En Pointe Part 14

Natalia didn't need anymore bad news. She waited outside the doctors office, her conversation with Reese replaying in her mind. He had no right to do that. To take pictures, to theoretically lie to her. "Miss Evans, the doctor will see you," she nodded and got up walking into his office. She walked in and sat on a chair opposite him.

"Hello," he said, taking off his glasses. She sat down across from him. "I had have another MRI to see how your knee was healing. I need you to be honest, have you been dancing,"

"Yeah," she said.

"You need to stay off your knee. No dancing until it heals." he said and looked down at the file, then back up. "You do want to dance this summer right?" she nodded. "Take it easy, do the exercises I gave you."

"I thought it was healed!"

"Calm down. Even if it healed it's more likely to get injured since it's weakened." He said gauging her reaction. "Stretch it out and try to strengthen. Go slower than you normally would, if you hurt stop and no going En Pointe."

"I thought you just said not to dance,"

"I don't recommend it, I never said you shouldn't," she let her mouth twitch into a rare smile as she thanked him and left.


At school she avoided Reese like the plague. She didn't want to talk to him. In photography they brought in the labtops for them to use. She downloaded the pictures onto it and saved them to her jumpdrive before deleating them off the camera.

"Hey," It was Reese. She stiffened, but didn't respond. "Tal, you can't do this forever. I'm sorry, okay?"
"Sorry's are meaningless. One word can't fix anything," he sighed.

"Fine, I want to know if I have permission to use the pictures," he said sharply.

"Go ahead, not having permission didn't stop you from taking them," she said. He took a deep breath.

"Can we talk?" he whispered. She rolled her eyes. "Listen I know your mad at me, but I was thinking we could do the duet together..."

"Are you crazy? I can't handle being in the same room with you now and you want me to trust you? I couldn't be your partner." She said, looking at him. She had never saw him dance but he didn't have the right build. Sure not all dancers had the 'perfect' body but it helped. His torso was too long and his arms didn't seem long in comparison to the rest of his body. He was about the right height but his shoulders were bulky and his feet didn't appear to turn out naturally.

"Why not? I need a partner and you can dance." He said.

"I dance classical ballet. I doubt you could do that," she said, focusing back on her assignment.

"Really? I take that as a challenge," he said. She rolled her eyes.

"Six o'clock Saturday morning, Rosewood park. If you can keep up with me I'll consider it," she said and walked away. Reese laughed thinking about how easy that could be.


When Saturday morning came around he saw Natalia standing by one the tables stretching. She was wearing sweats and her hair was in a bun on top of her head. "Ready?" she asked. He nodded and they started. "I thought we'd run this loop a couple times," she said.

"A couple? You do know this is around a mile,"

"Yeah, it's a good warm-up," she said. He hoped she was joking and ran ahead. They ran in silence and his breathing was getting harder. She was gaining up on him going a slow and steady pace. He couldn't believe it. Soon he matched her pace. By the end he was sweating and panting hard. She was controlling her breathing and resting. "Have fun?" she asked.

"Sure," he said gulping down some water, from the water bottle he brought.

"You have to have endurance if your going to dance. Along with strength and flexability. Are you sure you want to dance with me?" she asked. He nodded. "Good, race you to the dance studio!" The studio was about a block away, but he definatly didn't have the energy. Reluctantly he followed.


They'd been there nearly two hours and hadn't gotton to dancing. Natalia led him through this crazy workout. He thought he would die. It started out easy by stretching and working their way through the first five positions. Then they worked out seperate muscle areas and worked on jumps.

"Tired?" she asked. He nodded. "This is what you get for wanting to work with me. I work hard and I expect you to work the same," she said.

"Is this some kind of revenge?" he asked. "Make me kill myself by going through your crazy workouts?" he asked. She had turned the music on and went to the barre. She started in first position and did a demi plie, came up and did a grande plie before switching to second.

"No, I simply wanted you to know what you're getting into. I work hard and if your my partner I expect you to do the same," She said stiffly and propped her leg up on the barre and began to stretch.

"Fine," he said and walked out. She brought her leg down and looked in the mirror. She was sweating, tired wearing old workout clothes and for once was full on smiling. Reese had no idea what he'd gotton himself into.


"What if she doesn't? It's been over a month." Natalia's mom said. She had just gotton back from the studio.

"Lynn, the doctors are trying their best but they can only do so much. She's a fighter," It was her father. Natalia shut her eyes, it been a while since she thought of her sister; she'd been so caught up with Reese lately. She and Natasha used to be so close. At times having the other was the only thing that kept them sane.

Her parents voice got quieter and she walked into the kitchen. "Hi," she said. Her mom was at the table nursing a cup of coffee, her dad at the counter.

"Have fun?" she asked and looked her up and down, then sighed. She was wearing her dance clothes. "I thought you said you went for a run,"

"I did, these are just more comfortable." she said with a shrug reajusting the sweater that was slipping down her shoulder. "Is Natasha alright?" Her parents exchanged grim looks.

"Fine, it's just...just," her mom started.

"She's not waking up as soon as the doctors hoped that's all," her dad said with a smile. "Why don't you take a shower and change out of those clothes? I'll make you a breakfast burrito, you must be starved after all that running," she nodded, not wanting to ask anymore questions. She hadn't seen them openly worry about her sister, but after hearing this she got an idea of what was really happening.