Dancing Lessons

by R. Cooper

  Dancers were not all that shy, Chico was learning. Not when their teacher had a bite mark at his jaw, and Chico had a hickey on his throat.

  He coughed when they were alone. Partly to get Rafael’s attention and partly because his mouth went dry when Rafael bent over to stretch. Dear God, he was flexible. If Chico were the type to top, he’d be all over that. He still would, actually.

  “So,” he began in a raspy voice. “You need to tell me the real story.” Their talk could wait. He wanted to know this first.

  “Real story?” Rafael straightened and frowned, then seemed to understand Chico was referring to the ballet. “Ah. You mean the short story it’s based on? I thought you would have looked it up by now.”

  “I’ve been busy,” Chico pointed out, flustered when Rafael came over to him and sat at his side on the bench. He peered down at the embroidery under Chico’s hands, his chin on Chico’s shoulder. He often stared over Chico’s shoulder at his work, usually without actually touching Chico and never after they’d jacked each other off.

  Chico angled his chin up and felt a butterfly of a kiss on the side of his neck. He shivered. “The story.” And then they were supposed to talk. He had to remember that.

  Rafael slid his arms around Chico’s waist and settled against his side without offering any more distracting kisses. “There’s a theory it was a lost fairy tale by Wilde, but no way. Not a proto-steampunk story with a crippled protagonist. But the reason people think that is also the biggest difference between the story and the ballet—the dancer is male in the original story.”

  Chico made a surprised, confused, delighted sound, and Rafael curled his arms tighter around him as he went on. “The king is much creepier in the original. The inventor is sort of quietly defiant and crafty, and it’s fairly obvious in that version that the dancer and inventor are falling in love with each other. For the clockwork dancer, it goes about the same. Oh, and it has a happier ending. I should mention that.”

  “I want the happy ending.” Chico decided without even hearing it first.

  “It’s slightly more complicated and involves revealing that the inventor has broken the clock in the tower so it can’t ring twelve. Then he and the dancer escape while the king is presumably off fucking a robot.”

  Chico snorted with immature amusement. “Okay. I see why that was cut from the ballet. But… how do you know the dancer loves the inventor back in the original version?” In the pieces from the ballet he’d seen, there were scenes between the dancer and the inventor, but she was never near him. Rafael had told his students that most versions have her doing this to protect the inventor from the king’s jealous wrath.

  He got another light, pleased kiss from Rafael before Rafael explained. “The story is written like a fairy tale, so it basically says it. The inventor was kind and thoughtful, and he cared for the dancer and studied him enough to make a doll that moved and looked exactly like him. But he could always tell the difference between the dancer and the finest of his creations. His eyes were on the real dancer. And the dancer noticed because his eyes were on the inventor. The dancer even warns him, in the story, that the inventor needs to hide what he is feeling, or the king will know.”

  “Aw, he cares.” Chico wished he was being glib, but his voice was thick with emotion as he imagined it. “That’s a good story. Because the inventor doesn’t care if the king knows, as long as he frees the dancer. Wait, that’s horrible. He knew he was going to die.” Chico blinked his wet eyes several times.

  “Several male ballet troupes have performed it,” Rafael whispered into his ear. “You should see a performance.”

  Chico disgraced himself with a sniffle. “I’ll weep everywhere.” He turned toward Rafael with tears in his eyelashes. “It’s so epic and unattainable. The love of someone like that for someone so beautiful.”

  Rafael leaned away to study Chico, surprise and uncertainty and then pleasure in his expression. He came back in to curve his body around him. After a moment he stroked Chico’s side, offering comfort. “The dancer is certainly beautiful. But the inventor doesn’t love him for his face. He loves him because he sees past that. And the dancer loves him for the same reason. For someone in the dancer’s position, letting anyone truly know him is dangerous. He’s hidden away those unwanted parts of himself to survive. But he grows to trust the inventor as more than someone who makes clever things. The inventor is someone who has also disguised himself. He’s a smart man literally held back by his time and place. Their pas de deux as they learn each other is breathtaking.”

