Page 16 of Kissing the Debutant
She sighed. “Because you’re the janitor.”
She waited for him to respond, to yell or argue, but there was only silence behind her. Chancing a glance over her shoulder, she took in the hard set of his jaw, the way his eyes had so quickly gone from excitement to anger.
“So what if I am?”
She knew nothing about this boy except his name and that he had a little sister. “Can you even dance?”
“I guess you won’t find out, right?” There was ice in his voice where there’d been none before.
“I can’t afford to. This competition is a big deal. I’m going to win it, but not with a high school boy who fashions himself a choreographer. And I don’t have time for dance projects that won’t further my career.”
“Your career? Is that all you care about? Getting into a prissy ballet company and becoming a miserable woman who yells at her own daughter?”
Her back went rigid. She knew how people saw her mother outside of Lexington. At home, she was the center of social life, but here in small-town Ohio, she was a miserable shrew they couldn’t understand. “You know nothing about my mother.”
“I know she treats you like a doll, making you turn this way and that, repeating the moves if they’re anything less than perfect. You’re not a doll, Lillian. You’re a real girl, and you don’t deserve that. I can help you show her what you can do.”
The need to defend her mother rose in her. She was harsh, yes, but she was also all Lillian had since her dad died when she was a kid. There were no siblings helping her carry the weight of her mother’s dreams, nor even any aunts or cousins. They were a family of two, and family obeyed. At least, that was what her mother always told her.
“My mother is going to make me into a better ballerina.” Her voice was tight.
“And you want that? To be a ballerina? There is more to dance than ballet.”
She knew that all too well. For years, she’d pleaded with her mother to let her take other kinds of dance classes, but to be the best, one had to have focus.
And Lillian was going to be the best. “I don’t need dance advice from a public school kid, someone who cleans the studio I train in. I work hard, and I don’t need your little project derailing that.” She turned away from him and pushed open the front door. “Good luck with your sister.”
He didn’t follow her out into the parking lot, but she hadn’t expected him to. She hated how cold her voice had sounded, how like her mother’s. When had she turned into her?
And how did she make it stop?
* * *
By the time the Uber pulled up to the dance studio, Jack had left. Lillian stood from the curb. Going back to school right now would be the smart thing to do, and normally the only thing to do, but the thought of being around other students after her mother’s visit didn’t appeal. She could imagine Wylder barging into her room to ask about the dresses or Devyn giving her an understanding smile.
Those girls weren’t her friends, only her neighbors. At least, Lillian thought so. She’d never been good at reading people or what they were thinking.
So, instead of obeying the Academy’s rules and returning promptly after training, she had the Uber take her to the Main just down the street. It was the hub of Twin Rivers. The diner’s owners, the Callahans, were the town’s royal family of sorts. Aside from owning the diner, they gained notoriety when one of their sons drove a car full of teenage boys off a bridge into the river, killing himself, and ending the Olympic dreams of one of the others.
Their daughter, Peyton, was a student at MIT.
But it was their second son who really put the family on the throne. Julian Callahan was one of three famous people to come from Twin Rivers. His claim to fame? Romance novels, most of which he wrote right in the diner.
Lillian walked through the front door in dire need of just smelling the kind of food her mother would yell at her for even thinking about eating. It was a rebellion even setting foot in a diner. She was bad to the bone. Shaking her head, she laughed at herself, feeling as if her mother could see her.
In the back corner of the diner, the bestselling author himself hunched over his laptop, the dark hair on his head askew like he’d run his hand through it in agitation.
“Hey, sweetie.” A kind-looking woman wearing a dingy apron walked toward her. Lillian had seen her before. She was the type of woman who called everyone sweetie, as if she truly believed anyone could be sweet. “Are you looking for someone?”
Lillian tore her eyes from Julian and met the sincere gaze of the waitress. She looked maybe forty with tired, yet somehow still bright eyes. The only thing Lillian knew about her was she wasn’t a Callahan.
Her nametag readCara.
“No.” Lillian looked down at her hands. “I’m here on my own.”
“Well, in that case, honey, I have the perfect table for you.” She smiled before leading her toward a booth that looked no different from any other. The red vinyl seat peeled and cracked, but the table was clean. “Have a seat. Now, you look like you could use a milkshake. Let me guess, strawberry?”
Lillian nodded. She couldn’t remember the last time she had anything with real ice cream and not the low fat, soy stuff she splurged on every now and then. “And maybe a cheeseburger and fries?”
