Bad Reputation

by Stefanie London

  But Wes’s intense stare was like being hit from behind by a tidal wave.

  “Yeah, and you don’t want to get crushed like some sucker.” She drew her arm back, calm and straight. “You’re in control here.”

  When she released the ball, it sailed perfectly, hitting the floor with a solid thump and racing toward the center front pin. Strike!

  “Still got it.” Remi wiggled her hips and sauntered back to her friends, a cocky grin on her lips. “How many strikes is that now?”

  “Technically, it’s a spare, since you had a gutter ball the first time,” Annie said, smirking.

  “If my math checks out…” Remi craned her head up to the screen above their lane. “Yep, still winning.”

  “Enough fighting, children.” Darcy pushed up from her seat to retrieve her bowling ball. “Prepare to watch a miracle.”

  The girls cracked up. Darcy was so far behind there was no way she would catch up, not even if God himself sent her ball sailing down the lane. And she lacked the fierce competitive streak that Annie and Remi shared, priding herself on being able to score as little as possible with the utmost creativity.

  “I’m still confused,” Annie said. “Why did you say no?”

  “She’s worried his giant cock will eat her alive,” Darcy said from the front of the lane.

  “Darcy!” Annie shushed her as the people in the next lane whipped their heads around, suddenly interested in the sordid turn of conversation between the three women.

  “Believe me, it’s not that. All that online gossip stuff is bullshit anyway.” Remi toyed with the strap on her top. “And who cares if he’s well-endowed unless he can use it.”

  “So why turn him down?”

  “He’s part of the world I left behind…” She sighed. “I don’t know exactly. I think I got scared about being tempted by all that stuff again.”

  “Does that mean you’re really done with trying to get into a company?” Annie asked.

  Remi knew what her answer should be: yes, I’m done. But no matter how much time passed, she couldn’t force herself to say it aloud.

  “I’m done with making a fool out of myself,” she replied carefully. “Besides, Allongé is really starting to pick up. The new studio opens next week, and Mish has given me a good chunk of the schedule. I might even branch out on my own one day.”

  “You mean take the safe route.” Annie bobbed her head.

  “Going into business is not taking the safe route,” Remi argued.

  But even as she said the words, her thoughts contradicted her. It did feel like the safer option, because no one was going to point at her during class and tell her that she didn’t deserve to be there. That she’d gotten her position through nefarious means.

  No one would question whether she was good enough. She’d proven herself already, and that meant she was safe.

  “If it’s really what you want, you know we support you,” Annie said. “But I remember the bright-eyed woman who walked into Darcy’s apartment and proclaimed that she was going to be the best ballerina New York had ever seen.”

  God, she’d been so naive back then, thinking she could swan into this great big city and make something of herself.

  “With age comes wisdom, I guess.”

  Annie wrinkled her nose. “Or settling.”

  Was that what she was doing by accepting more hours at the barre studio? By not going out with a guy whose chemistry grabbed her by the throat simply because he reminded her of her past? Maybe. But despite what her parents had always told her about aiming for the stars and all that bullshit, it was better to excel where she knew success was possible than open herself up to even more disappointment.

  “In any case,” Remi said. “If I was going to attempt to get back into a production or a company—which I am not—sleeping with the guy who has the ability to make or break my success wouldn’t exactly be the smartest move on the earth, would it?”

  Darcy made a hmm sound. “That’s a very good point.”

  She didn’t need the girls to confirm it. Her ex, Alex, had made damned sure she learned that lesson when he’d denied having any feelings for her or for the baby she’d told him she was carrying. Guys in that world were driven by their own needs; they put their careers before everything else. Before obligation, before responsibility, before any other living, breathing person.

  “Why does it matter if you’re not planning to go back into auditioning?” Annie asked.

  “I don’t want to be reminded,” she said. “No amount of great sex is worth opening that old wound.”

  She’d moved on, healed. Mourned the loss of her career. Why would she ever put herself through that again? It was emotional sabotage, and Remi had learned the best way to avoid that was to keep things at a distance—her old dreams, her memories…and men.

  Chapter 4

  “Dating Wes is like riding a roller coaster in Disneyland. It’s thrilling, but first you have to get in line.”

  —SohoHoney

  Doubt was a stubborn bitch. It burrowed under Remi’s skin and forced her to question every life decision she’d ever made in an incessant loop. Replaying all the times she’d screwed up like some montage of failure, waking her at the crack of dawn and holding sleep firmly out of reach.

  Seven a.m. Her alarm wouldn’t go off for another hour and yet she was already out in the crisp, early-morning air. She burrowed her chin into her bomber jacket as she headed out of the Lexington Avenue subway station. The city had cooled over the past week, the mornings developing an edge. Especially at this hour.

  And while she would have loved to cuddle up with her duvet and a coffee instead of heading out into the bracing wind, the apartment was too silent. Way too silent.

  The quiet made her think. Remember. Doubt. All things she avoided. Keep life fun and light, that was her motto. But lately, it’d started to feel hollow and worn out.

