“I might actually die if Maverik gets his way,” I muttered.
“Don’t be dramatic,” Abby scolded me.
I raised an eyebrow at her. “Pot, have you met kettle?”
She giggled and went back to talking about all of the stuff we were going to do this summer. I turned my attention fully to my frozen yogurt as my brand-new bestie chatted away at me. For the first time since I had arrived in Bedford, I was starting to feel a tiny bit hopeful and not just resigned to my fate. I could already tell that Abby was going to make being here more than just bearable. I might even start to get used to this place. If they followed through with a decent ballet program.
Chapter 21
Katya
Richard went to work every day at about six in the morning, which was about nine in east coast time. I still hadn’t shifted my schedule to west coast time, so I would occasionally see him when I stopped in the kitchen for a snack before heading to my ballet studio. I was still stubbornly holding onto the hope that I would be going back to NY soon, so I didn’t want to make my body adjust for no reason. Plus, Nina and the two boys didn’t seem like the type to get up early, so I could enjoy the peace and quiet without worrying about being ambushed. Not that I really needed to worry about Nina – I hadn’t seen her in days. I assumed she was busy spending Richard’s money while planning the wedding of the century.
The next morning, I hung around the kitchen around six, knowing that I would run into Richard. I waited until Mr. Ferguson had handed Richard his coffee before I accosted him. Mr. Ferguson gave me a polite nod as he passed by me, and I smiled back. He’d been nothing but pleasant since I’d gotten here. He wasn’t as warm as Mrs. Ferguson, but she just radiated motherly vibes like no one I’d ever seen before.
“Good morning,” I said cautiously as I approached Richard from behind.
“Katya,” Richard turned to greet me with a smile. “Up early again?”
“I like to get started on the day as soon as it gets here,” I admitted.
He nodded. “Me too. I want to get ahead of everyone who’s still in bed.”
“Speaking of getting ahead,” I said nervously. “The headmaster mentioned that I was going to need a tutor?”
Richard waved his hand as if it were nothing. “My assistant set up some interviews. No one person is fully qualified for what you need, so we will probably have two or three to set up a schedule for you.”
My eyebrows rose. Three tutors? To get me ready for my junior year of high school? How stupid did they think I was?
Richard gave me a reassuring smile. “It’s not easy to find someone fluent in Russian, but who is also qualified to teach chemistry and physics. Since your grandmother raised you, I’m assuming you had a similar upbringing to Nina? You can speak Russian fairly well, but have never had any formal education in reading or writing Cyrillic?”
I nodded in confirmation. I never thought about how similar or different my childhood had been from Nina’s. She was so different from me or from Babulya that it was difficult to believe we were all related.
Richard interrupted my musing. “We probably won’t get you started until next week.” He looked at me thoughtfully. “I have a team working on your dance suggestions for Awake. Why don’t you come into work with me Friday and give some feedback on how they’re doing?”
My jaw dropped in shock. The founder of one of the biggest and most powerful companies in the entire world was asking for my opinion?
“Um, yeah,” I stuttered. “That would be great.”
“Be down here and dressed professionally at six,” Richard ordered before giving me a smile to soften his tone. “You can accompany me to several meetings in the morning, we’ll have lunch, and then you can meet with the team. We’ll call it a job shadowing opportunity.”
I grinned. “That sounds awesome.” I was pretty sure that this was an opportunity that tons of people would kill for. It was rare that Awake.com opened their inner sanctum to any non-employee, and probably unheard of for a high school student.
Richard gave me a wave as he headed out to the waiting car that would bring him into the city. I couldn’t help but smile back at him.
I had an Abby-like bounce in my step as I headed out to my ballet studio. Things were turning around for me. Today when I danced, it wasn’t grief or loneliness that motivated me - it was hope.
I even cut my morning session shorter than usual because Abby started texting me around eleven, wanting to know what we were doing today. I told her to come over this afternoon for some yoga to burn off all the froyo we had eaten yesterday.
Abby: Fine! But we’re hanging out at your pool afterward.
I laughed when I got her text. I don’t think I’d ever just sat around at a pool before, so this counted as me branching out and living life. Ryan had to do pool therapy for an injury he had once, but that was at an indoor, city pool - nothing like the pool we had here. A flash of sadness hit me when I thought about Ryan, and I was calling him before I even had time to second guess it.
Ryan had been ghosting my calls and answering my texts with only short answers, making it evident that he was trying to put some space between us. That hurt, but I probably deserved it for abandoning him in NY while I lived my fancy life out here in the land of the wealthy
