Chapter 4
In all honestly, Wanda isn’t sure how she makes it through that class.
She’s about ninety-eight percent sure she didn’t fall over, she thinks her body would hurt more if it had slammed to the floor, but other than that, she can’t really say what happened.
She has a vague memory of pirouetting at least twice, and she’s pretty sure she and Clint performed a partner center combination, but she honestly doesn’t know much more.
The blond man, Vision, she corrects in her head, hasn’t looked her way once since he entered the room. He keeps his body turned away, his profile facing forward, not a single flicker of recognition crossing his face.
Good, her brain hisses. Doesn’t date dancers, my ass. He is a dancer, cheeky little shit.
Company class ends and she knows her face must be bright red, tendrils of her hair frizzing out away from her bun.
Vision Shade stands gracefully, flicking a tiny piece of invisible lint off his shoulder and exits the studio.
“Pleasant man,” Natasha mutters at her right, her face a pink oval.
Depressed and frustrated, Wanda plops down amongst her bag and begins picking at the knot on her pointe shoe ribbons.
“Hey, Maximoff!” Steve throws himself down next to her dance bag. He’s wearing a Rolling Stones t-shirt, black tights, a pair of blue gym shorts, and black dance slippers. He’s sweating profusely and Wanda scoots away from him subtly.
“Steve,” she gives him a curt nod.
“Brutal class, huh?”
“Sure,” she says.
“Did you know?” Steve asks, his presence buzzing around her shoulder like an unwanted fly.
“Did I know what?” Wanda turns to him in exasperation.
“Who he was last night.”
“No,” Wanda grumbles. Then a tiny giggle erupts from her throat. “I can tell you this,” she says, her giggle growing louder and louder. “I’m not going to be cast in his piece though.”
Steve tilts his head. “How do you know?”
“He’s not my biggest fan,” she continues to giggle.
“Then why are you laughing?”
“I don’t know,” she breaks into more helpless giggles, tears of mirth forming in her eyes.
It really is desperately upsetting, and she’s pretty sure she’ll be actively crying into a bottle of wine tonight after the show, but for now, all she can do is laugh.
Because her last chance walked through the door and she insulted it, hell she yelled at it, without even realizing. With the way Agnes has been treating her lately, Wanda feels like she should just resign herself to being in the corps de ballet until she retires, performing Agon over and over again until she goes completely insane.
Vision Shade was her last chance to be seen and she basically told him to go to hell.
More giggles spill from her mouth, and a few other dancers stop to give her concerned looks as they exit the studio.
Monica approaches, tossing a towel over her shoulder, her skin gleaming with sweat against her bright yellow leotard.
“Did you break Wanda?” Monica asks Steve, her brow creased in concern.
“I think so,” Steve is looking at Wanda with poorly concealed alarm.
“Wand,” Monica says carefully. “Did you forget to eat again?”
“No,” Wanda has to wipe tears from her eyes. “I-,” she breaks off, cackling.
“What’s happening?” Natasha has joined the group, her eyes flicking back and forth between Wanda’s face and Monica’s.
“I broke Wanda,” Steve says sadly.
Natasha pointedly ignores him, her eyes fixed on Wanda. "Wand?"
"Yes?" Wanda asks.
"Anything wrong?"
"No," Wanda says, a snort forming somewhere around her left sinus.
"Okay," Natasha wraps an arm around Wanda’s shoulders and hoists her to her feet. “Get your sweats,” she tells Wanda.
“Why?” Wanda hiccups, the laughter still caught in her throat.
“We’re going to get lunch, my treat,” Natasha says.
Monica lifts Wanda’s overlarge sweatshirt from where it’s been haphazardly tossed across Wanda’s overflowing bag and hands it to Natasha.
“I have rehearsal for Jewels,” Wanda manages as Natasha forces the sweatshirt over her head.
“Not until 1:30,” Natasha says as Wanda’s head pokes out. “And you clearly need food.”
“I’m perfectly fine!” Wanda protests.
“Then I clearly need gossip,” Natasha shrugs. “Pick your excuse, but we’re going to lunch.”
Wanda sighs but shuffles the front of her feet into her sneakers and allows Natasha to pull her from the studio, Monica and Steve following behind, the latter carrying Wanda’s dance bag in his fist.
