by Tonya Plank
I caught Arabelle looking at Drew, rolling her eyes. Drew looked right at me. He smiled and waved. I waved back. But Arabelle wouldn’t look at me.
I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned to see a tall, thin woman who looked as if she’d had some plastic surgery done. Her face was a blank stare.
“Oh, hello,” I said.
“You need to reserve practice space with reception downstairs. Even teachers.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t—”
But she’d already stomped off. Wow, who was this woman? Alessia’s little minion when Alessia didn’t want to be the bad guy maybe? I looked around the room. It wasn’t crowded at all. I couldn’t have been bothering anyone. I guess rules were rules. I took my things and began my way downstairs to check with Alessia.
“I see you just met everyone’s favorite studio biatch,” a voice I recognized called out on my way out the door. I turned to see Paulina from my class who was practicing a Waltz with a partner.
“Oh, hey, Paulina.” I chuckled. “I was wondering what I did.”
“Uh-uh. Nothing. That’s Luna, aka, the Wicked Witch of the West, honey. Pay her no mind. She hates everyone here and everyone pretty much hates her. But they pretend to give her a little smidgeon of power, because…you know.” At this she rubbed the fingers of one hand together, the universal sign for money, indicating the woman was loaded.
“Ah,” I said with a nod, now a little glad I didn’t teach here permanently. Studio politics… well, I could definitely live without those. “Thanks for letting me know.”
“Sure thing, hon. We don’t want her sending any excellent new teachers running in the opposite direction now.”
I smiled. “Don’t worry. She won’t.”
“I’m going to your show next Tuesday. Can’t wait!”
“Paulina, get ready, our music’s next,” her teacher said, taking her into closed beginning ballroom position.
“Thank you again,” I said. “I hope you enjoy the show.”
“Honey, I know we will!”
Her music started. It was a sweeping Viennese Waltz. I watched as she and her partner flew over the dance floor. Wow, she was very advanced. She was a little larger than her partner, but once they took off they looked perfect together. She was so light on her feet. She knew her stuff, that was for sure. Maybe I could convince her to dance in class.
“Ooh,” she mouthed at me as she whisked by. She averted her eyes to someone behind me. I turned to see Arabelle and Drew walking toward the front door, bags in hand. As she flew by me again, Paulina shot me a raised eyebrow. I smiled. This woman was on the same page as me, for sure.
I followed Drew and Arabelle downstairs. I wanted to talk to Arabelle. It seemed she was mad at me and I wanted to make things right, to explain why I was here. But they were fast. Drew ducked into the men’s room on the first floor.
“Arabelle,” I called out. But she disappeared behind the door on the opposite side. I jumped into the men’s locker room, changed into my street shoes, and threw on my sweats above my Latin pants as quickly as I possibly could so I wouldn’t miss her.
Just as I was about to run out, I heard someone call out behind me.
“Hey, quite impressive.” I turned to see Drew.
“Oh, hey, thanks.”
“Yeah, you sure wowed the women. Especially Greta.”
“Greta?”
“Our coach. She trains lots of people here, including Belle and me. She’s a former longtime Latin champ and she’s wicked good. You impressed the queen of ballroom.”
I laughed. “Yeah, I mean, she looks like it.” I badly wanted to know how he knew I’d wowed the other woman in the back room as well. “You know how long Arabelle will be here? I just wanted to say hi since I missed her the other night.”
“You know each other?” He seemed surprised, so she obviously hadn’t talked too much about me.
“We just met briefly in Vegas.”
“Oh,” he said. Then, his eyes seemed to dart up and to the right, as if he was thinking of something. “Ohhh,” he said, now apparently putting two and two together.
“Ohhh, what?” I said.
“Oh? Ah, nothing. I just, my mind wanders sometimes! Anyway, it looks like I’ll be seeing you around!” He patted my back, somewhat awkwardly, as if he’d been caught in something and wanted to escape the situation, then fled out the door. I left the men’s room and stood in the hallway, across from the ladies’ room door. Damn, where was she? I waited five more minutes, then ten, then decided to call it a day. Drew was right, I’d be seeing plenty more of them.
