Page 68 of Dance with Me
She shook her head. “It’s not about a dream, though. It’s about proving that dance is a valid, viable, realistic profession, and that I’m good enough to make it a career.”
It sounded like she was having an argument with someone else, likely her mother, but he stayed quiet.
Natasha’s eyes glimmered with sorrow and pain. “This thing is evidence of my failure. Something I never wanted anyone to know about. But I’m starting to realize . . . maybe I don’t have to hold it all in.”
“You don’t.” He slid an arm around her and cuddled next to her. “You can let me carry some of it for you. With you,” he corrected. “I can carry it with you. Together.”
She flicked a glance at him, a grateful smile on her lips. Then she looked down at the water, bubbling around them. “I guess I should start at the beginning.”
Please,he wanted to say.Please, tell me everything about you. I love you and I want to know anything you’re willing to share.Instead, he nodded.
“Remember how I told you I got into Lennox and didn’t go?”
“Yeah.”
“Gina went. I worked as a waitress and a dance teacher to make money, and did a lot of dancing with a troupe we’d joined in high school. Our plan was to move out here after Gina graduated and saved some money. But then my great-grandmother passed away.”
She sighed when he gave her a squeeze. “She was the best person in my life. Without her, it was just my mother and I in that apartment. Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore, so I moved to LA early, before Gina was ready to go.”
There was a lot she wasn’t saying, about her home life and her relationship with her mother, but he didn’t dare interrupt, now that she was finally opening up to him.
“When I got here, I blew through the money I’d saved. I’m not good at organizational stuff, like searching for the best prices on apartments or living situations. Gina’s better at that. I went on a ton of auditions, but nothing panned out. So, I took a job I knew was bad for me, because at least there, I was making money as a dancer and I was being appreciated.”
He had a feeling he knew where this was going. It was a common story. But his gut churned and his heart broke for her, imagining how desperate and sad she must have been then, alone, separated from her best friend and biggest support, missing her great-grandmother.
“I got a job at a topless bar. The one Renee works at. She’s the one who taught me to pole dance.”
There it was. As soon as he’d seen her sitting with Renee, he suspected, and the postcard for Babe Planet was another obvious clue, but he hadn’t wanted to jump to conclusions.
It meant the world to him that she’d revealed it on her own.
When he didn’t respond, she shot him a glance, brows slanted in worry.
“What?”
She blinked. “You don’t have anything to say to that?”
He shifted her into his lap. “What, you thought I would judge you? This is a tough industry. Not everyone can hack it. But we’re New Yorkers. We can make it anywhere. Even if it means doing things other people might balk at. We’re strong enough to protect our souls and turn the experience into success.”
She exhaled, and all the tension drained out of her body. Winding her arms around him, she relaxed against his chest. “You don’t know what a huge relief it is to hear you say that.”
“You never told Gina?”
“Ay dios,no.” She huffed out a laugh into his neck. “She would never understand.”
“Are you sure about that? She’s a good friend.”
“She’s so focused on integrity and busting stereotypes, she wouldn’t get how I could ever stoop so low as to take my clothes off for money.”
He tightened his arms around her. “I hope she’d see that you were sticking to your own integrity by continuing to work as a dancer even when it got hard.”
She tilted her head back to search his face, her dark eyes glassy and full of uncertainty. “That’s . . . that’s exactly why I did it. I figured . . . at least I was still dancing.”
“So, why do you think you were a failure?”
She sighed and tucked her face back into his shoulder. “I couldn’t tell anyone about it. I had to say I was a bartender, and then I had to get a bartending job, too, just so it wouldn’t be a lie. I was working seven nights a week, butcoño,I was rolling indinero.”
“Hard to give that up.”
