It just surges.
He spins back, noticing. “Come here, Bay.” His voice is tender, and he brings me into another warm hug. I wrap my arms around his waist.
“Date night!” someone shouts.
I suddenly gape at Luka.
“Date night!” That’s a Kotova, jeering at us about our date night later.
I eye Luka. “You told who?”
He kisses my lips, my temple, my cheek, and he whispers, “Everyone.”
I wear a more heartfelt smile, swooning at him. We sway now like we’re slow-dancing. “Because you can,” I realize.
He nods, a powerful, assured nod. “Because we can.” We can tell the whole world we’re in a serious relationship. I inhale a freeing breath, and that’s when Sergei approaches, an envelope in hand.
Sergei opens his mouth, but an old female AE doc calls Luka over, “I need to do a short examination on you, Luka.”
“I had a physical last month,” Luka says while we separate. I tighten my towel around my chest, and Luka fits his baseball cap over his tousled hair, hiding his gaze from Sergei.
“It’s a follow-up to that one. Just step over here.” She ties her wispy gray locks back, and Sergei and I watch her lead Luka to the medicine cabinet.
I put my towel to my lips, nervous.
Early this morning, he stole a coffee canister from the grocery store. He helped me put away my veggie kits and protein bars—and I had to ask, “How bad is it?” We were both grabbing the refrigerator handle, frozen.
He knew I was referring to his kleptomania. “What kind of scale do you want?” he asked.
“One being you…”
“…have no desire to steal,” he helped me out. “Ten I can’t stop thinking about it?”
I nodded.
Luka contemplated for a second. “Maybe a six, six-point-five. It’s like…about as bad as when I was…” He winces through his teeth, trying to find an age. “Eight-years-old?”
“I didn’t know you then.”
He smiles. “No kidding.”
I tried not to smile back, but it was hard. “The other thing is worse right now though, isn’t it?” I meant his bulimia, but he hates the clinical names, so I always avoid them in conversation.
“Yeah, it’s not good.” Luka sighed deeply and spun his Knicks hat backwards. “I’m trying to get ahold of it. I’ve just felt out of control lately.” He chewed his bottom lip once in thought and nodded, coming to terms with that. “You sad?” he asked.
I made a so-so motion with my hand, and then we hugged, our hands dropping from the refrigerator, the door thudding shut.
My cheek to his chest, I asked, “Therapy?” I wondered if he was going.
“I never found a therapist in Vegas.”
“You never tried?”
He shook his head, blinking a couple times. “No. I don’t know, maybe I should.” He used to go when he was little, and he returned in New York around when I first met him, on-and-off. AE used to pay a portion, but Luka mentioned that his health insurance didn’t cover it anymore.
Sometimes it’s easy to use money as a reason not to go, but therapy helps us both a lot.
I nudged him lightly and said, “You should try.”
“…I’ll think about it.”
I replay our talk in my head as the female doctor nears Luka.
“Can you open your mouth, please?” she asks him.
He looks nonchalant as he lowers his jaw, mouth wide. She peers down his throat with a medical instrument and light.
“You’re worried about him?” Sergei asks me.
I frown. “Yeah, he’s my…” God, I’m smiling already. “Boyfriend.” It’s overwhelming being able to say that.
“No, I mean…” Sergei gestures from Luka to me and back again. “You know what he deals with. He’s told you?”
I nod, and I look at the ceiling as I find the answer. “I think he told me when I was…thirteen? Yeah, thirteen.” It was really hard for Luka to describe what had happened, which is why I don’t ever repeat his past to anyone. Not even to someone who may already have the answers.
Like Sergei.
He scratches his short hair. “I should’ve known you two were together.” His shoulders rise. “I just thought Luka would’ve told me that he had feelings for you. I never thought he legally couldn’t say anything.”
“I doubt Luka minds anymore,” I say. “He’s not really a grudge-holder.”
“My apology is for you.”
My brows jump.
Sergei laughs, more at himself than at me. “No one thinks I can apologize?”
I must not be the first stop on the Sergei Kotov apology tour. “It’s just apologies usually begin with I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry,” he says honestly. “For more than one thing.” He passes me an envelope.
My lips part. “Is this…?” I feel the outline of money without opening the flap. The grand for my misplaced box. I paid AE and depleted my bank account months ago.
“It’s not all I owe you. I thought I could pay in installments. A hundred a month.”
“I’m confused.” I slowly shake my head to clear cobwebs. “Why now?”
Sergei rubs his throat. “It’s not easy admitting that I’m in the wrong. Before I transferred to Infini and moved to Vegas—I honestly did not know this about myself. I guess confronting old choices puts your life into perspective…” He pauses. “And I’ve been mentally revisiting conversations and things I’ve done, and I realized I was stubborn and…an ass here. So.” He motions to the money. “That’s a start to an I’m sorry.”
“Okay,” I say with a small smile. “I accept, thanks.” Do we shake? Do we hug?
I guess I have to start with: what is Sergei to me exactly?
A co-worker?
My boyfriend’s older brother?
Luka is on okay terms with him. They haven’t built a close-knit relationship, but he’s not cold-shouldering Sergei like Timo.
To my knowledge, Timo hasn’t spoken to Sergei since The Red Death, and Sergei has respected his little brother’s space.
Their disputes aren’t mine though. I want to be friendly to someone who’s been kind, so I extend a hand to shake.
Sergei smiles and shakes back.
“I have it under control,” Luka says strongly to the doctor. Our eyes fix back on him.
She sighs. “You’ll need to start writing down everything you eat and your feelings about the food before and after consumption. I’ll give you a journal before you leave. I believe you did this before when you were…” She flips into his chart. “Six-years-old—”
“I am not that bad,” he refutes, turning his back on us.
Sergei cracks his knuckles, on edge.
“I think it’s best, Luka,” she says. “Stay there, let me get you a journal.”
“Baylee.”
I jump so much at the sound of Geoffrey’s voice, right by my ear. I end up bumping into Sergei, but he puts a hand on my shoulder, steadying me.
My lungs just shot out of my body, and Geoffrey wears zero humor.
Before I ask what, he says, “You’ll need to stay late tonight.”
Today is an “off” day—no performances. So Luka and I came in at 5:00 a.m. on the dot to workout and practice so we could have the night off. I reiterate this to Geoffrey, and he cuts me off mid-sentence with, “Shut up.”
“That’s not necessary, Geoffrey,” Sergei tells him in a controlled voice.
Luka abandons the medicine cabinet to reach us. “What’s going on?” His hand slips into mine.
My ribs hurt; I’m so stiff. “He’s saying we need to stay late.”
Luka shakes his head. “Why?”
“I need you both on trampoline tonight,” Geoffrey explains. “We’re changing your eight-ball, seven-up pirouette.”
“I can’t do nine balls,” I emphasize, my pulse racing in fear. It’s not possible. I’ve never done that before, not even on the ground. And any big changes we make now are risky. The show has already begun.
“Did I specify nine balls? No, I didn’t,” Geoffrey snaps. “You’re not going to sit on Luka’s shoulders anymore.” He takes one beat. “You’re going to stand.”
Shit.
Shit.
I rub my eyes, already tired at the thought of nailing that trick down while standing on his shoulders. And the timing—God, the timing.
Perrot would tell us to deal with this change. So I nod. “Okay.” All I can do is agree and work hard again and again.
Ignore the stress.