84 Ribbons: A Dancer's Journey

by Paddy Eger

  Her fingers trembled as she unknotted the satin strings and removed a tiny blue velvet box. When she opened the box, light ricocheted off a tennis bracelet of ruby-colored stones and oval diamonds. She gasped.

  “It belonged to my grandmother, a fiftieth anniversary present from my grandfather. I want you to have it, as my promise that I’ll return to be with you.

  ”A promise? She wasn’t ready for a promise. “What if I’m no good as a girlfriend?”

  “You’re a great girlfriend. How can you say that?”

  Tears raced down her face. She closed the box, shook her head, and handed it back to him. “I can’t.”

  “Why not? I thought you cared for me and that we made a good team.”

  “I do. We do. But you hardly know me. Right now I need to focus on my recovery. I don’t have the energy to think about all this.”

  “What does ‘all this’ mean, Marta?”

  “You know.”

  “No, I don’t know. I care about you so much, and now I’m leaving town for months.”

  “You want us to be a couple.”

  “So?”

  “I’m not ready to be a couple. I’ve never dated anyone but you. Besides, I need to focus on myself, and you need to focus on your internship.”

  Steve took back the bracelet, placed it in the tiny box, and tossed it on the front passenger seat. “You confuse me. I thought you’d want a commitment from me.”

  “I care about you, but I don’t need you to make a commitment.”

  “Fine.” Steve sat in stony silence.

  She leaned against the back of the seat and took a deep breath. “Steve? I’m sorry it’s just--”

  He raised his palm, stabbing the air. “Don’t say anything. Please.” He turned off the overhead light, started the car, and backed onto the road.

  Marta felt his verbal slap; her refusal of the bracelet devastated him. Maybe she should have taken the bracelet and worked out her feelings over the time he was away. Why hadn’t she seen something like this coming?

  She kept silent but studied his tight jaw as they passed street lights. His death grip on the steering wheel and his silence continued on block after block through town. She had no idea how to start a conversation. She might as well have been riding with a stranger.

  At the boarding house, Steve lifted her out, carried her inside, and left her sitting in her wheelchair in the front hall. When she reached out to touch his arm, he stepped away.

  “Not now, Marta.”

  He stalked to the front door and slammed it closed behind him.

  Hours and days passed at a snail’s pace. Giselle performances began. Lynne reported the ballet’s success to a tight-jawed Marta. She worked on bodice repairs for the ballet company, all the while replaying her last minutes with Steve. She should have found words to explain herself, but how could she tell him when she couldn’t understand her own reluctance? Now it was too late. An ache deep inside her body told her she missed him more than she had anticipated.

  James and Shorty sensed a change in her mood. They carried the basement record player and records to her bedroom and installed it on a TV tray beside her bed.

  “Is there music you’d like us to get for you?” James asked. “The record shop is on my way home. I can stop in tomorrow.”

  “No, these records are fine, thanks.”

  When they left, she placed the Nutcracker on the turntable. She watched the needle slip into the first groove. The open strains reminded her of the excitement of performing on stage in Billings just weeks earlier. With each new ring of music, she relived her various roles: Mother Ginger, the Waltz of the Flowers, background corps dancing, as well as the understudy roles she’d rehearsed with Lynne and Bartley.

  At meals she picked at her food. Dinner conversations blurred. She looked up when she heard her name, answered, and went back to pushing the food around her plate. After helping with the dishes, she wheeled into her dreary downstairs room and watched the sky turn as black as her mood. The quiet permeated the walls, the furnishings, and the air in the room.

  Lynne’s calls and her attempts to entice Marta to “spill the beans” were ignored. During the day she sat in her wheelchair in the common room and stared at the phone, willing it to ring, willing it to be Steve. Had he already left for San Francisco? She’d told him she couldn’t focus on him and her recovery. Now she could focus on nothing else.

