Leaps & Lies

Chapter Twenty-Six

J ulian beckons her into his car with a quick jerk of his chin. As much as her stomach is doing backflips, she knows better than to argue with him and risk someone seeing the two of them meeting at night. In the parking lot. Notably alone . And anyway, it’s raining, so she doesn’t want to stand in a dark, cold, wet parking lot while learning that—her lover?—Julian is a liar. Just like her.

As he always does, Julian manages to intuit her mood from a quick analysis of her expression and demeanor. It’s all in the way her fingers are twisting in her jacket sleeves, the way she’s absentmindedly chewing at her bottom lip.

“What is it, Viv?” It’s the first thing he’s said to her since Vivian climbed into the passenger seat of his car, only to find that he’d already turned on the seat warmer. The simple, thoughtful gesture tastes like ash in the wake of the lies and mystery Kelsey has brought to light.

Her hearts pounding, faster than it was on stage during tech. Faster than when she first auditioned for Ellapond only twelve weeks ago. Almost as fast as the evening he cradled her in his lap in Studio C.

“What’s Renaissance and why does Kelsey want me to cancel my audition?”

“Before she was in administration, Maureen used to dance. A few years back, she and Renee started Ellapond with a third partner.”

“I didn’t know Ellapond had three founders.”

“It was years ago, before I was touring with Pinsa.”

When they’re together, it’s often all too easy to forget their age difference but every reminder is startling. To think that he’s had a professional career since before she learned first position is often more than Vivian can wrap her mind around.

“The third founder was also their principal. She sprained her ACL two days before opening night of La Lumière Du Jour .”

Vivian winces in sympathy. As frustrating as her shoulder dislocation was, the timing, at least, didn’t affect the performance. She hated sitting on the sidelines, but at least she was injured early enough into the schedule that it didn’t affect her role or casting.

“Instead of just pulling in the swing for opening night and putting her on medical leave, they recast her role entirely. Maureen said that if she was younger and thinner, she wouldn’t have been injured.”

Vivian fights a gasp, knowing it would sound overly dramatic in the tense air of Julian’s car. Dance is a world of drama and backstabbing but to hear of it retold this way seems so startlingly . . . cruel. So blatantly mean. Even after being on the receiving end of Maureen and Adelina’s scrutiny, she can’t imagine ever spitting such vitriol at another person.

“But she was a founder too.” It’s not quite a statement, not quite a question. Vivian can’t help but vocalize her confusion.

“She was, but it was two against three. And without a role, she didn’t want to stay on as a silent partner. Maureen and Renee outvoted her at every turn.”

“So, she left?”

“She didn’t have much of a choice. Maureen and Renee never outgrew their love of pettiness and high school grudges. At twenty-seven, she had trouble finding a new studio to take her. She could hardly list Maureen or Renee as a reference, and she’d spent the last few years of her career with Ellapond. They practically blacklisted her. She—” Julian breaks off, voice thick and choked.

“No one knew at the time, but she . . . she ended up in the hospital after passing out during an audition. She couldn’t make herself younger, but she could be smaller. She was just skin and bones.”

Julian doesn’t have to say the words. He doesn’t have to name the demon that haunts troubled dancers. The demon that tells them to skip lunch, to eat smaller portions, to train harder, to warp their bodies into impossibly sculpted lines. The devil that takes the faces of women like Maureen and Adelina, plucking at thin skin and harping on meal plans. Naming the demon doesn’t make it easier to vanquish.

“But Maureen doesn’t even dance anymore. They pushed out their principal when she got hurt, but Maureen doesn’t even dance!” Frustration for this unnamed woman bubbles out of Vivian in sharp words.

Julian sighs, pulling his hat off and carding long fingers through his curls.

“I can’t explain why Maureen and Renee were so cruel. Hypocrisy doesn’t follow logic.”

He sets his hat on the dashboard thoughtlessly. It’s slightly damp from the rain and Vivian stares at it for far too long.

What if her shoulder had been worse?

“C’mere,” Julian says in a hoarse voice before pulling his hand from its home on her thigh. And then he’s fiddling with the handle on the car seat, pushing it as far from the dashboard as it will allow. With firm hands under her armpits, Julian hauls her right out of her seat and onto his lap as if she’s a child in need of comfort. She’s not sure which of them is more in need of physical reassurance. Her knee is digging into the seat belt anchor, and she’s far too close to Julian for how violently her pulse is pounding. It shouldn’t be hot.

“Is that why you were so weird about my sling and about private rehearsals?” she asks is a small voice.

“Yeah, Viv. I would never let that happen—” Julian’s voice breaks off, thick with emotion. She hears what he doesn’t say.

I would never let that happen to you .

His car is silent for several minutes, the air sticky with regret and lies.

“So, where do you come in?” Vivian’s heart is thumping out of her chest, battering against the bones of her ribcage, demanding answers and resolution.

“After she recovered, Ella and I started a new studio—”

“Wait, Ella like Ellapond? And you have a studio?”

