Rise Again Read online

  Table of Contents

  Rise Again

  Book Details

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Rise Again

  L.J. Hamlin

  Arkady loves the ballet. He's a great dancer, loves doing it, and even when the job frustrates him he wouldn't give it up for anything. Then it's abruptly taken from him, and Arkady is left floundering in the wake of a life he doesn't understand anymore. Even with family, a physical therapist, and the constant love of his dog Lou, he doesn't know how to handle life without ballet.

  Rise Again

  By L.J. Hamlin

  Published by Less Than Three Press LLC

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission of the publisher, except for the purpose of reviews.

  Edited by Megan Derr

  Cover designed by Michelle Seaver

  This book is a work of fiction and all names, characters, places, and incidents are fictional or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is coincidental.

  First Edition September 2017

  Copyright © 2017 by L.J. Hamlin

  Printed in the United States of America

  Digital ISBN 9781684310906

  For Adie, who encouraged me to write this story

  Chapter One

  The music is so loud the walls are vibrating, and Arkady is surprised no one has called the cops yet. He can't afford to be arrested again. It's unlikely he'd be able to keep avoiding charges, and his boss will kill him if he's late for tomorrow's photo shoot. Making his way into the kitchen, he grabs a beer from one of the ice buckets and cracks it open. A drunken party girl he'd been introduced to earlier, but whose name he can't remember, comes prancing over to him.

  "Dance with me!" the girl demands, and Arkady notices she has a daisy drawn on her cheek in face paint. And it clicks, her name is Daisy.

  "I don't dance," Arkady tells her.

  "Liar, Kris told me you're a dancer." Daisy pouts.

  "I'm not that kind of dancer." Arkady sips his beer. People don't get that just because he's a ballerino, and he loves it, doesn't mean he's good at, or likes, other kinds of dancing.

  "I can show you how, if you want? I'm a good dancer," Daisy says, shimmying her hips. She's cute as hell, but unfortunately, she's barking up the wrong tree. Arkady hasn't faked interest in girls since he was fifteen, and he's twenty-five now.

  "Sorry, I really don't dance. I just want to drink my beer. Then I should head home. I have work early," Arkady replies.

  And he thinks everything would be fine. Daisy is a nice girl and can take a no, but some asshole guy lumbers over.

  "Don't be a dick. Just dance with the girl. What are you, a fag?" the meathead slurs.

  "Yes, actually, I am," Arkady says coolly, trying not to bristle, but he has a bit of a temper. His manager calls him a hothead. His father says all real Russian men are fiery, and living in the states since he was six hasn't changed that.

  "Didn't realize this party was a god damn sausage fest. Why don't you fuck off to the gay bar, dude?" The guy sneers.

  Arkady knows better. He should walk away, but seeing how embarrassed Daisy is makes him angrier. He's a ballet dancer. He's used to homophobic slurs before he even confirms his sexuality, but he doesn't like to see people upset, and Daisy looks like she's blaming herself for this confrontation, judging by the guilt on her face.

  "Why don't you suck my dick?" Arkady says with a wicked grin, and Daisy snorts a laugh. Arkady's attention is caught by her giggle, so he doesn't see the punch coming till it's too late. He takes a shot square to the jaw and drops his beer. The bottle shatters on the floor, spilling beer and glass everywhere.

  His mother always taught him to stand up to bullies, to hit back if someone hits you, or they'll think they can beat you down whenever they feel like it. So Arkady is used to fighting, to standing up for himself. Growing up gay and Russian, he's been in more than a few fights, so if this guy thinks he's going to run away with his tail between his legs, then he's mistaken.

  Arkady has a good right hook that he's perfected in street fights and boxing classes. And even though the asshole really should have expected it, he looks surprised when a fist hits his face. He drops to his knees as blood pours from his broken nose.

