It was mostly Mrs. Winters. Mr. Winters was playing the piano and occasionally stopping to sneeze.
Mrs. Winters was smaller than Chico and appeared about twice as breakable, and she was possibly the scariest woman he’d ever seen. When she’d turned and smiled at him halfway through her lesson, he’d nearly fallen out of his chair. Rafael’s kind exterior didn’t come from her, but something of his attitude did. Not one dainty little girl with her hair in a bun was afraid of her.
Their parents were another matter. And the other volunteers. Those women, because of course Chico was a seamstress now, had all suddenly had someplace else to be when Mrs. Winters had sailed into the room. She had the most impressively silver hair, which she wore in a loose chignon. If her son went gray like she had, he was going to get even more devastating.
But she was
tiny
. Chico’s mother would crush her if they ever hugged.
He blamed that thought on being left on his own—again. This time he got it, at least. The women had jobs or kids getting out of school to go home to, and no desire to have Mrs. Winters continually turn to them and ask if they needed help, darlings, in a tone that implied they should be secure enough to do this by themselves.
He honestly had no idea what she’d do if he said, yes, he needed help. He couldn’t imagine himself correcting her if her stitching was less than perfect.
But since he didn’t need anything, it was simple enough to shake his head and continue cursing the volunteers before him who’d either rushed or not known what they were doing.
Notebooks in the room alleged to keep track of costume changes and location, which made him think someone had once done this full time and then possibly retired or moved away, and they hadn’t found a replacement.
Davi had been right. Technically, Chico shouldn’t have much to do but adjust hems, patch tears, and tighten in places. But while he was willing to ignore the unpacked boxes in his apartment, the current disorganized state of the costuming department he could not stand.
He flipped through the notebooks for
The Nutcracker
and knew he’d guessed right when he found the original pale blue snowflake design of the tutu on his table. He’d bet some kid had looked adorable in it. However, there weren’t any notes on what it had been turned into, or exactly what it was supposed to be now.
This was something he ought to ask Mrs. Winters about, but he glanced toward her as she guided her little dancers in some sort of leg-extending, toe-pointing exercise, and shook his head.
The costuming room consisted of the racks of costumes, an old sofa, two fitting stools, and two tables with sewing machines and space. Each table also had cups filled with scissors and pencils, and a small box filled with assorted loose pins, thimbles, measuring tape, and needles.
He plucked a pencil from the cup at his table and made the notes someone else had forgotten to make, noting the damaged embroidery, the tear, and the addition of purple tulle. Then, since he was at it, he sketched a different pattern over the bodice, since it was probably supposed to represent a court dress, but a young girl was going to be wearing it. She ought to look regal, not like she was wearing a reused false corset from a sugarplum fairy.
“So that
is
it.”
Rafael
had
to be doing it on purpose now.
Chico dropped the pencil and glanced up. Rafael was in the doorway, in his ballroom dancing teacher ensemble. “Do you not make noise?” Chico bitched at him, for the sake of his pride. He fought the need to put a hand over his sketch as Rafael came into the room.
Rafael pointed to the flat slippers he had on, presumably the reason he could move so quietly.
“So that is it?” Chico pressed, recalling what Rafael had said when he’d entered the room. “So
what
is it? What did you mean?” He tensed a bit when Rafael came around to study his sketch and then the costume. When he was done with that, he studied Chico.
“What you’re good at,” Rafael explained. “What you like to do. You sew. You make things.”
“Yes. Well. Yeah. Sometimes.” Chico slowly slid his hand away from the notebook. After another pause, he resumed fussing with the terrible stitching. He reached for the scissors. “Thank you for this,” he said, as calmly as his racing heart would allow. “It’s busy work I don’t mind doing.”
“You’re welcome,” Rafael returned warmly, then took another step so he could fall onto the sofa. He exhaled noisily the moment his ass hit the cushions. For some reason, Chico glanced guiltily out the door toward Mrs. Winters, but she was focused on her students.
“So… you’re teaching a class?” He kept his attention on pieces of cut thread, only to hide a shiver at the awareness of Rafael’s gaze on his bowed head. Rafael could be watching him intently, and Chico wouldn’t see anything unless he turned around to face him. The nape of his neck tingled. “I saw on the board tonight is the fox-trot. What about rehearsal?”
