Page 18 of The Failed Audition

I circle languidly, licking the side of my palm. And then I rub my hip against his calf, all the while a swelter boils in my body. But I do it again. And again, my arm brushing up against his skin.

His quads tighten in response. I tense just as much, and I catch a peek of his features, which haven’t changed since the beginning.

“Purr,” he tells me.

I freeze at the new command. Purr? How does one evenpurr?I’m going to try to attempt it. I have to. As soon as I open my mouth, the sound that leaves is nothing short of a moan, one that happens in private—not during an audition.A job interview.That’s what this is. With directors in sight.

The other gymnasts are most likely crossing me off their lists.One competitor down.

Nikolai appraises me but makes no statement whether I’m succeeding or failing at being a horny cat. “Stop,” he says.

A pit wedges in my ribcage, and I slowly stand to my feet, hot all over. I brush my hair into a tight ponytail. I can feel him scrutinizing my actions, and what’s worse—he won’t fill the empty air with talk. Not until I snap the band and plant my hands on my hips.

He has to stare down at me as he speaks. “I’m a marble statue,” he declares. “You’re obsessed with it. You dream about it, erotic fantasies that make you come at night. You see this statue, what do you do?”

Holy.

Shit.

He said all of that without balking.

I open my mouth, about to play into this pretend, weird scenario. The girl would probably grind against the statue. Right?

He cuts me off, “Show me.”

I hesitate for one second.

And then the other man yells again in Russian, spitting as gruff words pour from his mouth. Nikolai shakes his head at him, and he shouts back, making another hostile hand gesture that I read as:wait a minute.

I inhale, about to go into girl-obsessed-with-statute mode, but the moment I near Nikolai, the Russian man charges onto the mat and physically separates us. He wedges his short, stalky body between me and him, and he spews Russian words straight to my face. Like I understand.

I don’t.

Not one word.

“I don’t know what you’re saying,” I tell him softly, my stomach practically convulsing with nausea. I have no idea what’s going on. Maybe he’s upset with Nikolai for putting me through a strange audition. By the snarl on his wrinkled face, he clearly hates me.

And if my hunch is correct, he’s the choreographer for the aerial silk act.

He gestures to me and then to the mat with all the other girls. Nikolai tries to talk above him, but this only sparks another verbal shouting match.

Helen struts to the mats, approaching from a safe distance. “Thora, that’s it for you,” she says. “You can take a seat and wait for the other girls to audition. We’re making the first round of cuts at the end of the day.”

Her words knock me backwards a bit. She might as well have said:you failed so much that we only gave you five minutes instead of fifteen.My legs feel heavy as I trudge over to the girls. They shift nervously and none make snide comments or laugh and jeer about my cat-in-heat routine.

I plop down beside Kaitlin, who remains quiet. And I watch Nikolai and the choreographer come to a somewhat peace, their hands raised likelet’s end this and move on.

When they separate, Nikolai rubs his jaw and takes a few extra paces behind Helen. The older man stays on the sidelines of the blue mats. And it’s Helen who calls the next girl forward.

“Number 1,” she says.

Elena, the bleach-blonde, gracefully rises to her feet, nearly gliding to a halt in front of Helen. In her green leotard, her limbs seem thinner and her chest flatter.

I don’t even want to watch, my insides stretching to their limits. I fiddle with my fingers, pushing down my cuticles while I cross my legs.

“You’re a flower in a meadow,” Helen says.What?

My heart stops.

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