Oh my way out, I approached the receptionist, a very pretty brunette. She blushed when she looked up at me.
“Hey,” I said, somewhat flirtatiously, before mentally kicking myself. Why was this always my first approach with women?
“Hey yourself,” she said, more flirtatiously.
“Ah, I was practicing on my own after my private lesson and someone came up and told me I needed to reserve space on the practice floor. It was pretty empty up there, being morning and all, so…”
She laughed. “Luna? Yeah, she’s a nutter. I mean, you’re supposed to, but, you know, we don’t always enforce the rules on the pros. Especially during quiet hours.” One eyebrow was impressively raised and she had a sly smile.
“I see. Thanks for letting me know. But since I’m new here, I’d like to play by the rules.”
“Okay, that always works,” she said. “Sooo, you want me to book something for you?” She said this with the same tone as you might say, so, want me to do you? Ugh, I could really kick myself now. I’d started this with my flirtatious tone. Not that she wouldn’t be quite fun to hang with. But I didn’t want Arabelle thinking I was a total man-whore. And, I don’t know, for some reason I just couldn’t get my mind on anyone but her. Even though she wasn’t being so cool to me right now. Maybe that’s what made me long for her more.
“Yeah, can I, uh, see a schedule?” I tried to be nice without sounding like I wanted to fuck her. That was always a hard balance to find for me.
“I have it right here. You want to come over?” She faced the computer, and motioned to the seat beside her.
“Sure.” I walked over to her side, looked down at the screen. It had all the rehearsal times of everyone who’d booked the private room for the week. I saw Arabelle and Drew had lots of standing reservations, early morning and afternoons. I made a mental note of when I could catch her.
“Cool, so can you put me in for tomorrow from two to three?”
“Of course.”
“Cool. See you then,” I said before realizing what it sounded like. I did not know how to not flirt. I just didn’t.
She giggled again and I waved and walked out.
Chapter 10
Arabelle
I met Drew and Greta in the practice room at Infectious Rhythm for our regular one to three practice time. For the first hour we had the back room. Things went the same as they had been for a while. I was still getting the tremor. Okay, it was actually getting worse. I needed to book another session with the therapist. I just had to work in a few more private lessons before I could afford it. Insurance paid very little for mental health—which this was classified as—since I’d had all the medical tests my primary care doctor ordered and they’d all come back negative. That left only anxiety, she’d said. I felt like I could conquer it if it was only mental. But I was beginning to think mental disorders were the hardest to overcome, because it’s like you’re playing mind games with yourself and you don’t know how to stop the game. I just had to pinpoint what was causing it, and eliminate that.
That was really our main problem as a partnership. It was hard to maintain a good solid connection with Drew. I felt my nerves radiate from my body to his. It was getting so I didn’t even want to touch him for fear of making him all shaky, like me.
It was also affecting my concentration. I knew the steps of our choreography backward and forward, but
it was now the shaking that was making me more nervous. So I was forgetting simple things. My technique was solid since I’d been dancing so long, but Greta was adding all this fancy styling and it was hard to focus on making that as brilliant as she wanted it when most of my attention was on this ridiculous tremble.
“I’m sorry,” I heard myself say over and over again.
“You shouldn’t say that, because it’s not your fault. It’s not something you can control,” Greta said. “Really. Just try to concentrate and not think about it. I know it’s hard but you’ve got to put it out of your mind. Sweetie,” she added, trying to make her tone sound less harsh.
For the second hour of coaching, we used the main room since one of the wealthy students had booked the back room for a private lesson. I hated being out in the open room for all to see. And I hated feeling that way because I’d performed in front of large audiences so many times before. I didn’t want to be scared of people watching me. What was wrong with me?