  “Pas de deux,” Chico repeated and gave a small, somewhat watery laugh. “Another dance thing. I thought I knew what that meant, but now I think I’ll have to learn all these terms.”

  “If you took more of my classes, you’d know them.” Rafael was cuddling close, and instead of being bothered, Chico was leaning back to let him.

  Nonetheless, he stiffened at the teasing remark, which was as close to talking about their future as they’d come yet.

  “I can’t afford it,” he finally answered.

  Rafael hummed and took one of Chico’s hands from the needlework he’d forgotten about. He cradled it in his hand and slowly extended their arms. “They start out at different sides of the stage. The dancer, naturally, dancing as the king has ordered, the inventor keeping his distance. Then, slowly, it becomes something else.” He turned his hand without letting Chico’s fall, and curled his arm in so that both of their hands were against Chico’s heart. “Her dancing slows to allow him to catch up with her. She darts away when he gets close and cautiously follows after him when he’s too far away from her. Finally, she reaches for him, a full body extension, lightly balanced on one toe, so afraid and careful that a strong breath might knock her over. Instead, he takes her hand. The last thing he’s going to do is let her fall.” Rafael extended their arms again, and this time Chico thought that if he were a dancer, he’d get up to accept the invitation to dance.

  “She begins to show him how to dance, for the doll, I’m sure, if anyone asked. But it’s a fairy tale, so no one does. And she leads. It’s very unusual. He lifts her and demonstrates the strength of the male dancer’s body, but it’s entirely a dance about her offering herself, pieces at a time, and him following after her, protecting her.”

  “It’s intimate,” Chico murmured, his chest tight.

  “Yes, it is.” Rafael all but purred into his ear. “But we toned it down as much as we could stand to, for the sake of the parents in the audience and the age and abilities of our dancers.”

  “I’m the girl again, I see,” Chico pointed out breathlessly. He paused and gave a small shake of his head. “No, I’m not even in this story. You’re the dancer, of the two of us.”

  “Am I?” Rafael wondered, breath so hot Chico shivered.

  The bang of the french doors shocked Chico into flinching. He dropped his arm, and after a second, Rafael did the same.

  Jase fought with the stubborn french doors for a bit longer as he closed them, then stopped dead when he saw the two of them. He had a prop in one hand—the giant key the king uses to wind up the clockwork dancer.

  He let it fall to his side as if completely thrown by the sight of Rafael curled around Chico. Then he continued forward, holding the key out for inspection.

  “Private lessons now?” he asked in a joking tone. Chico frowned and stared down at his embroidery. He’d let himself forget about Jase. He’d assumed things he shouldn’t have, instead of talking things out like he knew he should.

  He thought—hoped, from what Rafael had said before—that Rafael might be willing to try with him. The waltzing and the sex had tricked him into thinking Chico could try too, that he truly was the kind of brave person who took dancing lessons and moved away from his friends and family to start a new life.

  He studied his embroidery thread in all the different shades of pink he’d chosen for the clockwork dancer. No one was even going to see any of this detail from the audience
. Chico had been wasting his time on things that didn’t matter.

  Rafael pulled away when Chico tensed, and continued to watch Chico as he got to his feet. He accepted the prop from Jase, and they spent a few moments discussing something about the sets or the high school auditorium where the performance would take place. The next rehearsals would all be there to allow the dancers to practice on the actual stage.

  After the ballet, Chico would have no reason to hang out with Rafael unless he asked for one. That left Chico only a few days to decide what he ought to do.

  “How about it, Chico?” Rafael interrupted Chico’s panicky thoughts, and Chico jerked his head up. He glanced between Rafael and Jase in total confusion.

  “You’re going to be there on the big night, right?” Jase still had that smile on his face, as if he thought everything was funny, or maybe that everything about Chico was funny.

  “Someone has to be there to deal with accidental rips and tears,” Rafael pointed out, frowning slightly. Maybe he could tell that Chico hadn’t realized he was invited backstage the night of the performance. “Someone other than my mother,” Rafael added, after a beat. “The costumer is always there… unless you’d prefer to sit with the audience?”

