‘How would that work? And where the hell evenisthat?’ I asked her, the irritation obvious in my tone.
‘Twenty minutes from Victoria on the train,’ said Emily, rolling her eyes.
‘On anovergroundtrain?’ I asked, confused.
‘You candothe train, can’t you?’ said Lira. ‘Or is it only chauffeur-driven limousines these days?’
I gave her a withering look. ‘I am perfectly able to use public transportation. I would simply prefer not to.’
‘Well, sadly, we don’t all have that privilege,’ she quipped.
‘Right, we must begin. Let us start with the American smooth,’ said Carlos. ‘Emily – music, please.’
Emily scurried over to the sound system and I suddenly wished I was anywhere else but here. I had been so excited about this show, but the proximity to Lira, the realization of how much time we would have to spend togetheralonein a studio was becoming more and more difficult to manage.
I stood up, moving into the centre of the dance floor, feeling the music in my body as it piped out of the studio’s speakers. Lira joined me on the floor and we stood opposite each other, looking at one another without speaking, listening to the track, letting the ideas come.
‘Why don’t we start separately and then come together?’ suggested Lira. ‘Like this: you over there, me over here.’
She directed me to the far-left corner of the room, while she took her place on the right.
‘Something like this?’ I asked, marking out some steps.
She followed suit, executing them perfectly.
‘Each step should move us closer together,’ said Lira.
‘Always keeping eye contact,’ shouted Carlos, who was watching us with crossed arms.
And as she moved closer to me, and we added in step after step, I found myself longing for the moment I could feel her body pressed against mine again.Porca miseria!This was not a good start, and I had a feeling that things were going to get much, much worse.
CHAPTER SEVENLira
When I arrived back at the studio after rehearsals, Sedi was lounging on one of the armchairs, chatting with somebody on video call.
‘Oh, hey,’ she said to me before flipping her eyes back to the screen. ‘Lira’s back.’
‘Who’s that?’ I asked, wrapping my cardigan around my body.
I’d worn loose black trousers and trainers to leave the studio earlier because I’d told them I was going to see my GP. Stupidly, though, I’d completely forgotten to change back after rehearsals and now I dearly hoped that Sedi wouldn’t notice I was wearing a skirt and a leotard underneath my thankfully oversized knitwear.
‘Nolo’s on the line. Here, look,’ said Sedi, flipping thescreen around to show my youngest sister, who was sitting cross-legged on her bed. I was usually delighted to talk to her, just not right at this moment.
‘Wasn’t expecting to see you,’ I said, taking a seat next to Sedi, forcing her to shuffle over to make room.
‘Missed you, too,’ said Nolo sarcastically. ‘Anyway, I can’t chat for long, I’ve got rehearsals in forty minutes.’
Nolo was currently living the dream – although she assured us there was still much more she wanted to achieve. She must have read the Misty Copeland autobiography about fifty times and was the most focused and ambitious person I’d ever met. Nothing – and I mean nothing – was going to get in the way of what Nolo wanted, which naturally made her just the tiniest bit selfish, but we forgave her because she had lots of other amazing qualities and none of us were perfect, were we? She was a member of the New York Ballet Company and had moved out there when she was a teenager. Ballet had been her passion since she was two years old – I still remember me, Sedi and Mum waiting outside while she took her first class – and she’d always been brilliant at it. She was brilliant at most things, as it happened, including life, generally, in my opinion. She didn’t have a problem saying no to Mum. She had no time for boyfriends and yet somehow had men begging to go out with her, and on the odd occasion she said yes to dating someone,shewas the one who broketheirhearts because they wanted to get serious and she didn’t. Today, she looked every inch the prima ballerina in her tight blackvest, black leather jacket and relaxed hair pulled back into a sleek bun. Nolo was leaner than me, and taller, with a smaller chest and narrower hips and a long, slim, elegant neck. Sedi was curvy like me, but because she was tall, too, nothing seemed quite so obvious.
It was like I’d come from a different set of parents (I hadn’t – I’d checked!).
I’d grown to love my more curvaceous figure over the years: my wide shoulders, my rounded hips, my nipped-in waist, the fact I was only five-foot-four. I’d come to terms with my body and how it looked and what it was capable of – which was quite a lot, actually – and how I feltinsidemy skin. The self-doubt had lessened now, and when I was on a dance floor, I felt sexy, attractive and desirable. Off it, not so much, but that was a work in progress. Unless somebody like Gabriele came along, tearing all the good work I’d done on myself to pieces, setting me back not just one step but several.
It had taken months for me to forget about him – or at least to not think about him every waking moment – and now here he was, cruising into my life looking beautiful, still, and dancing with me in the breathtaking way he always had. But this time I would remain strong. I would be cordial, but aloof; friendly but guarded. We would work together for rehearsals, the London run and then the performances in the European cities I couldn’t wait to visit, and then I would walk away from him. Because, after all, I’d done it before, which meant I could do it again.
‘Everything okay with the doctor?’ asked Sedi, giving me a concerned look.
‘All fine,’ I said, brushing her off. I really did not want to have to make up a whole bunch of details about my non-existent appointment. I felt bad enough about lying to them as it was.