“Yeah.” Rafael’s voice went rough on the word. He shifted position, and the sofa creaked a bit. “The kids are going to be put through their paces by my mother tonight. Except for Amy—that’s our clockwork dancer. Unlike the regular dancer, she is nervous enough that it shows. So after my class I have to try to calm her down, give her some extra practice.”
“Won’t you be tired?” Chico didn’t think there were dance classes in the morning, but he’d heard music when he’d come in, so someone had been dancing somewhere.
“Can’t say no to the tourist dollars, and the ballroom classes, which are pay as you go, are very profitable and enable us to do things like have ballet classes for the kids who love it but could never afford to study someplace else.” He could imagine Rafael shrugging, as if that wasn’t a big deal. “Luckily it’s the fox-trot, not the Charleston. I’m more worried about Amy anyway. What are you planning on doing to that costume? Can you really embroider? Where did you learn to do that?”
“Why are you worried about her?” Chico sidestepped the personal questions. He’d talked about himself enough, and the idea of explaining he was self-taught to someone who had studied and trained hard to be good at what they did made him want to squirm.
“She’s graduating high school in a few weeks and then going across the country for college. But she’s never really been outside of this very small town. Add to that the pressure of dancing the title role of this ballet… she’s putting too much pressure on herself to not let the anxiety show, but it’s going to. No matter how controlled the dancer, something always shows. They’re only human, despite what they tell themselves.”
Rafael’s even, measured tone was as gentle as fingertips at the top of Chico’s spine. Chico regretted wearing a thin, white athletic tee and his collection of silver necklaces. Between that and the measuring tape he’d draped around his neck earlier, which moved when he did, he felt like he’d displayed his skin on purpose.
Which was stupid because dancers displayed skin all the time. Rafael was showing more than he was. Chico imagined him draped across the sofa, arms bare, legs open, one foot on the ground, and began to strip away the hastily glued-on embroidery. He could fix it later. What else did he have to do with his nights?
“Controlled,” Chico mused, only a little breathless. “That’s a good word to describe your dancers.” And Rafael as well. He was the opposite of Chico. “That must be nice. She’ll listen to you, though. You’re a good, I mean, you seemed like a good teacher to me, from what I saw the other night. And what I saw in your waltz class, although I know I wasn’t there for long.”
“You’re welcome to come back,” Rafael offered, without a trace of a smile in his husky voice. That came a moment later, when he went light and teasing. “I promise not to show you off in front of everyone again, cross my heart. Not unless you want me to.”
“Oh God.” Chico had to fight not to turn around. He touched his stinging cheek and flicked another look out the door. He felt like a teenager with a boy in the house, although his mother had never thought to demand he leave the door open like she had with his sisters. “I’m blushing,” he murmured at last. He was smiling too, and jittery with excitement and nerves. “You’re very good at this.”
“Is that okay?” If Rafael’s gaze was anything close to as warm as his tone, Chico was better off keeping his eyes on his work. “After what you said the other night, I thought you might not mind.”
“No. No, it’s….” Chico took a deep breath. “It’s been a long time since someone bothered to tease me like that.” With interest and attention, which was something he hadn’t even noticed until now, or at least hadn’t let himself think about. Somehow he’d stopped expecting John to flirt with him and tease him, as if it was something couples didn’t do once they lived together. He’d stopped expecting a lot of things, as if he wasn’t worth the effort.
“I didn’t mean to make it awkward.” Rafael’s soft apology broke into his moment of realization. Chico must have been quiet for a while.
This time he did twist in his chair to give Rafael a quick smile. It only lasted for a moment, until he actually got a good look at Rafael sprawled out on the couch with his shirt twisted and more of his chest exposed, his arm along the back of the couch and his legs open like Chico ought to crawl between them.
He swallowed and lifted his gaze too late not to be caught fantasizing about Rafael’s cock in his mouth. He turned around.
“Awkward is my natural state these days,” he revealed shakily. Rafael shouldn’t do those things while Chico was this vulnerable. The man taught dance and emphasized precision and how movements had meaning. He knew exactly what his body was doing. And his mother was
right there
.
