10. Chapter 10

Chapter ten

Juliette

Time passed by incredibly fast. Kelsey answered me every time I took her aside to ask about Caleb with some variation of, "It's weird, but he's alright. I took your advice. Everything's fine," and the occasional, "Don't worry about me. We're cool."

Once everyone knew, they were smart enough not to ask any questions. Kelsey acted like everything was normal, so everyone played along. I caught glimpses of Ana squeezing her hand as they left class, but aside from that, I was completely in the dark as to what was going on at home.

Caleb hadn't contacted me either. I was effectively cut off, and it hurt.

We were working on our Spring repertoire, so classes went smoothly and about as silently as one could expect from teens. Kelsey showed up to assist my classes on time, and never missed a single rehearsal. Her demeanor was no different than ever, and I had to resign myself to the fact that not only did Caleb shut me out, so did she. Things were tense, yet eerily back to normal.

I hated it.

"Maybe they're getting along. He's a really nice guy," Cora said. We were locking up and dissecting every last crumb of our interactions with both Kelsey and Caleb. This was a ritual for us now.

"It doesn't matter how nice he is. She is going through the most traumatic experience of her life and he's all but forbidden me to talk to her about it. Then, when I try to talk to her, she won't. You see how she bolts out of here."

"Maybe she's talking to Ana. "

I considered it. "Ana's mom would have texted me. You know Ana, she's not equipped to help someone navigate this kind of experience."

"She's fifteen," Cora shrugged. "Maybe Kelsey's seeing a therapist?"

"Doubt it. Last time we spoke, Mr. Ramirez had these rose-colored glasses on like they were just going to settle in and talk over dinner and magically be a family. He said if I stayed out of it, they'd be able to form a bond. Because I wasn't on his side ." I said the last words mockingly.

Cora had heard this exact rant multiple times by now. This time, it seemed like Cora didn't approve. Her brow was raised to her hairline, hands on her hips. "Were you on his side?"

I scoffed. "Of course, I was on his side!"

She gave me a look that spoke for her.

"It is not my fault he didn't want to take my advice and—"

"Do it your way?" Cora cut me off, her tone flat.

"I," a pause for effect, "know Kelsey. Caleb," another dramatic pause, "made a stupid Star Wars reference within ten minutes of being her dad."

"That doesn't make him a bad person."

"It makes him clueless!"

"Give the man a break. He's trying so hard. Why do you hate him so much? He's so nice."

"I don't hate him."

"You avoid him like the plague when he comes in."

That was true. I actively found reasons to say in the studio whenever he was in the lobby. Suddenly, my phone was blowing up with texts I had to read. The floor needed immediate dry mopping. Handprints on the mirrors needed to be eradicated expeditiously. Anything to avoid stepping into the lobby and facing him.

Facing all the things I wanted to say.

All the things that had already been said.

The second week he started to come in early and watch the end of class through the viewing window. Parents did this all the time; but catching Caleb's gaze in the mirror sent a panic up my spine. The emotion that followed was indescribable. I had no right to resent him, but I did all the same. I felt him watching me for every second that he stood there and the feeling of his gaze made me burn. So, yes, I avoided making eye contact in the mirror, face to face, across the lobby when dismissing students.

"Cora, you know me. I wouldn't be able to stay out of it if he came in to talk."

"He asked about tuition again yesterday." Cora raised the second brow and pursed her lips in a way that never failed to make me feel inferior.

That was a very fetching pink lip color, I thought, grasping at ways to steer the conversation away.

"I told him you would give him a call. Speaking of calls, how's Nate? You been avoiding him, too?"

My groan escaped as a half-growl. "I don't want to call either of them."

Nate and I had been texting. Getting to know one another on that surface level, favorite food and animal type way. We flirted and sent the occasional selfie. I turned bright red when he'd come in and drop off packages, lit on fire by the way he looked at me. Our first date was inevitable and I had mixed feelings about it. He was eight years younger than me. Although I had nothing to base this theory on, I felt like he couldn't handle my past.

