Batty told Wesley that she didn't really want to say goodbye. That was a lie, but Batty felt it would make things exponentially easier if she didn't have to see Wesley one last time.
He was leaving the day before the traditional end of year recital the freshmen had put together. He had asked Batty if she wanted him to stay to watch her, but Batty explained it would just distract her if she knew he was in the audience.
She also was scared that Wesley would suspect her performance of "Burn" was about him. Because it totally was.
Her instructor said it was cliche to do a Hamilton song, but he had to admit Batty sang it well. Plus the show would be touring for ages, so it was just smart to have Eliza in her arsenal for later auditions.
Batty had recently told Jane she would rather play Angelica Schuyler, but Jane said that with Batty's doe-eyed visage, she had to be Eliza. Skye would make a good Angelica, Jane mused, if only Skye could carry a tune.
"I'm an actress," Batty had argued. "I can act like Skye and Angelica."
"No one can act that much," Jane had said with a shrug.
Before Batty took the stage at the recital, she briefly imagined what she would do if Wesely had shown up. If he was out there in the shadows, in the back. Wesley was too considerate to sit front and center. If Batty didn't want to be distracted, Wesley would stay hidden.
But he would come up to her afterward, as she lingered in the lobby, giving hugs to the fellow performers.
"Batty," he would say.
She would turn and gasp in surprise.
"You sang wonderfully," Wesley would say. "And it's made me reconsider. I can be a great artist right here in New York. I'll never leave. In fact, let's start looking for apartments together."
Batty shook her head hard to get rid of the indulgent daydream. She was being horrendously silly.
Besides, she knew for a fact that Wesley would not be in the audience. She had told him that she didn't really want to say goodbye, but he had shown up at her dorm room door the morning before. He was about to hit the road.
"I hate going against your wishes," Wesley had said. "But goodbyes are important. You told me that once."
Batty stood there in her snowflake pajama pants and blinked. She had been trying to erase the image of Wesley, but how could she ever when he was so handsome and nice and real.
"No I didn't," Batty said.
"Yes, you did. You told me about that summer you met your family's friend Jeffrey, and how you were all so sad to say goodbye at the end, but Jeffrey just said 'Goodbye for now' and you thought that was the best thing ever."
"But is this a Goodbye for Now?" Batty asked.
Wesley looked at the ground and grimaced.
"Well," he said. "Here's looking at you, kid."
Wesley hated to engage in overused lines or artistic trends, but even he loved Casablanca. Batty laughed, just once, and they hugged.
After she closed the door, Batty turned and started crying, and she felt like she hadn't stopped until coming to the theater for the recital.
Her roommate had even stirred herself from her indifference to bring Batty some cookies and ask if she was ok.
"I need to stop crying," Batty said through a deluge of tears.
"Nah," her roommate said. "For this one, you just need to cry it out."
The audience clapped for the previous act, and it was Batty's time to go on. She stepped into the lights, and let herself imagine, just for a millisecond, Naomi Watkins, her blonde classmate, singing the opening lines.
Then Batty opened her mouth and began.
She would sing this song, and she would pour into it all her hurt and pain over Wesley, and then she would be done. This wasn't the eighteenth century, after all. Women didn't have to marry the first man they met anymore. They didn't have to say vows and just be stuck with one guy for the entirety of life. And Batty was healthy. She ate her vegetables and she didn't smoke, so she had every intention of living a very long time.
So the missing Wesley was going to end with the final note. The audience would clap, Batty would bow, and then it would be summer. And summer was going to fix everything.