Julian laughs, but the sound is sharp and warped, more acerbic than humorous. “Yeah, they drove out the named founder of Ellapond. Fucked up, right?”

Vivian can only nod stiffly, mind whirring with information. When Kelsey said Vivian needed to cancel her audition, she thought . . . she’s not sure what she thought, but she didn’t expect this . This tale of an injured woman further wounded by Renee and Maureen. An injured woman betrayed by her colleagues. Her cofounders . Though Vivian is merely their principal dancer and not their cofounder, this could have easily been her. She could have been the rising star with her dreams quickly shattered, thanks to a simple injury.

“So, I’ve been recruiting from within Ellapond for Renaissance Ballet. Scarlett, Devonne, Paige,” he says with a wince. He pauses, fingertips tightening where his hand rests in its customary place on her thigh. “Hopefully, you.”

“You know that’s fucked up, right? I mean, what Renee and Maureen did is horrible but so is poaching their dancers out from under them.”

When Julian shrugs, his fingers flex and release. “If they could blacklist and bully their principal dancer—one of their founders —then they’re a toxic danger to any of their dancers. Especially their newest principal.”

And maybe Julian has a point there. For all that he’s been recruiting behind their back, a studio run with his stern but honest instruction is certainly a safer environment for dancers than the one they’ve both been suffering through. He may be stern and grumpy, but he’s never pinched at the skin of Vivian’s waist during a costume fitting while judgmentally asking if she expects to be this large on opening night. He’s never remarked on how good her petite frame looks on stage next to Alex’s slender one. He’s never dismissed her concerns as unimportant when she brought up weeks of missing paychecks. Not once has Julian ever implied that her fall from Alex’s lift was because she was too heavy .

It’s startling how easy complacency can be. How comfortable it is to continue with the status quo, avoiding dissent and discontent. How one day the right interaction, or the right words, can serve as the shocking wake-up call to shed a critical eye on your surroundings.

Vivian hasn’t had enough experience as a professional dancer to know what her work environment is “normally like,” but she knows enough to realize that this isn’t it. The cost of walking in off the street to be cast as principal is that the gold pedestal she’s let Ms. Renee place her on truly sits inside of a cage.

“So all this time you’ve been recruiting for Renaissance and you never said anything ?”

After only a couple weeks together, Vivian understands why he didn’t reveal this secret earlier. It doesn’t stop the sting of hurt she feels at the slight. After all the secrets she’s spilled to him, she wishes he’d felt ready to trust her with this one.

“Stop,” he says, voice firm. “I was waiting until after next week to tell you. Even if you desperately deserve better than Ellapond, you deserve to have the opening night of your dreams. I didn’t want to ruin your focus.”

“And you still planned to steal me away for Renaissance after?” From her place on his lap, they sit eye to eye. Julian’s hazel gaze is warm and unwavering.

“Viv, I’m not stealing you for Renaissance. I’m stealing you for me.”

Warm hands slip under her jacket and over her leotard-covered waist. Vivian hates that the spandex material is stopping her from feeling his palms directly on her skin.

“What about Kelsey then?” All at once, the dread that was overshadowed by the truths of Ellapond’s third founder comes rushing back, a flood of ice water down her spine. Vivian shivers in Julian’s lap, goosebumps chafing against her leotard. “She said she knows. I didn’t say anything, but she told me to cancel my audition. I can’t believe that you’re poaching her. She’s blackmailing me!”

“I’ll deal with Kelsey,” Julian says with a sigh.

Vivian scoffs, puffing air against his chest. It’s what she wanted to hear—that he would take care of it—and yet it doesn’t bring her nearly the comfort expected.

“You’ll ‘deal with her?’ Are you going to tell me you’re in the mob next? Don’t . . . hurt her, okay? She’s a bitch, but she’s only a girl.”

The expression he levels at her is full of mild annoyance. “Hurt her? Who exactly do you think I am?”

Vivian rolls her eyes, pushing a little at Julian’s chest where he’s done his best to eliminate any of the distance between them. “Well, you sure seem to like hurting me . . . ”

Warm breath fans her face before Julian is forcefully tucking her under his chin. “I’m sorry, Viv. I really am. I never could have seen you coming.”

The car is quiet again. She doesn’t know what to say. Doesn’t know how to verbalize all the emotions rushing through her veins and coating her throat in tears.

I’m sorry I started all this by lying.

I hate what they did to Ella.

I don’t know what I would have done without you.

I hate that you lied.

Who is Ella, and why were you willing to risk everything for her?

When the silence is so thick that Vivian is almost choking, she speaks, “Have you known Ella long? You two must be close to prompt such an elaborate revenge plot.”

“You don’t need to be jealous,” he answers, giving absolutely no information away.

“I didn’t say I was jealous,” Vivian corrects quickly.

Julian snorts, and a puff of air tickles the baby hairs touching her forehead. “Relax, Sugar Plum. Ella’s my sister. You’ll meet her at your audition in a few weeks.”