  On her way to the Upper East Side studio, Remi turned the corner and hurried down East Sixty-Sixth. The trees lining the street had commenced their annual change, turning from green to yellow and orange. This walk always felt so “New York” to her, with the cute apartment buildings and their zigzagged fire escapes, the yellow school buses and cabs, and the buildings with the awnings that stuck out onto the street to shelter people from the rain. It had all the things she’d seen on Seinfeld, Friends, and Sex and the City growing up in Australia.

  According to the new schedule, the second studio would be free for a few more hours. That’d give her enough time to stretch out and unwind. To lose herself.

  “You’re early.” Mish looked up from the reception desk, dark rings under her eyes. “I thought you were starting at nine.”

  “I needed to get out of the house.” Remi shrugged out of her jacket and slung it over one arm. “Do you mind if I use studio B?”

  “Of course not.” Mish yawned.

  “Late nights with the kitten again?”

  As if on cue, a tiny meow cut through the quiet reception area. Remi had been so wrapped up in her thoughts she’d failed to notice Mish’s feline companion, who was tucked neatly inside her sweater, a fluffy, gray head poking out where the zipper stopped midchest.

  “Yeah. I think I’m going to call him Pukey.”

  “He’s entirely too adorable for a name like that.” Remi reached out to gently stroke his head, and the kitten shut his eyes contentedly.

  “It’s Pukey for short,” Mish said. “His full name will be Little Cat of House Mish. First of his name. King of the litter box. Shredder of curtains. Destroyer of carpets.”

  Remi grinned. “Rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it?”

  “Well, he certainly acts like a king when he’s not curled up like this. I’m convinced he’s only cute when other people are around.” She chuckled and nuzzled the kitten’s head. “My sister suggested I call him
Runt.”

  “How about Mikhail?”

  “As in Baryshnikov?”

  “Yeah.” Remi studied the kitten. He was a scrawny little thing, with hair that stuck out in all directions and a charming twinkle in his eye. “He might not have the stature of other cats, but there’s something special about him.” Just like the famed male ballet dancer.

  “I’ll call you over the next time he decides to revisit his meal and see if you still think he’s special then,” Mish grumbled, but Remi could plainly see that her friend was totally and utterly smitten.

  “It’ll get easier, mama cat.” Remi paused for one more bit of kitten love and then headed into the smaller of the two studio spaces.

  The empty room chilled Remi to her core. Somehow it felt colder inside than it was outside.

  Remi rubbed her hands together as she walked the length of the room, the slap of her sneakers echoing off the walls. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and set it into the docking station. A second later, her warm-up playlist floated through the studio’s speakers.

  She took her time warming up, giving her muscles and joints an extra-long stretch. Lately, she’d found herself coming to the studio outside her scheduled classes, a certain piece of choreography tugging at her brain. Calling to her. It was the feeling she used to get back home when she danced regularly, a gnawing obsession to tweak and perfect. Which meant she’d been dancing more and more, no longer satisfied by simply conducting barre fitness classes.

  It was a tough piece occupying her brain—a piece that could be magic in the hands (or was that feet?) of a talented ballerina but a hot mess if performed incorrectly.

  Giselle.

  Remi identified with the famous ballet, with the naïveté of the heroine in early act one. Unaware of her fate, unaware that things were about to fall apart in a way she could never have imagined. This piece was the blissful ignorance of a girl who incorrectly assumed she had everything before her.

  Like Remi had in the past.

  She slipped on her pointe shoes, a pair that was knocking on death’s door. She couldn’t bring herself to replace them, because that would be like admitting she might have a use for them beyond dancing alone in a studio, like admitting she wished that someone would watch her. That someone would see the spark she felt deep in her bones.

  “No one is watching,” she muttered to herself as she reached for the pale ribbons attached to her shoes.

  There was something ritualistic about it. About the silky feel of the satin at her fingertips, the fluid way she crossed the ribbon in front and behind, tying the knot and tucking away the ends. She pointed and flexed her feet a few times, making sure the ribbons didn’t cut in.

  The music wound through her, notes seeped in hope and optimism. It was lively and upbeat. Remi could practically see the corps de ballet around her, dressed in their peasant costumes with puffy sleeves and knee-length skirts.

  She tried to imagine she was Svetlana Zakharova, her career idol, prima ballerina with the Bolshoi Ballet. A prodigy. Widely considered one of the best ballerinas of modern times.

  Remi rocked forward into first arabesque, her back leg extending behind her as high as it could go. Try to touch the back wall. Then her heel came down, and she pushed her opposite leg higher still, for just a second.

  “Not good enough.” She started the music again.

  This time she pushed harder, stretching higher. Feeling the pull in her arms and back and hamstrings. Yes. Arabesque in first, then down. Serré, développé. The moves picked up speed, and Remi imagined the frothy layers of Giselle’s white-and-blue skirt swirling around her legs. More arabesques, this time with attitude. Faster. Higher.

  The music lifted her and she spun. Pirouette after pirouette. Piqué tours en dedans, the air flying through her hair as she whipped around.

  “Again,” she said to her reflection.

