It is.
I almost think that it’s all in my head when I glance over at the thermostat. It’s down a few degrees again, and I bump it up to where it should be.
Strange.
I’ll have to see if Lark is having the same issue. Maybe we need to contact the super.
I dress as quickly as I can, then lean over my journal to dump a few thoughts and doodles onto the page.
“Coffee’s brewed!” Lark’s too-cheery-for-5:30-a.m. voice calls through the door. I sigh in relief. I need some caffeine after that night of sleep—or lack thereof. Throwing extra clothes into my dance bag, I turn off the light and beeline for the coffee pot.
“I can’t believeyou invited Blake over last night,” Lark groans from behind her steaming cup of coffee. I pick mine up and take a sip before setting it down on the table in front of us. Lark can’t stand Blake, both at the studio and outside of it. She’s made it very clear she doesn’t enjoy his regular visits to our apartment. “I’m just grateful to be immune to his charms. Watching everyone moon over him is gagworthy.”
“I didn’t invite him over. He asked to see me.”
We are both busy, both building our careers, though his is leaps ahead of mine. As a man, his ballet career is set up for exponentially quicker promotions. The reality is there are not as many of them, which creates a higher demand for strong male dancers. Despite her personal dislike for him, Lark can’t deny that Blake is a phenomenal performer. He had his pick of companies, but he chose the Institute because of their illustrious reputation and they’d all but guaranteed him an accelerated track to principal.
Lark sips her coffee before setting it on the table, then she places a hand on my knee. “You deserve better than being an asshole’s booty call.”
“He’s not an asshole.”
She cuts me a glare.
“Well, sometimes he can be a bit of a prima donna, but he doesn’t think of me like that.” We might not be ones for fancy date nights or prophetic declarations, but when he looks at me, it might as well be a spotlight beaming down.
“Oh really?” Lark nods at Delilah as she emerges from her room in an oversized t-shirt and heads over to the coffee pot, pouring herself a cup. “What did you talk about for the whole hour he was here before he quickly cut out?”
“We talked about plenty of stuff.” My mind goes blank when I try to recall, but I’m sure we did. “We talked about rehearsals.”
It’s a vague enough answer. We always chit-chat about dance, though less than we used to since I took my sabbatical. While I was on leave, I avoided talking about myself much—what was there to say? I was grieving, dealing with recovering from the accident, and avoiding everything that came with all…that. Now that I’m at Ballet Potomac, I’ll have more to share with him.
“Are you at least getting off?”
My face heats, and I’m glad I wasn’t mid-sip because my coffee would have been sprayed everywhere. Lark’s lack of a filter is something I love about her…as long as it isn’t directed at me.
“Th-that’s private.”
“That’s stress relief, which is important.”
Grabbing my coffee, I quickly bring it to my lips, taking a big gulp.
“So, no,” Lark replies for me, and she and Delilah exchange smugthat’s-a-man-for-youglances.
“I’m not talking about this with you.” When I realize how harsh the words come out, I take a deep breath and another sip of coffee before adding, “But I appreciate that you care.”
I know her concern isn’t really my sex life. We’ve been best friends since we danced together in high school. Even after going our separate ways, her training with the Institute when I went to Tisch, it was easy to settle into the familiar rhythm of friendship when I moved back.
“I don’t want you to get hurt, Jojo.”
“And I love you for that, but Blake makes me feel like I’m not some broken ballerina who will never see the spotlight again.” He never pitied me after the accident. Never mentions my injury, though I’m sure he has noticed it. He treats me the same even with not being invited back to the Institute. What we have is the one constant, other than my friendship with Lark, that still remains all these months later. One part of my life that hasn’t shifted despite the scars I’ve accrued, both visible and unseen.
Lark’s hand squeezes my leg, and I flinch, not at her touch, but because her thumb presses on the spot where I’m most sore from yesterday’s rehearsals. She brings her voice down to a gentle whisper, laying her palm flat on my leg. “You will see that spotlight. But that has nothing to do with him and everything to do with you.”
I sigh in frustration, the sound grating at the back of my throat. “I hate starting over. It’s like all those years of work were for nothing.”
“They weren’t for nothing. Now you understand what’s expected ten times better than those other girls. Soloist and principal may be closer than you think.”
With my luck, I’m not counting on it. I have no guarantees I’ll even make soloist at Ballet Potomac. I’ll be competing against those who have been paying their dues there since the beginning of their ballet careers. Dancers who are hungrier and haven’t been exhausted by the toll this career can take on you mentally and physically.
