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I briefly imagined this to be some sort of daring athletic feat, which, in a way, it was.
“All eyes are on you tonight,” Paul told me, taking my arm and ferrying me off through a sea of fake smiles.
Madame Genevieve was unusually sweet and cuddly, wearing some sort of sparkly Mrs. Claus dress with matching red-and-white fur-framed glasses. She told me that my potential was finally showing as she had always known it would.
Justin, who had accompanied us, noticed another familiar face. “Look, the Baby Jesus is all grown-up with muscles and everything.”
Luke did, indeed, have broad shoulders and a trendy unshaved look, but his shy smile and hug felt the same as they had before. Justin stayed speaking to Luke as Paul and I gloried on.
An older Russian man who knew Aleks actually offered me a job. “You are the latest Zolotov prodigy,” he said. “Many ballerinas he has promote, and they never go wrong.”
The need to respond was removed by the ongoing speed of the tour.
Paul introduced me to a vaguely recognisable person called Colin McKen, who was to be a guest teacher next term, and then he left me alone with him.
“You seemed very comfortable performing such sexualised choreography,” said Colin. His accent was Scottish, and posh, and sounded a bit like Michelle’s.
“I was concerned that most of my costumes consisted of only underwear,” I told him. “But I forgot about it once dancing.”
He roared with laughter, tossing his head back in a possibly rehearsed move to show off his messed-up-bed-hair look. “If you can do that with Zolotov and those boys, I wonder what you can do with me. Can I get you a drink?”
“I have one over there,” I lied, waving in Will’s direction, glad of the excuse to escape the man and return to my friends.
Michelle looked up as I approached, distracted from her discussion with Aleks by Benjamin’s increasingly loud crying. “I didn’t think I’d invited any children,” she said, as the baby’s cry turned into screaming.
“They’re Phi’s babies,” Justin told her, and I turned and walked over to Yvonne and the children.
“I could take them all through to the TV room to watch a DVD,” I suggested. “There’s some cartoon ones.”
“No, Phi,” said Yvonne. “I don’t want to spoil your night. I’m going to take them up to the room.”
“I could do with a quiet break myself,” I told her.
“Well, if you’re sure…”
I put Benjamin on my hip. He stopped crying at once, and grabbed at my necklace with his chubby hands. The girls chose a selection of treats from the table, and we headed out of the hall, a plate of pretty cakes carried with great reverence by Ophelia.
I sat on the sofa in the TV room and slipped off my shoes, finally able to enjoy the party food and relax. We were singing along to a song from a colourful animated movie when Will stuck his head round the door.
“Hello, girlies.”
“We are not girlies,” Freya informed him. She had never forgiven Will for making her ballet class play a game involving flesh-eating rats when I had been ill the previous summer, and he had taken over for me.
“We’re ladies, Will,” I said. “Show us the proper respect.”
It wasn’t long before Justin arrived wanting to know why we had made off with all the best food. “Now, that’s fucktastic,” he said, biting into a cake. “And that’s the word of the day too.”
“Justin is a very rude boy,” Freya told Will. “He says bad words.”
“Yes, Justin,” I said. “Consider your audience before you speak.”
“I’ve profaned the ears of the babies,” he said. “What is to become of me? By the way, for a moment there Michelle thought they actually were your offspring. She had a good look at Peter, then Hearst, wondering whose they were. It was a bit weird to be honest. She seemed quite excited, and then disappointed when she was put right.”
The boys soon bored of our company and went back to the party. Benjamin fell asleep in my lap, Ophelia walked round the room in my shoes, and Freya and I drew pictures of fairy-tale creatures. That was the scene Aleks walked into.
“Oh,” he said, pausing in his stride. “Look at you. But you are missing your party.”
“I’m really not,” I confessed, but asked him to get Yvonne as the children needed to go to bed.