  Over the next week, her costume repair tasks ended and she worked on intricate embellishments for costumes for April’s Serenade. Luckily the stiffness in her left hand disappeared, because adding tiny beads on the bodice made her hands ache almost as much as her iron injections made her derrière ache.

  Every two weeks, the nurse took blood from her arm. Then she stuck a large needle of an iron supplement in Marta’s derrière, smiled, and said, “See you next time.”

  One evening Lynne stopped by for dinner and stayed for conversation. They sat alone in the common room. When the phone rang at a little after nine, Marta jolted and dropped her hand sewing. The caller wanted to speak with Shorty.

  “Boy, are you jumpy!” Lynne said. “You miss Steve, don’t you? Does he know?”

  “I hope so.”

  When the hall phone rang again, she held her breath. Mrs. B. called out, “Marta?”

  A nervous bubble zigzagged through her. “Coming.” She wheeled herself to the hallway phone.

  “That’s my cue to exit stage left,” Lynne said. “Might be Mr. Wonderful. Call me if you return to earth anytime soon.”

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, Marta,” Steve said.

  The next afternoon, Lynne returned and dropped a large box on the floor beside Marta. “You didn’t call. Was it Steve on the phone? If so, did it get steamy or what?”

  “We got things straightened out.”

  “What things? Spill it, Marta. You’ve got a smile glued on your face.”

  “He apologized for going all crazy and not saying good bye. He’s stressed about his dad making plans and not consulting him. When I turned down the bracelet, he said it broke his heart. I apologized and told him I missed him.”

  “And?”

  “He’ll call every evening. I don’t know what I’ll have to talk about, though.”

  “Marta, he just wants to hear your voice. You could probably read him the phone book and he’d be happy.”

  “I hate to admit it, but I miss him. He had a way of making me forget about myself. I could use that now with this cast.” Marta fidgeted and brushed aside her straggly hair. She repositioned the sharp hairpins against her scalp.

  “Told ya. ‘Bout time you got off the dating fence. Now, back to the real world.” Lynne opened the box, revealing a pile of white bodices. “Rose said to copy the design from the old bodice onto the new ones. She needs them in two weeks.”

  “No problem. Sewing keeps my mind from spinning empty circles.”

  “You’re coming to see Giselle before we end, aren’t you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You’re coming. I’ll save you two tickets so you can bring Mrs. B. or someone to help you maneuver through the theatre. You have to see me dance as a Wilis. I love being a ghostly spirit who haunts people and dances on graves.”

  Carol entered and sat on the couch directly across from Marta and Lynne. “Where’s your boyfriend these days? Tired of you and your cooking, I imagine.”

  Marta bit her lip to keep from answering Carol, or better yet, ramming her with the wheelchair.

  Lynne stood, grabbed her purse, and stopped almost on top of Carol’s slippered feet. “See you Marta. Too bad about Steve getting an internship with a prestigious paper in San Francisco. Night, Carol. Too bad you’re going to be an old maid. I’d love to haunt your...”
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  “Lynne!” Marta said. “Call me tomorrow.”

  As the front door closed, Carol squinted her eyes and looked Marta up and down. “I hear San Francisco girls are stylish.”

  Back in her room, Marta stared into her mirror. Carol might be right. Steve could meet a stylish California girl and become infatuated. Who’d stay serious about a teary-eyed girl with a limp? She wondered again if she’d been wrong to refuse the bracelet. He wanted to commit to her. Why couldn’t she accept that and return his commitment?

  She sat in front of the mirror that hung over her sink and stared at her hair. As she dragged a comb through it, she turned her head side to side. Yuck. Her hair hung in scrawny kinks. If she trimmed it, the natural curl would hide its thinness. It might also perk up her evening. She reached for the scissors.

  21

  Snip, snip, snip. Strands of hair dropped away, covering the bottom of her wastebasket. Marta doused her hair in the sink, then towel-dried it as ringlets curled around her face. Kinda short. Oh well, she had time to grow it out before Madame saw it in June.

