Chapter 1: The Trap is Set in Glitter and Lies
The office smelled like old paper, lemon cleaning spray, and the ghost of a hundred different perfumes. Alex hovered in the doorway, his backpack slipping off one lanky shoulder. He’d only come to drop off a misplaced water bottle, but now he was trapped.
“Close the door, Alex. You’re letting the doubt in.”
Karla didn’t look up from her laptop. Her voice was a low, sure thing, like the hum of the antiquated radiator pipe behind her desk. Alex nudged the door shut with his foot. The silence in the small, rainbow-strewn room became profound, broken only by the soft clink of a teacup from the corner where a vintage kettle sat on a hot plate.
“I was just—”
“Passing by? You’re always just passing by.” She finally looked at him, swiveling in her chair. Her eyes were dark and amused, taking in his messy hair, his too-big hoodie, the way he seemed to fold into himself. “But you keep ending up here. It’s cute.”
“I don’t—” he started, but his protest died. He did keep ending up here. Because Sarah from his Sociology seminar sometimes volunteered here, stacking flyers and laughing with that bright, clean sound that made his chest feel tight. He’d never actually spoken to her.
Karla’s grin widened. She knew. Of course she knew. She rested her sharp jaw on her fist, the dark stubble there catching the light from the desk lamp. The lamp illuminated a framed photo behind her: Sarah, head thrown back in mid-laugh, her arms wrapped around the waist of a figure in a spectacular sequined bodysuit and towering heels. The face was hidden behind a fan of scarlet feathers.
Alex’s eyes stuck on it.
“Gorgeous, isn’t she?” Karla said, following his gaze. She didn’t specify which ‘she’ she meant. “Needs a new partner for the fundraiser, though. Last one got stage fright. Pissed himself in the wings. Literally.”
“The fundraiser?” Alex managed to croak out.
“Uh-huh.” Karla’s chair squeaked as she leaned back, reaching behind a stack of glittering drag magazines to produce a single, glossy flyer. She slid it across the desk toward him like a dealer presenting a winning card. It was a vibrant mess of pink and gold lettering: ‘GALAXY GLITZ BALL: Drag Extravaganza & Fundraiser.’ “Biggest event of the term. Society’s budget depends on it. We need fresh meat.”
Alex’s fingers trembled slightly as he picked up the flyer. The paper was slick. “Fresh… what?”
“Performers.Volunteers. Victims.” Karla’s tone was flat, factual. “We put on a full show. Drag kings, queens, bio queens, the works. It’s a riot. Also, it’s in two weeks and we’re three bodies short. One of those bodies needs to be able to walk in six-inch heels without crying.”
A cold, electric trickle ran down Alex’s spine. He finally tore his eyes from the flyer. “Why are you telling me?”
Karla stood up slowly. She was shorter than him, but the way she moved—all deliberate, contained force—made the space feel smaller. She came around the desk and leaned her hips against it, crossing her arms. She was close enough that he could see the frayed edge of her denim jacket collar, the fine lines at the corners of her eyes from squinting in appraisal.
“Because Sarah’s coordinating the front-of-house. She’ll be there all night. Front row, pretty boy.” Karla paused, letting the name hang in the lemony air. “And she adores a man in heels. Finds it… gallant. Thinks it takes a certain kind of confidence. A certain vulnerability.”
Alex’s mouth went dry. The image was simultaneously terrifying and electrifying: him, on a stage, in… whatever. And Sarah, watching. Not just passing by in the library, but watching him. Seeing something in him he wasn’t sure existed.
“I can’t,” he whispered. “I’d vomit. Or fall. Probably both.”
“Everybody falls the first time,” Karla shrugged, as if discussing a scraped knee. “It’s about getting back up. Makes for a good story. Makes you memorable.”
“I don’t want to be memorable that way.”
“You want to be memorable to Sarah?” Karla countered, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur. “This is how. You walk out there, terrified, doing something absolutely ridiculous for a good cause, and you own it. She’ll see you. Not just another tall, blurry guy in the back of the room. She’ll see you. And she’ll want to know who you are.”
The logic was flawless and terrifying. It bypassed his brain entirely and spoke directly to the knot of hopeful anxiety in his gut. He pictured Sarah’s laugh, the way her eyes crinkled. He pictured her looking at him with that kind of delighted focus.