“Hey!” Pepper runs up, her blue sweat suit causing her eyes to burn bright blue. “Where are we going?”
“Lunch,” Natasha says. “Wanda’s hungry.”
“I’m not hungry!” Wanda snaps even as her stomach gives an almighty gurgle.
Natasha smirks and even Pepper has to cough to disguise a laugh.
“Fine,” Wanda amends. “I may be slightly hungry.”
She’s really more emotionally exhausted, but that doesn’t seem like an appropriate conversation to have when she’s wearing an oversized sweatshirt, no pants, and her feet barely inside her sneakers.
“I could go for a sandwich,” Pepper says gently as Steve hands Wanda her dance bag. “Café?”
“Café,” Natasha agrees. “And don’t think you’re off the hook,” she jabs a finger at Pepper’s delicate nose. “I want to know why you look like you stayed up all night.”
Pepper blushes an impressive red, the color sweeping all the way into her hairline and down below the neck of her pullover.
“Uh huh,” Natasha clicks her tongue knowingly. “I want every detail.”
Wanda straightens from where she’s neatly tied her sneakers on her feet and smooths down the leggings she’s yanked on to cover her old pink tights. “Leave Pepper alone,” she tells Natasha good-naturedly.
Natasha just sticks out her tongue, leading the group down the stairs to the main entrance of the studios, the glass doors allowing the late morning sun to cut through dancing particles of dust.
The Café is located a block south of Lincoln Center and gets about eighty five percent of its business from the dancers at City Ballet. It’s dusty and sticky and smells like a grandmother’s foot, but they have the best French onion soup Wanda has ever tasted.
They’re almost to the front desk when Wanda hears a voice to their right say: “Pepper?”
It’s like the five of them are starring in a sitcom the way they all stop at the same time, their heads swiveling towards the speaker, standing off and slightly in the shadow.
Tony Stark leans against the wall of the lobby in a leather jacket that probably cost more than Wanda’s yearly salary, and a hesitant smile caught on his face.
His dark hair is messy, like he’s been running his fingers through it nervously, and his eyes dart from person to person in their group.
Pepper is staring at him like she’s seen a ghost, her blue eyes enormous. “Uh,” she splutters. “Um, what are you doing here?”
Tony swallows and steps forward, his smile wavering. “I, um, thought I’d come by and take you out to lunch.”
Pepper blinks twice. “You- wanted to-.”
“Take you out to lunch, yeah,” Tony shoves his hands into his pockets.
Pepper seems to be completely gobsmacked, opening and closing her mouth like a fish.
A beautiful, golden fish, but a fish nonetheless.
“If this is a bad time,” Tony is beginning to look more and more uncomfortably by the second, shifting his weight from foot to foot, his eyes darting from Pepper to the group behind her and back to Pepper. “We can rain check.”
“Of course, it’s not a bad time!” Natasha says when Pepper stays silent, shock pouring from her body. “Pepper would love to get lunch with you, wouldn’t you, Pepper?”
Wanda sees it happen before it really happens.
Natasha lifts her hand and places it on Pepper’s shoulder and shoves her good-naturedly towards Tony Stark.
But Pepper’s weight is centered over her right hip, her left foot completely off the ground and resting against her right ankle. When Natasha pushes her, she doesn’t have time to shift her weight, her left foot scrambling for purchase to stop her from collapsing.
Wanda sees Pepper’s left foot buckle under her weight as she lets out a surprised gasp.
Tony Stark, to his credit, manages to grab her around the waist before her left foot takes all of her weight, but her ankle still twists awkwardly underneath her body.
“Woah, woah!” Tony says, his arms tightening around Pepper’s torso. “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” Pepper manages, her voice breathless, but whether from the fall or her proximity to Tony, Wanda’s not sure.
Tony drops his arms from her as Pepper pushes on his chest to right herself completely. She holds herself straight, but Wanda can see that her face is pale.
“Pepper?” Wanda says tentatively, because no one else is speaking. Natasha’s hands are over her mouth, her eyes horrified. “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” Pepper grits out as she gingerly places weight on her left ankle. “I’m fine!” she repeats on a gasp.
