Clint just beamed. “I’m so happy you’re all back with us. I can’t—you know eliminations are almost as hard on us as they are on you. You’re the ones who have to leave, but we’re the ones who have to watch you go. You’re our best and brightest, and every time one of you walked away, you took a little bit of my heart with you. It’s so nice to have my heart back.” Coming from anyone else, it would have sounded utterly cheesy. Coming from Clint, it sounded sincere. He really did love each and every one of us, which was why he was everybody’s favorite judge. No matter how badly you screwed up, Clint would be there to say you were wonderful.
“Now, Adrian, I know our format is a little different this season—what can our dancers expect?” Brenna moved back into the scene, stopping next to the outside line of dancers. A few people turned to smile up at her. Most of us kept our attention on the judges.
“Well, Brenna, for the most part, we’re staying with the tried and true: we’re going to be splitting our dancers into partnerships, and those partnerships will dance live on our stage, beginning with next week’s performance show. America will vote, and each week the girl and the guy with the lowest votes will be eliminated, until the top four have been chosen. Then it’s every dancer for themselves, and we determine who of our top twenty will be America’s Dancer of Choice.” Adrian sounded very invested in what he was saying. Forget world peace: what mattered was who America would vote for. “I know you’re all aware of what’s at stake, and I know you’re all going to dance your best. Because we wanted to recapture the magic of your original seasons, we’re going to be initially keeping the partnerships where they stood as of the end of your first appearance.”
Some dancers murmured, looking dismayed: they’d lost their partners going into the top four, and would be dancing with people they didn’t have much experience with. Others grinned or punched the air. I kept smiling serenely. My partner, Anders, had been with me from the beginning. I’d pulled his name out of the supposedly randomized hat. We knew each other incredibly well, and we’d be able to get back into the groove quickly.
“Initially,” repeated Adrian. Both the cheers and the mutters stopped as we all went still, watching him with the wariness of mice sharing a tank with a snake. “In addition to voting on individual dancers, America will be voting on whether or not any given partnership should be broken up. If your partnership doesn’t draw enough votes, you’ll find yourself with someone new—and since we have dancers here from five seasons, that someone new may be someone you’ve never even spoken to before.”
The feeling of unease on the stage was growing. We’d always been subject to the whims of the audience. Now we were going to be more at their mercy than ever.
“I want to stress again that you’re with us because we expect truly great things from you. You are the best of the best, the dancers America couldn’t forget, and by bringing you back to our stage, we’re giving them what they want. Hopefully, we’re giving you what you want as well: we’re giving you a second chance to claim your title—or in the case of our five winners, to defend it. Only one of you will come away from this as America’s Dancer of Choice.”
“But they’re all winners to me,” said Brenna. She waded into our little sit-down, motioning with her free hand. “Up, up, my darlings, get to your feet, it’s time to say hello properly.”
When she came to me, she took my hand and pulled me into a standing position, smiling sweetly before she moved on to the next dancer, leaving a folded square of paper pressed into the center of my palm. I beamed at her, trying to look adoring and oblivious—two qualities Valerie Pryor had traditionally possessed in plenty—as I tucked my hands behind my back and slipped the square of paper into the waistband of my yoga pants.
Brenna continued on into the dead center of our merry band, gathering as many dancers in for a hug as she could. She towered over all but the tallest of the male dancers, like a swan moving through a flock of ducks, and the looks people gave her were genuinely happy. Brenna didn’t judge us or blame us when things went wrong. She just liked us. That wasn’t part of her job as host—she could have been businesslike and friendly and still kept her position—but it was a definite bonus. Brenna’s rapport with the contestants was probably why the producers had never considered replacing her with a younger model, unlike all the other dance shows out there.
