My baby girl

"Rhea!" I whipped my head up to Luke staring at me as though I had lost my head. "Come on, we have a show tonight! You have got to pay attention."

"Sorry," I sighed out. Then I straightened my shoulders and pulled a mask down over my features.
Luke snapped his fingers and gestured between me and Ricky. "Run the ending again!" This time, Rhea, get your head out of your ass!"

Ricky and I locked eyes and he gave me an apologetic smile. I didn't miss the dark circles under his eyes. The closer we got to the end of the exhaustion reflected in the face of every dancer here.

Our bodies were pushed to the limit every single day and that lengths we went to stay in shape for the shows were down right brutal. I would never speak of it out loud, but I knew the dancers with the contracts would have it I harder. Our time was split between out passion and the needs of others.

When I looked at the other dancers surrounding me in the studio, I would never know who it was suffering in silence. What had happened to the dancers of the New York ballet that some of us needed these contracts just to help pay our way through life?

As I spent hours running through the show with Ricky my mind wandered eventually from Aleksander to my papa. Right now, he would be lying alone in a hospital bed with nurses telling him that his charts were looking good while knowing that they really weren't.

Even with the money from my contract with Aleksander I was still in debt. Everything the world says about New York being brutally expensive is true and that just makes the hospital bills worse. But if it kept Papa in the best facility with the best treatment, I was going to continue doing what I needed to do.

For now, i wouldn't think about what might happen at the end of my time with Aleksander. Three months was more than enough of a reprieve from sharing myself with strangers, and I would be secretly grateful for Aleksander for that.
If it kept my grandfather alive then I would remain at the end of Luke and Dax's leash. Although Luke was the filthy middleman, I knew Dax was the real man behind this show.

There was nothing I could do about it. And if those medical bills were paid, I wasn't going to think about doing anything.

Instead, I would think about how it felt to be on stage. The freedom that came with the dance and the brilliance of the lights on my face as I performed. My feet were as light as air as I fluttered through the other ballerinas and into Ricky's arms as my prince.

When I was on stage there was no Aleksander and there were no contracts, my papa wasn't sick, and I wasn't an object for hire. This was the moment when my mind was truly free and the shackles around my heart could melt.

That night, I truly was Odette. I was the swan Queen, and I was everything I ever wanted to be. Everything I ever could be. What I had dreamed of being since I was little girl with her first pair of dance shoes.

A dancer. A ballerina. The Prima of New York.

And just like every night, when Odette dies for love, my tears were real. They were always real. Not the tears of Rhea Martinez and the sad life lived. No, they were real because I was someone else.
Because I was Odette of swan lake, and I was dying for love.

After the show I had more energy than I knew what to do with. That rush of adrenaline was still coursing through my veins like molten lava, and I couldn't tell if I wanted to fly over to the moon or run through the streets of New York under the dazzling lights. It was strange to feel this much, but my mind was still empty, and I wanted to reveal in that nothingness.

Most of the other dancers would be going to the after party and I didn't care. Ricky always begged me to join them but that wasn't my scene, not anymore. I wanted to take this time to myself while my head was still clear and just walk as far as I could.

Eventually the cold of the night air got the best of me, and I hailed a taxi to get me back to Aleksander's place. There was a content smile on my face as I listened to the low music from the driver's radio and watched all the people still out on the streets as we passed them.

If the hospital had visiting hours this late, I would go there, but I knew by now Papa was asleep and getting the rest he needed. I was able to take some comfort in that, and the light mood I was in helped.

Walking into Aleksander's home I noticed all the lights were still off and assumed Aleksander was working late again. If he wasn't here to tell me which bed to sleep in, I took the safe route and stuck to the spare room I currently called my own. Although I didn't sleep there as often as I thought I would.

But as I walked up the stairs to the third floor,I noticed there was a light in Aleksander's room through a crack in the door. I froze for a second and when I heard his voice my heart skipped right up through my chest into my throat.

"Rhea." His voice was like the call of an incubus, pulling at that lightness inside of me and drawing me in. "Come here, baby girl."

I swallowed hard, and before all my wild thoughts could come crashing back into my head, I pushed open the door to his bedroom.

Aleksander was still wearing his midnight blue suit from work. He was leaning against the windows with his head on his arm and I noticed the bottle of rum hanging loose from his fingers.

Even in this low light, looking disheveled from his stress of the day, he was still so handsome.