The second we got settled in the main room, guess who waltzed in? Out of all the studios in L.A., he had to walk into mine. I’d noticed him yesterday out in the main room with this same pair of students. Unbelievable. He already had private lesson bookings and had only been at the studio for a few days. He caught me looking at him. He smiled and even waved. I looked away. I was still fuming about him stealing our choreography and doing it so obviously, and right in front of me. But I didn’t care to say anything to him. It might seem petty, though it wasn’t to me. My choreography with Willem was everything to me, the most important thing I still retained of him. But he didn’t need to know that, or that he’d upset me. I’d just ignore him.
“Okay, with that little drama over, can we continue with our lesson?” Greta said to me, one eyebrow raised to her hairline. What? Drama? Drew looked like he was about to crack up, which at first seemed inappropriate until I looked at Greta again and noticed her cocked smile. She was ribbing me about something. What? “You and this guy seem to have a little something from the past, no?”
Greta, being German, sometimes didn’t get her words completely perfect in English. I had no idea what she was talking about.
“You know, Mr. What Happens in Vegas Stays in Vegas.” Drew pointed toward Jett.
“Or not, apparently,” Greta cackled. “You met him in Vegas?”
Ugh. Were they serious? I was totally ignoring Jett. “No. Nothing at all. I don’t know him at all.”
At this, it was Drew’s turn to cackle. Greta turned her cocked smile and raised eyebrow toward him.
“Ah.” Greta raised a palm to both of us. “Yes, it should stay in Vegas then. I do not need to know.”
“Nothing happened. We just met. Nothing happened,” I repeated more adamantly.
“Well, he is a good dancer. Very good. We saw yesterday. That is all I have to say about him. Anyway, let’s continue.” Greta waved her long, graceful, swan-wing-like arm at us.
We continued, picking up where we left off with the rumba routine. But now my stupid shaking was even worse, being in the direct line of vision of Jett. Would he steal this choreography too? Greta would be pissed. And then he’d have to deal with her wrath. He shouldn’t be watching me since he had students of his own. But this guy didn’t seem like the type to respect rules.
“It’s okay, shake it off. Do you need a moment?” Greta asked after my trembling was so bad, from elbow to wrist, I had to use my other hand to quiet it. I shook my head no.
“Yeah, that’s gonna look so cool if you end on no hands fish. That’s such an awesome step, and totally in line with the music. Wham!” Jett said, smacking his hands together excitedly.
Was he out of his mind, I thought? A no hands fish is a popular ballet trick but it takes a very advanced student. Both the male and female have to have a great deal of strength and coordination. The woman needs to be able to hold herself up by her back for a solid several seconds. That’s not easy. And she has to have very strong legs to hold herself around him by wrapping one leg around his back. The students were all amateurs.
“Earth to Arabelle?” Greta sang out. I whiplashed back to her.
“I’m fine,” I said. I took several deep breaths, pretending I’d merely been regrouping and catching my breath and not completely engaged in another teacher’s private lesson. Especially that other teacher’s.
“Okay, are we ready to try again?” she said. I nodded. We repeated the routine. My shaking was intense but I tried hard as I could to ignore it, along with the increasingly loud laughter and animated talking coming from across the room. They were having a damn lot of fun trying to kill themselves.
“You got it, you got it!” Jett shouted. “I mean, I think. I mean, wait, how’s that gonna...” The student was trying to wrap her leg around the poor guy with the damn Latin stiletto on. She was going to drill a hole right in his back with that thing. She needed to take it off and try it barefoot. I’d never seen anyone do that trick in heels, only in ballet shoes. “Ah…” Jett looked at the heel and then up at me for this first time since he began his lesson. Then he glanced at Greta. He quickly looked away and I wondered whether she’d given him a little glare for being too loud. When I returned my attention to Greta, she was looking right at me with the raised brow. “It seems like he could use your help, Ms. Showdance Diva.” She nodded toward Jett.
Ugh. I was kind of busy myself. “We don’t—”
“It’s okay with me if it’s okay with Drew,” she said.
He nodded. “Yeah, why don’t you take a little break from this. Maybe that’s what you need. Just for, you know, five or ten minutes. I can stay a little late.”
