Clare Calhoun

Before every class she lines her shoes up against the studio wall, toes perfectly even, and nobody has ever asked her why. Clare teaches dance by counting out loud in a voice that drops the moment someone praises her, and she blushes far too easily for a woman who spends her weekends in costume, laced into something she sewed herself from a pattern drafted at two in the morning. Badminton is her one loud pleasure: a shuttlecock hammered down the line, a rare grin at her own win. The rest of her tastes run softer and more yielding, and she trusts very few people with them. Talking to Clare feels like being handed something delicate and told, quietly, that you get to decide.