Once the hug was done, Brenna turned to the camera, raised her microphone, and said, “Here we go again! It’s your top twenty, America, and each and every one of them is already a star. Who will shine brightest? Whose constellation will finally take its place among the heavens? Find out next week, when Dance or Die begins the greatest battle that has ever graced our stage. Don’t miss it!” She winked. The show’s theme music kicked in, and like the well-trained beasts we were, all twenty dancers began to boogie down. The contemporary dancers shimmied. The ballroom dancers shook. And the hip-hop dancers did things with their ankles that made my joints ache in sympathetic pain.
The music continued. So did the dancing. One of the cameramen was probably getting a pan shot, something wide and exciting that would play well under the credits. Someone grabbed my hand, spinning me into a wide curve. I caught a glimpse of a grinning man on the other end of my arm: Ivan, one of the ballroom dancers from season four. He had good technique and was well known on the jive competition circuit. Good. I went into a series of jive steps as I spun back toward him, and was rewarded with him matching me beat for beat before grabbing and dipping me. I stuck one leg straight up into the air, narrowly missing kicking Lyra in the nose, and froze there as the music stopped.
“Cut! Stop what you’re doing!” shouted Adrian. All the dancers who hadn’t stopped of their own accord stopped where they were. Brenna extricated herself from the mob, murmuring polite good-byes as she stepped back to let the judges have their way with us. I stayed where I was. If Ivan was willing to hold me up, I might as well see how long I could maintain a full extension. Like yoga with a partner.
Adrian looked less intimidating when he was upside down. As things settled back into a semblance of order, he also started looking amused. “Valerie darling, did you decide to become a fruit bat between seasons?”
“Nope,” I said. “I just met this nice man, and I was trying to figure out whether I liked hanging out with him.” I righted myself, planting my feet firmly back on the stage, and offered Ivan a smile as I pulled away. “He’s okay.”
“Glad you think so. All right, everyone, if you haven’t checked in with the production assistants at the back of the room, you can go do that now. Fill out your paperwork and sign your waivers before we start putting you through your paces. We’ve got housing in the same complex as always, four to a two-bedroom flat. Roommates have been assigned, but if you want to negotiate a trade, feel free: just make sure everyone’s comfortable.” Adrian fixed us with a stern eye. “I’ll expect to see you all back here at seven o’clock tomorrow morning to begin rehearsals for the first episode.”
A hand went up. It belonged to a skinny redhead with hair several shades lighter than mine and cheeks brimming with freckles. Jessica. I wondered how many fits she’d had to throw to get her place on the show back. Technically, she’d been a part of her season’s top four, but she’d never performed with them: she’d dislocated her knee so badly during rehearsals that she’d required surgery, and the number five dancer, Honey, had gone on in Jessica’s place. If it had been up to me, Honey would have been the one tapped for this reunion, not Jessica.
(Jessica’s involvement with the show had never ended, damn the luck. She’d become a choreographer’s assistant after her elimination, and haunted the stage to this day.)
It looked like I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. The people around Jessica gave her sidelong looks, some annoyed, some pitying. There was little of the easy camaraderie that seemed to pervade most of the dancers, even the ones who’d never met each other before.
“Yes, Jessica?” asked Adrian.
“Is everyone going to have a roommate?” she asked. “I’m a light sleeper.”
“Every apartment will contain four people at the outset, with two bedrooms and four beds,” said Adrian. “There is also a couch. You may attempt to convince whomever has been assigned to share a room with you that they’d rather sleep on the couch, but I’m not going to step in on your behalf.”
“Shouldn’t be a hard sell,” murmured someone behind me. I bit my lip to keep myself from laughing.
“Are there any other questions?” asked Adrian. Without hesitating, he plunged on: “No? Good. We’ll see you at seven tomorrow morning. Please fill out your paperwork before tripping over a cable and breaking an ankle or something, no one’s getting sued today.” He stood, adjusted his jacket, and strode away, with Lindy scurrying close behind him.
Clint paused long enough to throw us a smile just as bright as the one he’d been using for the cameras, if not quite as crisp. “I really am excited to see you all,” he said, and trotted away.
