Dancer's Body

Chapter 29

"Legato sequence four," Roman barked at them. Olivia scrambled to keep up.

Her first day as an official dancer with RCDC and she already felt way behind. It was like being dumped as the new kid in a foreign and dangerous school. There were cliques, inside jokes, and short-hand terms she'd never heard. What was sequence four, again?

Fortunately, Roman hadn't picked on her for stumbling at the rehearsal. But on the other hand, he'd pretty much completely ignored her.

"Mind your kinesphere," one of the male dancers hissed at her as she nearly bumped him. She'd already forgotten everyone's names, too distracted by the raised brows and whispers when Roman had introduced her that morning.

"Okay," Roman called, exasperated. "Take ten. And get it together during that time."

She followed the rest of the dancers to the wing, looking around for her bag with her water and tape. It was nowhere to be found. A couple of the dancers were eyeing her from the fold-up chairs, sipping casually on their own thermoses.

She stalked over to them. "Where is it?" she asked.

"Where's what?" one of the lithe women replied, a smile playing at her lips. Her top knot was so tight it was painful to look at.

"Give it to me," Olivia demanded.

"Oh! She is bossy. He must like that," one of the other women said mockingly.

"I don't know what you're talking about," the top knot said sweetly.

Agitated, she walked away quickly to hunt down a makeshift water bottle.

"She definitely slept her way to the position. If you know what I mean," one of the dancers said behind her back.

"Back at it," Roman said as they fluttered back to the stage.

Olivia had thought rehearsals for her university performance were demanding. They had nothing on this. Nearly six hours of dancing, and Roman still didn't seem happy with any of them.

She refused to limp as they were dismissed. Instead, she watched the dancers, grouped in couples, trios and little groups, hustle into the dusk sky together.

The same homeless woman sat in her car, and this time Olivia wouldn't give her any reason to out her. Olivia held in her tears until she walked through her front door.

She fell asleep to old episodes of Real Housewives, missing Hannah and chewing through an entire bag of almonds. Her body craved sustenance and protein like never before. "Where are you?" she texted Hannah, but a "Message was not delivered" was her only reply.

A sharp knock at the door roused her from her lull. Nine o'clock? It had to by Nyla.

"I'm not up for—" she began as she opened the door, but it was Roman who was on the other side.

"Can we talk?" he asked.

She brushed flakes of almond skins off her old sorority tee-shirt and pulled at her shorts, wishing she'd known he was coming. You're a complete fucking mess. "Yeah, okay," she said. He brushed past her and sat on the couch.

"Do you want anything to drink? Or ... "

"I'm fine," he said. "How was the first day?"

"All right," she said warily, perching on the opposite end of the couch.

"It didn't look that way."

She averted her eyes. Was it that obvious I don't belong?

"You can't let them get to you," he said. "They can be vicious. Consider it a type of initiation, although a harsher one than I usually see. They'll get over it, you just need to trudge through."