Up In Lights, Special Edition

Keep at it, champ. We're counting on you.

Those are my parents' famous last words every time I step onto the stage for a show.

No matter how exhausted I am. No matter how close my body is to failing me. No matter how much I wish I could just stop it all and take a breath.

But I can't. Because they need me. It's not about me. It's about them.

Until Xavier Hendricks walks in, quite literally picking me up and putting me back together. He knows I can't go on like this. He lives and breathes to protect me. It's his job, after all.

But the more time we spend together, the more he learns beyond the scope of his work. The more he's with me, the more he sees every single piece of me. Even the ones I hide from the limelight.

The more we're together, the more he realizes the protection I need might not be from strangers on the street, but from the people closest to me. And maybe from myself.

I can't remember the last time I've felt this safe. This at home.

They say if you love something, let it go. Life with me isn't easy. It's hard, complicated, messy, exhausting.

I love him too much to let him go. But I can't ask him to stay.