Page 52 of Slow Burn
My relaxed state was soon interrupted by the trill of my phone.
I groaned.
‘Ignore it,’ said Gabriele, his fingertips making circular patterns on my back in a deliciously comforting rhythm.
‘It might be my parents,’ I said.
‘So what? Call them back.’
‘Or the studio,’ I said.
He was right, of course, there was nothing to stop me ignoring either. But this was me we were talking about, and learning hownotto be at everyone’s beck and call was going to take some more work. Plus, I was completely paranoid that the whole place was going to be burned to the ground while I was away, and every time the phone rang I assumed it was one of the teachers telling me the fire brigade were on their way.
I inched my hand across to the bedside table and to my phone.
‘Sorry,’ I said to Gabriele, rolling off him and onto my back. ‘I know I’m pathetic.’
‘I never said that,’ he said, watching me with a smile.
I glanced at the screen. Shit. It was Julie, one of the teachers from the studio. What was happening?
I answered the call, feeling as though my heart was stuck in my throat, and hoping this was a total overreaction to what could be a call about many different things, none of which involved flash flooding or armed robbery.
‘Hello?’ I said, trying not to sound as though I was in the grip of panic. ‘What’s up?’
I knew to at leasttryto play it cool.
I slipped my legs inside the duvet, feeling weird about taking a work call completely naked.
‘It’s Julie. Sorry to call so late, but I wasn’t sure what time you’d be back from the theatre.’
Julie had been working at the studio off and on almost as long as I had. She was one of our most trusted employees and my mother had been vaguely appeased when I told her I’d put Julie in charge in my absence. We all knew she’d do a good job, and the clients loved her.
‘Everything okay?’ I asked.
I glanced across at Gabriele, who was scrolling through his phone now, too. As if sensing me watching him, he turned to face me, propping himself up on one elbow and grinning at me in a way that would have been extremelysexy if I wasn’t about to have an anxiety attack about the studio. I looked away again – I couldn’t focus with him looking at me, and this was important.
‘Yes, don’t panic, it’s nothing urgent,’ said Julie. ‘Is this a good time?’
‘Sure,’ I said. Julie wasn’t to know.
I took a few deep breaths. It was okay. Something was happening, but it didn’t sound as though there was a threat to life.
‘I thought you’d want to know that a few of your clients are talking about leaving and going elsewhere for lessons. They miss you, and some of them aren’t convinced you’ll come back. They said they’d signed up because they wantedyouto teach them, not one of us,’ said Julie.
‘Right,’ I said. God. Really? ‘Can you ping their names over and I’ll send them a personal email. Reassure them that I’ll be back in a few weeks’ time and that normal service will resume?’
Julie was silent for a few seconds. ‘Will it, though? Only, I thought you might have caught the performing bug. Everyone’s raving about you in the press – I bet if you got an agent now, they’d be getting you seen for anything you wanted.’
My heart began to thump in my chest again, but with a different type of adrenaline this time. It wasn’t about whether the studio had suffered some sort of catastrophic incident, but about whether Julie was right. I hadn’t allowed myself to seriously consider whether I wanted to go straight backto the studio. And sure, I’d told my sisters that I wanted to keep dancing, but I had no idea how that would look, or if it would even be possible. And although I knew the show was going brilliantly, I’d always assumed that had far more to do with Carlos and Gabriele than me.
‘I assumed I’d come back and pick up right where I left off in some capacity,’ I said to Julie, deciding honesty was the best policy, with her at least. It’s not like she would mind either way. ‘But maybe you’re right. Maybe this is a sign I need to change things up completely, do something different with my life.’
But how was I going to stop our clients leaving in droves? My parents would kill me if the membership rate started to drop. We relied on those monthly direct debits to keep the money rolling in – rent in Castlebury might not be at London levels, but it was still extortionate, and the electricity bill was through the roof. Dad had tried to blame it on the revolving glitter ball.
‘Let me have a think about how to stay involved with the studio while I’m touring,’ I said. ‘There must be a way that I can connect more with our members. Let them know that I’m thinking about them all, that I care about the studio, and that I haven’t just abandoned them to go off and dance my way around Europe.’
‘Good idea. But do it fast,’ advised Julie. ‘And keep me posted!’
