Read Dancing Lessons for Free Online Page A

on jeans and a paisley purple button-up shirt that he loved unironically and that John had always disliked for that reason. He brushed his hair. He even put his rings back on.
    Once outside, he hesitated and then walked as slowly as possible to the scene of the crime, if the crime were Chico’s attempts to interact with a nice man.
    He needn’t have worried. The group of volunteers met in a back room away from any dancers, and they quickly decided Chico could help paint the background scenes without any contribution required from Chico himself. Davi almost said something about that but then let it go. Probably being considerate of Chico’s desire to stay comfortably out of sight.
    It wasn’t so bad. The part of the studio Chico hadn’t seen before was a huge room of waxed and polished wood floors, mirrored walls, and a series of closets where costumes from past recitals were kept. The room had a few benches along one wall, a piano, and a few hooks by the doors, overflowing with sweatshirts.
    The french doors he’d noticed before opened out from this room. He walked through them and out into the grass, where the other volunteers had set up tarps and the large rolls of canvas with the required scenery already drawn onto them. Basically, his job was like paint by numbers, and it was boring, but he got to sit down on the grass.
    It didn’t even require much socialization, so he didn’t know why Davi had insisted he help out. Davi, along some of the other volunteers, was in charge of construction and technical things. He came by once in a while to check on Chico and frowned harder each time when he noticed Chico by himself, but Chico was content.
    He was content right up until about an hour after the schools must have gotten out, and suddenly the big practice room he had a view of started to fill up with teenagers. Well, about seven older kids and maybe fifteen younger ones. They were excited and loud in the large, echoing practice space, although he did his best to ignore them. But when their instructor walked in, he forgot the paintbrush in his hand and his throat suddenly felt like the Sahara.
    Rafael’s ballet instructor clothes weren’t much different from his other clothes. He had on flat, black slippers, and softer, but somehow tighter, pants. The teenagers stopped most of their talking when he came in and began to sort of glide to the barres, where they all stretched and bent themselves in half and looked graceful doing it.
    Rafael considered them as they did, smiling a little, then glanced around the space.
    Chico ducked back over his painting. He’d smudged part of the giant clock tower, but hopefully no one would notice.
    Rafael said something about warming up, his tone as light and airy as the way some of the girls held their hands as they moved. Then someone switched on music, and when Chico dared a glance over, the dancers were lined up at the barres and Rafael was walking past them. He adjusted their hands or their feet or offered commentary Chico couldn’t hear but which made the students smile.
    It was a lot like what he’d done in the ballroom class, except the kids, even the teenagers, gave the appearance of hanging on his every word. After doing that for a while, they all left the barre and the music changed.
    Chico didn’t recognize the classical songs playing over the sound system, only that they kept starting and stopping and starting over again. From that, he realized this must be a rehearsal and not a normal lesson, since he couldn’t hear most of what Rafael said. Rafael would speak or take a moment to show them what he must have been talking about, and Chico’s breath would catch to see him casually demonstrate his skill.
    Obviously Chico didn’t know ballet. But he knew that however easy Rafael made it look, dancing like that took years and years of study and practice, and it was a lot more challenging than showing idiots like Chico how to waltz.
    But Rafael was all sharp eyes and