Tony snakes an arm around her waist again, holding her upright, as Pepper’s expressive blue eyes get shinier by the second. “You aren’t fine,” he says gently.
“I am,” Pepper says. “I just need a second.”
“You need a doctor,” Tony insists.
“It’ll be fine,” Pepper says. “I just need to walk it off.”
“Walk it off?” Tony looks horrified. “God no, do you know how bad that is for an injury?”
“It’s not an injury!” Pepper snaps out fiercely.
Tony looks a little scared, and Wanda doesn’t blame him, but the word injury is a bit of a triggering word amongst the company.
An injury is worse than death. And injury means weeks to months of sitting on the sidelines, loosing stamina and strength, while watching all your peers dancing the roles you want, slowly getting forgotten in the crowd.
“Please,” Tony is pleading. “Let me take you to the doctor.”
“I have rehearsal,” Pepper wobbles.
“I’ll tell Suki,” Wanda says. “Lily can dance Jewels tonight, she knows it.”
“But-,” Pepper begins.
“Please,” Tony Stark says. “Don’t make me beg, let me take you to the doctor.”
Pepper’s lower lip quivers but her voice is steady. “Okay,” she says.
Tony shifts his weight so that he’s got an arm around the middle of her back and sweeps an arm under her knees, lifting her without too much effort.
“Text me!” Wanda calls to Pepper.
She waves her fingertips in Wanda’s direction as Tony carries her off, her gold hair streaming over his leather clad arms.
The group is deadly silent after Pepper is carried away until Natasha says: “Café?”
It’s her voice that causes Wanda to snap out of her dumbfounded state. “Café?” she demands. “Café??”
“Um,” Natasha shifts. “Yeah, lunch was the original plan.”
“You just pushed Pepper over!” Wanda says.
Natasha cuts her eyes to the right. “I didn’t think she’d fall!”
“You pushed her!” Wanda repeats.
“He caught her, didn’t he?”
Wanda closes her eyes and counts to ten. “You just risked Pepper’s entire career-.”
“Let’s not be dramatic,” Natasha interrupts.
“Her WHOLE career,” Wanda continues, talking over Natasha. “Because-?”
“Because Pepper wasn’t going to go to lunch with him if I didn’t!” Natasha protests. “Besides, I’ve pushed her like that hundreds of times and she’s never fallen over. Maybe he makes her weak in the knees,” she tries to joke lamely.
Out of the corner of her eye, Wanda sees Monica shake her head at Natasha and sees Steve digging his fingers into Monica’s arm.
“She might never dance again,” Wanda says. “And it’ll be because of you.”
“Jesus Christ,” Natasha’s eyes flash. “Let loose a little bit, Wand. Pepper will be fine.”
“Or this might be the end of her career!”
“Not everyone thinks the end of their career is the end of their life!” Natasha snaps back.
Red is beginning to smudge the corners of Wanda’s vision as she lets her shoulders snap into a perfect posture, lifting her chin to make eye contact with Natasha before stepping around her, sweeping towards the stairs.
“Where are you going?” Natasha asks.
“Lost my appetite,” Wanda says.
She doesn’t wait to see how anyone reacts, she bolts back up the stairs, her heart pounding in her chest, anger causing a metallic taste in the back of her mouth.
In the back of her head, she knows she’s being irrational. She knows that this is just a reaction to the larger stress in her life, but she can’t find it in herself to care.
She storms down a hallway, blindly following a straight path, not sure what to do except move.
A tiny studio is in front of her, the lights off, the door closed tightly. Wanda yanks open the door and flips on the lights, dropping her bag by the door.
She puts her headphones on and clicks some music on her phone, violins scraping in her ears, and begins to dance.
She doesn’t know what she’s doing until she realizes she’s performing the choreography for Agon.
That makes her even angrier and she forces her body away from the familiar motions, tossing her legs behind her in a tour jeté. She pushes her feelings forward, working off the steam as she tries to push the image of Pepper's ankle crumpling out of her head.
An injury is a terrifying thing.
It’s like being reminded of one’s mortality. Any misstep, any ledge or staircase or slick floor could mean the end of her career.
And what is she if not a dancer?
Wanda has no plan B. No backups if something goes horribly wrong and she’s left with a foot in a boot or a knee in a brace.
