Allegro

Elektra Natchios was a lying bitch. What made her think she had the right to come over to her house and ask her boyfriend - her blind boyfriend - to let her borrow a kitchen utensil? And to do it when Natasha wasn’t home, on top of that. To make matters worse, she lived in the same apartment complex as Natasha and Matt. And it seemed like she’d lived there for a long time: Natasha was sure she would’ve heard buzz at the company about Elektra moving. This was a massive overstepping of boundaries.

“So, you knew where I lived and decided it would be a good idea to come and ask my blind boyfriend, who you were previously in love with, for a favor?” Natasha asked, talking to Elektra in the entryway of her apartment.

“You’re the only person in the building that I know,” Elektra answered.

“You have a car, you could’ve driven to the store and bought some for yourself. Hell, you could’ve even walked there,” Natasha said.

“I didn’t think it would be a big deal,” Elektra said.

Natasha sighed and leaned against her wall. “See, I do not understand why in the world you would think that. We aren’t friends, that makes it weird for you to show up at my apartment to ask for a favor. And then to bring over food that you made? It’s probably poisoned, we don’t want that.”

“Don’t say that, that’s rude and untrue,” Matt called from the living room.

What world was Natash living in that Matt was taking Elektra’s side over her own. Maybe they had had sex when Elektra came over initially, it would explain why he was defending her and why Elektra didn’t just go to buy her own cookie cutters. Fuck, this was really the last thing Natasha wanted to deal with today. 

“I just was in the middle of making cookies and realized I didn’t have any cookie cutters, that’s it,” Elektra explained. “I figured you guys would have one so I just came here. It’s much easier and faster than going to the store.”

“Yeah, whatever. You know what? Just keep the cookie cutters, we don’t ever use them,” Natasha said.

“Oh, uh, okay,” Elektra said.

“Have a good rest of your day,” Natasha said, walking Elektra to the door and quickly shutting it after her.

“Nat, that was rude,” Matt said.

Natasha walked into the living room and sat next to him on the couch. Matt had been working from home a lot recently with no real explanation. Maybe he and Elektra were having an affair. The cookie cutters were probably just an excuse for in case Natasha was home. It would make sense, they were flirting with each other the night Matt and Natasha met. In fact, Natasha had always been a little suspicious of all of their interactions. It wasn’t that far of a reach. 

“She’s rude to me, I think I can be rude back,” Natasha justified.

Matt sighed. “She wasn’t even being rude to you. She was actually being nice. She was returning something she borrowed, washed. And she brought us some cookies with them.”

“She wouldn’t do that without some underlying motive, Matt. Trust me, I know her better than you do,” Natasha said.

“Nat, I’m not trying to be rude, but not everyone is so obsessed with you that they go out of their way to make your life miserable,” Matt stated.

That stung. Did Matt actually think she was that obsessed with herself? Natasha didn’t think that everything everyone did was a result of her, but she knew a lot of things Elektra did were because of her. Elektra liked to play mind games with Natasha. It wasn’t like she’d never done it before. Just at the last show, Swan Lake, Elektra had used her costumes to put up Instagram videos insisting that she was the lead when she was just the understudy. Natasha knew that she only did that because she wanted to psych Nat out. It was just who she was.

“Not everyone is obsessed with me, you’re right,” Natasha said. “But Elektra is.”

“I honestly don’t think that she is, Nat. Well, maybe she is, but I don’t think she borrowed our cookie cutters just to make you miserable,” Matt said.

“You don’t know her like I do, Matt. Seriously. She doesn’t do anything involving me that doesn’t have some sort of fucked up intention. When it comes to me, everything she does is meant to hurt.”

Natasha was not in a good mood when she came into the company for rehearsal the next day. It was their first day attempting a full run through, which was never easy. Considering the amount of children in the show, it was undoubtedly going to be chaotic. When she walked into her dressing room, Bucky was already sitting at her vanity with two smoothies. He must’ve somehow gotten the vibes that she was in a bad mood and got her something to make it better.

