Amie Denman - Carousel Nights

“You brought the glamour home,” Megan agreed. “I have no idea what we’ll do next year when you’re back to your day job.”

June walked to the front of the stage. The seats were all empty, but she felt the magic anyway. She always had. She faced the rows of seats and the midway wall of the theater where the marquee hung over glass doors.

June breathed deeply, raising her arms and stretching. She imagined the excitement, music, costumes and applause. More than anything, her feet wanted to spell out a routine on the floor that would have the audience wishing for three sets of eyes to take it all in.

But she had a lot of work to do before one patron filled a seat. When June had agreed to come home for the summer and take a hiatus from dancing on Broadway, she’d exacted an agreement from her brother, Jack, and sister, Evie. They had to let her update the old theaters. It was their second year running Starlight Point after the unexpected death of their father. They’d had bumps in the road, major and expensive ones, but ramping up the live shows would be a return on investment.

As she stood on the stage, breathing in theater air and listening to the clicking of tap shoes behind her, June wished she could fast-forward to opening day with a hundred people soaking up the great Broadway revue show she’d sketched out.

“You’re smiling,” Mel said.

She hadn’t heard him come in. How long has he been there? He stood near an exit door at the side of the house five rows back. Mel Preston. Tall. Blue work shirt with Starlight Point over one pocket and his name over the other.

She already knew his name. And plenty of other things about him.

June had left Starlight Point seven years ago, when she was eighteen, to attend college in Manhattan and begin her Broadway career. She didn’t regret striking out on her own and leaving the family business to the rest of the family. But she did have one tiny regret.

Okay, one six-foot-three regret.

“Of course I’m smiling,” June said. “Theater is my life.” She spun on her good leg and tapped out a short rhythm with her foot.

“Even this dinky theater?” he asked, walking down the middle aisle.

Her heart rate sped up with each step he took.

“Careful,” she said. “I know the owners of this place and I could have you fired.”

Mel sat in one of the hundreds of empty seats. He leaned back, a travel mug of coffee in his hand. He’s staying? June needed to concentrate on her rehearsal, and Mel divided her attention with his mere presence.

“How have you been, June?” He sat as if he were a ticket-holding patron waiting for his entertainment. Asked the question as if they were high school classmates bumping into each other at the bank or the grocery store.

June had been home just over a week and she’d somehow avoided a reunion with Mel. But Starlight Point only covered a few square miles. If she was planning to be home all summer, she had to find a way to tune out the way Mel made her feel, even after seven years. Maybe I’ll turn the music up very loud.

“I’ve been fine,” she said with a business-casual tone she hoped would convince at least one of them. “Busy. I’ll tell you all about it when I get my shows open.”

“I heard you’re staying all summer.”

June nodded, unsure if Mel considered it a good thing or a bad thing she was staying all summer. Her two goals of recharging herself and the theaters did not allow room for reviving a romance she’d left on the table. Not that Mel’s tone or posture suggested a return to old feelings. He was busy, too, the head of maintenance at Starlight Point. If he’d already seen her plans for renovation on the Midway Theater and the Starlight Saloon Theater, he was probably ready to drive her to the airport.

“Why did you decide to come home?” he asked.

Why did he want to know? She could tell him to mind his own business...but it was a fair question.

A question she’d been dodging since she’d announced she was coming home. In the competitive world of Broadway, she’d only admitted the pain in her knee to her closest friends. And there was no reason to acknowledge it to Mel now. Especially since it already felt better after weeks off the stage.

“I came home to revitalize these theaters,” she said. “I do own a third of Starlight Point.”

Loud music poured from the small speakers behind her.

“Sorry about that,” Megan said, “trying to find the right track.”

June broke eye contact with Mel. He could stay and watch if he wanted to, but she had work to do. She could certainly keep her composure. After dancing in front of thousands of Broadway fans, keeping her heart and mind on her career should be as easy as learning to two-step. She turned to her waiting dancers.

“I made copies of the order of the numbers for you. I’ll grab them.”

June crossed the stage and dug through her lucky duffel, a high school graduation present from her parents. She’d stuffed her shoes and dance clothes in it for years, hauling it along to her Broadway debut in Oklahoma!, her chorus role in Hello, Dolly!, her crazily costumed role in Cats, and her most recent performance in Pippin. In all those shows, she’d been a background dancer. Her next ambition was to get a larger role where she could sing and dance. The front of the stage—that’s where she wanted to be.

She handed out copies of the program and sat at the piano.

“Let’s do a read and sing-through,” she said. “I’ll play since it’s easier than stopping and starting the sound track.”

The six male and six female performers sang through the pieces culled from a dozen or so Broadway shows. Typical audience members would recognize nearly all the songs, and June hoped the combination had just the right energy and appeal for the amusement park crowd.

“Ready to try the first dance number?” she asked, rising from the piano and stacking the music on top.

Her breath quickened just thinking about dancing and she pulled off her hoodie, tossing it toward the side of the stage and taking a quick look to see if Mel was still there.

He was. She should not care either way. Didn’t he have work to do?

June waited, tapping her toe in anticipation while Megan fiddled with the music on her phone.

“Wish I could dance,” Megan said, “but I’m barely surviving morning sickness as it is. Slow movements are my friend right now.”

June smiled sympathetically. “I thought morning sickness was supposed to go away after the first few months?”

“Apparently not for everyone,” Megan said. She finished searching the playlist and looked up. “Ready?”

Spin, step, step, hold, dip. June moved with the dancers, letting the energy of the stage and the familiar music take her back to the time when she never thought about her knee, never took a cautious step waiting for the slice of pain. When she was happy just being a dancer.

She wanted to keep going, but the song ended. Megan thumbed a button on the player and the silence was broken by the dancers’ quick breathing. A moment later, applause from the lone audience member reminded June he was still there.

June walked to the front of the stage, signaling the other dancers to join her. They held hands and did an elaborate stage bow. Mel stood, continuing his applause until the dancers dispersed to the rear of the stage where they’d stowed their water bottles and cell phones.

“Glad you liked it,” June said to Mel.

“What’s not to like?”

She smiled. Despite the four rows of seats between them, he could probably hear her heart racing with adrenaline and endorphins. It was the dancing, her love of the theater. What else would it be?

She focused on the ramshackle catwalk and the back wall, which sported faded posters and a series of cables and spotlights older than she was. There was so much work to do in the weeks before her show opened. Too much.