“It’s not your fault,” I whisper.
She presses her face against my chest, just under my chin, and nods, smearing tears and probably snot and spit and makeup on me.
“Sniff pixie dust and soar,” she wails softly.
My muscles contract. Does she remember that after all these years? She looks up, wiping her face with the back of her hand.
“What does it mean?” she asks. I swallow a ball of edgy spit.
“My father told us that confusion improves moods … so if in a difficult situation, you should say something strange … to confuse and take your mind off the difficult situation.” Now is not the time to go into details.
“That saying popped up in a very special girl’s mind and stuck with me.”
“It really works.” Yes, it does.
Date = 5 November
Place = San Francisco (Stanford) and San Jose (Santana Row)
POV – Melaena
“My brother was released from hospital this morning -” I break off and shake my head. Not quite right. I tighten my grip on the backpack I’m hugging tightly to my chest.
“I fell my ass off right in front of one of the hottest men in the world, who just happens to be the dog trainer of the team -” Nope, even worse.
“Prof, have I told you that you’re my most favorite -” No one likes a suck-up. Even if it’s the truth. Anne Jones, a lady in her fifties with the language skills of a 16-year-old, and the scorn of Dolores Umbridge when you get on her wrong side, really is my favorite professor.
Why am I so tense? I was only 10 minutes late for class. I’m sure she’s not going to let me write out ‘I should not be late’ a hundred times with a magical quail. I rub my knuckles in anticipation, clear my throat, and knock on the door.
“Come in!”
I slowly open the door a few inches and peep around it. She’s on the phone and gestures for me to come in. Like a skimpy mouse, I pootle to the pink coach and sit my ass on the very end of it.
“I told you I have it under control.” She rolls her eyes, not at me but at the person on the other side of the phone.
“I already have someone in mind.” She pulls a skewed face. I try to be as still as possible.
“I know they have to win.” A different skewed face.
“Yeah, I know it was my fault. I will fix it.” A third face.
“Listen, I’ll talk to you later, got a student with me.” Face four.
“Bye.” She puts down the landline, a little hard, folds her arms on top of her desk, and eyeballs me.
“I can explain, my brother got stabbed by this crazy stalker that wants revenge and he came out of the hospital … and his twin … my brother’s not the stalker’s … is sulking because he feels guilty because he wasn’t stabbed and then I got stuck in traffic and I ran to class and miss a step and fell on my ass in front of a very beautiful man who just happens to be the trainer of my puppy group class -”
“Stop,” she interrupts, “Please.” I shut my hub and rub my hands together.
“Do you have a magic feather that carves words on my hands as I write?” She pops her eyes and tilts her head.
“Are you on drugs or just fucking in love?” She now pulls on a frown. I’m back from insanity.
“Huh?”
“People go crazy when they’re in love … and you sound a little as if you have your head in the clouds.” Yeah, that’s a good question – where is my head? Even better, what happened to my brain? I blame it all on him. Again, as if it was nothing, he turned my world upside down. I blame it on D too.
I take a deep breath and decide to stop making a fool of myself.
“I’m sorry I was late. It won’t happen again.” Well, knowing myself it most likely will happen a few more times.
“I don’t care about you being late.” Huh?
“Why am I here then?”
“Because I need something from you.” I can’t think of a single thing my professor could ever want from me. “Do you still dance?” Now I’m stunned. Not at all what I expected.
She can probably see the confusion on my face cause she quickly adds: “I saw in your file … you were pretty good.” I was, but that was a while back. When I was still in school. Okay, maybe not a while … a year or three.
“No, I stopped in my junior year. Yes, I guess I was not bad.” I answer each of her questions.
“Fantastic. I have a little proposition for you.” I move even more to the edge of the sofa.
“My daughter’s dance class needs a new instructor. One that will take them to the top.” I can see where this is going. And darn, I didn’t even know she was married, now I learn she has a kid … maybe kids.
“What happened to their old teacher?” At that, she rolls her lips together and breaks eye contact. Not good.
“One of the mothers got a little heated during a lesson and threw the teacher with a shoe and now she’s out of action for 6 weeks and the competition is coming up.”
“She got taken out by a shoe?” At the thought, a half-neurotic giggle bubbles up, but I manage to swallow it. That must have been one heck of a throw.
“No,” Anne says sternly, “The shoe missed, but while dodging it she fell off the stage and broke her leg.” Right, that makes much more sense. But it doesn’t cancel the fact that the kids belong to killer tendency mothers. And I already have a killer stalker on my case.
“Listen,” she moves slightly forward in her chair, “We want them to compete in the Nationals. And you have the skills to take them there. They need to win.” First, I want to tell her that dancing should be fun, not about winning competitions. And then I wonder what will happen to the teacher if they get second place.
Ann frowns. “Please,” she begs, her eyes pleading. What the heck? I have nothing to lose and it could be fun. A distraction. And maybe I won’t need to worry about being a little late for class on the odd occasion.
“Okay,” I pull out the word, trying to rebuff my bearings.