Fallen Stars and Broken Dreams - C.C. Masters Page 0,48

but Ryan didn’t seem as excited as I was.

“It sounds like you’re getting along better with them,” Ryan said with a hint of jealousy.

I rolled my eyes. “I tell you that I’m in the middle of a prank war with two guys who hate me, and that makes you think we’re friends? They kidnapped me, Ryan.”

Ryan made a noncommittal sound. “If you were truly scared of them, you wouldn’t be poking at them like this. And didn’t you say that they stood up for you against your mom? I think the lady doth protest too much.”

I snorted. “As if.”

Ryan yawned again. “I’m going back to sleep, KitKat.”

“Don’t you have to get up for school?” I asked in confusion. “The summer session already started.”

There was silence on the other line for a moment before Ryan spoke. “I’m taking the day off.”

“Ryan,” I scolded. “Taking one day off can turn into two, and before you know it, it’s a week. You’ll feel like crap when you finally go back to the studio.”

“You sound like your grandmother,” Ryan said quietly.

A sense of loss stabbed me right in the heart. “Yeah, I guess I do,” I said slowly.

“You have to learn to take a day off every once in a while, KitKat,” Ryan told me. “Do normal teenager things like going to a party, having a few drinks, and letting loose.”

“Partying won’t get us to the top,” I insisted.

“No,” Ryan agreed. “But it will help you keep your sanity. If you’re obsessed with ballet every single second of your life, you miss out on everything else. You’re going to wake up one day and regret it.”

I swallowed when I realized Ryan had a point. I literally had nothing else in my life. The only time I ever took off was to be with Babulya or Ryan. Now, I didn’t have either of them, and I regretted that I didn’t treasure every moment I had with them. If I knew I would lose Babulya so soon, I might have skipped a practice or two to be with her. I trained three hundred and sixty-five days a year, so missing one or two days wouldn’t set me back that much.

“I gotta go, Katya,” Ryan said firmly.

My eyebrows raised. He never called me by my real name unless he was serious.

“To school?” I teased him, hoping he’d lighten up a bit.

He just sighed. “Bye, Katya.”

“I love you,” I whispered back to him.

“Love you, too.”

Ryan disconnected the call, and my levity vanished. While I was on the phone with him and hearing his voice, I could pretend that everything was normal. Once I was alone in a silent studio, yet again, it was back to my depressing new life.

Unable to take the silence for another moment, I walked over to the sound system. My first instinct was to put on something sad to match my mood, but I shouldn’t let myself sink deeper into this depressing mood. After flicking through my playlist, l decided to go with the Charles Matthew Pop Hits for Ballet Class to give myself a range.

I just got into the medium allegro section when the door to the fitness center slammed open. I glanced at the clock, surprised that it wasn’t later in the day.

Just as I expected, Kingston and Maverik stomped in my ballet room. Maverik had pulled on a pair of shorts, but Kingston had a towel wrapped around his hips. I got a wide smile at the spotty purple mess that was Kingston’s hair.

“You think this is funny?” Maverik said with a heated glare.

“Do I think what is funny?” I asked innocently, barely containing my giggles.

Kingston pointed to his hair. “It took me fifteen minutes to get the glue off my entire body, and that gave this,” he ran a hand through his hair. “Time to set in.”

I couldn’t help but laugh.

“I need to take a real shower,” Maverik told me. “Where’s all of our shit?”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Why are you bothering me? Go use one of the ten million guest bathrooms you have.”

Maverik’s eyes glittered, and I knew he wasn’t just asking for his stuff back. He was pissed that I’d gotten the better of him, and he wanted me to know it.

“Kitty Kat,” Kingston complained. “My hair. This is going to hurt my game with the ladies.”

I grinned at Kingston. “Nah, you can pull it off. You should probably use more of it to even the color out to make it look like you did it