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Give It Time

March 30, 2007

No one had any clue to what was truthfully going on, so that was one weight temporarily off Jaclyn's shoulders. The fear, however, never left. There were just some things you could never adapt to.

One of those things being Gillian Lynne's eyes drilling screws through her at all hours of the day.

Two more weeks passed without any word. The older woman only communicated through pleased grins, or disapproving shakes of her head. Jaclyn wasn't a fool, and something was wrong. The promotional video they were supposed to do for Romeo and Juliet was postponed until further notice, and no posters or programs had been printed yet featuring her name in the starring role.

Lynne was doing it on purpose of course, it was the only way she could threaten Jaclyn without dealing with the repercussions of threatening the future king's girlfriend. Although Jaclyn was a little insulted that the woman thought she was capable of going to such extremes.

"Where's your head at today, Jackie A?" Thomas asked, approaching where she sat in a butterfly at the edge of the studio. They both had a few free hours between rehearsals as Gillian ran over the corps dances, so of course the plan was to spend the break still dancing.

Jaclyn looked Thomas over as he crouched in front of her, his hair, which was in desperate need of a trim, falling from the red sweatband, his skin newly bronzed from his vacation with his family the past weekend, and his eyes more worried than they have been in awhile.

But where was her head?

All through technique that morning her gaze had followed Gillian around as the woman sized her up and down, being ruthless with her own judging stare. At lunch she had to refrain herself from speaking, in fear that she would say too much. Her head was also thinking of the polo match that was this weekend, worrying about who would be there, they questions they'd ask. But where was she now?

Without thinking much she sprung from the ground, warm up clothes completely wrinkled. "My heads in this pas de deux," and before Thomas could argue he was being drug across the room to the stereo where Jaclyn selected the song for the Balcony pas de deux.

It started with Thomas balancing her in an arabesque straight into a grand rond de jambe lift. He swung her into a deep dip, and then back up into the air. It was like flying, and for the first thirty seconds of the dance her feet never truly touched the ground. There was something freeing in the movement of this variation. It felt youthful, her body felt eighteen again, and no longer straining to reach certain poses, or aching after big landings.

She captured the essence of Juliet by remembering what the ecstasy of young love did, of what hope and blindness brought. As she danced around the studio with elongated arms and arched feet she pictured herself back in Westminster. Seventeen, baby faced, and alight with jitters. Blind to the problems. Excited with possibilities.

There was no thinking of lessons, and lost careers, and deployment. Just the two of them entranced entirely in a single moment.

That was what she as Thomas spun her around, let her soar, and set her free.

The moment came to a collapsing end as the big kiss came up, both of them freezing, staring at the other teasingly before they burst into fits of laughter.

"We're going to have to do it eventually," she wheezed.

He pulled back from her arms, still laughing softly, to fetch his water. "I'm still of the opinion we should ask to change it

"If we do that the entirety of the ballet community will call for our heads for changing the authentic Antony Tudor choreography," she reminded him, following him like one of the always lingering White Lodge students that were awed by the both of them.