“What… what would I have to do?”
Karla’s expression didn’t change, but something in her eyes flickered—triumph, quickly banked. She pushed off the desk and walked to a tall, freestanding wardrobe shoved in the corner. With a dramatic flourish, she pulled the door open.Inside was chaos. A explosion of sequins, feathers, lamé, and stiff tulle. Corsets hung next to tailored suits. A shelf groaned under the weight of wig stands, each crowned with lurid, synthetic hair. On the floor, a collection of shoes glittered, from sturdy brogues to monstrosities of pleather and glitter with heels so high they looked like weapons.
“We find you a character,” Karla said, running a hand over a sleeve of emerald green velvet. “Something that fits. You’re tall, lanky, blond… you’ve got a kind of lost princeling thing happening. We could work with that. Or,” she said, plucking a stark, black tuxedo jacket from a hanger, “we go the other way. Sharp.Severe. A razor in a pretty box.”
Alex stared into the wardrobe. It smelled of sweat, powder, and possibility. The sheer audacity of the objects felt like a physical blow. He couldn’t. It was impossible.
“Say yes, Alex,” Karla said, her voice no longer a suggestion. It was a soft, compelling command. She was beside him again, holding out the tux jacket. “Try it on. See how it feels.”
His arms moved without his explicit consent. He shucked his backpack and hoodie, letting them puddle on the floor. The lining of the jacket was cold and slick against his shirt. He slid his arms in. The shoulders were too broad, the waist pinched in a way his own clothes never did. It was entirely wrong, but when Karla turned him toward a full-length mirror tacked to the back of the wardrobe door, he didn’t see wrong.
He saw someone else.Someone with structure. Definition.
Karla stood behind him, her eyes meeting his in the reflection. Her hands came up to his shoulders, smoothing the padding. Her touch was impersonal, efficient. “Not bad.A few alterations. Now the shoes.”
She bent and retrieved a pair of patent leather oxfords. They were normal, except for the thick, two-inch heel.
“Heels?”
“Baby steps, princeling. Get used to these first.” She dropped them at his feet.
He toed off his scuffed sneakers and stepped into the oxfords.The world tilted. Just slightly. He felt taller, his posture shifting automatically to find balance. The click of the heel on the linoleum was a definitive, solid sound.
“Walk,” Karla said, stepping back.
He took a step.Then another. It was awkward, stilted, but not impossible. The jacket tightened across his back with the movement. In the mirror, his reflection walked—a taller, sharper, more uncertain version of himself.
“Sarah’s on the front desk tomorrow at three,” Karla said casually, as if commenting on the weather. “Signing up volunteers. You should stop by. Tell her Karla sent you. Tell her you want to help with the Galaxy Glitz ball.”
Alex stopped pacing. He looked from his strange reflection to Karla’s calm, expectant face, then down to the glossy flyer still clutched in his hand. The words ‘Drag Extravaganza’ seemed to pulse. He imagined standing behind a velvet rope, handing out programs, and Sarah smiling at him, asking why he decided to volunteer.
He saw himself saying, I just wanted to help.
It was a lie, but it was a start.
“Okay,” he said, the word leaving his mouth in a rush of air. “Okay, I’ll… I’ll talk to her.”
Karla’s smile was slow and deep, a crack in the stone of her demeanor. She reached out and adjusted his lapel, her knuckles brushing briefly against his chest.
“Good boy.”
The oxfords clicked on the linoleum as he took another hesitant step. The sound was alien, authoritative. He watched his reflection, a stranger in a too-sharp jacket, his own wide eyes staring back from a borrowed face.
“Stop staring at yourself and get moving.” Karla’s voice broke the spell. She tossed his hoodie at him. “Wear the confidence home. Let it seep into your bones. You’ll need it for tomorrow.”
He slipped the hoodie on over the tux jacket, the clash of fabrics somehow perfect. The flyer was still in his hand, the edges now damp from his sweat. He folded it carefully and tucked it into his back pocket, a secret pledge.
“Tomorrow at three,” he repeated, more to himself than to her.
“Don’t be late. Sarah hates lateness almost as much as she loves a committed volunteer.” Karla was already turning back to her laptop, the conversation clearly over. She took a sip from her mug, the steam fogging her glasses for a second. “And Alex?”
He paused, his hand on the doorknob. “Yeah?”
