LITMIR.BIZ

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Roman said. ‘He is still in the legion.’

      ‘Do you keep in touch with him?’

      ‘I do,’ he said.

      He turned off the light, gave her a brief kiss on the lips and then left. She lay in the dark, and slept. A sleep so deep that when she awoke Anya took a moment to realise where she was.

      The previous night’s events felt like a dream.

      She went into her bag for her phone to find out the time, but remembered that Mika had it. She went into the bathroom and freshened up.

      Did she dress for breakfast?

      Was it even breakfast time?

      She pulled on her robe and hurried out. She had class at eight and then rehearsals.

      ‘Bonjour, mademoiselle,’ Josie called out.

      ‘Bonjour, madame,’ Anya called back, and then wandered out to the balcony where Roman sat, reading the newspaper.

      Actually, he lounged in a chair.

      He was wearing only black jeans and he hadn’t shaved and when he looked up and gave her a smile, Anya had to fight not to go and sit on his lap and kiss him.

      ‘What time is it?’ she asked.

      ‘It is almost seven, I was going to get you up then,’ Roman said as she took a seat at the breakfast table. There were flowers in a vase and baguettes and pastries and a large silver jug, presumably coffee.

      ‘How did you sleep?’ Anya asked him.

      ‘I always sleep well,’ he told her. ‘So you don’t have to ask. If that changes I’ll let you know. What about you?’

      ‘I never sleep well,’ she answered. ‘But I did in the end. My room’s beautiful. You didn’t choose the furnishings, I take it?’

      Roman shook his head. ‘The apartment came as it was, even the staff! That was one of the most appealing things about it. I would have had no idea how to decorate it.’

      ‘Well, it’s perfect,’ Anya said, and reached for the coffee pot to fill her cup, and then frowned when delectable hot chocolate poured out.

      ‘I would like green tea,’ she said, cross with him for the temptation.

      ‘Sure,’ Roman said, and went to call out to Josie, but she was already there, bringing out some yoghurt and fresh berries, which she added to the collection of food on the table as Roman put in Anya’s order.

      ‘It might be a while,’ Roman said when Josie left. ‘She will have to go to the shop to get some.’

      ‘Oolong tea, then, or just—’

      ‘Do I look like a man who keeps a herbal tea collection?’ Roman interrupted.

      ‘I’m sure you’ve had other lovers ask for green tea,’ she sneered.

      ‘I don’t bring women here,’ Roman said. ‘There are hotels for all that.’

      And he both hurt her with the knowledge that, yes, there were women, and comforted her that he never bought them here, and yet here she was.

      ‘Tell Josie not to bother,’ she grumbled, and shot him a look as she poured hot chocolate. ‘Are you trying to fatten me up again?’

      ‘Anya,’ Roman said calmly, ‘I asked Josie to provide an alternative breakfast for you.’ He sliced open a baguette and slathered it with butter. ‘I drank black tea in the orphanage and then black coffee in the legion—’ he left out the years they could not speak of ‘—and then, that morning, when I found Josie in my kitchen, she brought out the same breakfast as she did for me today. She gets up early and goes to the bakery and she buys fresh bread and pastries and then comes back and makes the hot chocolate. I like it. That’s it. My choice of breakfast has nothing to do with you. You shall have a full herbal tea selection by the time you get back from dance.’

      ‘I might be back late. I have to work hard these next weeks,’ Anya said as she reached for berries and yoghurt but she did have hot chocolate.

      ‘Come back whenever it suits,’ he said to the newspaper but then he looked up. ‘Just come back.’

      ‘We’ve never had breakfast together,’ she said.

      ‘No,’ he agreed, and put down his paper and looked at her. ‘We cannot linger, though, you don’t want to be late.’

      Maybe they had changed.

      In their two weeks together they would make love in the morning and Anya would forget the time and arrive late for class. Afterwards, when usually she would stay late and rehearse further, she would race back to his.

      Her mother had once been at the stage door and had demanded that she come home and had chased her. Anya had outrun her, just for another night in Roman’s arms.

      ‘I won’t get in the way of your dance again,’ he said.

      He had learnt his lesson.

      After the disastrous meal and the row afterwards, the audition hadn’t gone well. Anya hadn’t made the corps and Katya had sought him out and come into the gym where he’d been training for his next fight. Anya had talent, she had told him. Anya had been doing well until he had arrived back on the scene.

      ‘You sabotage her dance,’ Katya had spat at him, and it was then she had told Roman that he was a burden to the system and that no family would want him in theirs. ‘You bring her down to your low level. Now I have to comfort her as she cries. All the work she has put in, all the agony she went through and now she has not made the corps. I wish, how I wish, for Anya’s sake, that you had never existed.’

      His passport had arrived that very day and Roman had packed up his things and left to join the foreign legion.

      No, he would not sabotage her dance again.

      ‘I need to go,’ Anya said.

      ‘Of course.’

      She went into her room and packed her dance bag and pulled on three-quarter tights and a leotard. Over that she put on a tube skirt and a wrapround cardigan.

      She arrived at eight, but that was late by her standards.

      And Mika’s.

      ‘Where were you?’ he said as barre work commenced. He was working behind her. ‘We waited in the foyer for you and then had Reception ring up to your room but there was no answer.’

      ‘I’m not going to be staying at the hotel.’

      She could feel his disapproval behind her and the same thing from Lula, who was working in front of her.

      Even if Anya wasn’t close friends with anyone, they were a close group. They were on tour together and often dined and went out together.

      Change was frowned upon.

      For Anya the class went beautifully. The whole day did. Her floor work went well, even as she and Mika walked through the second part of The Firebird, she was confident, and felt energised, just at the thought that tonight she would see Roman.

      ‘Tonight,’ the choreographer said once they were packing up their bags, ‘we thought we might go to the open-air cinema at the Vilette Park.’

      ‘I can’t make it tonight,’ Anya said.

      She did not have to give an excuse or a reason, yet as she headed for Roman’s she felt as if she should have, for she’d almost heard the silent disapproval from the group as she’d pulled back from them.

      Anya tried not to think about it and as she stepped out of the elevator it took a moment to realise that she was alone in his home.

      There was no answer when she called out Roman’s name. No Bonjour returned when she said it out loud.

      Anya

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