Infini

by Krista Ritchie

  He disappears when I lower my back to the blue mats.

  “Five,” Luka counts aloud.

  Rising up, he leans forward and places a gentle, warm kiss against my lips.

  I smile, lowering back to the mat.

  “Six.”

  I use my core to bring my body up again, and my eyes widen, horrified. I try to scream, but no sound escapes.

  Geoffrey replaced Luka; he kneels before me—gripping my ankles so tight, his fingers dig into my bones.

  His ill-humored glare slashes at me, his goatee out-grown and hair curling in oily tendrils. Before I can lie back down, Geoffrey leans forward and slams his forehead forcefully against mine—

  I gasp awake, breath stuck in my throat. My tank top and fleece pajama shorts suction to my sweaty skin.

  “Baylee. Baylee,” Luka repeats my name, his hands on my cheeks, hovering over me. I tighten my eyes shut. I’m on Luka’s top bunk.

  I’m not in the gym.

  Geoffrey isn’t here.

  I repeat it all, tired tears slipping out of the corners of my eyes.

  “Bay, can you look at me?”

  I catch my breath, my pulse racing, and I open my eyes. Luka’s concern blankets me, and I try to hang onto him. Metaphorically and physically. I clutch his wrists while he holds my face.

  “Luka…” My face is frozen in a wince. I think I scared myself.

  He quickly pulls my body onto his lap, sitting up, and his strong arms wrap around my back in a skintight hug. I press my forehead to his shoulder, my arms sliding underneath his, curving up his back.

  God, Geoffrey is invading my nightmares, and I can’t ever remember having one that vivid.

  “You’re okay,” Luka whispers against my ear. “You’re okay.”

  He’s such a dreamer. Because I don’t know if we are okay anymore. Luka has the darkest circles beneath his eyes, as sleep-deprived as me, and these past weeks, months, have been a giant struggle.

  He searches my gaze. “What are you thinking?” His voice is a whisper since Dimitri is on the bottom bunk beneath us.

  “That we’re sinking in quicksand, and I’m afraid…” I shrug, unable to say the rest.

  Luka combs back the sweaty pieces of my hair. “He won’t be our choreographer forever. This will end at some point.” His lips rise. “And we can watch the Mets lose to the Cubs in peace.”

  I start smiling. How am I smiling? “Hey, you have to admit, the Mets showed spunk and fought a good fight.”

  “Oh yeah,” he says easily. “They never gave up.”

  Those four words hang over us for a moment, and our eyes dance over each other again. I don’t want Geoffrey to hurt Luka, but our choreographer pushes him before and after performances in ways that he doesn’t push anyone else. Not even me.

  He has this gross fascination with Luka’s emotional restraint, and he tries to trap him in different acting exercises. Just to break him down.

  Each one ends the same way: Luka starts laughing and Geoffrey orders him to leave the gym. It plays out so often now, I’m scared that outcome will morph into something worse.

  The bottom bunk creaks, a body rolling ungracefully out.

  I rest against Luka. “We’ve woken the sleeping giant.”

  “Say that a little louder, I couldn’t hear you over your dry-humping,” Dimitri says, flitting on the lights by the dresser.

  Luka and I squint.

  “We weren’t humping,” I say flatly.

  Dimitri rests an elbow on the dresser. “Sounded like dick against pussy to me.”

  Luka rubs the tired corners of his eyes. “Shut up, dude.”

  I yawn again. “You seriously make it impossible to forget human anatomy.”

  “I’m an educator,” Dimitri agrees.

  “No,” Luka and I say in unison.

  His eyes dart between us, waiting for one of us to explain the truth of the matter, but we both hesitate for a long moment.

  Dimitri is concerned enough that he says, “I can always go find Brenden. I’m sure he’d love to hear about Luka’s pecker in his sister—”

  “Fuck you,” Luka says with very little malice.

  “Okay,” I say, and as he spins to the door, I add, “No, wait. I meant okay I’ll tell you.” I rotate so I’m on Luka’s lap, but I lean my back to his chest. He holds me comfortingly around the waist. “I had a nightmare.”

  Dimitri makes this grunting noise that sounds like a hmm.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Just wondering if it had anything to do with Geoffrey.”

