‘Stephanie—I think you use me once and throw me away?’
She looked over at the bed. He was smiling. She shut her tote bag and set it down softly. She went and sat on the bed. They kissed.
‘Stay, yes?’
‘I’ll phone Chris and say I’m at my mother’s.’
His finger traced out her eyebrows and the line of her nose. ‘You’re beautiful liar. Dangerous.’
‘You’re a beautiful everything. That’s even more dangerous.’
In the morning Sasha made coffee—French, not Turkish.
He said he loved her. She was the one woman he’d ever met who was his friend, who wasn’t pursuing him for celebrity or sex, who understood him. He was tired of playing around: he wanted someone that he could....
‘How do you say fidéle?’
‘Faithful?’ Steph guessed. She was wearing his bathrobe.
‘Someone I can be faithful to. Can it be you, Stephanie?’
She wanted to believe him. She wanted them to be lovers. She weighed obstacles: girls in the corps who loved to gossip about Sasha; Chris, with her crush on him; Mr Volmar, who was known to dislike him.
‘It has to be secret,’ she said.
‘Secret?’ He scowled.
‘No one can know but you and me.’
He stared a moment and then burst out laughing and hugged her. ‘Stephanie, it is perfect! You are perfect!’
For Steph everything happened all at once and beautifully. Sasha gave her his key. They became secret lovers. She planned her time so not a moment was wasted. There was work and there was Sasha. Nothing else.
She had never been happier and she had never danced better. She began getting nice small mentions in reviews. She barely glanced at them. She couldn’t wait to dash from the theatre into a taxi to West Seventy-eighth Street. All she wanted was to be with him.
Two or three times a week—some lucky weeks four—they met afternoons, between rehearsal and performance. There were beautiful sunny days when they shut out the sun and lay in bed. There were beautiful stormy days when they lay in bed and listened to the rain. If she could think of a plausible excuse for Chris, they met at night, and nights were loveliest.
In rehearsal they made miracles.
At the end of Sleeping Beauty Act Three pas de deux Steph had a dizzying rush of turns on pointe. It climaxed in a pas de poisson, a headlong suicide fish dive toward the floor broken at the very last moment when the prince caught her. The first time she and Sasha rehearsed it the other dancers applauded.
Even Volmar looked astonished.
After that, whenever Steph and Sasha were scheduled together, dancers crowded into the rehearsal to watch that final catch. There was an understanding between their bodies that she had never known with another dancer. Giddy with the certainty of him, she took risks she never before had dared. And when he caught her or lifted her or crushed her against him she almost cried out in happiness.
She wondered if anyone in the company suspected. Especially Volmar, whose eyes watched everything and gave away nothing.
Marius Volmar kept close watch on his four leads: the two he wanted and the two he must pretend to want. He rehearsed all four together, careful to pair them in all combinations. He distributed praise and blame so as to suggest a mind still open.
‘Wally, you’re going to marry Stephanie, you love her—now can you put a bit more gallantry into those lifts? And let your hand linger on her waist when you bring her down—as though you were sorry to let go.’
‘How many beats?’ Wally asked.
Volmar smothered an exasperated sigh. ‘It’s not a question of beats, it’s a feeling you must project. Your feet have the beats, your hands are free to express.’
‘It’s easier if I know the count.’
Which was the reason, Volmar was tempted to say, that very few gay men became danseurs nobles. Luckily, Wally Collins had Marius Volmar to guide his career.
Sasha, of course, had no trouble letting his hands linger on the girls’ waists, and he didn’t need to be told to extend his thumb. But he had trouble partnering Christine. And that bothered Volmar since he intended to team Christine and Sasha as covers.
Volmar watched them carefully. At first he could not tell where the fault lay. And then it came to him that the problem was Sasha. Not his dancing, but some psychological effect he seemed to have on the girl.
In solo variations, Christine responded intuitively to tone colours and harmonic shadings. She danced with her entire body, from eyebrows to fingertips to toes.
