Change Partners (The L.A. Stories)

by Alexandra Caluen

  “Ugh.” She waved her hand, like ‘don’t ask.’

  “Do you still wish to open your own?” He thought she might not, now that she was involved with someone. Someone who was probably not in a position to find work in a place like Visalia.

  “I’m not sure. Not yet, anyway.”

  “Have you ever run a studio?”

  “Not yet. My degree is in business, though.”

  That was encouraging. “Do you wish to stay in the Valley?”

  “Not particularly.”

  “Would you move to West Hollywood if you had job here?”

  “I could. Um. What are you getting at?”

  “I propose you come to manage this studio.”

  Elena was stunned. “Really?!”

  “I have discussed with Michelle and Patrick. Thursday through Monday. Eleven to seven Thursday, Friday, and Monday; nine to five Saturday and Sunday. Here is the class schedule.” He handed her a neatly printed calendar showing the regular group classes.

  “What’s ‘PWYC’?”

  “Pay what you can. Is community time, Sunday morning.”

  “Restorative yoga, tone and tune, cardio Latin. Who leads the evening classes?”

  “I do, when we are in town. My colleague Julia when we are not.”

  “How many instructors use the space?”

  “Many. The scheduling is nightmare.” He looked gloomy.

  Elena stifled a laugh; she couldn’t tell if he meant that to be funny. “Can I think about it for a couple of days?”

  “Of course.” He handed her another sheet of paper. Elena scanned it to see a list of the studio’s rates for practice time, floor fees charged to outside instructors, fees for group classes, Dmitri and Julia’s hourly rates for private lessons, wedding packages, competition packages, and more. At the very bottom Dmitri had handwritten a salary and benefits offer.

  “Wow. Dmitri … thank you.” She studied his face, which was politely neutral as usual. This had to have been his idea. Michelle barely knew her, and what Patrick knew about her had to be mostly bad. “This means a lot to me. I feel so blessed, that you would even make this offer, after everything.”

  “Elena.” His voice softened. “I see you at Emerald Ball. I see how hard you work, how well you do. How happy your students are. Michelle and I have other projects, we need time.”

  “Could I still do some teaching?”

  “If you wish, on your off days or evenings.”

  “I’ll call you by Tuesday night.”

  “Is good. Now, I hear Vanessa. Let us go.”

  Elena accepted the offer two days later. Dmitri told her that Vince and Kelli, who lived within walking distance of the studio, knew of a vacant unit in their building. By the end of the month, all the necessary changes were accomplished. That opened up time for Dmitri and Patrick to accomplish a necessary change of their own.

  June 2013

  Dmitri listened with a combination of emotions (dominated by amusement) to Patrick on the phone with his niece. “Ruzanna, I appreciate that, but no. You cannot tell anyone. The ones who would want to be there will all be mad that we’re doing this without them, and the ones who wish I wasn’t gay will immediately start discussing, with the entire family, whether this is a good idea. No, honey. We may be used to it but it’s still not fun. Besides, none of Dmitri’s family can be here. Well sure. But that’s exactly why we’re doing it out of state. Dmitri’s right in the middle of this campaign with Michelle and he does not have time for a big-ass party. If we told all our friends here in L.A.? Oh my God. Ridiculous. No, we can’t do that. We’ll have a party later.” Patrick tried to keep the doubtful note out of his voice. He didn’t know if they would ever have time for a big-ass party. Four days in Washington State (counting travel) was a stretch, and they only had a license, a celebrant, and two witnesses to wrangle. “Uh-uh. Nope. Doing it in San Francisco would be just as much trouble as doing it in Washington. If we have to go out of town, which is no longer the question,” he let his tone sharpen a little, because much as he loved his niece he needed to remind her that they’d been thinking about this shit for a while now, like a decade, “then we’re going someplace where it’ll be a mini-vacation, not a pain in the ass. San Francisco is always a pain in the ass. Yes. Thanks honey. Well, that’s why I’m telling you, and what? You want to come?” He made eye contact with Dmitri. “Uh, a couple of friends of his from Seattle. Really?” He listened, holding that eye contact, seeing in his partner’s expression that Ruzanna would be welcome at their wedding. “Okay. Yes. Thanks. I’ll send you the hotel information. Absolute silence, honey. You can tell everyone after the fact. I love you too.” He disconnected. “Well, I guess you got the gist of that.”