  Remi stretched her head from side to side, rolling her shoulders before hitting play and putting everything she had into that first step. Over and over and over.

  She’d dreamed about these steps, about this ballet.

  She’d been a member of the corps then, on the verge of stepping up to a soloist position. Her obsession with Giselle was in spite of not knowing if she had the skill to pull off such an iconic role but wanting it so bad that her teeth ached from the hunger of it. It was the role she’d thought might show her parents what she was capable of, that ballet wasn’t only rigidity and form. That when used correctly, the training could set her free instead of binding her.

  “Again.” She restarted the music.

  This time she stopped thinking and let the notes take her over. It was like falling into a trance, as though someone else controlled her body and she was only a vessel for the story. The steps fueled her. They penetrated her bones, fortifying her. They became her and she became them.

  The last part of the piece, a series of piqué turns, was like flying. The world rushed past, but Remi’s head was clear, her mind unburdened for what felt like the first time in months.

  The sound of someone clapping startled her. She whirled around, hand at her throat, to find Wes Evans standing in the doorway of the studio.

  “That was a hell of a show,” he said. He leaned against the doorframe, hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans, his dark hair wild and windswept.

  She glanced at her reflection in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors. Speaking of windswept…

  Remi tightened her ponytail. “Can I help you?”

  “You already did.”

  What was that supposed to mean? She hit the pause button on her phone. The sudden silence amplified the beating of her heart.

  Of course your heart is beating hard. You just danced your butt off. It has absolutely nothing to do with him.

  “Seriously, you’re…magnificent.” He stepped into the room and let the door swing shut behind him.

  If she thought he’d looked incredible before, then this was about to blow her expectations out of the water. Tight indigo jeans, chunky black boots, and a fitted black leather jacket. All that darkness made his eyes look like chips of aquamarine.

  She wasn’t sure how to respond. Having someone like him—someone who knew good ballet—catch her unawares was daunting as hell. She’d sooner have him walk in on her naked.

  Great work. Now she was thinking about where that might lead.

  Stop it. Now.

  “Thank you,” she said, her cheeks burning. “Are you here with Frankie? There’s no parents-and-kids class this morning.”

  “Actually, I called to see when you’d be teaching next and I was told you were scheduled for this morning. I was hoping to catch you before your class. When I mentioned that I was here recently, your boss seemed to remember the story about the guy who got roped into joining your parents-and-kids class.”

  Remi’s cheeks burned. So Mish had confirmed that they’d talked about him—great. “And you hustled over early to talk to me?”

  “It’s almost eight.” His lip quirked. “I’m usually at work by this hour.”

  “Well, if you think turning up will convince me to go on a date with you, then think again,” she said, choosing to shield herself with a hint of snark.

  “Giselle is an interesting choice,” he commented as though she hadn’t shot him down.

  The Anaconda isn’t used to rejection.

  Oh God. Now she really needed to stop letting her mind wander.

  “Why? It’s one of the most beloved ballets of all time.” She busied herself with untying her pointe shoes.

  “Interesting was the wrong word.” He stopped in front of her, his shadow blanketing her. “Ambitious is more what I meant.”

  Ambitious. In other words, beyond her skill level. She knew it, of course, but the assessment stung a little.

  “I know many a ballerina who’d give
their leg for the role of Giselle,” he added.

  “I imagine the piques would be a little difficult with only one leg.”

  He grinned. “Figure of speech.”

  He was right, of course. Giselle was one of the most sought-after roles in existence. To be the perfect Giselle—to do the legend justice—a dancer would need to have near perfect technique, grace to rival the prima ballerinas of the past, and they’d have to be an actress too. Giselle was known for its combination of mime and dance, something that could trip up even the most perfect technical dancers.

  Which was exactly why Remi loved it. It required heart and feeling, passion. Not just a series of immaculately executed steps.

  “And how did I do?” She wrapped the ribbons around her pointe shoes, fighting the dread building in her stomach.

  If his assessment was too negative, then it might crush what was left of her spirit. But if it was too positive, then she wouldn’t believe him.

  Pathetic.

  “I believe I said it before.” Wes reached his hand down to her. “Magnificent.”

  She hesitated a second before accepting the gesture, bracing herself for the singing electricity that zipped between them. It came right on cue. Dammit.

  “High praise from a VIP like yourself.” She stowed her shoes away in her bag and then stuffed her feet into her sneakers.

  “VIP?” He cocked a brow.

  “Well, being the son of a Broadway star and an accomplished ballerina, you must have some weight in the industry. Hence, very important person.”

  His eyes raked over her, and for the first time since they’d met, she saw something sharp. Edgy. His jaw ticked.

  “I guess you could say that,” he replied. “Although you make it sound like I’m a bull being assessed for breeding.”

  Her lip quirked. “Is this where I get to check the goods?”

  “I don’t know about you, but I like to at least have a meal first.”

  “Wow, a real live gentleman. Didn’t think those existed anymore.”

  Remi was suddenly aware they’d drifted close to one another, as though some invisible force were pushing them together. Each sentence traded was like a degree added to her body temperature. She pressed her hand to her cheek.