Evolving Dreams (New Beginnings Series) (4 page)

“Well, I think it’s perfect—no chips in it at all. A perfect souvenir of my trip to California.” She laughed a little. “I’m a souvenir collector.” She set the shell down on the arm of her chair. Meg slid her feet back into her slippers and moved back toward her chair.

“Cute,” Trace said as he looked at her feet. “What are those?”

“Sock monkey slippers. I have an affinity for sock monkeys!” She struck a pose.

He looked up and noticed she also had sock monkeys on her pajama pants. She wore a tank top with a cardigan sweater over that. “I can see that. Any reason why?”

“Not really. I just think they’re cute.”

She was standing there smiling at him with her auburn hair glowing in the early morning sun, wisps flying around her head. Trace thought
she
was cute and maybe he was developing an affinity for her.

Meg sat down and they were quiet again—Trace finishing his coffee and she finishing her tea. After a while she picked up her mug and her book. “Well, I’m going to get in the shower and get ready for my day. I don’t know what time Sean got in so I’ll let him sleep a few minutes more.”

“Okay. I’m heading out. I’ll see you later. Have a good day.”

“You too. ‘Bye!”

Trace picked up the shell after she went into the house and studied it. He hardly even noticed seashells anymore—unless he stepped on one with his bare feet. It could be fun to see life through her eyes for a while. Sometimes he wondered if he’d become so hardened he couldn’t enjoy life the way some people did. Maybe she’d let him borrow some of her joy for the short time they could spend together.

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Meg slid her lunch tray onto the table and turned around to look for Sean. He had been right behind her, but had stopped to talk to his new friends. She sat down and prepared to dig in.

“Hey! Do you mind if I join you?” One of the faculty members they had met with that morning sat down with her tray. “I’d like to talk a little more if you don’t mind.”

“Sure,” Meg replied with a smile.

Tobi Morrison was the advanced choreography instructor at SDDI. She reminded Meg of a pixie with her close cropped blonde hair, turned up nose and sparkling eyes. “I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed our talk this morning. I’m really looking forward to your sessions with my students. Is it going to be okay if I sit in too? I don’t want to cramp your style, but I really do think I could get something out of it as well.”

“That would be awesome. I get the feeling we have a very similar philosophy when it comes to choreography—at least that’s how I feel after our meeting this morning. I hope you’ll feel comfortable contributing to the sessions as we go along.”

“Well, I don’t want to step on your—or Sean’s—toes. I just want to learn whatever I can from you while you’re here. I think I can get as much out of the sessions as the students will.”

Sean arrived just then and slumped down in the seat on the other side of Meg. “Hi! Tobi—right?”

“Uh huh.”

Meg turned to fill him in on their conversation. “Tobi wants to sit in on the choreography sessions we’ll be doing with her students. I was just telling her we’d love it if she teamed up with us and felt free to contribute to the lessons.”

Tobi added, “I’ll only agree to be there to assist. I generally get these kids for two semesters so I want them to get all they can from you. Things can get a little stale when they just have me to instruct them. It’ll be good for them to see things through fresh eyes—creatively.”

Sean nodded. “I think it’ll be good for you to be there. You know these kids’ strengths and weaknesses so you can give us some insight. Sometimes when we do these workshops the instructors don’t want to be there. I think they consider it a chance to take some time off, but we think it helps for the students and the instructors to go through it together. I’m glad you’re willing to do that.”

Sean and Meg had spent the morning meeting with the different department heads and some of the instructors about their workshop curriculums. Sometimes viewpoints clashed and they didn’t want to be accused of undermining anyone’s teaching style or philosophy. They only had two more such meetings this afternoon—dance theory and dance technique. Hopefully the rest of their curriculums would be approved and tomorrow would start the first of their three-day workshops, this one in theatrical staging. The workshops would be half-day sessions and they would spend their afternoons preparing for the showcase that would take place toward the end of their six weeks at the Institute.

Tobi perked up as if she’d just had a brilliant idea. “Do you two have plans for dinner this evening? I know a great Japanese place not too far away. We could go and get to know each other better. I’ll ask around and see if any of the other faculty would like to go along.”

Sean looked a little sheepish. “I already made plans for dinner. Sorry.”

“I’d like to go,” Meg replied as she shot Sean a look. “That would be great, Tobi. Thanks.”

Tobi jumped up and grabbed her tray. “Good! I’ll spread the word. Do you just want to come by my studio when you finish up? My last class may still be in session, but if you don’t mind waiting you can come right in.”

Meg stood up to walk out with her. “Okay. Listen—if I get there really early do you mind if I join in? I could just sneak in to the back of the class. I really need to get in a studio and move. It’s been a couple of days. I promise I won’t disrupt anything.”

“Wow. You’d really want to do that? Of course you’re welcome.”

“Thanks!”

They dumped their trash, stashed their trays on top of the trashcans and moved toward the doors. Sean came up behind them and Meg and Sean walked toward the conference room to finish their meetings and Tobi waved to them as she almost skipped down the hall.

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Meg pulled up in front
of the beach cottage and turned off the ignition. Boy, she felt good. It had been a great day. The meetings all went well, with a minimum of problems to iron out. She had made it to Tobi’s studio at the beginning of class so she got the whole two hours to dance with the kids. She could tell what a great teacher Tobi was and how much her students loved her. She wasn’t easy by any means, though, and Meg had to push through some pretty challenging moves.

