Chapter 9

Darcy watched the clock tick away. Her eyes followed the minute hand for two full rotations, taking her past 3:30. 

With a sigh, she looked about, hoping Zara would be here soon. 

‘So rude to be late when she’s the one who wanted to meet up,’ she thought.

The goth girl finally arrived at 3:35, looking sweaty and out of breath. 

“Sorry,” she said. “I got stuck talking to Chester. He can really drone on.”

Darcy chuckled despite the dire situation. She figured this girl was going to chew her out or threaten her in some way. 

Instead, Zara took her hand. “Come on. I want to show you something." 

As Zara pulled her through unfamiliar corridors, Darcy noticed the signs pointing toward the hall at the end reading, 'Dance studio.' A sick feeling rose in her throat as she remembered the reason her friends had started bullying Josh.

Ballet.

They had called him gay, a sissy boy, Billy Elliot and worse on a daily basis. Her boyfriend Ted would even follow him to lessons just to laugh, point, and ridicule the sole boy in the group. The two other boys who started out doing ballet had quit—a fact Darcy now felt terrible about. Dancing might have been their calling. Their escape from reality. Their dream. 

'And I ruined it for them.'

Zara turned to her, pressing her fingers to her lips as they opened the door and snuck through. 

Thankfully, the room was dark except for the spotlights on the stage. Classical music with a haunting violin played from the speakers as the dancers moved onto the stage.

Josh wore the same leotard she'd once laughed at and ridiculed, but it looked different on the body of a man. Muscles flexed under black lycra as he moved slowly and carefully, every turn of his hands and feet perfectly measured. 

Another figure emerged from the curtains, joining the dance. The pair began to flit about the stage as one, moving faster as the tempo increased.

It was... beautiful. 

As the song finished, Josh picked up the girl by her waist in one hand, lifting her over his head as she balanced, legs and arms outstretched.

He held her for a moment before her leg began to wobble and she slipped from his grip.

"Sorry," the girl said, staring up at Josh. She was so tiny and perfect.

"Who is she?" Darcy whispered.

"That's Aurora Grace," Zara replied.

"Wow, even her name is beautiful." Darcy sighed.

"So you see... it's pointless," Zara said. "You really think you can compete with her? She shares his passion for dance, she's sweet and beautiful and God, I bet she can get that hot little body into some interesting positions."

"Those two are a couple?" she asked, looking over at the pair of dancers as they laughed and swigged on their water bottles.

Zara took her hand and led her from the hall, staying low and keeping to the shadows. She didn't answer the question.

"You're just making a fool of yourself when you throw yourself at him," she said instead.

'He's the one forcing me to do it!' Darcy screamed on the inside but couldn't say out loud without the difficult follow-up questions.

"Why are you showing me this?" she asked. 

The pair left through the side doors and stopped by the window, watching the pair of ballet dancers spinning, lost in their own world. It was as if only the two of them existed.

"Because I don't want us to be enemies. I've had enough of making enemies in high school and our class is just too small," Zara said. She turned away and stared through the window, eyes sad and full of longing. "Besides... it's beautiful, right?"

"Right." Darcy nodded without taking her eyes away.

They watched until the lights came on and the music stopped, moving toward the bus stop area in silence when the dancers departed. 

"This is my bus," Zara said, giving her a little salute wave before stepping on. Zara and the others lived in the city, so their buses were far more regular. The 41 popped up so often that sometimes there would be more than one at the stop.

Her bus—the 71 to Greenhill—was only every hour and she'd missed her usual bus. As she waited for the next, Josh appeared with a gym bag and a frown.

"What are you still going here? Classes ended over an hour ago," he wanted to know.

Her brain went into panic mode as she tried to think up a lie that made sense. Anything would do. Anything other than, 'I was stalking you.'

"I had to speak to the office administration and explain why I missed a week," she said. It was a total fabrication, but it made sense. She'd been wondering why nobody had bothered to ask her about her tardiness. 

Looking at him, she couldn't stop picturing his body in that tight black lycra.

"What?" he asked, his frown deepening.

"What were you doing?" she asked, despite knowing the answer. It would be suspicious if she didn't.

"Oh." He laughed and sat beside her. "Just being a sissy gay-boy."

When he took in her blank expression he clarified, "I had dance practise."

"Oh," Darcy said, once again overcome with guilt. She was glad he'd persevered with dancing, even though the tirade of bullying and insults. Still, the thought of him dancing with that girl, his body entwined with her, made her feel...

'Why am I so jealous?' she wondered.

