Pretty Perfect Read online

  Pretty Perfect

  Lana Sky

  Pretty Perfect

  By Lana Sky

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  Copyright © 2017 by Lana Sky

  All rights reserved.

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  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author.

  * * *

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  * * *

  Editing by Gemma Fisk Editing Services, Katrina Crane, Mickey Reed

  Formatting by Charity Chimni

  Acknowledgments

  A special thanks to everyone who supported me during the many, many drafts and edits of this story, including Kat and Gemma who tirelessly worked to whip this idea into shape, as well as Jilly who suffered a million different versions of it. Thanks to Mickey, who helped to take this draft to the next level, and a very emphatic thank you to Michelle Quinn whose patience knows no bounds. Last but certainly not least, thank you Charity Chimni for giving this story the final polish.

  Contents

  Act 1

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Act 2

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Act 3

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Epilogue

  A Word from the Author

  About the Author

  Also by Lana Sky

  Act 1

  Chapter 1

  The perfect fake smile required only two ingredients: glossy pink lipstick and pearly white teeth. From the outside, I looked charming, even while my lifelong dream drifted further out of reach.

  Acting at its finest.

  “Thank you for auditioning, Ms. DeSotto,” the casting director told me in a rush. I think his name was Fred—or whatever he’d blurted at the start of this hasty call. “You have beautiful form, but we’ve decided to go in another direction with this production.”

  And there it was. I wasn’t supposed to argue. For instance, if my lines were so beautiful, then why didn’t I get the lead? A background role? Anything? My therapist would encourage me to find a positive in this situation. “The wrong direction” was a new excuse from the typical list, at least.

  This could have been progress.

  Or rock bottom.

  “I appreciate the opportunity,” I croaked when I finally found my voice. “Thank you for even considering—” The dial tone interrupted my well-rehearsed spiel. Thank you for considering me for such an opportunity, blah blah blah.

  They remembered my name; that had to count for something. Rather than just written off, I had been artfully rejected, the truth sweetened with a little bit of sugar and personalized for dramatic effect. You are a beautiful dancer, whatever your name is… But you aren’t good enough.

  On the bright side, I couldn’t even remember what that audition had been for. A ballet company? A local production? Either way, it was the third rejection in as many days, and I felt fine. Peachy, in fact.

  “You’re setting yourself up for failure, sweetie,” my mother warned in her typical chiding tone as I tucked my cell phone into my bag.

  She’d eavesdropped, of course. Not that it wasn’t hard to from across the table. Crammed together in the dining room of a small café, we were both failing to hide our secrets. Like the fact that the “tea” she was drinking was really spiked with vodka—a lot, considering how long she savored her next sip. Like always, I pretended not to notice the flask sticking out of her bag and dug a tissue from my pocket to dab at my nose with. It was running again, but one peek at the napkin revealed that it wasn’t bleeding.

  Thank God for small miracles.

  “I thought you were done with all that nonsense?” Mom watched me with a raised eyebrow.

  “Am I…what?” Oops. My inner actress floundered, forgetting her lines for a split second. Caught off guard, I rubbed my nose again, checking for dust while fighting to maintain my cheerful grin.

  “Ballet,” Mom said. “I thought you gave that up. Your dad said you enrolled in some college courses. It’s about time you moved on from that, sweetie.”

  Oh. It was the typical argument. Why couldn’t I just grow up, bleach my hair blonde, and catch a man like she had?

  “I’m not trying to be mean, sweetie,” Mom added while patting her lips with a napkin. As always, an insult hidden between the lines, staining the air like the red lipstick coating the rim of her glass. You should just accept your place, sweetie; you aren’t a good enough dancer, sweetie.

  Her doubt was why I needed my therapist and my trusted “feelings” journal: to help me accept the flaws she loved to point out. I wasn’t perfect. I spun too quickly. My feet sometimes pigeon-toed. There was always room for improvement. I simply had to accept that. She was supposed to help me in that endeavor, but maybe those mimosas made her too maudlin to remember her part in the “Saving Anya” crusade.

  “I know,” I said, playing my role anyway. My watch revealed that only five minutes remained in this scene. Five more minutes that I had to pretend.

  “Hmph.” Mom prodded her uneaten salmon fillet with a steak knife. “Perhaps it’s time you outgrew dance anyway. I mean, you’re already twenty, dear.”

  She made it sound as simple as putting away tattered coloring books. Or, in her case, ending a ten-year marriage and waiting only six months before slipping a brand-new rock onto that cherished ring finger. Mature people threw away old toys, dreams, and families like raggedy baby dolls.

  Just like she had.