After a quick shower and changing out of her workout clothes, she met up with Tobi, Anthony—a Latin ballroom instructor, Estelle—a contemporary dance instructor, and Liliana and Kai—Estelle’s teaching assistants.
They all caravanned over to Sakura for sushi. Meg had a great time getting to know them all, and before she knew it three hours had passed. By the time they said their goodbyes in the parking lot they had all kinds of plans made—a dance club Kai thought Meg might enjoy, at least three other restaurants they wanted to introduce her to, and of course she had to explore a great museum with a wonderful historic costume and textile display that Anthony had raved about and wanted to show her. She left them feeling like she had truly made some new friends.

She noticed it was already nine o’clock as she grabbed her dance bag and locked up her car. She let herself into the house through the kitchen door and saw Trace sitting at the little dining table with a pile of textbooks around him. “Hi. Looks like you’re thinking hard.”

“Just getting ready to quit. We have a new computer simulation program to get up and running.”

“Taking advantage of a quiet house, huh?” Meg smiled.

“Oh, yeah, you’re so noisy. I hardly knew you were here last night you were so quiet.”

“No, you were just engrossed in the game,” she laughed. “Have you eaten? I have leftover sushi!” She held up a bag.

“Awesome! I had some chili, but it’s time for a snack.” He walked over, took the bag and peeked inside.

“Help yourself. I had dinner with some of the staff from the Institute. They were so much fun. Sorry, I probably should have called.”

“That’s okay. I just assumed your meetings ran late or something. You don’t have to answer to me. Where’d you go?”

“Some Japanese place near SDDI—Sakura, I think it was called.”

“Oh, yeah. I’ve never tried it—‘til now,” he smirked as he dug into a drawer looking for chopsticks. “Mmm, it’s really good.”

“I thought so.”

“Did you lose Sean on your way home?”

Meg rolled her eyes. “No, he didn’t come with us. He went out with that TA again—Steffy, I think her name is.”

“I take it you don’t think much of her.”

“Sean was telling me about all the great ideas Steffy has for our showcase
and
our workshops. Pretty nervy, if you ask me. I’m just afraid he’s going to give her an opening and she’s going to manipulate him into something. I haven’t figured out what she wants yet. I’ll tell you, though, none of the people I went to dinner with had anything positive to say about her when I told them she and Sean had hooked up.”

“Does he do this a lot on your travels? Hook up with women?”

“Oh, yeah, he always finds someone to hang out with. Some I like better than others.”

“And it really doesn’t bother you?”

“No, it really doesn’t. This one does just because I get a bad vibe from her. If he wants to date a TA from SDDI I think he could choose a better one. I had dinner with a real sweetheart tonight named Liliana. I’d be happy for him to hang out with
her
,” she said with a laugh.

“How about you? Have you found some special guys to hang out with in your travels?” He looked embarrassed. “You don’t have to answer that. I shouldn’t have asked—it’s none of my business.”

“No, it’s fine. I’ve dated a little, but nothing serious—just dinner here and there. I want to settle down someday. Sometimes I think I want it to happen sooner rather than later. But I can’t get serious about anyone with my career, my lifestyle. I do get lonely, though, I have to admit. I guess that’s my far-off dream—to have a family someday.”

“I know what you mean about your career making these decisions for you. I know I want a family, but I can’t ask someone to be waiting for me to come home from deployment, or accept that I may have to go wheels up without any notice on some classified mission that I can’t even talk about when I get home. I sometimes wish there would be someone waiting for me here when I get back instead of coming home to an empty house, but I just can’t do that—especially to someone I could love. It’d be like repaying their love with nothing but worry for me,” Trace added.

Meg smiled a little. “Well, we both have to retire sometime. I’m going to retire, get married, have babies, and teach little girls and boys to dance in a studio my husband will fix up with paneling, mirrors and a barre in our basement.”

Trace laughed, “That’s not
too
specific. Send me a flyer when you get your dance school off the ground and maybe I’ll enroll my kids there—the kids I have when I retire, get married and have babies.”

They were standing across from each other, leaning against the kitchen cabinets laughing as something warm passed between them. Meg realized they had a lot more in common than she thought. They each seemed to be living in a state of flux all the time—neither of them really settled.

CHAPTER SIX

The next couple of days passed by quickly. Friday morning rolled around and Trace had gotten up early to pack up his gear for the weekend training exercise. The plan was to go wheels up around 1300 hours and meet the FBI counterterrorism agents in the Cascade Mountains to run them through their paces. Trace and his teammates always kind of enjoyed jerking the feds around for a couple of days on these exercises, but for some reason he wasn’t looking forward to it the way he usually did. He blamed it on being too entertained by having Meg around. He would have included Sean, but he hadn’t seen much of him this trip because Sean was always out ‘til after Trace had turned in—and only up for a few minutes before he left for work.

He got to see Meg regularly, though, and the more time he spent with her the more he liked her. It had become their habit to have coffee while they talked out on the deck together every morning. After they each got off work they would throw something together for dinner and discuss their day. They also talked about everything under the sun. It was comfortable to be with her and when Charley dropped in unannounced the night before because he was at loose ends, Meg welcomed him right in and suggested they all watch a movie—then went into the kitchen to pop some microwave popcorn and find the sodas.

As Trace stepped out onto the deck that morning he noticed her empty slippers sitting by the steps. He looked out and saw her standing at the edge of the surf, the water rolling over her feet.

“Isn’t that cold?” he called out to her.

Meg turned and smiled, “A little bit.” She walked toward him, the sun shooting sparks off her hair. She sat down on the deck steps and pushed her feet into the sand until they were buried up to her ankles.

Trace sat down beside her. “How are you today?”

“Good. A little tired. I shouldn’t have stayed up to watch the end of that movie. But it was so funny. And as Elizabeth Bennett would say, ‘I dearly love to laugh.’”