‘I don’t mean to make things difficult for you, Gabriele,’ said Mama, feeling bad now, no doubt. ‘I know how busy you are. Forget I said anything.’
I had dragged it out of her, I supposed, but still – she could have made something up. The last thing I felt like doing was celebrating now.
I ended the call and put my head in my hands, trying to clear my mind. Perhaps my mother was being melodramatic; she did have a tendency to overreact. And my papa was a grown man – if he felt unwell, he needed to go get himself checked out, and I did not see how I could force him to do so, or why I should have to.
A knock on the door jolted me out of my melancholy.
‘Come in,’ I called, probably more tersely that I should have done.
The door was eased tentatively open and Lira poked her head around the frame.
‘Hey,’ she said.
She was glowing. Happy. And why would she not be? She had just danced the gig of her life and had pulled off the almost impossible, just as Carlos had reassured us she could.
‘Hey,’ I said, sitting up.
‘Am I disturbing you?’ she asked, hovering in the shadow of the half-open door.
I waved her inside. ‘It is fine.Prego entra.’
She let the door close behind her and suddenly we were alone in the stagnant heat of my windowless dressing room, her eager, open face lit up by the bright bulbs dotted around the edge of my mirror.
‘How did you think it went?’ she asked, crossing her arms and then uncrossing them again.
She was nervous; it was adorable.
‘Almost perfection,’ I said.
She laughed. ‘Always so modest.’
‘You would do well to sell yourself more, Lira. Who else is going to do it for you?’
‘Maybe,’ she said, a slightly wistful look in her eye, as though I had hit on something that felt important to her.
Her family, I guessed. If she was keeping the fact she was doing the show from them, I could only presume they were not supportive of her career choices. But how could they not be when she danced as beautifully as she did? Were they not proud of her? But then I thought of Papa and how he had never said he was proud of me, either. Quite the opposite at times.
You are throwing your life away on a stupid dance job! Call yourself a man? A real man would run the family business, like a good son should.
‘I was thinking we should rehearse the rumba a little more, if you can find the time,’ she said. ‘I messed up that step. And one or two of the lifts felt a little clunky.’
She was exactly right, and I could not help but be surprised at her attention to detail. I’d barely registered it myself, but thinking about it now, one of the lifts had felt more difficult than it should have been.
‘What are you doing tomorrow daytime?’ I asked her.
‘I thought I would celebrate by working like a dog in the studio all day,’ she said, with a wry smile.
‘You are joking?’ I said.
‘Half-joking. I do have a couple of lessons to do in themorning – the cover teacher has a medical appointment she can’t get out of.’
‘Shall I come to James Jive after that? Say 1pm? We can run through the dance for an hour or so and then head back into London together for warm-up.’
‘Sure,’ she said, frowning a little. ‘You’re agreeing to come all the way out to Castlebury for an hour without complaining? Who evenareyou?’
‘Hilarious,’ I quipped.
Her smile was infectious. Way to get me out of my bad mood.