But when Sasha partnered her the musicality vanished. The line became hard, staccato. There was no link from one step to the next. She rushed her lifts, touching down early. She was cringing from Sasha’s touch.
Volmar clapped the piano to a stop. ‘Christine, my dear, what on earth is the matter?’
The girl stood breathing rapidly. Her face was pale with a fever brightness in the eyes and it occurred to Volmar that she might be taking some sort of amphetamine.
‘You’re hurrying everything,’ Volmar said. ‘You jump two feet in the air before Sasha can even lift you. This is a grand adage—lyrical. Pas de deux. You’re in love. Can we take it again from the entrechats volés? And!’
The piano began again. Christine did her first entrechat, then stopped almost in mid-air. ‘I can’t.’
‘What did you say, Christine?’ Volmar asked mildly.
She kept her eyelids clenched, pressing back tears. ‘I can’t do it.’
‘But you’ve done it before, my dear, and you will do it now. Come.’ He snapped a finger in the air, gave the beat. ‘And!’
Another envelope came from Lenox Hill Hospital.
Even before she opened it, Steph knew what it was. Her heart dropped three storeys. What am I going to do about Chris?
She telephoned Ray Lockwood. At first he tried to refuse. ‘It’s not my business,’ he said.
‘You’re still a friend, Ray—aren’t you?’
‘So are you.’
‘I’ve been through it with her a dozen times and she won’t listen to me. You’re a man. You’re a lawyer. You can reason with her.’
‘So can her parents.’
‘It has to be face to face and it has to be now. Ray, it’s been months since she’s had a checkup.’
There was a silence and Ray said, ‘When do you want me to come over?’
‘She’s always home around five.’
Steph let Ray into the apartment. ‘She doesn’t know you’re coming. She’s in the kitchen.’
Ray crossed to the sofa. He was about to sit when Chris appeared in the doorway. She stood there a moment looking at him. His heart gave a bang like a backfire and he forced his eyes to meet hers.
What he saw shocked him. My God, he thought—she’s dying.
‘How are you, Ray?’
‘Fine. And you?’
She came into the room, white and tired and carrying a coffee cup. She sat down, saying, ‘I’m working ... working hard.’
He’d thought about seeing Chris again and he’d thought that after all this time he’d be able to handle it. Now he wasn’t sure. His voice felt strange in his throat, as though it belonged to someone else.
‘You don’t want to work too hard,’ he said. ‘You don’t want to seal yourself off. I did that, studying for exams. I lost twelve pounds in a month.’
Why is he here? Chris wondered. Why is he lecturing me? She sensed the same false jauntiness she had felt in him the last time and it put her on guard.
‘You’ve lost weight too, Chris.’
‘Maybe a little,’ she admitted.
Ray leaned forward to toy with the ash tray on the coffee table. He glanced up at Chris as casually as he could manage. She seemed tiny in her chair—tiny and nervous and terribly breakable. He had an impulse to gather her up in his arms and cradle all her tiny nervous vulnerabilities.
Instead he made himself bully her. For her good, he told himself. For her. ‘You
don’t look well at all, Chris.’
‘I’m a little tired, that’s all.’ She shifted impatiently. ‘Do we have to talk about people’s health?’
‘Don’t you think we ought to talk about yours?’
‘I’ve got doctors for that. Let’s talk about something pleasant. Are you married yet?’
There was an odd look in her eyes and he couldn’t tell how she meant the remark.
‘You know I’m not.’
‘No,’ she said quietly. ‘I didn’t know.’
‘Chris.’ He took her hand. ‘What the hell’s the matter?’
He could feel her wanting to withdraw but the chair walled her in. She yanked her hand free.
‘Why did you come here, Ray? To pick on me? Just stop it.’
‘He came because I asked him to,’ Steph said.
Chris whirled to stare at her. ‘Why?’