"Well, I can't call FedEx Man for you, but you need to face Mr. Ramirez and collect on Erin's debt."

"He's not responsible for Erin's debt."

"He wants to pay you. Take the money."

"I can't," I snapped.

As if summoned by our gossip, the front door opened, sweeping Caleb in with the wind. "Can I help you?" Cora asked, eyeballing me. She slung her bag over her shoulder, and I already knew she was going to abandon me here with him. Alone. She smiled ever so sweetly and made her way around the front desk.

I loved her so dearly, but she really was stubborn sometimes.

"Where's Kelsey?" he asked, stepping into the room.

"She went home with Ana," I replied .

Cora slinked past me and was at the door before I could say anything. "I'll see you tomorrow, Juliette. Have a good night Mr. Ramirez."

Caleb gave her a cheeky grin. "Cora, we've talked about this, Mr. Ramirez is my father."

She giggled under his gaze and admittedly dazzling smile. "You'll just have to keep reminding me, then."

How cute, they're best friends , I thought sourly as they parted ways.

Caleb approached me with an accusing tone. "Why did you let her go home with Ana? You know I've been picking her up."

Blinking, I answered, "I'm sorry, she's a teen. I assumed that she let you know."

"She didn't," he snapped before I finished my sentence.

"I'll be more careful with who she goes home with."

"Ugh," he growled, his face twisting as he shook his head.

When our eyes met again, it was as though he had driven a hook deep into my chest and pulled me violently towards him. I'd only ever seen that look once before, in my own eyes. A desperate sort of anger.

It vanished and his gaze softened. "I'm sorry. I'm not angry with you. It's not your fault." He raked his hand through his hair. "I told her I was going to be five minutes late tonight because of a meeting with a client. You know, she won't even talk to me. She acts like I don't exist. I never know where she is unless she's here." He was pacing my lobby, the words like water rushing from a broken dam. "I don't know how to talk to her. When was the last time I talked to a fifteen-year-old? When I was fifteen!" He turned those deep brown eyes on me, the hook dragging me in harder still. "God, I missed everything. I only started being a father a few weeks ago. I don't know what the fuck I'm doing wrong. She hates me."

My facial expression must have betrayed my surprise.

Caleb groaned and scrubbed his face, eyes closed and then turned to the ceiling, falling into a chair. "And now I'm spilling my dirty laundry all over her ballet teacher because I have no one else to talk to. If you ever want to know who your real friends are, have something really juicy happen to you and see how quickly you become the center of gossip. Because, surprise, all my friends have the emotional depth of a puddle."

The resentment I felt for him receded back into the recesses of my mind. I chose my words carefully, "I think your situation is unique and merits a little laundry spilling."

"Has she said anything to you?"

"No. She's made it seem like everything was fine."

"It's not. She won't talk to me. Won't let me talk. I'm still on California time so, I'm working when she's home. Then, dinner," he laughed humorlessly, "she always skips that, or she eats in silence and runs back to her room. I don't know which is worse. Are all teenage girls like this?"

I hesitated. "Most of them are. Maybe you two should see a therapist. They'll know better how to help Kelsey open up."

His animated expression fell. "Okay. I will. But maybe you could talk to her."

"I love Kelsey. I've known her most of her life, but I think you need a professional to help you navigate this."

"You're right."

"Also, the last time we spoke you told me to back off." Upon seeing his expression change, I thought maybe it was petty to remind him; but I wasn't going to allow him to come to me like this and then tell me to back off again.

He said he needed boundaries. This was mine.

I needed to put space between us. If he were any other parent, I'd already be holding his hand and offering all the advice I could fathom. I could feel my entire body, down through my bone marrow, aching to comfort him. My stupid bleeding heart.

His lips parted to speak. Instead, he nodded although the corner of his lips were downturned. This situation was… too difficult… I was too invested in a way I never had been.

