Dancing for the Lord The Academy - By Emily Goodman Page 0,25

on his knee and making jokes about how one of them needed to take out stock in a frozen pea company—peas, because those made the best ice packs. She wanted to hold his hand, and to see for herself the color of his face, to know that he was really all right and not just feeding her a line. “How bad is it?”

“I’m okay, Dragonfly.” The calm reassurance didn’t settle her nearly as much as she would have liked. Michael would lie in a heartbeat if he thought it would worry her too much to know the truth. “Just twisted it enough to be sore for a couple of days.” She could hear the grimace in his next words. “Wish you were here with me, though. Mom’s…well, you know how Mom is.”

Yes, Danni knew Michael’s mother all too well. She didn’t try to be overprotective; but that didn’t mean that she wasn’t. In spades.

And the last thing Michael needed right then was someone hovering over him, especially since he was embarrassed about how the injury had occurred in the first place.

“You make sure you take care of yourself, okay?” she told him fiercely. “No going back out there until you’re ready.”

“I won’t.” He sighed; she pictured him resting his head back against the arm of the couch, closing his eyes to hide the fact that he was flinching when he moved. “Don’t worry too much, okay? I’ll be healed up just fine in a day or two.”

“A day or two. Right.” She didn’t believe him. Michael was always overly optimistic when it came to his own recovery time—especially when he was trying to convince one of the ladies in his life that he was all right.

“Okay, fine, I’m out of class for a week, best I can do. Does that make you feel better?” He snapped the words, regretted them in the next heartbeat. “I’m sorry, Danni.”

“Nah, don’t be sorry. If you can’t snap and snarl at me, who are you going to snap and snarl at?”

“Drew,” he said immediately. “You know—the person who really deserves it.” A hint of mirth infused his voice, though Danni had the feeling that it was forced. “And hey, guess what?”

“What?”

“He’s going to get a week out of school for it—the gym teacher knows he did it on purpose.”

Danni was silent for several seconds, and then she said, “You shouldn’t be so pleased about that, Michael. How long have we prayed to turn him into a friend?”

Michael sighed. “Honestly? I’m not.” He shifted; she could hear the faint groan that he tried to conceal from her. “I forget sometimes that you’re not like most girls. They would’ve taken the glee for what it was and left me alone after that.”

“I’ll never be most girls.” She had never wanted to be.

“Wouldn’t have you any other way.” He let the silence drag on between them for a moment, but finally, he knew that he had to let her go. “Go get some work done, Dragonfly.”

“I’ll pray for swift healing,” she promised him.

She could hear his smile. “Then I know it will come.”

“Call me if you need me?” That she couldn’t be there in person was bad enough. If Michael believed even for a minute that he couldn’t call her, it would absolutely break Danni’s heart.

“As if I’d dare do anything else.”

Danni hung up the phone; but she knew even as she did that she wasn’t going to get any work done. Michael. His injury had washed away all the pleasure she’d felt at her new class. He would have kept it from her rather than have it that way; but she couldn’t help worrying about him.

Lord, let him be telling me the truth, she prayed desperately. Let it be just a little thing—something that will have him back on his feet in a couple of days. It wouldn’t be the first time Michael had been hurt; and his knees gave him problems anyway. For that reason, Danni had always been very careful what she choreographed for him, making sure that there weren’t too many fast turns that would put undue pressure on him. For the most part, he did all right; but she’d seen him hurt any number of times, and after a major performance, it wasn’t uncommon for him to retreat to the car with an ice pack. Both of their dance bags even had cold packs tucked inside them for just such an eventuality, and she always carried an extra ice pack with her