‘Because she’s your friend,’ Ray said. ‘Because you’re run down, you’ve lost weight, there are circles like moon craters under your eyes.’ There ought to be police, he thought, to keep dancers from killing themselves. ‘You can’t even hold that cup steady.’
She held it steady, defying him.
‘You shouldn’t have to clench and struggle to go through the normal, everyday acts of living. Face it, Chris. Something is eating at your health. Don’t you see the change in yourself? Don’t you feel it?’
She leaned back and closed her eyes wearily. ‘I’ve had a very hard season.’
‘There’s something else.’
‘I’ve been working hard. I’ve lost a little weight. I’ll gain it back after the season.’
‘How many pounds, Chris?’
‘Two or three.’
‘Ten or twelve,’ Steph said.
Ray decided to wade right in. ‘Chris—why the hell have you stopped going for your checkups?’
She spun and her hair whipped out straight behind her. ‘That’s none of your goddamned business!’ And then, abruptly calm, ‘I’ve had to shift my schedule around, that’s all.’
‘You haven’t gone for six months,’ Steph said.
Chris jumped to her feet, shaking. ‘I’m busy! I can’t spend Wednesday mornings shuffling around labs! I have class! I have a life!’
‘You have a body too,’ Ray said,’ and you’d better start paying some attention to it.’
‘It has nothing to do with my body and it has nothing to do with checkups!’
‘Then what is it, Chris?’ Steph said quietly.
‘Will you stop interfering, both of you! You don’t understand and you never will!’
‘Understand what?’ Steph said.
Chris’s lips drew apart in a sudden scream. ‘All right. It’s Sasha!’
Shock hit Steph in a slap. She did her best to mask it.
‘What about him?’
‘I love him.’ Chris collapsed back into her chair.
‘Oh, Chris,’ Steph said. ‘Still?’
‘Yes, still—and why not?’
‘But it takes two people—to love,’ Steph said gently. ‘You want someone who can love you back.’
‘He can love me back.’
Why am I forcing myself to hear this? Ray wondered. It’s over and done, I’ve had enough pain. Let her love who she wants.
‘Chris,’ Steph said, ‘you’re just—wishing.’
‘And I’m going to keep on wishing and please just stop meddling!’
‘We only want you to be well.’
‘I love him and I’m not a machine and I can’t turn myself on and off—like some of you!’ Chris stood and swerved, almost crashing into the standing lamp, and then she tore from the living room.
An instant later the front door slammed and Steph stared at Ray, biting her lip.
Ray steepled his fingers together. His voice was thoughtful, with a lawyerly sort of worldliness. ‘I suppose love happens to a lot of people and it wrecks a lot of them.’
‘She’s not in love. She’s a child and she’s heard about love and she’s making things up. Sasha would never have encouraged her.’
‘Are you sure?’
His eyes cross-examined her. She felt, after dragging him into this, she owed him some particle of truth.
‘A friend of mine—knows him very well. In fact they’re having an affair.’ What an awful word for love, she thought. It tasted ugly in her mouth. ‘There’s just no way Chris could be telling the truth.’
‘Maybe Sasha is two-timing your friend.’
‘I live with Chris. I know her schedule. She dances—and she sleeps. Here. Alone.’
‘In that case, Chris had better get help. Or a lover.’ Ray sighed and heaved himself to his feet.
‘You’re not walking out, are you, Ray? Now?’
‘Walking out?’ Do I have the face of a saint, he wondered, or a martyr? What in the world do people take me for? ‘There’s nothing to walk out on. She doesn’t want me. She never has.’
"But she needs you.’
Something soothing and vast washed over him. It was the calm of surrender. Finally he admitted to himself he was not a repairman or a nanny. He had done what he could and it had not been enough and now he had his own life to tend to.
‘She needs you and her family and a doctor,’ he said. ‘Not me.’
He kissed Steph light on the cheek.
‘I can’t care any more, Steph. I tried, but I can’t go on caring. I’m sorry.’
And then he was gone and Steph sat alone, realizing nothing had been solved.