She twists in a fouetté turn, spotting the back wall as her right leg flies out and snaps back against left knee in a passé. As she rotates a second time, she thinks she sees blond hair at the tiny window of the door, but as she spins back around a third time, she doesn’t see anything.
The music in her ears softens, a piano and flute beginning to soar together in a heartbreaking harmony, and Wanda allows her body to flow with it, her muscles lengthening.
She shucks her sweatshirt and leggings, the fabric too constricting around her joints as she moves. Left in only her navy-blue leotard and pink tights, she lifts her right leg in a controlled arabesque until her foot is suspended at a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree angle.
It’s freeing to dance without her pointe shoes, the calluses on her feet celebrating their release, and she rises onto relevé, sweeping her right foot forward to catch all of her weight before propelling into a pirouette turn, her arms raised above her head into a fifth position.
The music slowly wanes, the flute trilling two last notes as the piano echoes and both fade into silence.
Wanda comes to a stop, her lungs heaving from the effort, her muscles shaky. She pushes sweaty hair out of her eyes, turns to grab her water bottle and almost has a heart attack.
Monica is sitting by her dance bag, her grey sweatsuit zipped up to her neck, and a wry smile on her face.
“God,” Wanda clutches her already pounding heart. “Make a noise next time.”
“Sorry,” Monica’s smile turns rueful. “You’ve been working on your pirouettes.”
“How long have you been here?” Wanda lifts her water bottle to her lips, sipping slowly as her heart calms.
“Not long,” Monica says. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a foil wrapped square. “Here.”
Wanda unwraps the foil and hears her stomach snarl in delight at the sandwich neatly sliced diagonally.
“Turkey on rye,” Monica says.
“Thank you,” Wanda takes a bite, her whole body squealing with relief.
“Don’t thank me,” Monica says. “It’s from Nat.”
“Oh,” Wanda looks up from the sandwich, her lips turning down. “Is this a peace offering?”
Monica sighs. “She feels really bad.”
“I know,” Wanda sits next to Monica, stretching her feet out in front of her, taking an enormous bite of sandwich. “I do too.”
“Then why are you here, sulking like a child?” Monica asks bluntly.
“Why are you here, speaking for her?” Wanda shoots back.
Monica barks out a laugh. “Touché,” she says.
Wanda squeezes the muscles in her calves as her body begins to cool down.
“Pepper’s going to be fine,” Monica says. “She’s not-.”
“She’s not me?” Wanda finishes.
Monica’s eyes dart to Wanda’s right ankle, two scars crisscrossing the pale skin. “Do you remember when Clint tore his ACL?” she says unexpectedly.
Wanda blinks. “Hard to forget,” she says.
It had been a chilly January day, about a week after their two-week vacation after Nutcracker. The studios had been freezing, the temperatures outside registering negative eight with the wind chill, and the heaters in the building had been struggling to keep up. Everyone was still in sweats by the time they moved away from the barre, and Clint had been wearing oversized sweatpants, the hem stretching past the tops of his ankles.
Wanda had been in the corner, waiting to perform the combination, when Clint had landed wrong.
“You could hear the pop across the studio,” Monica shudders. “To this day, I haven’t found a sound that makes me shake like that sound did.”
“It was awful,” Wanda agrees.
“My point is,” Monica says. “Is that we didn’t hear any of that when Pepper fell today. Sure, her ankle twisted, but if it’s a sprain, which I’m about ninety percent sure it is, she’ll be back in the studio by next week.”
“It was reckless,” Wanda insists, popping the last bite of sandwich in her mouth.
“It was,” Monica agrees.
“Agnes is going to flip,” Wanda says.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Monica shoots Wanda a sly smile. “Once she hears that Pepper fell into the arms of one of the biggest donors to the ballet? Agnes might throw Pepper a party.”
“Goddamn it,” Wanda climbs to her feet, balling the foil from her sandwich in her hand “I hate that you’re right.”
Monica squeezes Wanda’s shoulder.
Wanda eyes the clock in the corner and sighs. “We have Jewels.”
“Yep,” Monica waits as Wanda shoulders her bag. “I don’t want to miss Lily’s face when Suki tells her she’s going on tonight.”