“The shoes. Keep practicing.”
The hallway outside was a study in grimy, fluorescent normalcy after the curated chaos of Karla’s office. The sound of his new heels echoed off the lockers, a steady, conspicuous click-clack that made him want to walk on his toes. He didn’t. He forced his feet down, embracing the noise, the unnatural lift in his gait. By the time he pushed through the heavy front doors into the damp afternoon air, the rhythm had started to feel less like a warning and more like a metronome, ticking down to three o’clock.
The Student Union building smelled of old carpet and microwaved pasta. Alex’s heart was doing a frantic, irregular tap dance against his ribs, entirely out of sync with the deliberate click of his heels on the polished floor. He’d worn the oxfords again, a private pact, a suit of armor. The jacket was in his backpack, a hidden promise.
He saw her from thirty feet away. Sarah was behind a folding table draped with a purple cloth, a laptop open in front of her. A handwritten sign taped to the front read “GALAXY GLITZ VOLUNTEERS” in swirling glitter pen. She was nodding at someone, a guy with a skateboard under his arm, and her laugh carried down the corridor—a bright, clean sound that made Alex’s mouth go dry.
He wiped his palms on his jeans and approached. The skateboard guy left with a flyer. Then it was just him and the table, and her.
“Hi,” she said, looking up. Her smile was professional, polite. It didn’t quite reach her eyes, which were the color of strong tea. “Interested in volunteering?”
“Yeah. I mean, yes. For the, um, the Glitz thing.” He fumbled in his pocket, pulling out the now-creased flyer and smoothing it on the table like a holy document. “Karla sent me.”
Something shifted in Sarah’s face. The polite mask softened into something more genuine, more curious. “Did she now? And you survived?” She leaned forward, resting her chin on her hand. “What’s your name?”
“Alex.”
“Well, Alex-survived-Karla, what are you offering? We need bartenders, bouncers, stagehands, seat-fillers, green-room wranglers…” She ticked the roles off on her fingers. Each one sounded like a form of social torture.
He took a breath that shuddered on the way in. The words came out in a rush.“I want to help. With anything. I just… I wanted to help.” It was the lie he’d practiced, but saying it to her, under the warmth of her gaze, it felt flimsy, transparent.
She studied him for a second that stretched into an eternity. Her eyes flicked down, just for an instant, to his shoes. Back up to his face. A tiny, knowing smile played at the corner of her mouth.
“Karla’s a visionary,” she said, her tone shifting into something lighter, conspiratorial. “But her visions often involve throwing people into the deep end to see if they can swim. Or, you know, tread water in six-inch heels.” She glanced at the flyer between them. “We are short a few performers. The lineup’s a little… bare.”
The floor seemed to tilt.This was it. The moment. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He saw himself on a stage, a spotlight blinding him, a silent scream stuck in his throat.
Sarah’s laugh bubbled out again, but it was kinder this time. “Relax. I’m not recruiting for the main stage. Not today.” She tapped the laptop. “I need a gopher. A ‘get-this, find-that, hold-this-for-me’ person. Someone who doesn’t mind missing the show because they’re too busy making sure the show happens. It’s thankless, mostly boring, and you’ll spend half the night in a dark closet looking for a spare box of sequins.”
Relief flooded him, so potent it left him weak. A dark closet sounded like paradise. “I can do that. I’m good at finding things.”
“Great.” She clicked a few keys.“Email address? I’ll send the run sheet and the manifest. We have a storage locker in the basement of the drama building. That’s where most of the ‘get-this’ stuff is. Could you do a preliminary inventory this week? Make sure what’s on the list actually exists?”
He nodded, reciting his email, watching as her fingers flew over the keys. She had a silver ring on her thumb, a tiny, coiled snake.
“You’re hired,” she said, finally looking up. “Welcome to the glamour.” Her smile was full and real now, and it was for him. “Meeting’s Thursday night, here, eight PM. Don’t be late.”
“I won’t,” he said, and the click of his heels as he turned away sounded surer, stronger.
He didn’t go straight home. He went to the drama building, a Gothic pile of stone tucked behind the modern library. The basement key Karla had slyly pressed into his hand after his first visit turned in the heavy lock. The air that wafted out was cool and smelled of dust, old canvas, and the sweet, decay tang of mothballs.