  “Is good. Without Ruzanna,” Dmitri didn’t finish the sentence: we might never have met. They saw her from time to time, most often at Sarkisian family events (Patrick always called these ‘convocations of the Armenian mafia’) but occasionally at the dance studio. She was apt to give her uncle a little snark about the night they met, and the front he put up about being interested in ballroom. But she, like the rest of Patrick’s brother’s family, had always been sincerely supportive of their relationship. It was right that she should be there. He was glad she was willing.

  Patrick saw all that, interpreting the expression and the gesture and the silence as usual. “You notice I didn’t ask her how she proposed to get the time off.” He blew out a breath. “Well, that’s that. The flight is booked, the hotel is booked, we’ll do our license application this weekend, and wow.”

  It wasn’t a word Dmitri used, but it was apt. After ten years together as friends, lovers, and partners, to finally be married: it was hard to imagine. Impossible to verbalize how he felt about it. He resorted to an embrace, holding Patrick tight.

  Nobody expected Dmitri to talk about personal things at the studio, but people still asked. You’re away for four whole days? Michelle’s staying here? Is everything okay? Anything we can do? And, subtextually, what’s going on?! A few of them might have suspected. The blossoming of marriage equality over the past few years had been a major topic of discussion in West Hollywood. Some of their gay friends had gone to San Francisco five years previously, when Mayor Newsom started allowing same-sex marriage licenses. Then all those people had to suffer through Prop 8, and the years till they knew whether it would be upheld. There was a moment when Dmitri and Patrick thought, maybe. But the fear of having it taken away held them back. Now, knowing it was finally and truly legal in California, there was no more reason to wait.

  They flew in to Seattle early in the day, dropped off their bags at their downtown hotel, then went to City Hall to finalize the license. The two-hour wait was excruciating. Having the documentation in hand was not enough to get them past the fear that something would go wrong. Dmitri’s green card, their birth certificates (Dmitri’s with its certified English translation), their passports. As they stood at the window watching the clerk review everything, they were holding hands so tightly it almost hurt. But then she looked up with a smile, and a few minutes later it was done. They both thanked her, stepped away to tuck that precious document into the leather case with all the others, and went out into the hall. “Oh God.” Patrick sucked in a breath, biting down hard on the inside of his lip, trying not to cry. Dmitri pulled him into an embrace, leaning against the wall, cheek against his hair. Neither of them was breathing right. Neither of them could have said another word just then, and it was several minutes before they were sufficiently composed to walk out.

  After officially checking in, they spent the rest of the afternoon confirming the ferry schedule, their ceremony details, their witnesses, and the celebrant. Ruzanna arrived that evening. She wanted to know about the whole City Hall procedure. By then Patrick had indulged in a good cry, they’d both indulged in fifteen minutes simply lying down together and holding each other, and he was able to be funny about it. Dmitri, as usual, was quiet. Occasionally he contributed something, b
ecause while Ruzanna knew him well enough to know his reticence wasn’t meant to create distance, Patrick needed him to participate. This day, and the next, would be days they both wanted to remember with joy.

  Early the next morning they were up, shaved, groomed and dressed. Not in the tail coats this time; those seemed excessive for an outdoor wedding. Kenji dressed them again, though, this time in matching tailored plaid jackets, with a pastel pattern on gray. Those were worn over ordinary white button-down shirts, blue jeans and loafers. They met Dmitri’s friends Lorenzo and Marta at the car-ferry terminal. The day promised to be warm and sunny. It could have been pouring rain and they wouldn’t have cared.

  Ruzanna told everyone they encountered on the ferry about the wedding. At first it was embarrassing, and slightly nerve-wracking. It almost seemed that she was daring anyone to say anything objectionable. But everyone congratulated them; there were handshakes and best wishes, and even some pictures. Upon docking at Whidbey Island, they all got into Lorenzo’s car for the short drive to the Chocolate Flower Farm, where they were meeting their celebrant. Ruzanna had questions about that too. “You couldn’t have a priest, could you,” she said regretfully. Neither the Armenian Apostolic nor the Russian Orthodox church solemnized same-sex marriages.