He was brutally open. Too aloof to realize that his emotions were written on every line on his handsome face, those dark circles beneath his eyes. He really did have a beautiful face. The fact that I even registered him as handsome was a problem in and of itself. No, I needed to get away. I needed to be rational and that scraggly, overtired, sorry look on his face was not helping me in that regard.

I started towards the first studio room to create the distance I felt would snap me out of the tumultuous tide.

Don't forget, I warned him. I tried to help. He pushed me away.

Reality had finally smacked him dead-on. Where was his go-with-the-flow attitude now? He pushed me away, I reiterated as I started closing-up. I couldn't look into his eyes any longer. That pleading helplessness, it would start chipping away at the fortress I'd built around this whole shitshow to stay out.

It already had! I screamed internally, scowling. I took the step up into the studio and stalked across the room. My thoughts chased me.

You don't get to dangle a promise of alliance in front of me and rip it away all in the same day. You don't get to insult me the way you did and come into my studio begging for help. You don't get to—

"Juliette, please." His voice trembled on my name and when I looked over from the stereo his face was hidden behind his hands. He took a deep breath and pointed at his chest. "You believe me, right? That I would have never walked out on Kelsey. I would have given her the world. All these years." He scrubbed his growing beard and covered his face again. "And she wants nothing to do with me."

My heart sank a thousand feet into the earth's crust.

My softer nature won, again, because I was ever the bleeding heart. The angry side of me shook her head disapprovingly as I crossed the room and embraced Caleb. I had consoled so many parents before. So many children. But this felt different somehow. I felt so much more conflicted and connected to this.

To Kelsey.

Because I had so stupidly dreamt up this future for us so quickly and so resolutely. And I blamed Caleb for taking something away from me that never even existed.

I was an insect caught in a sticky web.

"I don't know what to do." Caleb's voice echoed over my shoulder, bouncing off the mirrors and reflecting the pain in our chests.

This was the part where I told the parent that everything was going to be alright. However, it felt like an empty promise (and borderline insulting) given the circumstance.

I let him go. "I have a therapist I can recommend. She helped me when," I hesitated, but unfolded my past for him, "When I was going through infertility treatments, and divorce."

Caleb's brows twitched, frowning almost imperceptibly. "I'm sorry you went through that. You look so young." We stepped away from each other.

I forced a lax smile, and rolled my eyes to lighten the mood. "I'll take the compliment. We were young," I said referencing my ex. "You and I, however, are probably the same age."

"Thirty-seven?"

"Thirty-five."

"And you can still bend like that? Fuck, I can hardly walk in the morning," he chuckled despite the pain still in his gaze.

Heat blushed everywhere my leotard exposed my skin.

Caleb noticed. "Fuck, sorry. I didn't mean it like that. I wasn't. I'm not watching you. Well, technically I am," a look of pure horror, "because you're dancing. You're teaching." He snapped his lips shut. Opened them with a breath like he was going to say something. Snapped them shut again with a visible wince. Then added quickly, "You're really graceful."

Men and their graves , I thought, amused by his embarrassed blush.

Caleb pointed over his shoulder, "I'm just going to jump off the nearest cliff, thanks." He laughed humorlessly, "God, you were right. I am an idiot."

Despite myself, I was smiling back at him. "It's fine, really. I get that a lot. Everyone's always fascinated by how the old and decrepit owner still has her flexibility." Caleb's shoulders dropped an inch. "Off the record," I added in a low voice, as if I were to reveal a huge secret, "I can hardly walk in the morning."

"For the record, though, I'm much more impressed by your ability to keep teenagers in line. I can't get a singular teen to even speak. What the fuck do I do here, Juliette?" Caleb cut through our brief moment of reprieve.

I took a deep breath. "You asked me to stay out of this." I shook my head and started spraying the mirror down.

"Well, that was Vikki talking, and she was wrong. And now I'm asking you to get into this. Begging, really."

"Don't deflect this on to your girlfriend, it's insulting."