  “Yeah, I guess…”

  “I mean, look at Jake.” She smiled for real, turning the head of every man in the room. “His mother says that he heard from an NFL scout already…” She paused as if waiting for me to fill in the gaps of information. I didn’t. “Anyway, he needs your support now, sweetie. I know ballet used to mean a lot to you, but now, you have a future to worry about.”

  A future… I should have just let her criticize me in silence—like usual—but I’ve only been mended for just a few short months. Bad habits are hard to break.

  “It’s so nice to know that you dragged me to all those years of ballet lessons just to placate me and not because you might have actually believed in me.” Oh dear. Snarky voice, sharp inflection.

  “Anya, please don’t do this.” Mom sighed. “Not now.”

  Oops. Selfish Anya had shown her unwelcome face, resorting to what the therapist had deemed “hostile negativity.” The truth was simply untherapeutic—like the fact that Jake and I had broken up six months ago, and he could have been playing football in China for all I knew. One had to always “consider how your words might affect those around you. Try not to dwell on the negatives.”

  In other words, lie. My mother was the master of the art form.

  “I d-do believe in you, Anya,” she insisted, though her voice la
cked any conviction. “I only meant…”

  “I know. It’s okay.” I flashed my teeth, reassembling my charming mask. “I’ll just try harder next time.”

  “Right!” she agreed. “That’s what I meant, darling.” Mothering was so much easier for her if someone fed her the right lines. Act. Scene. Our play was back on schedule, and the audience was none the wiser. “Next time, sweetie.”

  She patted me lovingly on the forearm, and I stood while she started on her second drink. There were only five other patrons in the café besides us. All of them were far too busy putting on their own strained façades to notice me slipping a ratty canvas bag over my shoulder, despite how it clashed with my designer outfit.

  “Oh, and, Anya, sweetie?” Mom called as I pushed my chair under the table. “You might want to pick up some allergy relief stuff if you need it. You’ve been sniffling all day. The weather is a nightmare this time of year…right?” Her tone straddled that fragile line between hope and fear as I followed her gaze to the wad of used napkins piled beside my soup bowl.

  “That’s okay.” I ran a hand underneath my nose just to be sure. “I’m fine.”

  On my way to the main doors, a cheerful waitress urged me to come again even though she served me here at least once a month. Mother then piped up from our customary table, loud enough for everyone else to hear and marvel at how close we were. “Same time next week, sweetie!”

  “Like always!” I bolted from the café without a backward glance.

  The luncheons were her way of bonding after the divorce—or, more importantly, her way of making sure my father and I couldn’t bond too much, and she had a direct line of gossip into the goings-on of the DeSotto household. It made her feel better for having dumped me there.

  Nine years later, the fear that I might ask to live with her instead of him was one of the myriads of reasons why her meals consisted of liquor. If I caught her sober, she might have to pretend that she cared. Dwelling on the past, Anya, my therapist would warn. Focus only on the present. Like racing to the bus stop before the driver pulled away from the curb.

  The best tactic, per the good doctor, was to ignore everything—just not the old way. No handfuls of narcotics to swallow down the misery. The music blaring from my headphones was enough to separate me from the rest of the world because music was better than any high. The therapist said that too. And it worked—sort of. Rather than my mother’s latest drama, my thoughts consisted of nothing but Tchaikovsky and an array of choreography so intricate that I couldn’t afford to miss a single step.

  “One flaw snaps the chain,” Remsky liked to quip.

  I repeated his mantra as I departed the bus ten minutes later and caught the train to the heart of downtown. Just my luck, the doors of the theater were already closed by the time I reached them, and the faint hint of Chopin drifted from beyond like an ominous warning.

  “Shit.”

  I slipped around the side of the building, shouldered open a fire exit, and hurried down the dimly lit hallway that led backstage. The other dancers were already warming up. No barre work today, but straight into center work, which left me with no chance of hiding within the shadows of the studio.

  Double shit.

  Remsky shot me a death glare from his perch at the end of the stage while I skulked past. With gleaming silver hair and black sweats starched to the nines, he resembled an orderly in some clinical psych ward, ready to snap at any infraction. “Later,” he mouthed.

  Dreading the next few hours already, I entered the dressing room and changed into my leotard. Using an exposed pipe as a makeshift barre, I warmed up, hitting all the important joints: legs, knees, toes, ankles. My calves were burning by the time I reentered the auditorium and attempted to slip unnoticed amongst the cluster of dancers grouped near the front of the gallery.

  “Hey!” A hand tapped my shoulder. “Incoming. Nosebleed.”

  A telltale warmth dripped down my upper lip. Thankfully, whoever had pointed it out was already in the process of shoving a napkin into my hand.

  “Maybe you should sit out this round?” the do-gooder wondered.