He found the light switch. Flickering fluorescent tubes illuminated a cavernous space crammed with the ghosts of productions past. Wooden throne rooms stacked next to abstract metal sculptures. A rack of fur coats next to a box labeled “INTERGALACTIC LEOTARDS - MEND.” He navigated the narrow aisles, the beam of his phone flashlight catching on glitter in the dust.
In the far corner, he found the Galaxy Glitz lock-up: a chain-link cage within the larger room. Inside, organized chaos reigned. Crates were marked with tape: FEATHERS (OSTRICH), FEATHERS (MARABU), FEATHERS (ROADKILL?He snorted. Another held nothing but shoes, a mountain of drag footwear in every color and height, from sensible block heels to stilts disguised as sparkly boots.
His phone buzzed. An email from Sarah, with the subject line: “For Our Newest Gopher :)” Attached was a PDF manifest. He scrolled, cross-referencing. 12 pairs of fishnet tights (large).Check. 4 gallons of body glitter (assorted colors). Check. 1 functional fog machine. He peered into a crate, saw a hulking metal box with a cord, and checked it off.
He was deep in the inventory, the silence of the basement a blanket around him, when a shadow fell across the page. He looked up, his heart lurching.
Karla leaned against the chain-link, arms crossed. She’d changed into a worn leather jacket. “Making yourself useful, I see.”
“Sarah asked me to,” he said, and the name felt like a talisman in the dusty dark.
“Of course she did.” Karla unlatched the cage door and stepped inside. She walked over to the shoe mountain and rooted through it with the expertise of a archaeologist. She pulled out a pair of heels, impossibly high, the color of toxic waste, with clear plastic platforms. “These would shatter your ankles. Perfect for a first timer.” She tossed them at him. He caught them against his chest, the plastic cold and unforgiving.
“I’m not performing,” he said, but his voice lacked conviction.
“Inventory is a form of rehearsal,” she said, her voice echoing slightly in the cavernous space. “You touch the artifacts. You learn their weight. Their purpose. You imagine them on.” She picked up a crown of twisted wire and cracked plastic gems from a nearby box and placed it on her own head. It sat crooked. “Everyone performs, Alex. The question is whether you choose the role, or let the role choose you.” She took the toxic heels from his limp hands and placed them neatly back in the crate. “Thursday night. Don’t be late.”
She turned and walked out of the cage, leaving the crown on her head. The door clanged shut behind her. Alex stood alone again, surrounded by the quiet, glittering evidence of transformation. He looked back at the manifest on his phone, then at the mountain of shoes. For a second, he didn’t see a pile of discarded costumes. He saw a toolkit. A arsenal of possible selves.
He reached out and let his fingers brush against a sequined boot. The sequins were cool, sharp. He picked up the toxic waste heels again. Heavier than they looked. He took a breath, set them down squarely on the concrete floor in front of him, and stared at them.
From the doorway at the top of the stairs, unseen, Karla watched the solitary figure in the cage of light, staring at a pair of grotesque shoes.
She smirks.
She smirks.
The heavy basement door sighs shut behind her, leaving Alex in the sudden, profound silence. The fluorescent buzz is the only sound. He stares at the neon heels. They look less like shoes and more like a dare, carved from solidified recklessness.
He’s about to turn back to his clipboard when a sound slices through the quiet—not the door, but the sharp, clear click of a lighter. He spins around.
Karla is leaning against the chain-link just outside the cage door, having never left. She takes a long drag from a slim cigarette, the ember flaring in the gloom. She exhales, a plume of smoke curling through the wire diamonds toward him.
“Change your mind yet?” she asks, her voice a low rasp.
Alex jumps, his hand flying to his chest. “Jesus. I thought you left.”
“I did. Then I didn’t.” She pushes off the fence and walks to the lock, giving it a rattle. The key is still in it on his side. “Open up, princeling. My cigarette break’s only ten minutes.”
His fingers feel clumsy as he fumbles with the padlock. The mechanism clunks open. Karla slides the door back just enough to slip inside, sealing them both in the cage of costumes. The scent of her smoke, cheap and papery, mixes with the mothballs and dust.
“So?” she prompts, resting her hips against a crate marked ‘FABRIC – FLAMMABLE (PROBABLY).’ “Inventory going well? Find the box of spare courage? Usually labeled ‘misc. sequins.’”