  No one had stepped in when the homophobe had hit him, but as soon as Arkady lands a blow, people jump in, pulling them both apart. People are yelling. Daisy is crying and trying to explain that Arkady didn't start it, but he still finds himself being dragged outside by three guys. They look like they're tempted to give him a beating on the guy's behalf, but Arkady is braced and ready for a fight, and they seem to realize three on one won't go as smoothly as they'd like.

  Left on the street, Arkady rubs his jaw. It's aching a little, will probably bruise, but he broke the other guy's nose, so he's pleased with the outcome. Starting to walk to a busier area so he can hail a taxi, he pulls out a packet of cigarettes from his leather jacket. He keeps saying he'll quit. They want him to at work, as they worry it'll impact his performance. But so far it hasn't. He doesn't smoke enough to counteract how much he works out and trains. He's still one of the best.

  He smokes, letting the steady and repetitive action of filling his lungs with smoke and then releasing it calm him. By the time he's finished, he's shaken off the fight a little, and his mood is improved a little by the fact he gets a taxi easily.

  Letting himself into his apartment, he's greeted by his pit bull, Lou, who comes straight over, tail wagging, sticking his nose everywhere, and Arkady has to push Lou around a little so they can both get in the apartment and close the door behind them.

  "You want food, boy? Yeah, me too." Arkady walks further into the apartment, ditching his jacket on a hanger near the door. Lou licks his hand as he walks toward the kitchen. Lou is never overly demanding. He loves to eat, but always waits for permission.

  Arkady gets out a can of wet dog food and puts it in Lou's bowl, wanting to feed Lou before he feeds himself because he's not the kind to leave his dog hungry while he eats.

  "Dinner," Arkady announces, setting the bowl down. Lou gives a small woof, almost like he's thanking Arkady, before he starts devouring his food.

  It's after ten, and it would be easier to eat junk, maybe a pizza, but Arkady works hard on his body. He's five-foot-seven of muscle, toned stomach, the works, but then you have to be strong to hold a grown woman above your head. Dancers are no weaklings, and Arkady doesn't stay in that shape by eating take out, so he makes some chicken and rice.

  Arkady cooks with the practiced ease of someone who lives alone, checking on Lou every now and then. He dishes his dinner into a bowl and goes to the couch to eat it, putting the TV on for some background. Once he's finished, he puts the bowl in the sink to wash later. Lou looks up, licking his chops and he seems to have finished, because he follows Arkady back to the couch.

  He kicks off his shoes and gets more comfortable, Lou's head in his lap, and scratches at Lou's ears. Arkady watches TV, looks through his phone, trying to ignore the ache in his face. He gets comfortable with Lou, and not for the first time, ends up falling asleep on the couch to the drone of the TV and the sound of his dog snoring softly.

  *~*~*

  "What's that on your face, Arkady?" Jason, the head of the ballet company he's working for, yells as Arkady is helped into a harness. Jason has him doing a photo shoot for the company to advertise them, and
that requires he look like he's flying.

  "A bruise," Arkady replies. He thought the makeup girl had covered it when she did his dramatic stage makeup.

  "Have you been fighting again? Never mind. I don't want to know. Just don't do it again. And someone get the makeup girl. Get it covered up," Jason orders. At over six feet, he can seem a little intimidating at first, and he loves to shout, but that's as far as his temper goes, whatever racist bullshit people occasionally spew about a large black man being in charge.

  Someone gets Tracey, and she manages to do magic as people bustle around them both, covering up the purple on his jaw, muttering in Spanish. Arkady can't help thinking of the man who'd hit him, and feels a surge of anger. He hates homophobes and bullies. He wishes they weren't a part of his life, but they are and always have been. He knows that it's at least better here than it would have been if he'd stayed in Russia.

  Finally, after adjustments and safety checks, Arkady finds himself in the air, doing ballet poses, like fourth position, en haut of the arms with feet in the fourth position croisee. He shows the Attitude pose in a terre, sur la pointe. He does port de corps and en coux. Not all the positions they have him doing are technically perfect ballet poses. They ask him to make his body look like it's flying, and he does, keeping his toes en pointe.

