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That night, after the final curtain, when the theater lights dimmed and the crowd finally stopped screaming, the queens stayed.
Catherine of Aragon kicked off her heels first. They skidded across the stage like fallen crowns.
“I have waited five hundred years to do that,” she said, rolling her shoulders. “Divorced, beheaded, died—no one tells you about the foot pain.”
Anne Boleyn snorted, already halfway into a dramatic pose that no one had asked for. “Please. Suffering looks good on me.”
Jane Seymour perched on the edge of a riser, smoothing her skirt. “Can we all agree,” she said gently, “that tonight was… rather nice?”
“Nice?” Anna of Cleves laughed, tossing her jacket over a spotlight. “We sold out. Again. I call that a glow-up.”
Katherine Howard twirled, glitter catching in her hair. “And did you hear them when I hit the high note? I thought the ceiling was going to come down.”
Catherine Parr, last to sit, surveyed them all with that calm, knowing smile—the one that said she’d already read the ending of this story and liked it. “Sisters,” she said, “we did exactly what we came to do.”
There was a moment of quiet. Not awkward. Not sad. Just full.
Then Anne clapped her hands. “Alright. Enough reflection. We’ve got unfinished business.”
Catherine of Aragon raised a brow. “Do I even want to ask?”
Anne grinned. “Group rewrite.”
Jane blinked. “Of… history?”
“Obviously,” Anne said. “I’m thinking: no kings, no executions, and absolutely no portraits where we look like haunted furniture.”
Katherine Howard gasped. “Can we keep the outfits though?”
“Non-negotiable,” Anna said. “These boots are my emotional support system.”
They laughed—six voices, different timbres, one harmony. Somewhere beyond the walls, time itself seemed to pause, as if listening.
Catherine of Aragon stood and walked to the edge of the stage. “You know,” she said, softer now, “I spent my whole life being told I was wrong. Too stubborn. Too foreign. Too much.”
Jane joined her. “I was told I was perfect,” she said quietly. “Flawless. Obedient. And then I was gone.”
Anna crossed her arms, smile fading into something real. “They called me a mistake. Like I didn’t belong in the story at all.”
Katherine Howard’s voice wobbled when she spoke. “They called me foolish. Like I didn’t know what was being done to me.”
Catherine Parr reached out, linking hands with the others. “They called me lucky.”
Anne scoffed. “They called me a problem.”
Silence fell again—but this time it wasn’t heavy. It was charged.
Anne straightened, eyes blazing. “Well, history had its say. Now it’s our turn.”
She stepped forward, snapped her fingers, and the stage lights flared back to life—brighter than before.
Music hummed under their feet. Not recorded. Not rehearsed. Something alive.
Catherine of Aragon lifted her chin. “I choose myself.”
Jane smiled. “I choose to stay.”
Anna laughed. “I choose freedom.”
Katherine Howard wiped her eyes, then squared her shoulders. “I choose joy.”
Catherine Parr nodded. “I choose knowledge.”
Anne Boleyn grinned wide and wicked. “I choose the crown—on my own damn head.”
The sound swelled, six stories weaving into one, rewriting not just what had been, but what could have been.
No court.
No scaffold.
No footnotes written by men who never listened.
Just queens.
When the music finally faded, they stood breathless, hands clasped, something ancient and new settling into their bones.
Jane laughed first. “Well,” she said, “that felt… healing.”
Katherine Howard beamed. “Ten out of ten. Would reclaim narrative again.”
Anna stretched. “So. Same time tomorrow?”
Catherine of Aragon smiled—a real one, hard-won and bright. “Always.”
As they walked offstage together, the theater stayed warm, like it had learned something important.
History might remember them as wives.
But the world would know them as queens.