"I'm so sorry, Cora," Lucy sighed, and it was slightly relieving to hear that she sounded like she was pissed off at the situation, too. "I swear I just found out half an hour ago, and you were supposed to find out in person when you went to work tomorrow. I don't know who in their goddamn mind went and told the press first."

"I just—I thought," she croaked, already choked up. God, this sucked even more than she ever could have imagined. "I thought we were doing well. This doesn't make any sense—the house is packed with people every night..."

"This isn't your fault," Lucy told her gently yet firmly. "I know you tried not to read reviews of the show, but I did, and I promise that you and Rasmus both got shining praise for your performances. And you're right about the fact that you've been selling the tickets you need. This is just a disgusting, worst-case scenario of a landlord choosing to boot you out in favor of what they see as a more predictable source of long-term profit. You deserve so much better than this and I really am so freaking sorry."

"Thanks, Luce," Cora whispered. It was as loud as she could speak up without bursting into tears. "I—I gotta go."

A droplet of moisture dripped down her cheek as she hung up the phone and she swiped it off with the sleeve of her jacket. She looked over at Rasmus, who was standing a short distance away while he talked with his own agent. But when he shoved his phone in his pocket and met her eyes, his lips pulled into a tight, trembling line, Cora knew he'd just been told the same thing she was.

Dozens of people laid off over social media. Not even given the dignity of learning that they were losing their jobs before the whole world got to know, too.

She didn't even process that she'd run back over to him, but suddenly she was right there weeping into his shoulder. She didn't know what else to do.

Her body was shaking and rattling with sobs; his was shocked into stillness and silence. He held her numbly, barely moving, barely seeming to even breathe. And all the while, her mind was howling with panic. What was she going to do? How was she going to tell her parents, her friends? Had they already seen it online?

How was she going to keep paying rent?

She was surely drawing attention to herself, but she barely had the headspace to even notice, much less care. It wasn't long before her lungs were aching, her throat raw, her cheeks a tapestry of tears that left their mark behind in the form of redness on her skin and a dark blotch on his jacket.

When he held her tighter, when he buried his face in her hair and she could feel his chest start to quiver from the suffocated sounds that wanted to claw their way out of his lungs, Cora knew that the panic had struck him, too. And knowing that he was hurting, that his heart was breaking over and over and over again just like hers was, only made her cry even more.

"Why?" she finally managed to gasp out, her voice strangled. "Why did this have to happen to us?"

Of course she'd always known that their show couldn't run forever. It was common knowledge that except in the rarest of cases, straight plays simply weren't the cash cows that musicals were. They might burn brightly for a year or two before the audiences got bored and moved on to the newest thing. But a smaller show like Illicit Affairs also cost a hell of a lot less money to put on than one of those mega-musicals, so especially when she saw how crowded the theater was each night, Cora had just assumed that closing soon wasn't something they needed to be even mildly worried about.

She'd thought they had so much more time.

"I don't know," he managed to answer, but his voice was quivering just as much, if not even more, than hers was. "I have no idea, Cora."

She lifted a trembling hand to his cheek, trying to comfort him and herself at the same time and doing a miserable job at both. He was trying not to shed any tears, she realized, which was somehow just as painful to look at as it would have been to watch him sob his heart out.

This was their dream, their everything, and they had both finally started to believe that it was worth all of the heartache they had endured in their lives to get to where they were now. How was anyone supposed to react when the best thing that had ever happened to them was torn away?

Cora opened her mouth to ask, What are we going to do?, but she knew before she said it that he wasn't going to have the slightest clue. So she swallowed down the lump in her throat, and her voice sounded distant from her own body as she said, "I guess we just keep walking."

His eyebrow furrowed. "What?"

"I guess we just keep walking," she repeated. "I can't go home right now. I can't sit in my bedroom for the rest of the day without going out of my damn mind."