  They bring him down for breaks, to give him water and let him pee because, in Jason's words, he doesn't want Arkady to have 'I need to tinkle face'. They have him up for the last time. He's stretching one arm above his head and leaning his head against it as they ask, legs out to the side as if he's mid leap.

  "Look to the heavens, my dove," Jason yells, and Arkady looks up, up into the walkway above him. There's only one person, when there should be at least three, and Arkady notices the man's face is covered with a red scarf. Arkady opens his mouth, ready to ask what's going on, when he sees the knife.

  He yells, but the man slashes through the cords keeping Arkady in the air. He thinks he screams as he hurtles to the ground, but he's not sure he even breathes. Pain bursts bright like a supernova, only to be replaced by a darkness more dim than any he has ever seen. He has strange thoughts that the darkness will last long after he opens his eyes.

  Chapter Two

  Waking up happens slowly, like a heavy fog lifting. That's when the pain hits him, wave after wave, and he doesn't know why, what happened. He searches his memory and remembers a party and a fight. He wonders if the pain is from that? Then Arkady opens his eyes, and the room he's in is much brighter than his bedroom, and he can't feel the weight of Lou on his feet. His body is screaming, and it takes a long time to realize he's in a hospital room. There's a buzzer placed near his hand, and he's surprised by how hard it is to focus through the pain to make his arm move so he can pick up the buzzer, and there isn't even a mark on his hand.

  Arkady buzzes, and after only a moment, a nurse appears. She's older, plump, and pretty, perfect makeup, the kind of girl his mother Veronika would have liked him to bring home, maybe still would. They don't talk about his sexuality much, or her hopes for his future beyond his job, but then, his job had always come first with his parents. Born to be a star, was what they always said.

  "Oh goodness. You're awake. I thought maybe the buzzer went off by mistake. You've been asleep quite a while, young man." She smiles and comes over and starts checking things.

  "What happened?" Arkady asks. His head feels heavy and really painful, worse than a hangover, and when he raises his hand to his head, instead of feeling his messy black hair he feels bandages.

  "You don't remember?" she asks, looking concerned.

  "No," Arkady frowns, trying to focus. He gets an image of being thrown out of the party by a group of guys, and he wonders if they did this to him? Did he get beaten up badly enough to put him in the hospital?

  "Let me just go get a doctor for you, sweetheart. I think it's best she checks you out." The nurse leaves, and Arkady looks around. There are flowers and get well soon cards on the bedside cabinet. So he's been here long enough for people to find out.

  Arkady goes to move closer to the cards so he can see who they are from, and his upper body moves pretty easily, with a few aches, but then he moves his leg and the pain is so sudden and so severe he screams. He holds his body still, afraid to move even an inch, his stomach rolling, making him feel nauseous. Once he's sure he's not going to be sick, he moves again, just his arms, pulling the blankets back.

  His left knee is all wrapped up. It looks ten times the size of Arkady's other knee, and the leg below has been shaved, and an arrow is drawn on his leg, pointing to his knee. Arkady thinks that means he's had surgery. How can he not remember having surgery? It seems like he hit his head, or did someone hit him in the head? He doesn't know. He knows his head is throbbing, as is his leg. He's never felt pain like it.

  A doctor comes in a few moments later. She's tall, with short black hair, her features suggest Native American. Arkady thought Native women kept their hair long, but he guesses he doesn't know much.

  "Hello, I'm Doctor Ali. Do you mind if I call your Arkady? Mr. Alkaev?" The doctor asks.

  "Call me whatever the hell you like. Just tell me what happened. How long have I been here? What's wrong with my leg? Why can't I remember how I got here?" Arkady says, getting more distressed as he talks. The pain isn't fading. It feels like someone is pushing needles into the bone of his knee.

  "You had an accident at work. I was told they think it was an accident. You fell from a height. You've been here about a week," Doctor Ali replies. "The reason you're having memory issues is that you hit your head badly. You fractured your skull. You're lucky to only have slight amnesia. We did a number of scans while you were asleep. There was swelling, but it went down. We don't think there's any permanent brain damage."

