The troupe continued for years, Jenny, Joe and Carol the only constant. It ended with Mark getting busted on a sting and the whole house of cards went up in flames. The revealed corruption touched many, though the bigger they were, the less they fell. Perhaps the embarrassment kept things from going public, and money could be used to let most slip through the cracks. The only ones really to get the full consequences were Mark and Stella.
Carol managed to slip through somewhat unscathed, pleading ignorance, but the support for her troupe ended. Joe, who had returned to school and had finished his PhD at Columbia, accepted a position at a small college in New Hampshire as a teacher of film, his filmmaking becoming better known than his poetry though he did publish three books of poems.
Jenny joined him and they finally got married, Jenny becoming pregnant not long after. Though they'd played dangerously with conception early on, thankfully it never took, she'd have had an abortion if it had, and she'd been on the pill for years, getting off it when they decided to finally tie the knot. She started a dance school for the small college town, getting some of her students from the bigger city nearby.
Carol floated around for a couple years, drinking a lot, doing coke a lot, ending up at her home mansion and drinking even more until her father sent her to Hazelden like he had for his wife, as much kicking her out as getting her fixed.
She was sober by the time she arrived in New Hampshire where her former lovers took her in, surprisingly, for her, happily. Within a year she got a position as dance teacher at a university in the nearby city having to commute but she didn't mind, because she felt so at home with her lovers. Eventually Jenny's little dance school became a dance company, regional at best, and many of the dances they performed were choreographed by Carol.
Since the wakeup call of Joe's OD, neither Jenny nor Joe ever used heroin again, nor anything else except for the post work drinks and frequent smoking of marijuana. That continued in New Hampshire, mellowing out with a nice wine and a joint at the end of the day except when Jenny got pregnant twice of course, a couple of adorable girls. Carol joined them in these relaxing imbibing. She'd been a drunk for a couple of years, but it had been more about a deep depression than her being an alcoholic. She didn't need to keep drinking until she was drunk. She'd drank before, even got drunk from time to time, but it never had taken her over, become necessary, except when she felt she'd lost everything, feeling worthless. Now she felt loved and welcomed into a loving life. Dancing or being in charge was less important, to the point she got pregnant too, twice, two adorable boys. Joe got himself snipped after the last so that the ladies could enjoy him without rubbers or the pill.