by Lola Keeley
Life isn’t fair, she chants in her head as she launches into the first, feted Kitri jump, bending her back leg as high as she can when the first leap comes, almost brushing the back of her head. It draws gasps from the room. But no one can make me live a life I don’t want, Anna continues, her footwork tight, controlled. She flicks her fan open with the lightest twist of her wrist and sweeps low, drawing early applause.
If this is the zone, she’s in it.
The scant minutes pass in a blur, the faces watching her faded out. Anna steps and jumps and turns and it happens exactly as it should. Her sequence of pirouettes—she can almost see the toreadors who should flank her as she moves across the space—falters only for a split second on the second to last. She finishes en pointe and the applause seems shockingly loud from so few people.
Jess, of course, is the most effusive. Climbing on her chair, she whistles and leads shouts of “bravo“ that the rest take up right away.
Anna beams, clasping her hands and trying to curtsy better than she did after her dance with Ethan, not sure what she was doing wrong. Only coming up from that does she see Victoria, unmoving. Her hands aren’t raised in applause and she isn’t making any noise at all. Instead she sips at a glass of clear liquid and sets it down, never taking her eyes off Anna.
It’s impossible to tell what she’s thinking, so Anna nods one more time and bolts.
Victoria watches the cluster form around Rick, and if this was ten years ago they’d be reaching for their checkbooks. Instead, it’s become a contest of who can pledge the biggest wire transfer on Monday. He’s in his element, and for a moment Victoria feels the old fondness for the boy who danced with her, who became the one partner in her life who’s ever lasted. Even if it is more like guerrilla warfare these days, and they were a disaster in the brief romantic experiment offstage, he’s still there.
He meets her eye over the crowd and gives a less-than-subtle “okay” sign.
Victoria nods toward the curtains, silently asking if she should bring Anna out for a round of handshakes and blushing at compliments, but Rick dismisses with the slightest frown. Of course. Preserve the mystery. If Rick understands anything, it’s the mentality of rich jerks. He summons Victoria over instead, and she grits her teeth for the requisite schmoozing.
“Now, ladies and gents…” Rick has to make it splashy. “Let’s have a round of applause for the woman responsible for tonight. I send her hamburger and she somehow gives me prime rib.” Sharing the credit. He must be in a good mood.
Victoria holds her hands up against their adulation, but a little part of her starts to crave the clapping in the very second that it trickles to a halt.
“A word?” she asks, the better to get it over with.
Rick deflects an investor and steps aside with her.
“Now, Victoria, a little patience,” he cautions, but she lacks the patience for kissing up tonight.
“You saw it.” Victoria stands with her hands on her hips, defying him to argue with her on this. “That’s in a week, Rick. Imagine what I can do with a full season.”
“She’s good, but we can’t bet a season on someone so raw.” He stays just north of scolding her. “I’m not saying she can’t feature—pick a solo or two in something splashy—but you’re putting the cart before the horse on this one. Scale it back.”
Victoria’s grin is fixed. She’s used to having to compromise, to cajole others into seeing it her way. Rick isn’t usually one of those others.
“She’s ready,” Victoria says.
Rick bares his teeth in response, just quickly enough that others might mistake it for a smile.
“Have the program back in order for the print run,” he warns. “And next time someone brings up your retirement, how about you give a straight answer instead of letting me save your pride, hmm?”
“Rick—”
“Whatever, it doesn’t matter. What does is that I can’t protect you from a flop, Victoria. No matter how talented you used to be.”
With that gut punch, he turns her with a practiced touch at her hip and unleashes his charm on the wealthy men trying to buy a little culture.
If Victoria keeps smiling, she can almost convince herself she doesn’t feel sick.
By the time she escapes, Victoria is exhausted. She slips backstage and listens to Rick lead his group out—only the biggest donors are invited to drinks at his godforsaken club.