  My stomach drops. “How’d you know?”

  Luka frowns. “You had a nightmare about Geoffrey.” It’s not a question. His concern heats me up inside, and he rubs his face again like he wishes our torment would all end tonight.

  Dimitri explains, “I’ve been having a reoccurring nightmare where Geoffrey starts screaming at all the girls in Infini. My brothers and cousins restrain me, but I eventually land a fist in his face. And I’m fired.” He thinks for a second. “I thought maybe Geoffrey wasn’t just penetrating my mind at night. Maybe yours too. That fuck-face.”

  Luka asks, “What happened to fart-face?”

  “He became a fuck-face when he started penetrating brains at night,” Dimitri nearly growls. He massages his knuckles and scans me in a once-over.

  Luka extends his leg out, his muscle probably cramping. “Geoffrey needs to relax.”

  We wear weak, nostalgic smiles as we’re subtly reminded about the sex toys and relax note someone slipped in Geoffrey’s office.

  “Did I ever tell you,” Dimitri says, “I found out who gave him the blow-up doll and ball gag?”

  My eyes grow, curious, but my phone buzzes. I search beneath the buried blankets while Luka asks, “Who?”

  My ankle touches the hard phone cover, and I wrestle with the sheets for it.

  “Sergei.”

  I freeze. “Sergei?”

  “No,” Luka rejects the idea. “Someone’s fucking with you.”

  “If they were fucking with me, I’d know it,” Dimitri says. “You forget that I grew up with Serg. Once upon a time, I knew him better than I knew you.”

  I find my phone. “Sergei is a rule-follower.”

  “To the core,” Luka adds.

  “Like me. Like Nikolai,” Dimitri agrees, “but Sergei also can’t turn down a dare. Erik dared him, and what do you know—it happened.”

  Luka looks dumbfounded.

  Dimitri flips off the lights, returning to his bunk. “You’re probably too young to remember all of Serg’s dares. Nikolai once got him to streak buck-ass naked through a Waffle House in Atlanta.”

  The bed squeaks as he climbs on, the entire structure rumbling. I clutch Luka’s thigh in case the bed collapses.

  I’ve imagined the super shitty scenario a dozen times, and I always feel terrible for Dimitri Kotova. On the flip side, he told us that if he dies underneath our bunk bed, he’ll haunt our asses for the rest of our lives.

  It’s a seriously terrifying threat.

  Luka calls down, “How old were all of you, back then at the Waffle House?”

  “Fifteen, seventeen,” Dimitri says from below. Luka would’ve been nine-years-old at that time, and while he mentally sifts through his history, I click into the email notification.

  Date: August 25th

  Subject: New Changes

  From: Geoffrey Lesage, Choreographer

  Cc: Baylee Wright

  Baylee Wright:

  Starting tomorrow, you will practice with machetes for the opening number. Clubs are over. (You will still perform with fire for your juggling act and use balls for the trampoline act.)

  I expect a completed, pristine performance with machetes on stage in one week.

  Don’t fail this show.

  Geoffrey Lesage

  Infini Choreographer

  geoffreylesage@mailme.com

  I have no reaction. None at all.

  I spin my scree
n to Luka, the soft blue glow illuminating his angered eyes.

  It’s a rare sight, his anger. I keep soaking in his features. He’s twenty-one now. He looks older, but more so from stress.

  I pre-ordered the Hamilton soundtrack on vinyl for his birthday, August 21st. He’s been obsessed with the musical, and the soundtrack is releasing soon, so he was happy and surprised I remembered.

  But I wish I could’ve done more. Hamilton just moved from Off-Broadway to Broadway this month, and he would’ve loved to go.

  It’s not even the price that stops me. We don’t have time. I mean, we celebrated his birthday in Verona, the club. Not the city. And even then, Luka and I had to leave early.

  Geoffrey had the costume department make miniscule changes on our “nightmare” outfits. He scheduled us for fittings on that particular day, at night.

  Luka shakes his head. “We’ll get Perrot to change this.”

