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Gina never looked at him anymore.
She’d clearly been working through… something lately. But she didn’t want his help. She’d stopped letting him in. Stopped needing him.
In rehearsals, no one else seemed to catch those quick flashes when she vacillated between making herself small and jumping out of her skin. Was that what she wanted? For no one to notice? To escape?
Using their drama club’s production of Beauty and the Beast as a break from whatever was going on sounded as viable an explanation as the next. It didn’t feel entirely right, but she wasn’t talking to him of late, so he couldn’t know for sure.
And she never glanced his way. Like, ever. He’d checked.
So yes, it was just a routine afternoon where she was giving instructions as choreographer, and yes, those notes were directed at the entire after-school group, but when her eyes connected with his in a brief pass, he was momentarily dazed.
Hearing “Ricky” fade from her lips in favor of “castle” and “jeté” snapped him almost fully back to the present. He had to shake himself a little first.
And walk it off.
He didn’t notice his ragged exhale.
Obviously, his awareness of her would never go away. She was amazing and that was impossible.
But he would try to stop looking, to stop seeing her, if that’s what she needed.
He could only hope that was what she needed.