Delphine and Gabriel are long gone, experienced enough to know when they’re not needed. Victoria knows how precious free time is, and she lets her dancers have what little there is. Just because she has no use for downtime doesn’t mean everyone else is similarly addicted.
Irina hasn’t returned, but Anna has changed, her hair in a loose ponytail. Her sister is nowhere in sight, and Victoria can’t say that disappoints her.
“You waited.” Victoria doesn’t like stating the obvious, but she’s a little off her game. “The sixth pirouette—”
“I know,” Anna deflates, hanging her head in shame. “At the time it didn’t feel like much, but then I replayed it over and over in my head. If you want me to go again now, I can tell Jess to go home without me.”
“You…” Victoria shakes her head, as though she might have water in her ears. “You’re saying you’ll rehearse with me now, just to get it perfect?”
“Sure.” Anna drops her bag. “I mean… Oh! You probably have plans.”
“Your face,” Victoria says, deflecting. “It’s not bruising too badly.” When did Anna get so close? The girl hasn’t moved, Victoria realizes as she reaches out to touch the faint pink mark over Anna’s cheekbone.
Anna tenses, so Victoria doesn’t press down. She withdraws her hand more slowly than she should.
“It’s fine,” Anna insists.
“Well, you’d know by now if it was broken. And Anya?”
“Yes?”
“I’m not going to make you rehearse again now. Go, have a life while you still have an hour to spare.”
“You’re sure?”
“Am I ever anything but?”
“I’ve only known you a week…” Anna’s grin is slow, impressed at her own daring.
Victoria shouldn’t indulge it, but a hint of a smile won’t kill her.
“So I didn’t screw it up completely?”
“Predictably the men in suits are falling over themselves to throw money at my little experiment. I assured Rick I could polish you up even more. People like shiny.” It’s a sin of omission, at worst.
“Right. I should go check on Irina. She didn’t look so good.”
“What did I just tell you about other people’s problems?”
“There’s a way to be a person. You said I had free time, so it’s up to me how I use it, right?”
“Fine,” Victoria snaps. “Don’t say you weren’t warned.”
Victoria waits for the quiet to settle again. The building exhales quietly, dispersing bodies into the neon and first cold snap of a New York fall. Victoria sits on an abandoned chair, knee twinging at a night spent on the forbidden high heels, and lets herself breathe all the way out.
“Jess?” Anna gave only vague directions to the locker room, so she isn’t sure her sister will have ended up in the right place. Victoria Ford can take her precious freaking ballet and shove it up her—
“There you are.” Anna greets Jess from the door of the room, a little stunned that Jess is currently propping up five feet eight inches of floppy ballerina.
“I heard her lashing out, so I came in to calm her down,” Jess says. “There was some crying and now I think she’s sort of asleep…on me?”
Anna rushes across to help. “I know where she lives, it’s not far.”
“Is this what the new intake have to do? Usher the old-timers through their crises?” Jess asks. “Because babysitting actors is my job, but this shouldn’t be yours.”
“It’s been intense” is all Anna will confess. “Let’s just put her safely indoors and go
get a drink, okay?”
“Victoria happy?” Jess asks, and it’s just too nonchalant.
Anna can’t even bring herself to ask. She gives a nod.
“You kicked so much ass tonight, little sis.”
“I screwed up a pirouette.” Anna groans as they leverage Irina through the doorway between them and start shuffling down the hall to the elevator. “Which at this stage in my career is like forgetting how to walk. I should kill myself, basically.”
“And yet here you are, all limbs intact. So you can’t have really screwed it up.”
“I think it’s officially on,” Anna admits, pulling Irina’s arm tighter over Anna’s shoulder. The last thing anyone needs right now is Irina hitting the floor. “Do you think that means I’ll really have to do…I don’t know…press? Photos in the program, all that jazz?”
“Not jazz,” Jess answers in her best Anna, you idiot voice. “Ball-et. Remember?”
“You’re hilarious,” Anna deadpans. “She’s kinda heavy for someone so skinny.”