  “Perrot hasn’t fought Geoffrey on anything. Even Nikolai called him spineless.” I can’t be surprised anymore that this is happening. I can’t even be mad. I feel like I’m reserving all my energy for an apocalyptic scenario where Geoffrey attacks Luka.

  Luka looks away, thinking.

  “You know what’s weird? Months ago,” I whisper, “machetes seemed like the most dangerous, worst thing that could happen.” I shrug. “Now they don’t seem that bad.”

  Luka gapes at me. No one ever asks if I’m being serious because they always know I am. “Come on, Bay.”

  “What?” I frown.

  “They’re bad.”

  “They’re dulled, and I can put rubber on the edges while I practice.”

  His nose flares. “What happens when you drop the machete on your head and the blade hits your skull? You’ll need twenty stitches, and you may form a stutter.”

  So that happened to one of my instructors when I was eleven. I shouldn’t have told him that story. “Will you still love me if I form a stutter?”

  “Bay,” he forces.

  “You better,” I say. I already know he would.

  Luka hugs me again, and he presses a long, warm kiss to the top of my head. As though healing a wound that hasn’t arisen yet.

  FALL

  Act Forty-Eight

  Baylee Wright

  A moan tickles my throat, my lips parted in an O-shape, and I accidentally thwack the handle of the shower for something to hold onto. Hot water cuts off, steam vanishing from the glass inside Luka’s bathroom.

  My mind is on an earth-shattering ascent while my bare body is in Luka’s possession, my right leg hoisted over his shoulder. He kneels on the tiles, his fingers pressing in the soft flesh of my thigh.

  I tingle all over, and my hand finds his thick hair, gripping as he kisses me right between my spread legs. As his tongue flicks and laps my sensitive clit, I tremble against him. Oh God.

  Oh God.

  I cry out, and I pinch my eyes closed, losing sense of place and time. I force my eyes open for one reason. To see him.

  Breath tight in my chest, I look down.

  His mouth encloses my pussy, kissing deeper, harder. His tongue is a force that I know intimately now. And his gaze, locked on mine, almost sends me over, soulful grays devouring me whole.

  My muscles tighten, and I clench and clench. My pulse dives straight down. Throbbing. God, I’m throbbing so badly. In the best, best way.

  He hits another sensitive spot, and my back arches. I feel myself slipping, my legs shuddering, and I’m unable to hold myself upright. Reaching out, I knock over a shampoo bottle and soap. I clutch onto the tiny ledge with one hand, the other, I fist his wet hair.

  “Luka,” I moan. Luka.

  Luka.

  I can feel his smile against my heat. And then his fingers slowly fill me, pulsing in and out. Slow and firm. I inhale a sharp breath.

  Holy shit. My world rotates, and I tighten around his fingers. My moans turn inwards, caught deep in my throat. I shudder and shudder, my body bowed towards Luk.

  And then the door flies open.

  My face drops as Dimitri and I look straight-on at one another. The glass shower isn’t fogged anymore. There’s no more running water, and he can easily distinguish me from waist-to-face. Nipples, boobs—all exposed. And Luka’s head is between my legs.

  Great. Just great. I have the shittiest luck. Thankfully, Dimitri growls a curse and spins his back to the shower.

  Luka casts a quick glance over his shoulder before rising. Both of my feet are now on the tiles, and Luka snags a towel off a shelf in arm’s distance and wraps it around my body.

  “I saw nothing,” Dimitri says, solidified in the doorway. “That’s a lie. I wish I saw nothing. I saw Baybay’s tits.”

  I cringe. Is this karma for that one time I saw his dick in my peripheral?

  “Dude, you can leave now,” Luka says.

  Dimitri adds, “This would’ve never happened if I heard the motherfucking shower.”

  So now it’s our fault. I refute, “You need to fix the bathroom lock.” It broke yesterday when Dimitri said the wood couldn’t handle his brute strength.

  “My bathroom lock. Not the. You’re the one crashing in my suite. You’re my guest—”

  “She’s my guest, my girlfriend,” Luka interjects, “and seriously, leave.”

  “I can’t.” He rotates towards the mirror, but he trains his gaze on the sink.

  I secure my towel and squeeze out my wet hair. Luka opens the glass door, completely naked. His tattoos just barely stop at his ass, and he doesn’t even bother cupping a hand around his dick.