“Guess we’re doing this,” said Anders, stepping up next to me.
“Guess we are,” I said. “Can you and Lyra go find out whether we’re all rooming together, and start making trades if we aren’t? I need to go say good-bye to my boyfriend.”
“Always knew you’d land a hottie,” said Anders. “I should’ve moved faster to make sure it was me.”
“Not getting my email address from Jessica would have been a start,” I agreed, and kissed his cheek before heading for the stairs. I could have jumped off the stage—it was only a four-foot drop, and I have a tendency to leap off the sides of buildings at the slightest provocation—but I hadn’t filled out my paperwork yet, and I didn’t want to give the poor production aides panic attacks. They already had to work with Adrian and Lindy. They didn’t need me to start torturing them, too.
Dominic was seated on the aisle about two-thirds of the way back, where he had a good view of both the stage and the aisles leading up to it. He’d been providing cover, in other words, making sure nothing was going to get the drop on me while I was playing good little dancer.
I rewarded him for his clever placement with a kiss. He kissed me back, so I felt compelled to kiss him again. This somehow turned into several minutes of us passing the kissing responsibility back and forth, my arms remaining locked around his neck the entire time. A few of my fellow dancers whistled or catcalled amiably as they walked past, but I ignored them. I had more important things to do.
Finally, Dominic let go and asked, “Well? Was it everything you hoped it would be?”
“It was pretty much exactly what I expected,” I said. “I have to go see the official housing, but I should be able to sneak out after sunset. Meet you back at our usual spot?”
“Ah, yes; I’d missed this phase in our relationship. The intrigue. The subterfuge. The frequent need for tetanus shots.” Dominic kissed me again. “I’ll see you there.”
I let him go, and watched, only a little regretfully, as he walked away. It was going to be weird, sleeping by myself. But who knew? Maybe this was going to get us back to New York.
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” I said, and turned to head for the back of the room. It was time to fill out my paperwork and meet my roomies.
Five
“The only place you shouldn’t sleep when you have the chance is a den full of bears and rattlesnakes, and if you’re tired enough, even that turns negotiable.”
—Frances Brown
The Crier Apartments, privately owned by Crier Productions, about an hour later
ADRIAN CRIER WAS A SMART MAN: everyone who’d ever had cause to work with him knew that. Being a smart man, he’d invested in Burbank real estate more than twenty years ago, which had helped to fund his production company. Among his assets were several apartment buildings, one of which was kept perpetually open in order to house the people who came to work on his various shows—people like us.
We’d all stayed in the Crier Apartments before, and there was something oddly comforting about climbing the exposed exterior stairs to the second floor. The building followed the kind of open design that only works in deserts and places that get minimal amounts of rain: all the apartments had doors that opened on the outside, and were built around a central courtyard that contained a fountain and a barbecue grill, as well as a great deal of aquamarine tile. It was like looking down into an empty swimming pool. It also echoed weirdly, something that was being clearly illustrated by the people who were shouting across it to their friends.
“I am so glad we’re sharing a bedroom,” I said to Lyra, as I unlocked the door to our temporary home. “I know you’re not weird.”
“And I know you are weird,” she said amiably. “Do you still sneak out the window in the middle of the night?”
“Yup,” I said. I opened the door and braced it with my suitcase before turning to take Lyra’s duffel bag. As a jazz dancer, her costumes took up substantially more space than mine. Add that to the fact that I was using Dominic as off-site storage for half my stuff, and it was obvious why she needed help. “Do you still whistle in your sleep?”
“Sometimes.” She eyed my single bag dubiously as she pushed past me. “Are you planning to get eliminated in the second week?”
“David’s delivering the bag with my shoes in it later,” I said.
Lyra smirked. “You know he can’t come in, right? Show rules.”