  A quick ruffle of her hair and a shake of her head and she’d be ready to go. If she looked perky, maybe she’d feel perky. No way could Lynne say she didn’t take chances now.

  When Lynne arrived for dinner the next night, she stared open-mouthed. “What did you do, back into a lawn mower?”

  “I cut my hair.”

  “I can see that. But why super short? You’re nearly bald.”

  “It’s easier with my wheelchair and taking showers and all.”

  “Madame will kill you.”

  “No, by the time she sees me, it will grow out. Besides, no one notices me.”

  “Doubt that, Harpo.” Lynne circled Marta. “Does your hair grow fast?”

  “I don’t know. If it doesn’t, I’ll buy a hairpiece.”

  “Like that will work. So, what’s for dinner? I’m hungry as a bear.”

  “Tonight is chicken and dumplings with mixed vegetables, a salad, and a pudding cake.”

  Lynne yawned. “Just what I need; a hearty meal before I flop into bed.”

  After dinner, Lynne yammered on and on about rehearsals. Marta visualized each dance, wishing she could lift out of the wheelchair to perform a simple series of balancés. Embroidering costumes paid a few bills, but costumes were window dressing and had little to do with the art of dancing. Most dancers would wear black leotards and be content, as long as they could dance.

  “News flash,” Lynne said. “Madame’s threatening to look for replacements before audition season begins. She’s so steamed at you and Bartley that she paces and talks about loyalty and respect and people risking their careers. But you’ll prove her wrong when you come back next season. I’m anxious to watch her eat her words. I’ll bring the ketchup.”

  Bartley began calling Marta and Lynne Sunday afternoons at Marta’s. The girls sat close, sharing one phone, comparing their weeks, and talking ballet.

  “Is Madame still mad about me leaving?” Bartley said.

  Lynne laughed. “Almost never comes up, just every day. Calls you a disloyal, ungrateful girl, but doesn’t mention your name.”

  “Oh, guys, I’m sorry, but only because of you. I loved it here the minute I arrived. The ballet mistress is nothing like Madame. She treats us like Damien does, as human beings. I belong here; so do you.”

  “Don’t worry. Marta and I are fine. Hey, do you really have room for us to come visit?”

  Bartley laughed. “The entire company could move in and there’d still be empty space.”

  “Has Steve called you?” Marta said.

  “He left a message with the butler, but I haven’t seen him yet. I’m sure he’s busy settling in. It will be nice to see a familiar face from Billings.”

  “Too bad you’re not here, Bartley,” Lynne said. “My aunt has a brainy idea. She wants us to give ballet lessons to the little girls in her church’s after school club starting in March. Looks like Marta and I will have to do it without you.”

  “That sounds fun. But where will you meet?” Bartley asked.

  “Wait. Lynne, when were you going to tell me?” Marta said.

  “I just did,” Lynne said. “Tomorrow, I’ll ask Madame about using a small practice room. What could it hurt?”

  The next evening Lynne paced Marta’s bedroom as she relayed her encounter with Madame. “You’d think I’d asked her to pay us more money or make us prima ballerinas next week. I thought she’d have a heart attack. Her face got blotchy, and I thought the mole on her face might burst.” Lynne crossed her arms and lifted her chin. “And, I quote... ‘We can’t let you in and out whenever you feel like dancing or giving lessons.’ I couldn’t think of anything more to say, so I backed out of her office.”

  “Ouch.” Marta wheeled to the window in her bedroom and turned her chair to face Lynne. “I’ve got an idea. And Madame won’t have anything to say about it.”

  Mrs. B. stood by the kitchen sink scraping carrots. Marta watched the easy way she kept the peeler moving down and around each carrot.

  “Having a good day, Marta?”

  “Kinda. I need to ask you something. If you say no I’ll understand.”

  Mrs. B. stopped peeling and turned to face her.

  “Is there any way Lynne and I could use my basement studio space to teach ballet lessons? Lynne’s aunt supports the after school program at her church. She thought ballet lessons would interest some of the girls, but Madame said no to our using a rehearsal room.”