  "And my leg?" Arkady doesn't like how she hadn't answered that question.

  "You sustained multiple injuries on impact. You dislocated your knee cap, sustained a meniscus tear, which is a rupture of the cartilage, and torn ligaments and tendons. We did surgery to repair what we could."

  "What does that mean? I'm a dancer." Arkady feels sick again. He's had sprains before. They didn't feel like this. They didn't need surgery. He just iced them and rested a little. The pain of those injuries was never like this one. It's like there is a constant burning ache in his knee.

  "You crushed everything in your knee. There isn't a part that didn't sustain some level of damage. Due to that, you'll need intense physical therapy. You will be able to walk, but you'll need an aid, like a cane," Dr. Ali says softly.

  Arkady hadn't even thought not being able to walk was a possibility, and his heart gives a horrible lurch at that. His brain is fuzzy from pain, from smashing it on the ground apparently, and it's taking him longer to process her words than he'd like. She's saying he'll need help walking. A man that needs help walking is not a man who can dance.

  "So, what? I'll have a limp? How long for?" Arkady can't lie and say he doesn't have a flash of vanity. He's a good-looking guy, handsome, with green eyes and dark hair. He has a good body from his job. He attracts attention from men and women alike. The idea of walking down the street, and the reason people are looking at him is because he's limping, or because of the stick in his hand, hurts his vanity deeply.

  "Yes, you'll have a limp. Listen, I don't like to be harsh, but I don't want to give you false hope. An injury this severe, even if the damage heals well, there will always be weakness and some pain. I'll refer you to people who can help you deal with that, find a pain management scheme that will help you." Dr. Ali looks like she feels bad about what she's saying, and Arkady gets the random thought of wondering if this is the worst news she's given today. Permanent weakness: his career is over, but he has to be sure.

  "You're saying I won't be able to dance anymore, aren't you?" Arkady asks her.

  "I'm so sorry, but yes. The height you hit your head from could have killed you. You could have been paralyzed. Your dancing career is, u
nfortunately, over." Dr. Ali sounds like she's trying to make him feel better, but her words make him feel worse. He feels like he's suddenly been passed a weight, and he doesn't know why, and he can't put it down.

  "It's not just a job to me. I've been training since I could walk. I dance almost every day, and the days I don't, I think about it, train for it. You've just told me my whole life has turned to shit, and what? You want me to look on the bright side?" Arkady can't help the anger burning inside of him anymore than he can control the thickening of his accent when he gets upset or angry.

  "I misspoke. I'm sorry. I know this is a very serious change to your life. I'll schedule a counselor to come talk to you. Just buzz if you need anything." Dr. Ali looks embarrassed, and she departs quickly, leaving Arkady alone with the heavy feeling in his chest, pressing down till he can hardly breathe.

  He doesn't know how to react. He wants to yell, to scream until his voice gives out, but his mother taught him not to behave that way. A gentleman does not shout. He contains his anger, suppresses it, swallows it down like poison. A nurse comes in and gives him an injection he says will help with the pain. It does a little, but it makes him very sleepy, and it becomes hard to think. He can hardly process his own thoughts.

  He doesn't know how long he's been there, just drifting in the pain and medical haze, when someone knocks on the door, snapping him out of the weird fog he was in. He looks up, and his manager, Thomas, is in the doorway. When he sees Arkady is awake, he walks in and takes a seat beside the bed. "So, the doctors told me you were awake, but wouldn't tell me anything else. How are you?"

  "No brain damage," Arkady says, surprised that his tongue feels thick, and he has trouble with the words. It hadn't been like that talking to the doctor, so he guesses it's whatever was in that injection. Arkady hadn't had a chance to complain about the pain. He'd been too shocked, so maybe they gave it to him because of what the doctor had to tell him, her way of softening the blow.