  Patrick shook his head. “Our minister in WeHo reached out and found a colleague in the Unitarian Universalist church who’s doing the ceremony for us.”

  “Did you write your own vows?”

  “Uh, no.” Patrick glanced at Dmitri. “This person sent the proposed text and we thought it was fine. Why, are you going to write your own?”

  “If I ever get married, you’d better believe it. The regular ones are so medieval.”

  Dmitri was now clearly suppressing a laugh. Maybe he was mentally hearing the same movie line Patrick was. Neither of them made any reference to getting medieval on anybody’s ass. Instead Patrick changed the subject. “The celebrant is the one who turned us on to this location. She said, you’ve never seen anything like it. And then she wanted to know if we had a favorite flower, and did we have a garden at home, and honestly I suspect she might be a hippie.” Lorenzo and Marta both laughed.

  Ruzanna said, “Well, you do have a garden.”

  “Only because we have a gardener. Oh, here we are. Oh my God she totally is a hippie.” He was delighted. The person who had to be the celebrant was standing there in a long dark-green robe that might have been hand-woven. Draped over her shoulders was a flat stole that was definitely tie-dyed in shades of lighter green and blue. It looked like an elongated view of planet Earth. Underneath the robe she wore jeans, a white tunic, and hiking boots. Her hair was curly, mostly gray, and piled on her head. She waved the car in, pointing to a parking place, holding a book in the crook of her other arm.

  Lorenzo parked the car. “Anybody want the bathroom?” Nobody did. They’d all used the facilities on the ferry. Dmitri took Patrick’s hand and squeezed. Both of them were choked up. Neither of them spoke as they got out of the car.

  Ruzanna had appointed herself Document Manager. She went to greet the celebrant, and then introduced everybody. “Reverend Barr, this is my uncle Patrick, and this is Dmitri. These are their friends Lorenzo and Marta Santini. When do you need the license?” There was a brief conversation about that. Then the celebrant led the way to a white-painted iron gazebo. The path was surrounded with banks of flowers in colors from white and pink to purple and brown. The place was humming with bees. A cottontail rabbit shot across the path ten feet from the gazebo. The structure was covered with a vine. Its flowers were a warm brown so dark they were nearly black. The scent of chocolate hung in the air.

  “Well, honey,” Patrick said quietly, “this couldn’t be much more beautiful, could it?”

  Dmitri was holding his hand. He squeezed it again. “Is perfect.”

  They arranged themselves under the gazebo. Ruzanna stood off to the side. She’d also appointed herself event videographer, and had her digital camera out as soon as they started crossing the garden. Patrick and Dmitri forgot all about her after the first few minutes. The ceremony wasn’t long. Lorenzo and Marta each did a brief reading. Then it was time for the vows, and the exchange of rings. Plain gold bands, weighted with so much history and significance that they were both blinking back tears.

  Then the celebrant said, “Now seal these vows with a kiss,” and Patrick completely lost it. To kiss in public was still, after all these years, not their usual. To kiss in front of ballroom colleagues like Lorenzo and Marta, colleagues from outside the little sheltered world of Shall We Dance: unprecedented. It was brief, because Patrick had to hide his face against Dmitri’s neck.

  Dmitri stroked back Patrick’s hair, pressed a kiss to his temple, said “My dear love” very softly. Then Lorenzo, Marta, and Ruzanna were all hugging them. Patrick was sniffing, laughing, wiping his face. Dmitri saw his look of radiant happiness and had to turn away for a moment. Tipping his head back, breathing through his mouth to ease the tightness in his throat. My husband, he thought.

  After a few minutes they were able to thank Reverend Barr, shake her hand, and (with Ruzanna) confirm that she had what she needed to complete the paperwork. She congratulated them and went away. Ruzanna told them to walk around the garden so she could take some pictures. It was nearly an hour before they finally piled into the car again.

