A Forbidden Finale (Student/Teacher Romance)

Chapter Three

Chapter Three

I walked into the studio with what I hoped was a neutral expression. On my lunch break, I'd done the natural thing and Googled Ethan Langley to find out everything I could about him.

He was good.

Not just–"wow, he's pretty cool,"–but insanely talented. I looked like a sham compared to him. I hadn't been able to find anything about his personal history, but judging by the videos I'd seen, the fact he wasn't dancing with a company was insane.

My stomach twisted with nerves. I was practically belittling him by having him instruct me. I was a ballet peasant compared to what I'd seen in the video of his own end of year performance. Mr. Langley wasn't here yet and I picked at my nails. I wanted to get this over and done with; I wanted to know how horribly embarrassed I was going to be by the end of it.

Dancing poorly in front of the whole class was one thing, but I'd watched Mr. Langley's videos and I had to admire him. When I messed up in front of him it was going to be a personal hell. I couldn't kid myself into thinking I didn't care what he thought. He knew what he was talking about.

The door opened a minute later and I straightened my back, gaze darting to his tighted up bum for only a second. I'd been right. It was perfect.

He was silent whilst he gave me a once over. I knew he was looking at my dimensions, seeing what I could do with myself, but my skin didn't understand that and it burned under his appraisal. I might not be a good dancer, but I put in the work and I had the body to prove it. "Let's start with the basics," he said.

The expression he wore screamed of distaste and I wanted to slap it right off his pretty face. I wished he'd been ugly as fuck. I wanted an excuse to hate every part of him. Unfortunately, he was a flawless looker and dancer.

I stood at the barre and followed his instructions, cheeks burning red as I wondered what awful thoughts he was having about my technique. "Plié from first," he barked, mouth returning to a hard line after the word had left his mouth. "Tendu."

I groaned when he kept going. "Can't we not use the French words? My ballet teacher just called them squats, it made everything far more amusing." If we were going to have to spend hours together I couldn't deal with them being filled with one word commands only.

He stared in what I assumed was horror before grimacing. "I'll write you out a dictionary of the proper ballet terms to memorise."

I rolled my eyes, but continued to follow instructions. "So, how long have you worked here?" I could make conversation and do the basics. The silence was killing me.

"You're supposed to be focusing."

"I'm a chatterbox. I can't spend however long this lesson is going to be listening to my own breathing, it's torture. Even if we're reciting ballet terms to each other it'd help." I cast a glance over my shoulder and revelled in his irritated face. If he wanted to hate me then it wasn't in my prerogative to grovel until he liked me.

"Posture," he snapped, forcing me to look back in the mirror at my reflection. "And two years now."

"You don't need an actual teacher's like degree to work here, right? How old are you? Do you have to pass a ballet test or something?"

It was a tired breath that he let out and I smirked. I almost considered letting him get on with job and improve my ballet, because I definitely needed it, but I refused let this be a walk in the park for him whilst he sent his disdainful glares my way. I'd never had to deal with being looked down on before coming to Briarwood. It turned out I didn't deal with it very well.