Rush

I spend the afternoon making phone calls and lining up auditions for the following day and the one after. Sixteen more dancers agree to trek all the way out to Shropshire—thankfully, I can tell them all expenses paid—for a fifteen-minute rehearsal for the pickiest man in England. I’m going to be yanking Rush out of the studio all day. If he makes even one peep of protest, I’ll remind him that this is all his fault.

He comes to every audition with a smile on his face, shakes his head, and then saunters off to the studio again, seemingly unconcerned that we’re getting nowhere.

I grab him after the sixteenth audition, saying I need to talk to him. I take a deep breath, asking—no, begging—for something in the universe to give me strength. “Let’s not make a final decision yet. Let’s have a think on it over the weekend. I recorded all of the auditions and I’ll watch them all tomorrow. Maybe you could, too?”

Rush nods. “I will.”

But he says it in a way that doesn’t convince me he’ll do it with an open mind. I just have to keep reminding myself that it’s his album and his music video. His deadlines and his veto power. If we can’t film the video because we don’t have a Priestess, that will be on him, not me. The only thing I can do is offer him the best dancers I can find.

And meanwhile, not stab him in the throat with my nail file.

I glance at the time on my phone. Four o’clock. My train to London will be arriving at the tiny local station soon. “Okay. I’m heading back to London. See you Monday.”

Rush gives me his lazy smile and rolls his shoulders in preparation for heading back to the studio. “See you soon. Safe journey.”

“Yeah, thanks,” I mutter, and head for the staircase. It’s his video, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t grown to care about it. The band’s music is great. Rush dances beautifully. I want it to be amazing, for their sake, and because something in my life needs to go right.

Two hours later at Euston Station, instead of taking the Underground west to go home, I go northeast instead, to Mum’s house in Highbury. I promised I’d come for dinner as I haven’t seen her in weeks.

The house stands on a corner, a narrow Victorian terrace with a red roof and white pebble walls. Inside, the living room is full of pictures of me in various ballet costumes over the years. I smile as I see that she’s added three new pictures to the mantelpiece of me in a hunter’s costume from Peter and the Wolf when I was seven, and two more of me as a blue munchkin in Wizard of Oz.

“Mum, these ones are so lame. I was barely in these shows,” I call out to the kitchen, and she comes through holding two plates of fish pie.

She puts the plates on the table and we sit down. “When you become a mother and your child leaves home, just see how many pictures you want to put up then.” Smiling, she nods at the cork board that hangs by the kitchen door. “You haven’t seen the most recent one.”

I turn around and see that she’s pinned a computer printout of a photo I sent her while we were rehearsing for Itch Scratch’s video.

“I’m so pleased you’re working again,” she says, dishing beans onto my plate and then hers. “That’s what’s been keeping you so busy, isn’t it? I see you’ve got luggage with you. Where’s this new job, Wales? The North?”

“Not quite that far, but yes, a new job,” I tell her, and a smile bursts over my face. Despite Rush being difficult, I’ve had a wonderful week and I’m dying to talk about it.

“Who’s hired you?”

“I can’t say yet. It’s a well-known act, though. I’m enjoying the work, though it’s challenging me a lot.”

“Are you working for a man?”

I concentrate on adding pepper to my meal. “Mum, what difference does that make?”

She fixes me with a stern look. “You be careful and protect yourself. Don’t let him think he can walk all over you like that Striker Jones.”

I knew this was coming and I bite my tongue. She was so upset for me when things went to hell because of Striker, and I’m so grateful for her support and sympathy. I can feel myself redden as I remember Rush’s kiss. Mum would blow her top if I told her about that. “I won’t.”

“And don’t get involved with him, either. There’s too much of a power imbalance when a man’s your boss as well as your boyfriend. In fact, don’t get involved with anyone if you’re not ready. You’ll only make bad decisions.”

Thankfully, my mouth is too full of fish pie to answer. When Mum was younger, she was a legal secretary who became involved with her boss, a famous defense lawyer—in legal circles, anyway. He was also married. When she told him she was pregnant, he didn’t want anything to do with her.