  They found a café in Langley for lunch. Then the five of them split up to stroll around, because it was a beautiful day. There were flowers everywhere. The air was clean, the breeze was fresh, there were big animals moving through the water offshore. Patrick and Dmitri stood on a dock at the harbor and let themselves settle. Leaning on the railing, side by side. “We are married,” Patrick said after a while. “Can you believe it?”

  Dmitri turned his head. “Almost no,” he admitted. “Ten years!”

  “I’m so glad you stuck with me.” A hint of a smile.

  Dmitri turned ninety degrees, dug his hand into Patrick’s hair, and leaned in for another kiss. “There is no one else. Not since the day we met. Only you.” Patrick’s eyes filled again, and they were hugging again. In this moment Dmitri almost resented the fact that they had to go back to Los Angeles. That the minute they were home, he had to go back to work with Michelle. But he couldn’t afford more time off. They needed to win the championship this year, if ever. He couldn’t have done any of it without Patrick. One day, he vowed silently, I will be only yours.

  They were back at the ferry in good time. Lorenzo and Marta left them on the Seattle side, with more hugs and promises to see each other at one or the other future ballroom event. Dmitri and Patrick returned to the hotel with Ruzanna. She was flying home in the morning. They would have the entire next day alone together to savor being newlyweds. And then it would be back to their routine.

  Patrick knew it was necessary. He understood how essential this championship was. The studio business was solid now, but it would never get easier until Dmitri had that title. So he would make the most of the next thirty-six hours. He’d made dinner reservations for the following night at the restaurant atop the Space Needle. Tonight they had dinner with Ruzanna in the hotel bar. Sensible salads followed by exceptional clam chowder with hot fresh bread and butter, washed down with dry local Riesling. Then his niece said something about watching a movie in her room, kissed them both, and went away. Patrick looked at Dmitri. “It’s awfully nice in here with the fireplace. But I would like to go upstairs and make love to my husband.”

  Dmitri nodded, smiling. “Yes.”

  They both thought, later, that it made no sense for this to feel different. And yet it did. After ten years in love, eight cohabiting, and seven as registered partners, why this one day and that one piece of paper (now in the hands of Reverend Barr, and soon to be back in theirs with a dozen certified copies) made them feel like different people was a mystery. If anyone had asked Dmitri how he planned to make love to Patrick on their wedding day, he would have said (assuming he answ
ered at all) ‘I will take him like I’ve come home from battle.’ If anyone had asked Patrick, he would have said, ‘I will seduce him like the Whore of Babylon.’

  Instead they lay naked on the king-sized bed, kissing and caressing and murmuring soft words that at least one of them might have blushed at on any other day. Promises and reminiscences, nothing at all practical. Both of them were apt to be far too practical about their daily life. Too cognizant of their commitments, their compromises, and the limitations of time. This evening they had nothing to do but love each other. They spent an hour on it. Not even trying to climax, though they both eventually did. When they finally slept, it was in a tangle of sweaty, exhausted satisfaction worthy of men half their age.

  Chapter 7

  August 2013

  They made no announcements. It took nearly two weeks for the news to filter through their community. Dmitri’s colleague Julia might have noticed earlier if she hadn’t been distracted by her new boyfriend. Michelle might have noticed earlier if she hadn’t been distracted by a negotiation with Kenji about her schedule through the end of the year. Dmitri’s friend Andy noticed when he came in for an Argentine tango lesson. He didn’t say anything until the end of it, and then he tipped his head toward the office. “Got a minute?”

  Dmitri was thinking of other things. He’d ceased to notice the ring after a few days; it felt like part of him now. So he assumed that Andy had a question about this round of lessons, or perhaps that he was going to tell Dmitri why he was taking them at all, and why with that TV actor. Instead he closed the door behind them, took Dmitri’s left hand in his right, lifted it to eye level, and said, “When.”

  Dmitri blinked. He was sufficiently surprised that he couldn’t think of anything to say for a few seconds. Finally he managed, “End of last month.”

  “And why the fuck didn’t you tell anybody? Meaning me?”

  Now Dmitri almost laughed at the expression of incredulous outrage Andy was putting on. “Was too difficult to make a plan.”