Finding Center by Katherine Locke

Author:Katherine Locke [Locke, Katherine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781459290105
Google: Dh9KCAAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 25265879
Publisher: Carina Press
Published: 2015-08-16T16:00:00+00:00

Aly

In the dressing rooms, Sofia waits with me and catches me up on the company drama after my week away. This is what friends do, and I’m grateful for her right now. It’s lessening my anxiety about running late this morning and missing my usual company class. The first, with Madison, Yevgeny and Yana, is nearly done and the dancers for the next one fill the hall. We’re the last two in the dressing rooms.

I stare at my reflection, sliding my last bobby pin from between my lips and into my hair. Another thick section still hangs loosely from my ear to my bun. Pregnancy and prenatal vitamins are doing wonders for my previously thin blond locks. But taming my hair now requires double the hair spray and double the bobby pins. Somewhere in this room, there’s a black hole where Band-Aids and bobby pins disappear. I reach over and snag one of Sofia’s dark bobby pins with a wink. Lila will frown at me—she’s a stickler for proper appearance—but I’ll get away with it until I can buy a new box.

Sofia rolls her eyes at me and says, “You could ask, you know.”

“You’d say yes,” I laugh. “I took out the middle step.”

Sofia surveys me, leaning back from her mirror. “You look different.”

I blink and look at myself in the mirror again. “I don’t think so. Same old me. Still look way younger than I am. Still would get carded at bars if I went out.”

My heart’s pounding when I stand up and turn away from her. I wore an older leotard today, a little slouchy in the stomach, but I can see it in the mirror. I know, I know, I know I need to tell Jonathan and the rest of the company. Zed made me promise this morning that I’d tell Jonathan before I danced but he was in a meeting when I showed, and I was relieved. But some secrets you can keep. And others you can’t. This isn’t going to be a secret I can keep.

“Alyona?” Sofia knows. I can hear it in her voice. Her chair scrapes backward. The room is quiet, quiet, quiet, and outside in the hall, I can hear the murmur of voices, the sound of the water fountain running, the muted notes of the piano in the studio. Her hand on my arm is hot against my cold skin and I jump. She whispers, “It’s okay.”

I am not going to cry. I’m just not going to cry. I cried when I woke up and I had to come back here, even though I want to be here. I want to be here and have a magical wand that keeps the baby and hides my body. I don’t know how to reconcile this in my mind.

“Yana and I thought so, a few weeks ago, but Yevgeny didn’t want us to say anything because he was worried that maybe you were gaining weight for a medical reason or something,” Sofia says.

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