peridot | lando norris

16|ballet|

maeve pov.

"did he pick up?" niamh asked me as i looked down at the series of undelivered texts on my phone. "not yet" i say and she wraps her arms around me. 

i was backstage with her, she'd gotten her make up done and i did her bun like i always did. this was her first big show, being one of the younger ones performing today. she was really nervous and hadn't eaten much but i didn't force her since i was just like that too. she was sipping on some juice and i was able to get her to have some apple slices which were good enough.

it was starting to get chillier in london, since it was november already. i had a black boucle jacket on, niamh picking at my sleeves. "it's going to be alright, nia. just focus on doing your best today." she looked up at me and pulled away, fixing her costume. "i am. can we try calling him just once more?" she said when gracie walled over to us. "maeve, you need to get to the auditorium. we start soon." "just give me a minute, i'll leave soon" i tell her and niamh looks down. 

i try calling up lando, and finally the call gets through but disconnects 2 rings later. he had a late race last night. i had my doubts it he'd be able to make it back to the uk in such a short span of time but honestly, i wasn't going to tell that to niamh because there was still a chance he'll be here. he could do anything once he put his mind to it.

i give niamh one more quick hug before heading out to the auditorium seating, wishing luck to a bunch of other dancers. "ms.clarke!" i turned around and saw hera park. niamh and hera didn't get along very well and personally, i wasn't a big fan of the girl either. "hello hera. you're performing today?" she nodded an gently touched her headpiece.

she had a jacket all the way zipped up so i couldn't quite tell what role she was playing based on her costume. "i am playing odile" she says with a smile and i nod, rather impressed. this girl was bad news, but she was talented. her father was ... in the best ways to put it- like ashton. it was all about the labels which isn't a bad thing if you can look past it. "well, i wish you all the very best for the performance" i tell her and she thanks me and i'm back on my way to the seating area.

i sat down in my seat with my purse in my lap and phone in my hand as i texted leigh about maire's baby shower that was later this month. she was going to be coming to london alone since ronan couldn't break away from work for planning and arlo too had his school. she insisted on having niamh involved, as a way to get her to open up and be around family. 

i saw another missed call from lando before the network connectivity within the auditorium was terrible. i just wished it meant that he was nearby. i didn't even know niamh had invited him until last week. we hadn't seen lando since september since he constantly had triple race weekends with one week off travelling to be active at mtc.

he'd asked if i could drop niamh at his apartment two weeks ago in woking but i she had rehearsals and made the decision herself to not go. it was almost unlike her to skip out on seeing lando but he didn't push it either and flew back to monaco early. we hadn't spoken otherwise and i had no idea if niamh had either. ever since we got her the ipad, she preferred using it to call and text him most of the times but i'd barely seen her use it.

i know school wasn't treating her the best recently but i didn't think she'd distance herself from lando because of it. i wanted to tell him what happened but there was nothing he could do about it and i was confident that niamh would explain it better by herself. it was also another reason i wanted to keep hera and niamh from interacting.