It was strange, but her brain began to picture herself as the female dancer, being held up in his hand.

'How could I ever think it was nerdy or sissy or lame?' she wondered, imagining the strength it must take to hold a girl above your head in one hand. Even if his hands were enormous.

"Josh," she said, looking down at his sneakers. "I'm so sorry I took the piss out of you. I've never done anything. I'm not good at anything—"

"What makes you think I'm good?" he interrupted. "I could dance like a buffalo on rollerblades."

Darcy laughed and shook her head. "I highly doubt that."

They sat in silence, waiting for the bus as the rush hour traffic whizzed by. Several of the local buses passed, picking up the other stragglers and chugging off into the distance in a puff of heat and smoke.

"You know, I did dance lessons as a kid," Darcy said. "Until I found out it wasn't cool. I loved it so much at the time. Why couldn't I have stuck at it?"

She expected him to say something mean. To tell her it was her own fault for listening to others instead of listening to her own heart. Something along those lines.

"My room is basically a mini dance studio," he said. "I can teach you if you genuinely want to learn."

"Um... you would?" Darcy gasped.

He nodded. "Hmm, I'm a very strict teacher though. Proper old school. If you don't listen properly, I'll whack you with a cane."

"Seriously?" she asked, eyes widening at the thought as he made a whipping gesture, hitting the air.

"No!" He let out a sharp ring of laughter. "But why did you look so excited?"

She shrugged and blushed, unable to answer the question. Did she secretly want him to punish her? Would it ease her conscience? Or was it something deeper?

'Like what?' she thought. 'I'm a masochistic freak?'

"Would you really teach me?" she asked.

"Hmm." He nodded. "The basics at least."

"Thank you," she said. The thought of sitting about her empty house for another night, alone and sad, was anxiety-inducing.

By the time the bus chugged its way to Greenhill it was pitch black and beginning to get chilly. She pulled on her hoodie, shivering as they made their way back to his home. 

The grass-lined pathway leading to his front door was still lined with giant effigies of witches, mummies and ghosts. Inside, the decorations were still up, and a fresh batch of cupcakes decorated the stand. As she looked at them, feeling her mouth water, she saw the intricate swirls of frosting and hand-made fondant characters. His mum had put so much effort into them. 

"Just take one," Josh said with a tut. "Standing there drooling like a mongie. You can take one night off your stupid diet since you’re going to be doing exercise."

She slumped her shoulders and furrowed her brows in protest, but still took one of the delicious cakes.

"Do you want a coffee before we start?" he asked. Since he veered toward the kitchen she nodded. Coffee wasn't something she typically drank, but she felt stupid and immature asking for a hot chocolate instead.

‘I want to be the sort of person who drinks coffee,’ she thought.

As she took a sip, she smiled, realising it wasn't as bad as the last one she'd tried. Maybe his coffee was superior, or maybe her taste buds were finally changing as her mother always insisted they would.

"One day we will drink wine together on the veranda," her mother was always saying. She had some pretty romantic ideas for someone who was never in the country. It wasn't her fault. Being a successful author, she had to do book tours and appearances. It was all part and parcel of the job.

Her books were about health and fitness, so getting fat had never been an option for Darcy. Being overweight was just about the worst thing you could be in the eyes of her mother. Even worse than being a bad person.

As they sat together at his kitchen table—littered with random items ranging from car parts to photographs, she noticed her coffee cup was on top of a half-completed jigsaw puzzle and moved it.

"Oh, don't worry," Josh said, pointing at the Santa Claus themed puzzle. "We started that at Christmas last year and never bothered to finish it. Every so often we get bored and do a bit, but it always ends up getting broken again."

As Darcy stared down at the cheery red cheeks of the Santa and the bright little elves stacking presents into his sleigh, she thought was a strange family they were.

When her parents had been together, they had sat down to regular family game nights. She remembered taking out dusty boxes, playing games of scrabble and Dad moaning every time her mother won. She always won. She was just smarter than him. They would argue about the validity of words, pulling out the dictionary and leaving Darcy to tidy up, careful not to lose any pieces.

A year after that dad had run off with a vapid and brainless woman, leaving family game nights a distant memory.

As she stared down at the puzzle, she saw a fitting piece and put it together. She smiled at the little elf, feeling an odd sense of achievement. Doing a puzzle was something she’d always considered nerdy or lame, yet slotting the pieces into alignment filled her with a comforting glow, almost as if the little bits of card were a metaphor for her life or psyche.

"Come on," Josh said, scraping the seat noisily as he stood. "Time to see what you're made of."

$ Chapter