  I flashed my patented smile and dabbed away every trace of blood. “I’m fine.” Better than fine. I didn’t even feel the need to compare the way I filled out my leotard to Chloe, the bulimic whose straps threatened to slip from her waiflike shoulders. According to my therapist, that kind of thinking led to a dark place.

  I eyed the stage instead, trying to decipher the routine being practiced. A blonde attempted a pirouette—turns today?—while Remsky berated her in a mixture of English and Russian. Spotting me, despite my hiding place, he frowned again and tapped the end of his walking stick against the floor.

  “Tardiness is unacceptable, Anya.”

  I flinched, though it was a mild insult coming from Remsky. He was probably saving his worst for later.

  Turning his attention to the rest of the class, he bellowed, “Group one, to the stage,” and I was forgotten.

  The warm-up group scattered. In their place, five new dancers filed onto the stage and performed to the tune of cheerful music while Remsky insulted mistakes and issued corrections. This was the instruction we all paid thousands for. Victor Remsky didn’t believe in adding sugar to soften rejection. In his eyes, a lesson wasn’t a very good one unless someone broke down in tears during it. Preferably twice.

  “Sloppy feet!” he snarled, the first of his usual complaints. “Poor posture! Pathetic technique! I am not impressed! Next.”

  Once the second group had limped, panting, into the gallery, he called the next. Far too soon, there were only five dancers left, one of them me.

  “Final group!”

  I hurried from the wings and took the spot farthest from Remsky’s perch. When the music began, I attempted to lose myself in the same role we’d been rehearsing all week: a variation Remsky had composed himself, with complex, repetitive motions designed to test endurance.

  Like a hawk, the instructor paced the line, searching for the slightest flaw, and it wasn’t long before he attacked his first victim.

  “Timing, Katja!” Remsky scolded as she finished the first pirouette a full count behind. “Remember to watch your timing! Pretty feet! Posture! Are you a barn animal or a dancer?”

  Eventually, his commentary trailed off as we fell into a well-rehearsed recitation of the steps. It almost seemed mechanical: a row of perfect, robotic music box dolls performing in sync. Saute, arabesque, plié. My muscles were throbbing beneath a thin layer of sweat by the time Remsky cracked his cane, commanding us into the finale, a fluttering motion of the arms, and a bow.

  I breathed heavily, holding every limb in place, while Remsky began his customary slow stroll of the stage—something he did at the end of every lesson. For what felt like an eternity, he lingered three dancers down, trailed by the sound of his cane scraping the floor and the advice he spat out at random intervals.

  “Too slow...”

  “Too fast...”

  “Sloppy posture...”

  “If only your punctuality were as reliable as your technique, Anya.” The acidic compliment accompanied the dry fingers that gripped my shoulder seconds later, easing me upright. “Don’t be late again. I expect more from all of you,” he barked once his scathing individual assessments were completed. “Rehearsal is done. For now. However…Cassandra, Katja, Anya. You will stay behind.”

  Damn. There went my plan to fly under the radar until the end of class. God only knew what kind of tirade Remsky had in store—not that I was worried.

  Besides, Cassandra, a petite dancer with red hair, and Katja, the willowy blonde, didn’t seem to have a clue why they’d been singled out, either. The three of us could only stand there awkwardly, sweating beneath the stage lights, as everyone else flitted off into the shadows.

  “Now,” Remsky began, commanding our attention. “I will warn you. I didn’t select you because you are either the best or the worst in my class. I believe that each one of you m
ight learn something from this experience.”

  “What experience?” Katja demanded, twirling a strand of golden hair around her finger.

  Her outburst earned a withering glare from Remsky—not that I blamed her because I had the exact same question running through my head. Remsky’s learning opportunities tended to resemble the average person’s general concept of torture.

  “A chance to prove your passion, Katja.” The way Remsky’s Russian accent thickened over the words made them seem more like a threat than anything else. “It’s an opportunity for you all. An old friend of mine is visiting the theater today, and he just so happens to be scouting for an upcoming performance.”

  It was a suspicious coincidence—made even more suspicious by the fact that Remsky had no friends, at least none he had ever introduced at rehearsals. Even odder, he had picked only three dancers out of twenty-five to showcase in this supposed audition. Make that two wispy, thin ingénues. And me.

  “Of?” Katja pressed.

  Remsky shot her a death glare.

  To her credit, the blonde only shifted onto the balls of her feet before contritely batting her eyelashes. “Sir.”

  “Giselle,” Remsky continued. “This friend is affiliated with a company in London that is considering new talent for their—”

  “London?” The outburst came from Cassandra. Her freckled nose twitched, her green eyes comically wide. “The role is in London?”