No one seemed to realize I didn’t want to help Mr. Jett the Jackass. I turned back to him. He seemed to have heard the whole discussion from all the way across the room. “No, no, no, I’m totally not bothering you while you’re at work. I can…I’ll talk to you about it later, and you can give me pointers, Arabelle. Seriously. Thanks but, really, go back to your work.”
“He needs your help. That girl is about to ice pick her guy right in the back and he doesn’t even know it, poor dude,” Drew said. “Just take five, Belle. Come on. Do it for the guy. Not Vegas guy, I mean the other one.”
He was right. The male student needed help. Because he wasn’t getting it from this teacher.
“I’ll only be a second,” I said to Greta, then hurried over to Jett. Jett shook his head but I cut him off. “I only have a second, but you can’t do that with the heels on. At least not for now. She needs to practice and get the strength in her back first so she can hold herself up or he’s going to drop her straight to the ground when he lets go of her torso. And he will freak out and drop her once he feels that stiletto ice-picking his back.”
“Ice pick?” the male student said. Jett’s mouth fell open. But for once Mr. Pompous had no words.
“Seriously, let her down so she can take off her shoes.”
The student looked at Jett, who nodded. “Lady knows her stuff. She’s the world showdance champion five years in a row.” I didn’t remember telling him that. I had no idea he knew.
“Yes, we know.” The woman giggled.
“This is Paolo and Judy,” Jett said to me. “And, I guess you already know her, but if you haven’t officially met, this is the amazing Arabelle Fonseca, world showdance champion.” It was sweet how he was lauding me so, but I kind of wanted to slap him since I was a former champion, and only with Willem. Now I was a Latin finalist. And I knew he knew that, since he apparently knew everything else about me.
Judy giggled again and Paolo offered his hand with a polite and grateful nod. I took it. He was strong. “Honored to meet you,” he said as we shook. I couldn’t help but blush. How’d Jett land such nice students?
“Well, thank you. And same here. You’re on the mambo team. I’ve seen you dance. You’re both very good.”
“Ooh,” Judy squealed.
“You don’t know how much that means coming from you,” P
aolo said.
Another blush.
“Thanks so much for helping, Belle. But, I mean, I don’t want to take too much of your time right now. I know you were practicing.”
Belle? That was what Willem had called me. Then my dearest friends. How dare he just start using that nickname! I seethed, but only inwardly. Judy and Paolo were too sweet. And any blowup right now would be totally unprofessional. I looked back at Drew. He was practicing the routine with Greta and she was giving him corrections and advice. They were working. I was glad they weren’t stopping the lesson for me.
“Okay, so you will need to take your shoes off,” I said to Judy. “I’ve never seen anyone do this in Latin heels, or in any kind of heels.”
She looked deflated. “But I need to wear the heels for our performance.”
I understood, but seriously didn’t know if they could do this move if she wore them. But I wasn’t going to say that right now. They’d figure it out later. “That could end up being okay. But definitely not when you’re learning. You need to hold yourself up wrapping your leg around his back, and your heel could get stuck somewhere bad. Let’s just try it without first.”
He held his arms out for her as she kicked her shoes aside. I shook my head again. “No, you’re not ready to do it together. Judy needs to make sure she has the strength in her back first. Here, get down on the ground. Like me.” I sat down, then laid on my stomach. She laughed and did the same.
“Good, now raise your legs and your arms, like me.”
She imitated me.
“Good, now arch your back up as high as you can, like me.”
She did so, but her arch was way too low.
“Come on, higher. You can do it.”
She took a deep breath and lifted, for all of three seconds.
I stayed arched for a few more seconds and then let myself down, out of breath as well. But it felt good to work muscles I hadn’t worked in a while. “See, you have to work up that flexibility and strength in your back. If you’re not arched way up, when you’re at his waist level and he bends down, your head’s going to hit the floor. You have to arch way up to avoid falling into the ground. And you’ll have to hold it for longer than that.”