swear by him. Now I just have to contact Dr. Hanson and get my records sent over.” Frankly, she’d rather chew glass but it was something that had to be done.
“Not looking forward to it?” His gray eyes were sympathetic.
“Asking for a second opinion is a slap in the face, no matter how you look at it. He’s not going to be gracious about it,” she said. And, rational or not, she was angry with Dr. Hanson. Both he and Andrew had given up on her before she’d had a chance to prove herself. The last thing she wanted was talk to either one of them.
“Want me to do it for you?”
“Yeah. But I’m not going to let you. You know, Monsieur Laurent, I’m beginning to think you have a bit of a Sir Galahad complex. You’re always primed to ride to my rescue at the drop of a hat.”
He made a dismissive noise.
“What do you call trying to sleep on the camp bed last night?”
He looked caught out.
“Exactly. You’re too gallant for your own good.”
“Humph.”
“What?”
“My sister said something similar the other day.”
“Well, then, it must be true.”
He smiled, and she smiled back, and for a long moment they enjoyed the camaraderie.
See? This is normal. Just like old times, B.S.S. Before Shower Scene.
Then he looked at his watch.
“Guess we’d better get started, huh?” she said.
That quickly, she was nervous again.
“Guess so. Unless you need to do something else today?”
“No. Nothing else.” Unfortunately.
She reached for the sash on the robe. This was her way of repaying Max for his hospitality. It was the least she could do for him.
She let the robe slide down her arms.
Like yesterday, he was busy organizing his pencils when she looked at him. She turned her feet out and pulled in her belly and squared her shoulders.
“Okay, I’m ready when you are,” she said.
He barely glanced up. It struck her again how commonplace this must be for him. She was simply another model, another body. Which made it even more stupid and pointless to feel so self-conscious and uncertain.
“Let’s start with fourth position, en pointe,” he said.
She moved smoothly into the pose, concentrating fiercely on achieving perfect form and posture. Anything to stop herself from thinking about the fact that she was standing naked in front of Max, and that yesterday he’d been so hard and—
Enough!
She gritted her teeth and arched her back a little more. He began to sketch. She kept her mind busy reviewing the choreography for the production of Giselle she’d been rehearsing before Dr. Hanson ended her career. After ten minutes, Max asked for a second pose, then a third, each of which she held for close to fifteen minutes as he worked. Nearly an hour later, he paused to flick through his sketch pad. She stretched out her calf muscles and surreptitiously massaged her bad knee.
“Do you feel up to something more dynamic?” he asked.
His gaze was on her knee. He’d caught her rubbing it. She turned her feet out and stood tall.
“Whatever you’ve got.”
“I don’t want to aggravate your injury.”
“You won’t. It’s healing. Work is good for it,” she said. “I have to start building my strength up again.”
He looked doubtful. Self-consciousness forgotten, she rose up en pointe and began a series of battements, her feet flashing as she flicked one pointed foot in front of the other in a rapid, beating movement, her arms held in a graceful curve at midchest height.
“Okay, okay. Point taken,” he said, shaking his head.
“What were you thinking of?”
“Do you remember the season of La Sylphide we did right before I left the company? There was that series of fouetté rond de jambe tournants toward the end of the last act.”
She tried to recall the choreography he was referring to. It had been a long time ago and there had been many, many sequences since.
Max stood and took up position, rising up onto his toes in his bare feet. Despite the fact that it must have been years since he danced professionally, his form was perfect as he began to spin on his left foot, his right leg raised and bent at the knee as he demonstrated a fouetté. His right leg whipped around his body again and again as he spun, powering his turns, while his arms were held extended at shoulder height.
“Yes! I remember now,” she said. The sequence spilled into her mind in an unbroken chain. The grand jeté, followed by the increasingly frantic fouettés, then the despairing collapse and surrender at the end.
Max stopped, barely breathing hard from the exertion.
“Still got the old moves, Max,” she said admiringly.
He’d been such a wonderful dancer. Watching him was like seeing a ghost from the past.
A shadow passed over his face. Yearning, regret, disappointment—she saw it all in his eyes for a few unguarded seconds before he picked up his sketch pad.
“A few more rotations and I probably would have spun into a wall or torn a muscle,” he said dismissively.
She took a step toward him.
“Do you think you can hold the end position for me?” he asked without looking up.
She stilled. He didn’t want to talk about it or acknowledge his reaction. For a long beat she considered how she would feel if their positions were reversed. Then she pivoted on her heel and walked to the farthest corner of his work space.
Some things were too painful and private to talk about.
When she turned to face him, he was once more armed with his charcoals.
I don’t ever want to know what it feels like to not have dance in my life.
The thought came from her gut. Rationally, she knew she had to retire someday. No dancer could perform forever. But she wasn’t ready to hang up her slippers yet. Not even close. The thought of losing the most important, fulfilling thing in her life was unthinkable. Unbearable.
“Do you have enough space?”
“Yes.”
She