Rasmus seemed to understand now. If they kept walking around in the snow, they could suspend reality a little while longer. If they kept walking, they at least had something to distract their bodies with. If they kept walking, they could process as slowly as humanly possible. If they kept walking, they couldn't completely fall apart yet.

So they kept walking, her hand gripping onto his for dear life.

It was hard to tell how long they wandered for.

Cora was trying not to look at her phone, though she could feel it buzzing in her pocket—probably all notifications from her family and friends learning the news and trying to check in on her. But she didn't want to talk to anyone else before she had even a small sliver of time to process it herself.

She couldn't imagine not going to the theater every day anymore, no longer feeling that pre-show adrenaline bristle up her spine as she waited in the wings with Rasmus and listened to the hum of the audience. No more chatting with Anais as she got in and out of her costumes, no more getting to interact with people at the stage door. No more whispers and good luck kisses on the back of her hand right before they went onstage. She couldn't imagine it, so she didn't.

They simply wandered and attempted to enjoy the snow, but she didn't feel as though she could enjoy anything right now. The only thing that sounded even the slightest bit appealing was to go perform their show, so for the very first time, she was angry about having the day off.

The remainder of her coffee had gone cold in her hand, and when she realized that it had been such a short while ago that they were laughing and Rasmus was scrawling down drawings of her in his sketchbook, she let out a sigh of disbelief. How was it even possible to go from cloud nine to rock bottom so quickly?

Now, he was eerily silent next to her, even his footsteps barely making a sound. He didn't let go of her hand, but his grip no longer held any of that comforting firmness and he didn't seem to want to meet her eyes.

Cora's feet were sore long before they stopped walking. It felt like they were trekking the entire length of Manhattan, but even as the sun rose higher in the sky and then started to lower again, she refused to go home yet. She refused until her legs were cramping and her mouth was parched and her skin was chapped from the cold air; she refused until she could not refuse any longer.

"What do we do?" she finally, wearily asked. Somehow even her voice was tired though she hadn't been using it.

"Drink?" Rasmus offered dryly, but it was only half a joke.

And that was how they ended up back at his apartment half an hour and one subway ride later. It was dark, the unfortunate consequence of how early the sun sank back below the horizon in the wintertime, so Cora flicked on the first light she could find, a lamp that bathed the room in a golden glow, as Rasmus opened the fridge and pulled out the strongest thing he had.

He poured two glasses. She lifted hers to her lips as soon as her fingers wrapped around it and took a long gulp. It burned on the way down. She nearly winced, and now that she was looking at the amber liquid, it didn't seem nearly so appealing as it had while they were out in the cold.

Great. She wasn't even in the mood for alcohol. Rasmus appeared to be having the same thought, staring at his glass as if it had done something to disappoint him.

She set her drink aside and pulled herself up onto the narrow counter, the heels of her feet thudding against the bottom row of cabinets. When she held her arms out so that he would come to her and rest his chin on her shoulder, Cora didn't know if she was doing it more so for him or for herself.

But when he slipped into her embrace like a puzzle piece being locked into its place, his head bowed against her shoulder, she felt like she could finally breathe just the tiniest bit.

"Fuck," he whispered, and she thought that this might be the moment when he finally cried.

Her fingertips stroked at his hair, cold from the snow but still soft against her skin. "I'm here," she said softly to him, her voice quivering. "I feel like shit, but I'm here. I'm here."

For a split second, everything was still. She had thought he was on the verge of tears, so a breathy, startled sound left her lips when he abruptly pressed his against the spot where her shoulder met her neck.

Her fingers tightened in his hair, causing a small noise to escape from the back of his throat, and Cora was overcome by a sudden pang of want—of need—her body flushing with heat. She drew his mouth up to hers, their eyes locking for a fraction of a second before she kissed him like she did onstage.

Desperately.