  Hesitation like that from Rafael made Chico pause too. “No, I can… be backstage, if you’d like me to be.”

  A cinnamon-coffee smile warmed him to his toes.

  Then he glanced at Jase, who was observing all of this, and returned to poking at his embroidery. Jase had no problem asking Rafael out. If Chico wanted this, he should do the same and stop worrying about how he might mess it up. The night of the performance might be a good time to try. Rafael might be in a good mood, might feel exuberant and generous and say yes to anything.

  Chico already knew he wanted to sleep with Rafael. He could feel his skin grow hot if he let himself contemplate it. He ached for it, however it would be. Different from John, and that was fine, good, great, because it would be Rafael.

  He also knew that he wanted more than that. He liked sitting with Rafael, and hanging out with him made him smile more and feel better than he had in years.

  But his heart beat faster and his hands started to shake when he imagined asking for that.

  Stupid Chico, he scolded himself. Rafael had said he would wait. Chico only had to tell him what he wanted.

  “What are you sewing?” Jase kept trying to bring Chico into the conversation.

  Chico frowned without raising his head. “Embroidering.” He corrected Jase, hoping that would be enough. Judging from the expectant silence, it wasn’t. He swallowed to wet his throat. “This is for the clockwork dancer. She is, well, she will be dressed as a reflection of the king. She’s there to please him, and nothing pleases him more than himself. Or—” He reconsidered his quiet words. “—how he views himself anyway, as this great figure. So she has the puffs at her shoulders, smaller than a leg-of-mutton sleeve and more like what you see on a Degas dancer, but hers are there to resemble his epaulets. Then, across her… décolletage, she will have embroidery to both highlight her figure and to match the medals all over his chest.

  “She’s there to make him look good, not to be her own person, and I want it to show,” he finished. “It’s why he chooses her over the real dancer. She can’t think and feel for herself.”

  Only after the words had spilled out of him did he think about what he was saying, and how he was saying it.

  “Like I am any sort of expert on ballet,” he added as an afterthought, glancing up at both of them, but stopping with his gaze on Rafael. “I don’t know what I’m talking about. No one is even going to notice these details. I’m being an idiot. I’ll stop.”

  “No, no.” Rafael turned toward him with an interested look. “Go on.”

  Chico had seen that expression on Rafael’s face before. He darted a look to Jase, then dropped his gaze. “It’s just an idea. Or I could have left her in the garish costume someone originally chose for her.”

  “Don’t blame me for that one,” Rafael protested. “I like to think I have better taste than that.”

  For some time after that, no one spoke. Chico, for one, couldn’t think of what to say with Jase there. Rafael muttered under his breath, and Chico looked up at him.

  “It’s way after closing time. I’ve got to go make sure the place is empty and lock up the front. I’ll be right back.” He offered Chico a quick grin. “We can talk then, okay?”

  Chico’s throat locked, but he nodded and watched until Rafael was out of the room. Then his gaze went to Jase. He had no idea what to say.

  Jase did not have that problem. “So you’re going to stick around after all?”

  Chico couldn’t read his tone at all. He was still smiling, amused at everything, and though it possibly wasn’t aimed at Chico, it felt like it was.

  “I don’t know.” Chico currently had no plans for his life and didn’t know how to feel about it, but he didn’t want to discuss it with this man.

  Jase’s smile dipped, as though he didn’t care for that answer.

  Good, Chico thought, with a viciousness that surprised him. Someone else should be as confused as he was.

  But Jase perked up a moment later with another conversational gambit. “Davi says you sell shoes.”

  Chico tensed. His tone was too close to John’s when he’d say certain things. This is Chico. He sells suits.

  Chico had sold expensive menswear that had included suits and custom neckties and cufflinks, to private clients only. He had to know fit, fabric, color, style, and tailoring, for a job like that. But in the right tone, it was nothing.

  “And now you design costumes?” Jase had narrowed his eyes to watch Chico carefully.

