Page 22 of Taking It To Overtime
“You can stay,” Vera said, “but I bet I can get to the front door before you.” and they smiled at each other before scrambling out of the car, knocking shoulders and hips as they ran for the entrance.
The store was small, racks of leotards and warm-ups organized by size and color in front of the trio of arched mirrors. Gauzy curtains and fresh flowers made the entire sales floor a princess-perfect wonderland. Robbie shouldn’t have fit it at all, not with his athletic shorts and dirt-streaked shirt. Not with his dark hair curling around the brim of his backwards hat and his scuffed sneakers. Vera half expected him to break into hives, or offer again to wait in her mom’s car, but he found a seat on a pink upholstered bench and settled in with the book he’d tucked under his arm.
This year was a big one for Vera. She was finally going to wear a light blue leo for class and maybe in a few years she’d be ready for pointe shoes. She couldn’t wait for that. She had apair of dead pointe shoes worn and signed by Darci Kistler after her Sugar Plum performance hanging from the post of her bed. That wasn’t strange, either. She knew for a fact that Robbie had a puck signed by Jaromír Jágr. Not that Vera knew who that was, other than that he played for Pittsburgh and the boys thought he was top tier.
“Let’s get that hair up, young lady,” the shop owner bustled over, a black elastic wrapped around her bony wrist, and then Vera didn’t have time to think about Robbie at all.
The trip took an hour. Vera picked out two light blue leotards for her ballet class, one long-sleeve, one with spaghetti straps and a plunging back. That one had been a hard sell for her mom, but she wasn’t a little kid anymore.
“It’ll help Miss Eve see the lines of my shoulders,” she’d wheedled, full of complete poop as she turned side to side in the mirrors. Vera was trying to see herself like one of the older dancers on pointe. She held her hands out at her sides as if she didn’t want to squash a shimmering tutu. She arched her neck and imagined she was feeling the heat from the spotlights as she stepped out onto the stage at Lincoln Center. Dance was going to make her a star someday. She could feel it in her bones.
“Sorry you got stuck with all that,” she said. She knocked her knee into Robbie’sonce they were back in the car, her newly stocked dance bag sitting at her feet. He’d been exceedingly patient as she tried on tights and leotards and wrap skirts. He’d kept his nose down, barely sparing her a single glance until her mother went to pay. Then he’d asked her to show him the basic positions, clapping and grinning like she was a prima ballerina wowing a sold-out crowd.
“I don’t mind.” Robbie smiled at her, his eyes warming as they slid over her face, before he turned his head back toward his book. “I like seeing you dance.”
“I barely did anything.” She laughed. She’s only shown him first through fifth position. Those are the moves they teach in beginner classes. “You’ll have to come see an actual show.”
Vera winced. Robbie Oakes wasn’t going to take time out of his practice and game schedule to go to her dance recital or watch the nutcracker. He wasn’t going to put on his fancy shoes and sit at the edge of his seat while Doctor Coppelius tried to steal Franz’s heart for his life-size doll.
“I’d like that,” Robbie said, turning the page in his book, not even glancing up.
“You would?”
“Yeah,” he turned another page. “You can come watch me play hockey, too.”
“Okay.” Vera looked out the window as they drove past another set of fields. She’d probably have to stop playing pickup games with them—too much risk she could break a bone, which would mean no dance—so she could go watch him play as a sort of consolation prize.
“Someday I’ll tell everyone I saw the famous Vera Novak dance.”
She met her best friend’s eyes.
“Someday I’ll tell them I scored a goal on NHL superstar Robbie Oakes.”
“Someday you’ll shoot at the right net. If you keep practicing.”
She’d grinned the rest of the way home.
You haveno one to blame but yourself,my brain unhelpfully supplies as I wrench open the door to the public library. I have time to kill and forgot how little there was to do around here. Dad’s at work, gearing up for yet another season with the Kimmelwick Vikings and Mom is…. Well, I know it was my idea to keep up the dating ruse, but I don’t really want to rehash that conversation with her just now. I’m sure it’ll come up tonight when we head to the Oakes’ for dinner.
The Kimmelwick Public Library is almost an optical illusion. It sits in what looks like an old, Victorian house, but once you step through the doors, it’s as high tech as any of the smaller branches out on California. The main level is one big open space. Gleaming mahogany shelves line the walls, and small study carrels filled the center space. A circular reception desk faced the front door, a blonde woman typing at the speed of light on a sleek black computer.
“I’ll be right with you,” she says, not looking up from the screen, and it occurs to me I know her.
Birdie Bellamy sat in front of me for four straight years of high school English and next to me for three years of science. She’d been quiet unless her hand was high in the air and she always wore her hair yanked back into two tight braids. I wouldn’t have categorized us as friends, but she was always niceand did her share of group projects. I’m not sure Birdie really hung out with anyone.
She glances up from her computer then, pushing a pair of round glasses up the bridge of her nose, and smiles at me. “Hi Vera, how can I help you today?”
“Um hi, Birdie.” I give her an awkward wave from my hip. “How have you been?”
Her smile grows wider, and she reaches up to push her hair behind her ears. “I’ve been good. Life has been nice and quiet.” Her eyes shift away from mine. “I wasn’t sure you’d remember me.”
I have to bite down on my lips to keep the smile at bay. I don’t want Birdie thinking I’m laughing at her, but she looks exactly the same as she did in high school except for a few gray hairs and some faint lines that show she smiles freely. She still has the same honey-colored eyes, wide under the lenses of the same glasses she wore in high school. She’s even still rocking a braid, although it’s a single plait now, loose, tendrils escaping to frame her face as it falls down her back. She used to get teased for the mousy color, but old money blonde is currently on-trend. I know several girls who’ve payed a small fortune to achieve what she comes by naturally. It’s even harder to hold in the laugh now. I could say the same thing aboutmyhair color. And freckles.
“Of course I do,” I tell her, but I’m not sure what else to say. It seems rude to say she hasn’t changed or that her vocation certainly didn’t surprise me. “I also remember you had the best taste in books, and I was hoping for some recommendations.”
And I had some time to kill and nothing better to do,but I don’t say that.
“I was hoping you’d stop by. I didn’t know how long you’d be in town and I work most of the shifts here.” She gestures around the empty room.