“Good morning,” Bucky greeted, handing Natasha her smoothie.

“Hi,” Natasha said.

“I feel like maybe I should buy a blender and try making my own smoothies. I literally buy a smoothie every morning,” Bucky said.

Natasha sipped on her smoothie and contemplated, “Well, I think it would be almost impossible for you to recreate the Smoothie King recipes You could still make good smoothies, but they wouldn’t be the same.”

“I’ll just test it out before investing in my own blender,” Bucky decided. “I’m pretty sure that Steve and Sam have a blender at their place.”

“When are you guys going to move in together?” Natasha asked, sitting up on her vanity, facing Bucky.

Bucky blushed. “I honestly have no clue. I want to move in with him soon, but the fact that he lives with Sam makes it complicated. We want to get an apartment in your complex. We’ll probably get one within the year.”

“Apparently Elektra lives in my complex,” Natasha informed.

“That’s wild,” Bucky said. “I’m jealous.”

“Well she came over to my place to borrow cookie cutters when I wasn’t even home, just Matt was there,” Natasha ranted. “Which is honestly completely inappropriate. I mean, they’ve only met each other a few times. If I was there, it still would’ve been inappropriate but less so. The fact that she knows which apartment is mine is in and of itself concerning. Why would she know that? Has she, like, followed me there before?”
“That’s actually a fair point,” Bucky said.

“Matt thinks I’m just being over dramatic and rude to her, but he doesn’t get it. He doesn’t know how she acts towards me,” Natasha said.

“Well, it’s been friendly recently,” Bucky reflected.

“For now,” Natasha said. “But whatever, I need to stop wasting so much energy on her. Today Maria is going to do a private rehearsal with Alexei and I before we do our full run through, so I need to be more focused on that.”

“I’m sure it’ll be great. You guys are, like, the best dancers in the company,” Bucky said.

Natasha took off her street clothes and started taping her feet. “Yeah, well, we’ll see about that.”

Alexei was definitely a talented dancer. He’d actually met Natasha when they were teenagers, training at the Vaganova ballet school. Both of them were dreaming of dancing for the Royal Ballet Company one day. Well, that didn’t really work out for either of them. Because of their past, they’d always had a good dance connection. It was the reason they were pas de deux partners.

Natasha rolled out and taped her feet before putting on her pointe shoes. She was pretty much ready for the day. 

“When do you have to leave for your rehearsal?” Bucky asked.

Natasha glanced at her clock and said, “Right now, honestly.”

“Well, I’ll see you at the full run through,” Bucky said.

“Are you ready for this?” Alexei asked as Natasha walked into the rehearsal studio. 

“I’m always ready to dance with you,” Natasha responded, smiling at him.

Alexei was wearing a white long sleeved tee with light purple biker shorts. Natasha had to admit, he was a very attractive guy. They’d had a little bit of a romantic fling in ballet school, but it didn’t last for long. There wasn’t much room for love at the Vaganova school. Even back then, they had been pas de deux partners. They were some of the only American kids in their class. 

“You two better get to it if you want to run through and get critiques before we go for the rill rehearsal,” Maria advised, standing at the front of the room.

Maria started the music and they began to dance. Natasha didn’t like the beginning of the Sugar Plum pas de deux because she thought there were way too many supported turns. When she was dancing with a partner, there were much more interesting things she wanted to do. The ending of the dance, however, had a few nice lifts and shoulder sits. Overall, it wasn’t filled with enough content to be energetic but also not soft enough to be considered beautiful. It was definitely not one of her favorites.

As Natasha hit her ending arabesque, she could feel that they had danced perfectly. Most dance teachers had told her there was no such thing as perfect, you could always improve, but there was no room for improvement there. Alexei and Natasha had danced to their fullest potential.

Maria clapped and walked over to them. “Wow, that was amazing,” she exclaimed. “I knew you two would be able to perform like that, I just didn’t realize it would happen so soon.”