Her body instinctively arched against his as he deepened the kiss and his fingers splayed across her back, holding her as tightly as he could without hurting her, their bodies pressed so closely together that she could feel the firm muscles all up and down his torso. And yet it still wasn't enough to appease that ache in her core—she wanted him closer, closer, closer. Closer than she'd ever had him, closer than she could manage right here in this position.

Cora pulled back from his lips long enough to breathe his name, but as she did, his hands were already where she wanted them, tentatively sliding up her thighs. So she kissed him again, nudging him onward, and then he was wrapping her legs around his hips and she was no longer on the counter anymore.

As soon as they tumbled onto his bed, she was drawing Rasmus back down to her; she was drowning in his kisses while her fingers roamed downwards for the hem of his shirt. He pulled his mouth back from hers long enough to let her lift his sweater up and over his head, long enough for her to see the burning look in his eyes and the heavy rise and fall of his chest as the first article of clothing was discarded.

A moment later, her top had joined his on the floor. His fingers were tracing along her bare midriff, his lips murmuring admirations against her own. It was enough to make Cora almost forget, to make her feel almost happy. She slipped her hand into his, guiding him to the clasp that rested against her spine.

And he yanked his hand back as if he'd touched fire.

A sharp breath left his lips. "Wait–"

Wait. He didn't want this like she did.

Her cheeks flamed. Her throat felt like it had closed up, as if she'd swallowed poison. She was stunned into silence as he sat back, looking pained.

"I can't do this." His breathing was still rugged, heavy. "I'm so sorry, Cora. But I can't use this—you—as a distraction."

All she could do was scrunch her eyes shut in frustration. She wanted to cry, wanted to reach for the shirt that was too far away for her to grab. Because he was right, of course, but it was humiliating that he had that self-control and she didn't.

His fingers softly cupped her cheek, coaxing her back to him. "Will you look at me?"

She did, partially out of sheer surprise at how quickly his voice had gone gentle. A wistful smile was attempting to pull at the corners of his lips, which she found to be highly untimely until she heard the words that came out of his mouth.

"I think they say you're not supposed to admit this for the first time when you're sad, but I was never much good at following the rules anyhow," he murmured, his eyes bright with an emotion she didn't recognize until right as he was voicing it. "So, screw it—I love you, Cora, I love you and I don't know if I could forgive myself if I ignored the voice in the back of my head telling me this isn't the right moment."

If she had been emotionally overwhelmed a minute ago, she didn't even know what the word was for what she was experiencing right now. It was like being struck by a tidal wave, except the wave was the thing saving her instead of the thing killing her. It was like getting lost in the dark but then realizing that the darkness was warm, safe.

It was finding home where and when she least expected it.

She barely had to lean forward to rest her forehead against his. But the coldness of self-doubt was still creeping in, blurring her picture of them around the edges. "What if this doesn't work when we're not working together?" she whispered.

"Have a little faith, Coraline," his voice hummed delicately, his breath fluttering against her skin. "We both fought tooth and nail for these jobs. We can fight for other things, too."

We can fight for other things, too. The weight in her chest began to ease, the cold retreating. We can fight. We can. We can do whatever the hell we want to do.

"I—holy shit. I love you, too."

It wasn't how she ever would have expected a love confession to go, but they were laughing and now he was kissing her again and it was soft and slow and sweet and full of hope. And hope, she knew deep down, was sometimes the only thing you needed to have to lift yourself out of what felt like the darkest of places.

"Let's go out somewhere," he eventually suggested between kisses, when they surely wouldn't be able to keep on kissing much longer. "We've been living the fucking dream and we should be celebrating."

She grinned against his lips, pulling back and resting her hands on his shoulders. "And where do you suggest we go?"

"I have no idea," he told her honestly. "But the night's still young, why shouldn't we go have some fun?"

It was, of course, a simple decision; a no-brainer. Because Cora had finally found her person, the one she was happy to follow anywhere.

"Alright," she agreed. "I'm in."

____________________

A/N:

this chapter was an emotional rollercoaster but I hope you enjoyed it! :')