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on the back of it. He was smiling at me in that trying-not-to-laugh way. I glared at him and then caught Asher giving me the same look. I rolled my eyes at both of them and settled back in my seat.
I fell into a sort of daze, and then Micah raised the open program in his other hand in front of my face. I had to blink to read it. Jason Schuyler was listed as accompanying senior student Alicia Snyder. He’d said that the men were really just mobile props so the senior girls could have a wider choice of dances for their last hurrah before going off to college. “We’re just there to make the girls look good, and tote and fetch them.”
When I’d asked, “Then why do it?” he’d looked at me as if I’d said something silly. Jason had been in dance and theater all the way into college; apparently it was just some sort of dance thing that I wasn’t going to understand, but it made sense to him and to the other men that he’d talked into doing it. It had been Jean-Claude and Jason’s idea to make the exotic dancers at Guilty Pleasures, and the less exotic dancers at Danse Macabre, two of Jean-Claude’s clubs, learn to really dance. Jason and Nathaniel had been working with them and the teachers at the school all summer. It was the most men that the senior girls had ever had access to for partners, and most of them had taken our men up on the offer.
The ballerina with Jason was actually shorter than he was, and since he was only an inch taller than me, she was tiny in her black proverbial ballerina outfit with white tights and a flash of sparkle in her bound hair. He’d tied his own longish blond hair back in a tight, smooth ponytail so that it gave the illusion of being short. He wore an outfit that matched hers and I realized I’d never seen Jason in black before. They both looked elegant. Jason was usually smiling, joking, and one of my best friends. He was a lover as well. He was cute and even handsome, but I’d never realized that he could be elegant and beautiful. The music began and I saw instantly why she’d wanted him to partner her. I knew Jason moved well, even danced well, and I’d seen some of the practices, but I hadn’t seen much of him with the girl. I’d never seen him move like this in dance.
He had the grace both of his years of dance training and of being a werewolf. All the wereanimals moved well, as if it came with the disease in their veins. He didn’t have a lot to do but hold her en pointe and help her twirl and do some lifts, and finally lift her completely over his head one-handed and carry her rainbowed body across the stage to bring her in a heart-stopping drop to be caught an inch above the floor with her body still graceful and taut in his arms.
The last move made the entire audience gasp. There was a moment of dead silence and then thunderous applause. J.J. leaned over and said, “That moment of silence is worth more than the applause afterward. It means you’ve nailed it.” She was clapping as she spoke, and when the audience actually rose to their feet we joined them.
The girl curtseyed and was given a bouquet of roses by one of the earlier students still in costume. They kissed cheeks and then the ballerina took two of the long-stemmed roses out of her bouquet and handed them to Jason. He came forward, took the roses, kissed her hand, and then she insisted on bringing him forward so they bowed together. I didn’t need anyone to explain to me that Alicia was showing that she knew she could not have wowed the audience without Jason’s help.
He was beaming, eyes glowing, even as his chest still rose and fell from the effort of lifting and throwing her, and making it all look pretty and effortless.
J.J. said, “I don’t envy who goes next.”
I agreed and was glad it was a senior girl by herself. I didn’t want to see one of our own guys compete with what we’d just seen. It seemed like a damned hard act to follow.
The senior girl was good, but she wasn’t as good, and I sympathized that here at her last performance she had