“Sssh!” Irina half grunts from where she has her head on Jess’s shoulder. “Calling me heavy, malenkaya.”
“Well, I guess she knows who I am? Irina? If you’re conscious, could you maybe help with the walking?”
She tries at least, as they exit out the side of the lobby and toward the impressive building that houses Irina’s killer apartment.
Jess raises an eyebrow when she sees where they’re heading.
“S’ry hit you,” Irina mumbles.
Anna hopes her sister doesn’t hear. Judging by the way Jess almost drops Irina right there, no such luck.
“Dancing accident!” Anna soothes her protective sibling. “I got too close at a dumb moment.”
“Sure?” Jess asks.
Anna nods, and they continue steering Irina across the darkest side of the plaza, sticking to the shadows as much as possible.
Sundays have become Victoria’s favorite day somewhere in the mix. Maybe it’s the high of coming off a Saturday night performance that lingers in her bones, or maybe it’s just the thrill of having gotten exactly what she wanted, again. Either way, she’s in a far better mood.
It’s a full class schedule today, but nothing that’s on Anna’s roster. The new photoshoot is arranged, subject to Anna agreeing to come in on her dark day, but working a Monday once in a blue moon isn’t the last sacrifice Victoria will ask of her. Better that Anna get used to it now.
“Kelly?”
“Yes, all-knowing ruler?” Oh good, wiseass Kelly showed up to work today, in a cat sweater and ripped jeans no less.
“Did you get the company housing arranged for Anya yet? I have to drag her in tomorrow for a photoshoot, so something new and shiny to distract her would be great.”
“I freed up that one-bed you used to—”
“Fine, fine,” Victoria interrupts. “Keys?”
“Wait, you’re going to take her?” Kelly can’t hide her amazement.
“I’m cultivating a working relationship,” Victoria explains, completely truthful in every word. “Don’t act like I never do anything for my dancers.”
“By all means, if you want to revisit old stomping grounds then…catch!” Kelly pulls a set of keys from one of her pockets and tosses them toward Victoria, where they almost fall short but skid across the desk in loud, faltering bounces.
“What time is she done with David?”
“Around two,” Kelly answers, the human encyclopedia of the entire company’s schedule. “Should I call your car for then?”
“Mmm.” Victoria picks up the keys and shoves them in her purse. “Do that.” She waves Kelly away.
CHAPTER 13
Anna takes her time in the shower. On the way in she’d dropped into a drugstore and picked up the most expensive conditioner they had. Probably not up to Victoria’s standards, but a start at least.
She’s humming their last bout of rehearsal music as she comes back into to the locker room. Distracted, it isn’t until Anna reaches for her locker that she realizes she has company.
“Jesus!”
“The comparison has been made,” Victoria drawls. “But he only walked on water, not en pointe. You take your time, don’t you?”
“It’s nicer than my sister’s shower,” Anna says, her heart pounding. “And well, conditioner takes longer than normal.” She tugs at the loose tuck of her towel over her chest, willing it not to suddenly spring apart on her.
“Speaking of your living arrangements,” Victoria says, from where she’s sitting on the long bench that bisects the changing area, “when you’re dressed, meet me out front. We have an appointment.”
“But isn’t Kelly—”
“Out front, Anya.” Victoria stands in that fluid way that makes Anna think of black satin ribbons. “Unless you want to dance your debut season with backache from sleeping on a lumpy couch.”
“Sure.” The flush of a good session after Saturday’s relative success is deserting her in favor of a wave of nerves. “Out front. I’ll just get some clothes.”
“Well, I’m not staying for the floor show,” Victoria calls back as she heads for the door, but at least she sounds amused. “You know that I don’t like to be kept waiting.”
Anna grabs her jeans from her open locker and waves them at Victoria in acknowledgment. It’s dorky, but Victoria leaves with a short, satisfied nod.