Caleb crossed the room and took the dry mop I had perched against the mirror. He started pacing the room, helping me clean while we talked. "Okay. You're right. I'm sorry about that. I don't know what I was thinking. It was stupid of me. It's all so…"

"Fucked up?" I finished for him. He let out an exasperated huff and continued to pace. "I'll text you the name of the therapist and Ana's house address. Kelsey really likes the pizza here on the corner. Maybe start by asking her what slice she wants, but she's going to say the veggie slice."

"How do you know so much about her?"

"Erin wasn't exactly mother of the year. Kelsey spent a lot of time when she was in elementary school as my little shadow while she waited for Erin to pick her up."

"Fucking, Erin," Caleb cursed, and I toasted it with a swig of my water and the same two words.

We moved to the second studio, and I sprayed down the mirror while Caleb switched out the dry cloth pad. "The little gremlins are always stuck to the mirror. It's like they're magnetically attracted," I said.

He laughed at that.

"Kelsey's really good with the kids," I offered. He needed something to talk to her about. The more I talked, the more I realized I knew about Kelsey. Mundane things, like favorite foods, but also monumental things like the fact that she wanted to be a professional dancer and also a social worker.

"Is she? She's so quiet."

"Not with the kids. She's my aide in several of my preschool classes, as you know, and they love her. She can be very silly and spontaneous with them. You should ask her about it. Maybe the neutral topic will get her talking."

"How'd your date with FedEx Man go? I was hoping she'd at least gossip with me with about that, but it's been radio silence."

I tried to swallow a heavy lump in my throat. "It's radio silence because I haven't gone on that date."

"Well now you have to take one for the team so that she and I will have neutral territory to talk about."

"Are we on the same team now?" I raised my eyebrows.

"Gossip is the fastest way to make alliances."

He was right. Not that I would ever admit that. "I'm too busy for dating."

"It's the only topic she talked to me about that first day together! You don't want to at least hook up with him?" Caleb's suggestive grin accompanied a quick glance own my body that made my cheeks heat instantly .

"That is none of your business."

"Come on," he pleaded, "give me something to talk to Kelsey about. Is he a gentleman? Have you been texting at least?" This man was digging himself a really deep grave.

"I'm not discussing this with you! This is so inappropriate."

Caleb scoffed. "Oh please. We're a little bit past propriety, you and I, don't you think? Humor me. When was the last time you went on a date?"

"Enough," I tossed the paper towel in the trash and bent at the waist to pick up some crumbs of something that had fallen next to the bin. "I haven't dated since the divorce, and I don't intend to because, believe it or not, men are despicable."

When I looked back up Caleb looked away. I checked the neckline of my leotard, and smoothed my ballet skirt. Nothing was out of place. I brushed off the strange look on his face as him just trying to manipulate me into saying more. "Besides, I'm out of practice and he makes me nervous. We know nothing about each other, and he keeps persisting. "

"Yeah. I… um," Caleb reached down and plucked the dry mop pad off the floor and tossed it in the trash next to me, "can't imagine why. Totally weird," a pause, "for him to," he cleared his throat, buying time to choose his words wisely, "pursue a pretty woman."

A what?

An awkward beat passed where we both burned red under his compliment. Caleb from embarrassment (no doubt) and I from shock. "How long have you and Vikki been together?"

"Not long," he answered evasively. We made our way out of the studio and into the lobby, turning off all the lights behind us.

"How's she taking this whole thing?"

"Not well. It's been tense."

"It's a hard situation for everyone."

Caleb didn't reply, which gave me reason to pause. I waited for him to elaborate, but for once he didn't ramble. Instead, he changed the topic as we headed to the door. "The other day I convinced myself Kelsey wasn't eating dinner after dance class because she sometimes takes her plate to her room. So, I went through her trash."

"You did not!" I gasped. "Is she eating?"

"Yes, she's eating. Unless she's flushing it."