“It’s… organized chaos,” Alex says, holding up his clipboard like a shield.
“Organized chaos is the only kind of chaos worth anything.” She flicks ash onto the concrete floor. “Sarah’s a good kid.Efficient. But she’s a planner. She thinks this,” she gestures vaguely at the towering, teetering piles, “runs on spreadsheets and meeting minutes.”
“Doesn’t it?”
Karla’s laugh is a short, dry hack. “It runs on panic, improvisation, and the profound fear of public humiliation. The spreadsheet is a comforting lie.” She takes another drag, studying him through the smoke. “You’re not a planner, are you, Alex? You’re a ‘hopes-for-the-best’ er. A ‘maybe-if-I-stand-here-quietly-something-good-will-happen’ er.”
The accuracy of it stings. He looks down at his borrowed oxfords.
“Nothing wrong with that,” she continues, her tone softening into something that might almost be mistaken for kindness. It isn’t. It’s strategy. “Planners need people like you. To do the things they didn’t plan for.” She stubs her cigarette out on the sole of a nearby platform boot. “Like stand in for a missing performer.”
Alex’s head snaps up. “What?”
“Ollie. Our reigning ‘Glamazon Gorgon.’ Wisdom tooth infection. His face is currently the size of a volleyball. He’s out.”
“But… the show’s in two weeks.”
“Ten days,” Karla corrects. She begins pacing the small space, her boots making no sound on the concrete. “Ollie’s number is the finale. It’s a classic. ‘I Will Survive,’ but as a power ballad. Tears, sequins, a six-foot feather fan. The works. It’s a crowd-pleaser. Without it, the whole finale falls flat.”
“Can’t someone else do it?”
“Everyone else already has three numbers. They’re stretched thinner than spandex on a size sixteen queen.” She stops directly in front of him. She’s so close he can see the individual threads of her jacket. “You learn quick. You’re the right height. The costume might even fit. And you,” she pokes his chest with a blunt finger, “are available.”
The walls of the cage seem to shrink. The mountain of shoes looks like a landslide waiting to bury him. “I can’t. I’ve never… I don’t know how to perform.”
“You’re performing right now.” Her eyes lock onto his. “You’re performing ‘Alex, the helpful volunteer.’ You’re performing ‘Alex, the guy who just wants to be near Sarah.’ This?” She plucks at his hoodie sleeve. “This is a costume. The heels you’re standing in?A prop. We’re all just picking roles that get us what we want.”
He wants to deny it. The words won’t come.
“Sarah will be running the whole show from the wings,” Karla says, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur. “Right there in the thick of it. She’ll see every second of that finale. She’ll see whoever is on that stage, pouring their heart out under a tonne of glitter. She’ll remember that person.”
Alex feels the hook slide in, deep and inescapable. It’s not a lie. He can see it. The darkness backstage, the frantic energy, and Sarah with her headset and clipboard, her face illuminated by the glow of the stage lights. And on stage, under that blistering spotlight… someone else. Not him.Someone brave.
Karla sees the decision in his eyes before he’s fully formed it. She smiles, a real one this time, all teeth and no warmth. “We start tomorrow.Seven PM. This room. Don’t eat a big dinner. You’ll be bending over a lot.”
“What about Sarah? What do I tell her?”
“You tell her you’ve volunteered for a bigger job. That Karla needs you. She’ll respect that. She might even be impressed.” Karla turns and unlatches the cage door. “Lock up when you’re done. And bring those,” she says, pointing a finger at the toxic waste heels. “We’re breaking them in.”
She disappears up the stairs, leaving him alone with the silence, the dust, and the terrifying, glittering weight of his new role.
He doesn’t move for a long time. Then, slowly, he bends down and picks up the neon heels. They’re cold. He turns them over in his hands, watching the flickering light catch on the cheap plastic. He thinks of Sarah’s laugh, the coiling snake on her thumb, the way she’d said “Welcome to the glamour.”
He slides the shoes into his backpack, next to the tuxedo jacket. They clunk against his textbooks. He turns off the lights, plunging the treasure trove of other selves into darkness, and locks the cage door behind him. The click of the padlock is final.
His own footsteps, in Karla’s loaned oxfords, echo all the way up the stairs and into the twilight. They sound different now. Less like an experiment, and more like a march.