  “I bet she did.” Mrs. B. wiped her hands on her apron. “So, what’s your plan?”

  “The church bus will bring the girls here twice a week at a quarter after four and pick them up at five-thirty. When Lynne has late rehearsals or performances, the lessons will be canceled.”

  Mrs. B. turned back to the sink. Marta watched her pick up another carrot and continue peeling.

  “When would it start?”

  “The first part of March. The girls would be supervised at all times, even going to the bathroom.”

  Mrs. B. turned to Marta with a grin. “Sounds good to me. The girls may use my private bathroom. But I have two questions: will they need a snack, and do you and Lynne get paid?”

  “The girls will have a snack before they arrive, and Mrs. Meadows said we’d get a small stipend. We could share it with you.”

  “No, no, dear. I wanted to be certain you two women were paid for your time and your skills. And seeing a happy face on you will be wonderful.”

  “It will be fun. Thanks, Mrs. B.”

  Marta wheeled plates and silverware to the dining area. Carol sat by the bay window with a book in her lap. Seeing her brought up one last question. On her return to the kitchen, Marta approached Mrs. B. “What about the boarders?”

  Mrs. B. smiled. “I’ll handle Carol.”

  Marta called Lynne from the downstairs phone as soon as Carol headed up the stairs. “Mrs. B. sounds as excited as we are.”

  “Good,” Lynne said. “Let’s plan it out tomorrow.”

  The following evening, Lynne joined the boarders for dinner. Marta caught Carol eyeing Lynne at regular intervals. It didn’t appear that Carol knew about the arrangement yet.

  After dinner, Lynne and Marta disappeared into Marta’s room and closed the door. Lynne lounged on the bed while Marta sat in the wheelchair with a tablet on her lap. “How shall we start?”

  “Like we do, with barre exercises,” Lynne said. “They’ll need to wear shorts and undershirts so we can see their bodies until they get leotards. I’d hate for them to start bad habits. My aunt will buy what we need. I’ll have her pick up rug samples for them to sit on, plus scarves and beach balls for movement activities.”

  “I’ll make totes,” Marta said. “We can ask the c
hurch auxiliary to purchase ballet slippers once we know if the girls are interested.”

  While Lynne continued to throw out ideas, Marta absentmindedly opened a box beside her nightstand and took out a pair of scissors and four old pointe shoes. She cut off the ribbons and rolled them up.

  “More ribbons?”

  “I just found these in a bag in my closet. They may be the last ribbons I’ll ever have.”

  “Come on, Marta. Don’t talk like that. If you don’t believe you’ll recover, who will?”

  Lynne had a good point. She needed to stay positive. She closed the box and shoved it under the bed.

  At nine-thirty Lynne stretched and grabbed her coat. “We have enough to get started. Let’s decide records later. I doubt the girls will appreciate Shorty’s Overture of 1812. This may be the kick in the derrière you need. I’m tired of coming over to find you all gloomy about dancing and Steve and Bartley and getting fat.”

  “By then I’ll be out of this cast, so getting to the basement will be easier.”

  Lynne put her hand on the doorknob. “If it weren’t for you and Mrs. B., we couldn’t do this.” Lynne bowed. “Thank you, Miss Selbryth.”

  As Lynne turned the knob, footsteps scuttled away. She closed the door and stepped close to Marta. “We have a spy in the hall. Let’s make up an outlandish idea to entertain snoopy Miss Carol.”

  “Naw. She’s not worth the time and energy.”

  Excitement over working with the girls raced through Marta. The next morning, after Friday’s breakfast dishes were done, Marta placed an early call to Bartley, trying to catch her before she left for practice. The phone rang and rang.

  “Hello?” A man answered.

  Marta didn’t speak.

  “Hello?”

  She set the phone back in its cradle. Her spirit sank into the floor. Steve answered the phone. He must have been there all night.