"She's not flushing it," I laughed. It was sweet that he worried about it at all. I had too many parents who didn't care about their child's caloric intake. "Kelsey has a healthy appetite. She's always eating snacks and slices of pizza. We'll talk about eating dinner at the table with you."

"You should come eat with us. She'd sit with me if you were there."

An innocent invitation.

To him, a solution to a problem. A means to an end.

To me, entering as a mediator was the decision to allow myself to be used and discarded.

For the greater good.

For someone else.

For another family I would never be a part of, but always exist on the sidelines for .

The intangible, unidentifiable, ache that lived in me yawned deeply in my chest. A black hole seeking to swallow me from the inside out. We held eye contact for several moments before I could speak. "Are you sure this time?"

"Yes." Caleb chuckled and rocked back on his heels, unaware of how deeply this trajectory would affect me. I'd help make them a family, and then stay quiet when they didn't need me anymore. The stage director in the wings, marionetting the entire performance.

I'd done this plenty of times. What could possibly make the pain of this experience any worse?

This won't be just a few parent meetings, several hours of tears, and a few follow-ups with all parties involved. This isn't just an unruly teen who was failing school and needed an attitude adjustment. A little voice warned me.

She needs me. I whispered back, tip-toeing around the black hole in my chest.

"Okay."

"You'll come?"

"Saturday. I'm here on weekdays."

"I'll take her to therapy as soon as I can get an appointment."

"I'll text Dr. Liu and give her a heads up you're going to call first thing tomorrow. She'll fit you two in. She's done it for several other students and families who needed to start right away. She doesn't accept insurance, though, if that's a problem."

"It's not a problem. I'll pay out of pocket." Caleb kicked an imaginary rock while he asked, "Do lots of families need therapy?"

"In my opinion, almost all of them do. You'd be surprised the things you see when you're a teacher. The things the kids will tell you. The amount of parents who don't know a damn thing about their children's lives and have no clue how much their kids—daughters in particular—need them."

I slung my bag over my shoulder under Caleb's gaze.

"Not all of it is bad. I've encouraged therapy to families where the kids felt too pressured by their parents to succeed at everything. Then, when you talk to the parents, they're glowing because they're so proud of their child's work ethic and even worried for them. Most of the time, love simply leads to miscommunication."

"You know a lot about your clients."

"You have to remember, I've known most of my students from when they're three years old. Which means I've known their parents all those years, too."

Caleb shoved his hands in his pockets and shifted his weight. "You ever been invited to dinner before?"

"Unless you count that first night, no. This will be my first time."

"I wouldn't count that. There was no formal invitation. So good, another unprecedented experience for the two of us. Three," he tacked on at the end, counting Kelsey.

"Kelsey's had dinner with me," I pointed out. "A lot."

He chuckled sarcastically, "Fantastic."

I shut off the lights in the lobby and cloaked us in darkness. "I'm very good at steering conversations. Follow my lead."

Caleb gestured to the door and followed me out. My keys chimed in the empty parking lot as I wiggled them in the rickety lock. A hand, larger and warmer than mine closed over my fist.

"Juliette," Caleb's voice was hardly above a whisper, "Thank you. I'm sorry about before."

As if all the air had been sucked out from around us and we were in a vacuum, my breathing stopped. His too as our eyes met and we both acknowledged the fragile strand of trust growing between us. Trust born of necessity, not time or friendship.

"It's for Kelsey." I squeezed his hand and he nodded.

We parted ways in the biting late winter air, and I found myself watching him walk to his car with an uneasy longing in my chest.

How had I gone in one night from staying away to agreeing to become completely enmeshed in their journey to becoming a family?

Inside, a piece of me rolled her eyes and tapped her foot menacingly.

I knew. I knew exactly how that had happened; and I also knew that no matter how much that protective part of me scolded me for the next however many weeks, I would ignore her and continue giving my time and emotional labor for Kelsey and Caleb. For this new little family.

I ignored the intrusive memory of a time when I had longed for a family of my own.