“What now?” Anna groans. She can’t believe she thought that the actual dancing might be the most terrifying part of her new job.
Rushing as fast as she can, she towel-dries and braids her hair down her back before pulling dry clothes over slightly damp skin. It’s not the most put together she’s ever looked, but it looks way better than her usual efforts from her old wardrobe. The gray T-shirt is almost a little too revealing with its dipping neckline, but Anna hopes her mother’s necklace will divert some attention. Black jeans and her favorite sneakers are dressed up with a cute jacket from Victoria’s haul. A bit of lip gloss and mascara, and Anna is as close as she’ll get to ready.
She’s prompt, at least. Victoria barely has time to check her watch a second time before Anna comes barreling across the foyer, skipping down the broad steps with a gambol that would put mountain goats to shame.
Victoria nods toward the car, sunglasses firmly in place. Her driver is distracted, so Anna opens the door for her. That expectant grin should be irksome, but Victoria’s never been one to look a gift horse with good manners in the mouth.
Anna slides in on the other side, having taken her time to walk around the car.
Perhaps the nerves set in at the thought of confined spaces; Victoria knows she has that effect on the hardiest souls.
“So when you said this was about my living arrangements…” Anna trails off, fixing her seat belt and scanning the traffic as the car pulls out.
“I have time, for once. And if I see the place for myself when you move in, it preempts any whining in two months because you don’t like the drapes.”
“If I don’t like the drapes I’ll just change them,” Anna says. She’s just that little bit more sure of herself.
Victoria pulls Anna’s sunglasses off when Anna turns to look at her, a chance to inspect the aftermath of Irina’s damage last night.
“You did bruise.”
“Hardly at all,” Anna lies, hand rising to cover the mark automatically. “I iced it as soon as we got home from Irina’s, and again this morning.”
“From Irina’s?”
“Someone had to get her home.”
A touch of reproach; that’s daring.
“So where are we going?”
“Not far,” is all Victoria feels like divulging. They could have walked, but the power balance feels more intact in a chauffeured car. “Why? Somewhere else to be?”
“I was just going to run through Kitri again.” Anna settles back against the leather, shrugging. “That wobble on the second-to-last pirouette is still bugging me.”
Victoria smirks. “You know you’re not actually dancing Don Quixote this season, right?”
“Still,” Anna sighs, leaning back against the headrest, almost relaxed.
Victoria studies her a moment in peripheral vision. There’s a stillness, a solidity there. In a life punctuated by fragility and chaos, that slow-blinking, easy-smiling kindness isn’t entirely unpleasant to be around. God, her shrink will have a field day if she starts talking like this out loud.
“How attached are you to your day off?” Victoria makes the effort to say it almost sweetly. “I know being dark on Monday is sacrosanct, but I have a photographer who owes me a favor and we need to shoot immediately if we’re going to revamp the brochure.”
“Like new headshots?” Anna asks, still looking out of the window. “I just got them done before the auditions, I’m good.”
“Headshots?” Victoria scoffs. “Well, God knows we could do better than the Shirley Temple knockoffs with your résumé. No, the shoot is for the season program.”
“But you’re just putting my name in it!” Anna laughs around the words, seemingly more nervous than when called out in front of the entire company. “The program is for… It has… People will be so pissed!”
“How am I supposed to launch you as my principal if no one knows what you look like?” Victoria makes the reasonable point, but Anna is practically scrabbling at the leather seat, as though she can back away from the very idea and escape into the trunk of the car. “Being a principal is not just about dancing. There’s a certain media presence, although we’ll preserve the air of mystery around you for as long as possible. The visuals? Nonnegotiable.”
“But I’m just… I mean, I saw Delphine’s photos from spring and that was like Vogue or something. I…don’t look like that, Victoria.”
“Which is why Susan and her best people—who, despite constantly wearing cargo pants, know everything about fashion—will be on the case. It takes a village, Anya. When are you going to start trusting that I know what I’m doing here?”