“Five dollars says she cries,” Wanda says.
“Only five?” Monica teases. “I bet you ten she immediately calls her mother.”
***
That night, Wanda sits in the dressing room, her emerald costume half on her body, when Natasha comes in.
She smells like cigarette smoke and chilly air, and Wanda knows she’s been up on the roof. They'd avoided each other in rehearsal that afternoon, Natasha choosing to stand with some of the principles, her eyes downcast, her hands wringing together.
Wanda had let her stew, not very nice of her, she was aware, but she didn’t want Natasha to feel like she’d gotten off easy. Wanda is still mad at her.
But now, as Natasha carefully peels her red costume off the hanger, stepping into the tight bodice and short skirt, Wanda feels a flit of fondness.
Natasha was her first friend in the city, her first friend at S.A.B., her first friend in the company. She may be occasionally an idiot, but at least Wanda knows her heart is in the right place.
“Here,” she stands. “Let me help.”
Natasha stops twisting from side to side in an attempt to hook up the back of the bodice and stands still as Wanda clips each hook and eye closure together. “Do you need help?” she asks tentatively, waving at Wanda’s open back.
“Thanks,” Wanda turns to allow Natasha to close the back of her costume.
She catches a glimpse of the two of them in the mirror, Natasha, tall and blond, all legs and eyes, and Wanda, her red hair threatening to explode under her green crown, the skirt of her emerald costume much longer than Natasha’s.
“I really am sorry,” Natasha murmurs next to her.
“I know,” Wanda sighs. “I’m sorry for reacting the way I did.”
Natasha smirks just slightly, her full mouth catching upwards mischievously. “I still want to know why you were laughing hysterically this morning.”
“Places for Emeralds,” Jimmy’s voice crackles over the speaker in their dressing room.
“Later,” Wanda promises, shooting her own slight smile.
She scurries through the wings, the cool air welcome after the warm lights of the dressing room. She does a few relevés in her pointe shoes, the satin straining against her ankles as she rises and sinks.
“Hey, girlie,” Bruce, a burly stagehand with curling salt and pepper hair, steps next to her, watching as a different stagehand sweeps the floor delicately. “How’re you feeling?”
Wanda gives him a fond smile, appreciative of his gruff manner and occasional bad mouth. “Exhausted,” she admits.
“Green’s a good color on you,” he says.
“You’re sweet,” Wanda grins.
The rumbling of the audience dies and the stagehand scurries off stage right before the curtain rises.
“Merdé,” Bruce murmurs in Wanda’s ear.
“Thanks,” she says poised to make her entrance.
The ballet passes in a bit of a dream, Wanda feels hazy as she moves through the familiar steps, the gauzy skirts of her costume floating around her body gently.
At one point, she thinks she sees blond hair again, leaning against the wall of the wings, but as she twists her head in time to music, her focus cutting to backstage, she only sees Jimmy, who gives her a thumbs up.
She shoots him a secret smile.
The end of the dance comes sooner than she expects and she races offstage, barely even winded.
Anything would feel like a walk in the park after Swan Lake, she thinks wryly.
Natasha is warming up in the wings, her legs kicking forward and back as she works her hips. “Hey,” she whispers as Wanda arrives.
“Hey,” Wanda whispers back.
“Places for Rubies,” Jimmy hisses into his headset from where he perches on a stool backstage.
“Merdé,” Wanda says.
Natasha kisses the air next to Wanda’s cheek and goes to stand on stage, rise on pointe and snagging the two dancers’ hands next to her, raising them in the air, so they make a long line.
Wanda stays to watch the beginning of Rubies, loving the moment when the curtain rises and the audience gasps at the tableau.
Back in the dressing room, Monica is applying lipstick to her mouth, her pale Diamond costume already on. “You got a text,” she tells Wanda as she blots her mouth with a tissue.
Wanda lifts the phone, her heart pounding as she reads.
Pepper: all is good. doc says it’s a sprain. gonna stay at tony’s tonight, just in case. love u!
“Good news?” Monica asks when Wanda doesn’t say anything for a couple of seconds.
“Pepper’s staying at Tony’s,” Wanda says.
“So?” Monica asks.
“So?” Wanda faces her with large eyes. “So, I need to get over there.”