SeduceMe(46)
This seemed to strike a sour note with Drake, as he scowled. “It was just a dress, Shana. How could you have let something like that make you feel inferior?”
She lifted her hands in the air. “If you’d ever been a fourteen-year-old girl who wasn’t a size two, you’d understand.”
He had to concede that point. “I have no delusions about the pressures your society and species places on girls and women to look a certain way. It’s all over the Internet. But it’s also something you denounce on your website. You take the stance that everyone has to find their own way and be true to themselves. Why can’t you take your own advice?”
She let out a long breath as her hands dropped to her sides. Deflated, she said, “I don’t know. Maybe it’s because it was engrained on my brain that I was different. I was constantly reminded of it when designers created the gowns the women performed in or when we were all photographed together or when we sat in front of thousands of people and I looked at the semi-circle of other female violinists and saw how small and feminine they looked. They all sort of blended together. And then there was me.”
He seemed to consider this, taking her self-consciousness seriously. Finally, he asked, “So about the dress?”
“I bought it, of course. My own gift to myself. Though…” Her brow furrowed. “I’d always considered it was the sincerest gift I’d ever received—even though I’d been the one to buy it—but in hindsight, it was the most insulting one.”
“How so?”
“I took it with me everywhere. I’d hang it in plain view in my hotel suites, and every time I passed by it, I’d touch the satin skirt or a lace sleeve. I had room butlers steam it as soon as it was unpacked or if I saw the tiniest wrinkle. And sometimes, I’d try it on. Of course, I could never get the buttons to fasten at my hips. They’d hook at my waist, because it was small enough. But my hips and breasts… Not a chance.”
“Good Lord.” He raked a hand through his hair. “Those hips and breasts are the stuff fantasies are made of.”
She smiled up at him. “Thank you.” She never would have believed his words had it not been for last night. “But dresses like that one were made for women with zero curves and no boobs. So it would never fit me, no matter what I did. Yet I hadn’t quite accepted that reality when I was fourteen.”
He groaned.
“Yeah, I know. But again, it all comes down to being thrust into a limelight I never wanted to stand in, and all the attention created a lot of anxiety. So much so, one night before a performance, I fainted. Collapsed backstage.”
She hated to tell him this part of the story. It was painful, yes. But as she thought of it, she could see how detrimental she’d been to herself.
She said, “They rushed me to the hospital and hooked me up to an IV. I realized I hadn’t eaten much in weeks, and even less over the past few days. When a nurse told me they were feeding me intravenously, I got hysterical. I ripped the IV out of my arm and tried to leave the hospital. They had to restrain me.”
Drake’s fingers smoothed back strands of hair from her face. “Shana. You are so beautiful.”
“You make me feel that way,” she told him without thinking twice about it. “I’ve struggled with this for so long, but last night… Everything changed. I just didn’t know how to let go of all that baggage. I’ve carried it for so long, it became a huge part of who I was. Even leaving music behind and changing my name couldn’t cure me of how out of place I’ve always felt. I purposely Americanized myself when I turned eighteen. I never felt comfortable with European culture and I had no experience with my own heritage. I moved to New York and tried to fit in with the rest of the eclectic group that populates this city.”
“Didn’t work either, though, did it?”
Shaking her head, she said, “No. I just keep denying who I am, and that’s no one’s fault but my own. I thought I could be happy as just another face in the Manhattan crowd and hide behind my computer. But that’s not really living, is it?”
His brow furrowed. “What is it that you want?”
“To salsa dance,” she told him.
He let out an unchecked laugh, clearly taken aback. “I don’t think I understand.”
“I’ve never done it. I don’t speak a word of Spanish. I’ve never been to Mexico. I can’t even recall ever eating a taco, because I was terrified of the calorie count. But mostly… I never got the chance to know my own culture because I was thrust into someone else’s and I believed I had to fit into it. I didn’t want to be different. But the fact is, I am. I’m not French or Swedish or Italian. I’m Hispanic. I should know something about my own culture, don’t you think?”