  Chico’s fingers twitched, and pink thread spilled to the floor. Nobody needs to wear that for Halloween, Chico. Nobody else even takes these things seriously. You’re wasting your time.

  Jase tried again, outright frowning now. “And you dance too?”

  “No,” Chico responded at last. “Not me, silly Chico.”

  “What’s a silly Chico?” Rafael demanded curiously as he came back in.

  Jase broke in earnestly. “Did I say something wrong? Is this about the other day? Because you know, I didn’t know. And it’s a small town, and I thought I’d check out all my options, maybe scope what the scene is like, but it was mostly just a friendly dinner.” He babbled almost as much as Chico once he got going.

  Chico smiled at him, but it was distracted. “No, you didn’t say anything. I’ve just, I think, I’ve been brave enough for one day. There’s a pile of pillows I could be hiding under.”

  “You’re going to go?” Rafael raised his voice at the question and stiffened when Chico stood up. His stare was steady. He would have seemed calm if Chico hadn’t known him, if he hadn’t watched dancers control every single aspect of their bodies, even their faces.

  “I have things to think about it, and it’s late.” Chico looked away from him in order to gather up his needles and thread. “You said—” He paused because of Jase’s presence and to pick up the costume. “You said slow was okay. And I don’t want to be stupid Chico again.”

  “Were you ever?” Rafael’s tone was not at all kind. At least his rancor wasn’t aimed at Chico.

  Chico gazed imploringly at him.

  Rafael stared back and let out a noisy breath. “Slow. Fine. But don’t take too long, all right, Chico?”

  “I’ll have her bodice done by Friday.” Chico frowned at him for thinking he’d leave something so important unfinished.

  Rafael glowered, actually glowered at him. “Not the performance, Chico. That’s not what I meant. I’m thinking about you. I’m anxious, and I’ll miss you; that’s what I’m trying to say. Someone ought to kick your ex in the balls.”

  “Uh.” Chico blinked, lost for words all over again at being placed first. He looked over to Jase, staring at Chico with concern and worry in his expression, then clutched his sewing things to his chest be
fore turning to Rafael again. He approached him with light, careful steps and stopped just in front of him. He was trembling, but he couldn’t do anything about it.

  He took a long, deep breath and looked up. “I like you a lot,” he confessed, as though it was the worst thing to ever happen to him. His throat was dry as a bone, and he nearly croaked the words. “I don’t want you to not like me.”

  “Now you are being a silly Chico,” Rafael responded softly, immediately, with a sudden, goofy sort of smile.

  Chico was still shaking, but it felt like aftershocks now. “I didn’t know how worn down I’d gotten from all the things he used to say and do.” Chico summed up three years of his life and assumed Rafael would understand. “I’m just starting to feel strong again. Some of that is because of you, but I don’t want to risk losing that, not even for you.” He continued, conscious of Jase, who didn’t seem to know where to look. “I don’t want to be that Chico again. So I need… to be careful. You’ll wait?”

  His legs were barely supporting him. He couldn’t believe he’d said that. Of all the stupid, reckless things to say, he’d asked Rafael to wait for him with Jase right there. He’d all but said he didn’t trust Rafael and then asked him to wait anyway.

  He took one pained, gasping breath while Rafael searched his face, and then hiccupped in surprise when Rafael nodded.

  “Oh.” Chico shouldn’t have been so startled. But his wide, relieved smile seemed to make Rafael relax too.

  Chico nodded back at him, breathing easier. He studied Rafael for another moment, then backed up and turned toward the french doors.

  The night air seemed impossibly cold, and his feet seemed to find every rock, but he hardly noticed. He stumbled along the path through the trees, but the moonlight was enough, now that he knew the way. The whole time he grinned to himself. He had talked about what he wanted, and Rafael had taken him seriously and listened. That was, undeniably, progress.

  And Rafael had agreed to wait because Chico was worth waiting for.

  DAVI AGREED on the progress, without even minding much when Chico showed up on his doorstep to talk about it. After a while, in the spirit of being a grown-up and a new person, Chico also offered to look into yoga classes, if Davi was willing to take the chance.