"Croisé devant, fifth, plié, chassé, pas de bourrée, échappé, jeté, jeté, glissade, piqué turn and fifth." Carolyn's ancient Russian ballet teacher spit out the words at them as they went over the combination for the thirtieth time that day.

It had already been five grueling hours of rehearsal and Carolyn still had one more hour of class left before she could return to her dorm room and soak her aching feet in ice water. Old Russian ballet teachers weren't the most lenient, that's for sure.

"No stopping unless you're passed out on my dance floor or dead." Was probably her favorite saying.

The first week after Carolyn's first day of classes, she would get back to her dorm room and find blood staining her ballet shoes. She wasn't used to being en pointe for such a long period of time during one day.

Despite the pain, it was what she wanted to do. She knew that all of her hard work would one day pay off in the end.

"Carolyn." The old woman barked. "The piqué turn should be in retiré, not coupé. Fix it." She said coldly and banged her cane against the wood floor.

Carolyn winced at the sound and secretly rolled her eyes at the decrepit woman. She shook her head at herself for being so stupid. She couldn't believe she had made such a simple mistake. She glanced at the clock. Ten more minutes of torture.

--

"Hi, my name is Andy. I'm looking for a pretty blonde girl." He walked up to a girl wearing a slimming black leotard with her hair done up in a high bun.

"You're going to have a hard time with that. There are a lot of pretty blonde girls on campus." The girl replied with an attitude and continued walking.

"Wait!" Andy jogged after her. "She dances. Her name is Carolyn? Ring a bell?"

"Ooohhh. Carolyn. Yeah, I know her. We take ballet one together." The girl informed. "But she's 'so advanced' that she gets to take pointe two with the sophomores and juniors." The girl mumbled enviously.

"Yeah, anyway," Andy pushed the girl's envy aside. "I'm looking for her. Do you know where she is?"

"She has class with Madam Petrova right now. I suggest not interrupting that class. Madam Petrova will most likely behead you with her cane if you ever interrupt her ballet class. Although it's almost two o'clock now, right? She should be done soon. Her dorm room is in that building right over there." The girl pointed to the building right across from them. "Room 278. It's on the second floor. You should be able to find it pretty easily. She leaves a spare key under the mat if you want to get in and wait for her inside. I'm assuming you're her secret boyfriend?"

Andy furrowed his eyebrows. "'Secret' boyfriend?"

"Yeah, secret." The girl said as if Andy should know what that meant. "We're not allowed to have relationships if you're in the 'orthodox ballet' as we like to call it. Ballet all the time. No exceptions and especially no relationships."

"Sounds... Nazi-like." Andy commented. "Is this a college or a concentration camp? Honestly..."

The girl laughed. "Yeah, we seem to be pretty restricted here. But it's what we get for wanting to be ballerinas. Well, I hope you find Carolyn. I have to get to my next class." The girl said goodbye to Andy and continued on her way.

Andy made his way to the dorm building where he planned to surprise Carolyn when she got back from class. It sounded like she was definitely going to need this surprise.

--

Carolyn trudged up the stairs to the second floor where her dorm room was. That had been the most brutal class of them all so far and it was only October.

When she went to place her key in the lock, she noticed the door was already unlocked. That was strange. Her roommate was at a dance competition in California. There was no possible way she could be home already. She stood there debating with herself on whether she should enter or not. What if someone had broken in and was waiting for her to get home so they could kill her? But then she started to think being murdered would be much better than going back to Madam Petrova's class tomorrow.

She opened the door slowly to find all the lights in the dorm room were off including the ones she always left on. Her hand glided against the cold wall in search of the light switch. When she found it, she flicked on the lights and dropped her dance bag on the floor when she saw who was standing in her tiny hallway.

"Andy!" She exclaimed and ran towards him despite how much her feet were screaming at her to sit down.

He wrapped her in his arms and picked her up, spinning her around once before putting her back down. "I missed you." He said into her ear. His deep voice was like sweet melted butter. How she had missed that voice.

"What are you doing here in my dorm room? In New York?" She smiled the brightest she ever had. Just seeing his face made her feel complete again.

"I went to your house to surprise you and your dad told me you were here. So, I decided to come surprise you here." He explained.

"Oh, Andy." She latched onto him again and didn't ever want to let go. She deeply inhaled the sweet scent that lingered on his body, intermingling with the smell of leather. She had missed him so much it hurt.

"So, now that I'm here," Andy began. "I thought we could have some... fun." He said with seduction practically dripping from his tone.

"I want to," She frowned. "But I really shouldn't. I have class tomorrow at six AM sharp and if I'm even a second late, the crypt keeper will put me through relevé drills... Those will for sure break my toes if they're not broken already."

"But please Carolyn?" Andy whined, putting on his best puppy dog face.

Carolyn knew she couldn't resist the look of his eyes when they were filled with sadness. She tried not to look but he lifted her chin so her eyes met his.

"An hour. At the most." She said.

We all know it wasn't about to last just an hour.