Free Dance Academy Anywhere but Here by Bruno Bouchet Page A

usual Miss Raine doesn’t miss a trick and looks over at me at the window.
    ‘Are you going to kick me out?’ Scout asks.
    Miss Raine looks at her and then back at me.
    ‘Well, perhaps there was an administrative error. Now you’re here, you might as well stay,’ she says.
    Loving the new human version of Miss Raine.
    At least in the junior program, Scout will get the chance to find out if dance is really for her. All I wanted was for her to have her chance.
    We share a pizza with Scout after the call back, giving her plenty of advice about the pain involved. She thinks she’s up for it.
    ‘We’ll all be around,’ Tara says. ‘Me and Kat and Petra. We’ll help.’
    ‘No, not me,’ says Petra. She’s decided to spend the summer with her family in Germany before she joins the Company in Berlin.
    It’s sad. I was looking forward to spending the summer showing Petra what real teenage girls do when they’re not punishing their feet in
pointe
shoes.
    We’ll miss her, and she’ll miss us, but she knows it’s what she really wants.
    And what do I want? I still don’t know, but I can’t help thinking more and more that it’s not this. I want to run as far away from ballet as I can, but it’s hard to start running when you don’t know where you’re running to.

CHAPTER 12
    It’s the end of semester. Apart from summer’s stinking heat and Sean’s sweat dripping all over the studio floor that means one thing – auditions for the Academy’s production of
The Nutcracker.
    I hate
The Nutcracker
with a passion that few people in the world can match. It’s impossible to hide such hatred. Sammy grills me about it.
    ‘It just reminds me of stolen Christmases,’ I explain. ‘Natasha dancing, Dad directing. Ethan and I stuck in a hotel.’ I groan. ‘I am so sick of complaining about my parents.’
    ‘Have you ever thought about really telling them where you’re at?’ Sammy asks me.
    Great advice, just one problem.
    ‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘Where am I exactly?’
    This year the school’s production is being graced with the talents of Australia’s finest ballet director, one Sebastian Karamokov, otherwise known as Dad. As he sweeps into the Academy, Ethan and I learn it’s not simply the irresistible lure of directing teenagers in the world’s cheesiest ballet that’s brought him back.
    ‘There are some serious family discussions to be had,’ Dad says.
    I get my ‘discussion’ the next day at the café. He’s already ‘sorted out’ Ethan and recruited him as his assistant director for the ballet. Now it’s my turn.
    ‘So
Nutcracker,’
he starts. ‘You ready to fight the mice?’
    I know where this is going. ‘Dad. Do you have to?’
    ‘I’ll never forget it. Your mother was playing Clara. It was the battle scene. You were …’
    ‘… three and I ran onstage to save her from the giant rodents.’ I’ve heard the story a million times before.
    ‘You stopped the whole performance. Stole the show. And I knew, right then, that you were born to be onstage, too.’ He smiles as we get up from our table at the café and he leads me towards theAcademy. ‘That’s why I’m not worried about you. I get it – you’ve felt the need to push the boundaries this year. I know that next year you’ll be ready to work.’
    Will I? He really doesn’t get it.
    ‘I’ve “pushed the boundaries” because I’ve been unhappy here,’ I tell him, but he doesn’t take me seriously.
    ‘Then why haven’t you left?’ he asks in that direct Russian way.
    ‘Last time I checked, I didn’t have a choice.’
    ‘Come on,’ he says. ‘Ever since you were three you’ve done exactly what you’ve wanted.’
    I don’t get a chance to speak before he continues. He spends half my life overseas and still thinks he knows me so completely.
    ‘Sweetheart, I understand you want to rebel against your parents but you belong here. And you really need to start accepting it.’
    He’s not interested in a response. I