  “Why not?” Luka asks.

  “Tell me what I just saw aren’t bruises from work.” He’s worried.

  Luka and I exchange a look, and our eyes travel down each other’s body. Yellowish and blackish bruises mar Luka’s back, waist, legs, his pale skin dotted with them, and I’m not any better.

  Big purple and blue welts bloom across my brown skin, saucer-like patches around my hips, knees, and my shoulder.

  I shrug at Luka. Neither of us wants to lie to family and friends. We were forced to, and now that we have the choice, we’re choosing honesty.

  Luka explains, “We were having trouble with her standing on my shoulders—the timing, and this past week Geoffrey has been running us in drills off the mats. Look, I combatted him, got Perrot on the phone, but he said, it didn’t sound bad.”

  I tighten my towel, a chill in the air. It’s known that Perrot mostly sits behind a desk, not very knowledgeable about the ins-and-outs of disciplines and athletics. If asked what a burpee is, I question whether he’d know the answer.

  Dimitri looks out of the corner of his eye, noticing me covered, and he faces us. Luka still stands unabashed and naked in the shower doorway.

  Taking in the welts all over his younger cousin’s body, Dimitri cocks his head. “I never saw you two off the mats. When was this?”

  “At night.”

  “How much sleep—”

  “Don’t,” Luka starts. “There’s nothing we can do but deal with it, and we’re dealing.” We feel trapped, but in a different way than when the contracts loomed over us. Luka already went to medical on my behalf.

  And coincidentally, I went to medical on his behalf.

  We were both called in. They examined our bruises and said it’s normal in our profession. They don’t feel the harshness or cruelty in each one. So I’ve become more and more resigned.

  Dimitri glowers. “This shit isn’t work. That’s abuse. And it’s ending.” He storms out of the bathroom, but he calls back, “Get dressed! We have plans to make!”

  Act Forty-Nine

  Luka Kotova

  At a 1:00 a.m. stage rehearsal, I slump a bit on a midnight-blue velveteen seat, just to kick up my feet on the chair in front of me. The cast fills the middle rows, watching Infini’s acts until our turn arrives to perform.

  On stage, Zhen and Brenden clutch ivory straps rigged to the ceiling, and they slice through air, circlin
g each other. In sync as the music crescendos to a heart-stomping beat. The breathy, celestial lights sweep their bodies, and they gracefully collide like two archangels born together.

  I’m drawn in for a full minute, and I’ve seen their act before.

  The only reason it may be axed: Corporate thinks there are too many “aerial” acts in Infini, and aerial straps could be replaced by Cyr wheels. (Which is ridiculous—it’s called Aerial Ethereal.)

  Bay is worried, but I don’t think it’ll happen. We’re in October, and contract renewals are coming in January. If anything, Infini has a greater chance of being cancelled. Sales are only up 4% from last year, and I think the Masquerade and AE were expecting a 20% increase.

  (That’s the monthly gossip, provided by Luka Kotova.)

  Quietly, I shake Junior Mints into my mouth, my left arm around Bay’s chair. She conked out about an hour ago, and I’m not waking her since she’s done with rehearsal. We’ve all just been ordered to stay put until everyone finishes.

  Brenden stretches in a split midair, and Zhen balances on his head with one hand, their limbs extended in clean angles. Even without costume and makeup, they’ve hooked in the attention of the cast.

  My cousin Abram draws forward, his eyes lit up, and his chest lifts as trumpets infiltrate the score. Zhen and Brenden increase their momentum, soaring.

  This is why I love art. The circus moves people.

  Art moves people.

  To me, there’s very few other things more amazing than that. After their act ends, Geoffrey nears the stage to speak to them.

  He’s been testy since trampoline performed. The four oldest guys—Sergei, Dimitri, Erik, and Matvei—have been purposefully fucking up their routines at rehearsals only. Just to distract Geoffrey.

  It works sometimes. His attention veers on them more than us, but I really didn’t want my cousins and brother to risk their reputations. Professionalism matters to them.

  I’m the one who doesn’t give a shit.

  But once Dimitri gets an idea in his head, there’s no stopping him.