“I can’t deny the awkward, but I have to say there’s something sweet about it. You’re very honest, even when you aren’t speaking. It’s those eyes. Truthful and sincere and incredibly appealing.” And then Rafael had to go and be kind again.
“
Too
honest,” Chico corrected, as though his blood wasn’t singing at what he was hearing. “I’m not exactly at my best.”
“You’re nervous and sort of skittish, if you don’t mind me saying so, but so are most people who’ve been through the wringer.” Rafael was curious, and Chico couldn’t blame him, considering how all over the place he was now. “But for all that, you seem pretty together to me. What do you consider you at your best?”
“You really want to know?” Nobody just asked questions like that, certainly not people Chico barely knew. “I’m not that interesting,” Chico added. “And ‘skittish’ makes me feel like a deer.”
“A soft, little deer on wobbly legs, with the hugest, brightest brown eyes I’ve ever seen,” Rafael said softly.
Chico spun around to look at him and found he couldn’t meet Rafael’s eyes while those words were hanging in the air between them.
He faced forward and stared at the notebook. “You’re teasing me, Mr. Raf.”
Rafael hummed in agreement… or perhaps encouragement. “I’m flirting with you, Mr. Silva.”
Davi must have told Rafael Chico’s last name. Davi could have told Rafael anything about him, and still Rafael was trying to flirt with him?
Chico tried to imagine his old life, and if Rafael would have liked him if they’d met in the city.
“Me at my best?” he wondered, after several moments of contemplation. “I haven’t felt that way in a while. Years, maybe? I can’t remember,” he answered at last. “Oh shit.” He put his head down in the middle of stiff, itchy tulle and let one high laugh escape, then another. He waved a hand behind him when he heard Rafael move. “I’m not having a breakdown. I just… is it your quiet teacher vibe? Because I don’t do this around anyone else, not even Davi.” He chortled into the tutu, then lifted his face. “You know. I don’t think I had anyone to tell about John. I think he liked it that way. Not in a scary abuser way, or, yeah, I guess. Not scary. But definitely isolating. As though if I was around other people, I’d notice what a loser he was. God, he was such a loser. All my time ended up going to make him look better. Nice, clean apartment, advertising our social life so all his friends online could see it, learning to make quinoa, as though I’m any sort of a cook. As though it’s some miracle food, when I’m tired and I just want a peanut butter sandwich.”
Chico stopped to heave a breath. “And now you’re flirting with me, and it’s so nice I don’t know what to do.”
He immediately dropped his head again to giggle into the sugarplum fairy’s skirts.
“Are you all right?” Rafael moved again, probably sitting up.
Chico shook his head, then changed his mind and nodded. “It’s
that
. It’s when you do that. You care, and you actually react to what I’m doing and what I’m saying. You’re the complete opposite of him, and that must be what triggers it. I think of him and how he’d compare, and God, what a loser.”
“Thank you?” Rafael replied hesitantly, no doubt thinking Chico was crazy.
Chico sobered up. “What does it say about me that I thought a loser was too good for me?” The question was real. But it was also something for therapy, or maybe another evening on his balcony,
not
the costume closet of the Winters Dance Studio. Chico sat up. “You know, it could be the nights up here. I’ve had nothing to do but think and stare at the stars.”
“They’re a nice view, aren’t they?” Rafael offered sincerely, bringing Chico around to face him. He gave Chico a friendly grin. “Clarifying, somehow.”
“Yeah,” Chico agreed, smiling without any hysteria in it this time. “They’re almost worth everything. Every weird, horrible thing I’m still getting used to, like how long it takes the two cashiers to ring people up at the grocery store. Or everyone knowing my name. The stars are great.”
Rafael smiled back. “I’ve always thought so.”
Chico flashed back to the articles and pictures in the foyer, although he really couldn’t think of a way to ask why Rafael had given up professional dancing. He bit his lip and gave him a careful look. “They helped you too?”
If the subject was painful, Rafael hid it well. He rolled his shoulders. “They still do. After a bad day, there’s nothing like going out to let the view soothe my weary body and somewhat tired soul. Maybe I should feel alone, looking at them, but I don’t.”