Ballet Shoes, Angel's Hair and Revolution (A Les Misérables fanfiction)

Chapter 19

"Courfeyrac?"

"Victorie?"

We asked at the same time, both of us stunned to see the other one. We looked at each other with our eyes wide opened, and I felt myself getting a little bit dizzy. My brain couldn't seem to process the fact that I was facing my best friend... which meant that my best friend was the vicomte de Thouars! It didn't want to believe it but it suddenly all made sense! He told me he was at the premiere of La Sylphide, and his mother knew so much about me! How could I be so stupid to not connect the dots! I had known his family was important but now I finally knew why. I kept looking at him with an absent gaze, not knowing whether to feel relieved or stressed about the fact that out of all the people of Paris the mysterious vicomte turned out to be no one other but my Courfeyrac.

"You are the Vicomte de Thouars?" I asked in disbelief when I finally was able to utter a single word. I felt my hands shaking nervously. All of this was wrong, he shouldn't see me like this. And most certainly, it was not the way he was supposed to find out about me being a dancer. We all know what being a dancer often ment in our times... What if he thought that I was a prostitute? After all that's exactly what madame LeBlanc was forcing me to become when she pushed me through that door. I needed to stop the imminent panic attack.

"And you... you're a ballerina" he muttered, "you never told me about this,"

His voice was full of disappointment, his eyes gazed upon me with pity, and I felt blush creeping on my cheeks. I felt embarrassed. I knew how terrible I must have looked at that moment. I wasn't the bourgeois natural beauty that danced with him at his parents party a couple of nights ago. That girl seemed to be dead when I turned into this one; A simple, frail gril in a cheap ballet costume which was exposing her white bony arms and her ankles, with a face covered in an inappropriate makeup that almost prevented from recognizing. As he pierced me with his eyes, I felt as if all my secrets were being exposed and my dignity was slipping away from me. I was broken.

"You never told me you were a vicomte!" I said, trying to defend myself without actually realizing that I was attacking him,

"I think I had a right to keep a secret," He said, raising his voice, "after all it turns out that I'm not the only one who's keeping them! Victorie... you, a ballet girl? Is that really your finishing school?"

"What's wrong with it? It's a school like any other" I frowned,

"A ballet school? For a girl who claims to be coming from a respectable family?" He asked with disdain, "look at yourself, you could be so much more than this..."

I looked at him with pain in my eyes,

"You have no idea, what you are saying, Courfeyrac. I had no choice! The ballet allows me to live a normal life, without it I would have nothing," I argued.

"Is this what you call a normal life? This ever-present game of secrets and risking your reputation?" He asked, "this is a nightmare beyond your dignity! A ballet school! If you needed help you should have told me, I would have helped you, and  you chose to disgrace yourself in such a way!"

"How was I supposed to tell you about ballet if I knew you would react like this?!" I questioned with a certain desperation in my voice, "I love this, I love ballet!" I exclaimed, he looked at me almost with disgust, and I felt my heart sink, "You really see me as a prostitute right now, don't you?" I asked but he didn't answer, "That's why this needed to be a secret! Because everyone in this messed up city associates ballet with prostitution! And it's not true!" Suddenly my eyes were filled with tears, and I saw his face redden with anger.

"It's not? Then how am I understand this sick situation! Why on earth would Madame LeBlanc isolate me from my parents and send you here to accompany me?" He asked, he was too smart to not notice the obvious, "Was that the plan? Were you supposed to 'satisfy me' so that I would influence my parents decision about the donations?" He almost spat these words, and I felt myself too weak to answer, there was nothing that could explain this, "Is that how your usual work at the ballet looks like? Do you always make sure that the more influential spectators are happy and satisfied?"