“Well it’s all thanks to him,” Natasha complimented, setting her hand on Alexei’s chest.

Alexei blushed profusely. “I think it was a combined effort.”

“Well I’m very impressed. If I’m being honest, I think you two could handle much harder repertoire. If you two are up for it, I’d love to work independently with you two on some pas de deuxs for fun,” Maria offered.

“Yes,” Alexei and Natasha answered in unison, smiling at each other 

“Perfect. I’m going to have to have a talk with Tony about this pairing, we’ll be choosing our next ballet soon,” Maria said.

So Natasha and Alexei were going to be leads in the next ballet together. That was extremely exciting. Although, it seemed like Tony loved Bucky and Elektra together. They might be a threat for Alexei and Natasha. Natasha could not handle losing a lead to Elektra. It was hard enough for her to lose Snow Queen to her. But how could Alexei and Natasha get a leg up? Maybe they’d have to develop a bond. If they were close friends, their dancing would reflect it. 

“Let’s hang out sometime,” Natasha suggested after Maria walked out of the studio, sipping on her water bottle.

“Should we? When? Where?” Alexei asked.

“It could be today if you want,” Natasha said. “And we can go somewhere or just hang out at my place. We’ll have better chemistry if we get close in our real lives.”

“Very true. Let’s hang out after rehearsal today,” Alexei said.

Natasha smiled at him. “Deal.”

Rehearsal with everyone there was just as terrible and exhausting as Natasha had expected it to be. The little girl playing Clara was only twelve and this was her first time in the role, so it was a little bit overwhelming for her. She had a lot of choreography to remember. There were also a lot of little kids other than Clara. For example, all the little party guests. There was no real issue with them other than the fact that their dance moms would come with them to rehearsal. If there was one thing Natasha had learned during her years of dance, it was to stay away from dance moms.

Because Natasha was dancing the Sugar Plum Fairy, all the little girls were obsessed with her. It felt nice to have a posse of fans, honestly. It was the one benefit of dancing her boring role. But it also meant that the kids would follow her around everywhere she went. Natasha didn’t really need seven little girls to accompany her to the bathroom or to her dressing room. Even after their rehearsal finished, they still seemed to be there, trailing behind her. Natasha knew of only one way to get rid of them.

“Hey, Tony,” Natasha greeted, walking into Tony’s office after rehearsal, followed by four little girls.

“Hey, Tasha,” Tony said, standing up from his desk to greet her.

“And who’s this?” He asked after a second, noting her following of little girls.

“Partygoers,” Natasha explained. 

“I think now would be a great time for them to have a party by themselves,” Tony said, closing the door on them.

Natasha laughed. “Thank you for that. They’ve been following me around all day and I couldn’t seem to get rid of them. I figured you could do the trick.”

“I’m always willing to get rid of little kids for you,” Tony said, sitting back in his chair. “Now, is that the only reason you came here?”
“Well, I also love you, of course,” Natasha said, smiling at him.

“I watched the rehearsal today,” Tony said.

“Really?” Natasha asked, surprised.

It was rare for Tony to watch a rehearsal until the final dress rehearsal. He wasn’t really the person to try to critique anyone, seeing as he wasn’t trained in ballet. Well, he wasn’t trained in any type of dance. The only reason Tony had a job at the company was that his family owned it. He’d grown up learning the job, so it was natural for him to take it. But this watching rehearsals thing was very odd. The last time he’d done that it was so he could replace a dancer.

“Well, Maria was absolutely raving to me about how amazing you and Alexei are doing with your pas de deux,” Tony explained. “I figured it was only right for me to go and see if she was correct. And she was: you two are absolutely exceptional together. She was saying that we should take that into consideration when choosing the ballet for next season.”

“Well, Alexei and I would be honored to dance together again. We love it,” Natasha said.

“I’ll definitely be keeping that in mind,” Tony said.

So, that was it. Natasha had all but been casted as the lead in the next show. And with Alexei, whom she loved, as her partner. 

The only competition was Bucky and Elektra.