“Right.” Show rules: no visitors were allowed in the apartments, and while our friends and family could visit if they wanted, no one was supposed to go and show them around. Everybody did, of course. We just had to make sure the producers never noticed.
The apartment was small enough to be compact and big enough to be cozy, skirting the line between “reasonable housing for four people” and “dormitory” with consummate skill. Lyra and I were the first to arrive. We claimed the back bedroom, farthest from the echoing courtyard, and I dumped my stuff on the bed next to the window. It would be easier to slip in and out if I didn’t have to negotiate a sleeping body in addition to everything else.
Lyra looked at the bed I’d chosen and shook her head in amusement. “Oh, look, Val’s next to the window. Whoever would have guessed? Not me. Never me. I know nothing.”
“Let’s keep it that way,” I said, taking a moment to nab the note from my waistband. As expected, it said “See me later.” Brenna wanted to talk. “Do we know if the boys were able to trade for the other bedroom?” Anders and Pax—Lyra’s original partner—had been deep in negotiations when we left the theater. We were allowed to set up coed rooming arrangements if we wanted, as long as it didn’t distract from our work, and sometimes sharing space with your dance partner could be a real advantage. If you wanted to practice at three in the morning, you could do it in your living room, instead of in the courtyard. Big help.
“We are triumphant!” shouted Anders from the living room.
“Uh, yeah, they did it,” deadpanned Lyra. We both broke down giggling.
We were still laughing when Anders and Pax appeared in the bedroom doorway, effectively filling it. Anders was tall: Pax was taller, a solid wall of Hawaiian muscle who moved with a grace that should have been illegal in the natural world. If he’d been human, I would have considered him a violation of several laws of physics. Since he couldn’t have been much farther from the human genome without being made of silicon, I didn’t have that problem.
Pax offered a shy, tight-lipped smile when he saw me looking at him. I smiled back. “It’s good to see you,” I said. “I’m sorry we didn’t have a chance to talk at the theater.”
“I wasn’t talking much with anyone,” he said. “My flight from Maui got in an hour before call. I was afraid I was going to be late and get myself eliminated early.”
“How would they even have handled that?” as
ked Lyra. She sat down on her bed, looking coquettishly through her eyelashes at Pax. She’d been flirting with him since auditions. It had never gotten her anywhere, but she wasn’t about to let that stop her.
Too bad for her that Pax wasn’t likely to fall prey to her considerable charms: not when he had two wives and a husband waiting for him in the waters off Maui. He was Ukupani, one of the only known aquatic therianthropes, named for the shark-god Ukupanipo, who’d supposedly created them. (Maybe He had. How would I know? I don’t have much experience with gods, and I don’t want much experience with gods, since people who meet gods tend to wind up pregnant with demigods. Not my idea of a good time.) This all meant that when he wasn’t teaching dance classes on the island, he was splashing around in the Pacific Ocean, being a combination of man and shark, and birthing a million nightmares whenever someone happened to catch a glimpse of him.
Not that any of this was public knowledge. Pax was supposedly a single Hawaiian hottie, since female Ukupani couldn’t change shapes, and he was media savvy enough not to have mentioned his husband to the judges, or to anyone who might let it slip on the air. Adrian had a reputation for wanting his men to be manly, which carried with it an unfortunate whiff of homophobia. It sucked. Hopefully, this time we could do something about it.
“Probably have kicked off my partner, too, to keep things fair,” said Pax.
Anders snorted. “As if they’d eliminate a winner? Lyra took our season. That means she’s untouchable, at least until the second week.”
“Cynic,” accused Lyra.
“Realist,” countered Anders.
I laughed. I was back among the people who understood this side of me, the side that wanted to cha-cha rather than negotiate peace between disparate cryptid communities. Pax caught my eye and nodded, agreeing with my delight. His situation wasn’t quite like mine, but it was close enough that we both knew what it was like to hide half of ourselves from the world. We were still hiding, even here, but at least we could let our less-seen sides come out for a while.