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I leave those thoughts behind me and focus on my students. We only have a handful of practices left before our big performance. Instead of participating in Pride weekend proper, the kids will be dancing at a small kickoffevent taking place at the start of the month. It’ll be a lot tinier than all the official celebrations at the end of June, but they don’t know the difference at such a young age. Besides, those huge events downtown can overwhelm even adults. This will be a lot more special, a lot more intimate.
I wind down the practice and have all the kids sit on the floor with me in a circle. I like to end things this way, bringing them out of the realm of pure, frantic movement and back into their heads.
“Okay, how are we feeling?” I ask.
I look around the circle, taking in all those shining eyes and twitching smiles. They’re old enough that they don’t want to show mequitehow excited they are, but they’re young enough that they aren’t as sneaky as they think they are. Ah, almost teenagers. They think they’re so wise to the world, when they haven’t even begun learning.
None of them answer for a moment. I notice Kevin’s eyes flickering back and forth before he finally speaks up.
“Are we going to be ready?” he says.
“Of course,” I say. “You guys aresoclose. If you had to perform tomorrow, you’d do great. The rest of our practice sessions are bonuses to make your routine even more perfect.”
“What about costumes?” Tammy says. “Do we get to see them?”
“Super soon,” I assure her. “They’ll be here any day, I promise.”
A ripple of excitement passes through the group. I know they’ve been waiting eagerly on the costumes, but I won’t have them for a bit longer.
One final child speaks up, even more tentatively than Kevin and Tammy.
“What if someone says something?”
A hush sweeps into the dance room. Darren doesn’t need to elaborate. Everyone in that room, even the youngest kids, know what he means. What if someone says somethingmean? What if someone decides to be cruel to them for being in a Pride show? What if full-grown adults are assholes to kids who want to put on a little dance performance? Unfortunately, it’s not impossible.
“You let me worry about that, okay?” I say. “I helped put together this performance for the past three years and everyone’s always been nice. You have nothing to worry about, I promise.”
Darren looks a little less worried, and we’re out of time, so I’ll have to hope my message got through. Parents start arriving to pick up their kids, and I help usher everyone out. It’s a flurry of questions and goodbyes and chatter, then the dance room is empty and silent as suddenly as it filled with all those excited young voices.
I give myself a moment to collect myself before I retrieve my stuff where I stashed it in a corner. I’m glad I don’t have to dance at the club tonight, as much as I like the money. Some days being with the kids is draining in away even having to dance until two a.m. isn’t. Luke would understand. As much as I love their energy and enthusiasm, some days it leaves you exhausted.
I notice a text when I get back to my phone. For a moment, my heart jumps around my chest, but there’s no way it could be from Luke. He wouldn’t contact me. No chance. He said it was a one-time thing that night and he meant it. There’s no fairytale ending where he comes running back telling me he caught feelings. It was a hookup and nothing more.
Sure enough, the message is from my boss Chloe, not Luke. I call her when I’m on my way out of the studio and heading toward the bus stop.
“Hey, Chloe, what’s up?”
“Sorry, were you at your volunteer shift?” she says.
“Yeah, but it just ended. I’m available.”
“Great, I wanted to see if you were interested in an extra shift,” she says.
My heart sinks. I suspect I already know where this is going, but I let her spell it out for me anyway.
“There’s a school class who wants to drop in for a little field trip. It’ll mostly just be talking about Pride and playing with the cats. You don’t have to worry about the talking, though. I simply need someone to be on hand to help Henry out. He can’t deal with twenty-four kids plus chaperones on his own. We’ll need to make sure the kids aren’t bothering the cats too much or destroyinganything. They might want drinks or snacks. It should be simple. And they’re teenagers, not little kids, so half of them have probably been here before. It should be a really easy shift, but if you don’t have time because of the club or Pride or something…”
I desperately want to take the easy out she’s offering me. I knew this was coming, knew I’d have to see Luke again. He warned me about this when we met for that drink. I’ve been trying not to think about it ever since. Because seeing him again, especially in his element — it’s going to hurt like hell.
Even so, I feel the “yes” formulating before Chloe is done explaining. I can’t leave the two of them to deal with a whole class of teenagers. Chloe is offering this as a choice, but if I say no they’ll be completely overwhelmed. The only other employee is River, who teaches yoga classes. He doesn’t even know how to work the espresso machine.
Chloereallyneeds to make good on hiring another part-timer to help me and Henry.
“I can do it,” I say. “I could use the extra shift. It’s during the day, right? It shouldn’t conflict with the club.”
She gives me the date and time. “You don’t have to do a full shift, even. If you can be around for the block of time when that class is here, that’ll cover us. Henry and I can worry about cleaning up.”
“As though I’m not going to help you two clean,” I say.