Tomorrow, Steph thought, if I have to chloroform Chris and drag her to Lenox Hill in a mailbag,I’ll get her to that hospital tomorrow.
But tomorrow came and, with it, the explosion that changed everything.
It happened at rehearsal.
The pianist banged into the adagio three beats before Chris’s cue.
She froze. She could not will her feet to move. She felt Volmar watching. His eyes were grave and they were waiting to see what she was made of. Now was the moment to swallow back tears and torture and prove she was a dancer. Her eyes were burning and the blood was thumping in her cheeks. She struggled. She lost.
‘I can’t dance with Sasha!’
Something changed in Volmar’s expression: there was an infinitesimal realignment. ‘But you must. That’s your job.’
She could only stand, hands limp at her sides, and whisper, ‘I’m sorry.’
She sensed the other dancers holding their breath. Volmar came to her. A hand rested on her shoulder. A voice soothed.
‘I’ll tell you something, Christine. What you are feeling—now—will help your dancing. Use it. Go. Move.’ He gave her a tiny push.
She felt desperate and trapped. She looked at Sasha in his dark green T-shirt and tights. She imagined those broad shoulders supporting her and the curling dark hair pressed into her face with its familiar faint smell of sweat. He was waiting with the godlike patience of a statue. Instinct or accident had guided him into a spotlight. His smile was a beacon. It beckoned.
Her body screamed refusal. She exploded in tears and ran from the stage.
Volmar sighed. Then, with heavy irony: ‘Sasha, I think you have influence on Christine?’
Obediently, Sasha went and stood in front of Chris in the wings. She was backed against a carpenter’s ladder and her eyes would not meet his.
‘Christine—come.’ He took her hand.
She jerked away.
‘They are waiting,’ he said.
‘And how long do you think I’ve been waiting?’ The cry was torn out of her and there was something young and shrill about it, like the yelping of a puppy, that made her even more ashamed of herself.
‘Christine, we must be professional.’
She saw the other dancers hovering near. Their eyes were level with hers, curious but encouraging too. They meant to give support, but she knew she was not one of them.
‘I still love him,’ she heard herself sob.
Silence swept the stage
and beat deafeningly on her ears. She collapsed whimpering on the ladder. There was nothing left now, neither hope nor pride.
‘I still love Sasha but he’s dropped me for someone else!’
Steph stood at the edge of the circle of dancers. The shock came so swiftly that for an instant she couldn’t react. Her eyes took in Chris, brittle and broken like a stick-candy doll, and Sasha, stiff and barricaded in his cool lack of denial.
She moved through the dancers and faced him.
‘Sasha—is it true?’
His gaze fixed Chris with undisguised contempt.
‘Answer me, Sasha,’ Steph said.
His face was sullen. He shrugged. ‘So what?’
There was a deathly silence in the wings. Tears were running down Chris’s face. For an instant Steph and Chris and Sasha were alone, cut off from those around them, three solitary people waiting for something to explode or die or vanish.
Anger and disappointment swelled within Steph. There was no explosion, no death. Nothing vanished.
‘You weren’t honest with me, Sasha. You weren’t honest with Chris.’
‘You are babies, both of you!’ he shouted. ‘Are there no women in this country?’
He strode past her, shaking his head violently, making it clear he had been wronged and martyred. He’s very good at that, Steph thought. He can imitate anything. Even love.
She crouched beside Chris. She spoke softly. ‘Chris, I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t have any idea.’
Chris stared at her with shattered blue-button eyes. ‘But I told you.’
‘I thought it was puppy love.’
‘If I’m in love it’s puppy love and if you’re in love it’s real, and that gives you the right to do what you want?’
‘I didn’t know, Chris. I’d never have—’
Chris stared at Steph with her long blonde hair and her soft insinuating pity and she knew this girl was not on her side.
‘You knew,’ Chris said. ‘You knew.’
Marius Volmar stood observing. His eyes were cold and bored. He clapped his hands. He had wasted enough rehearsal time.
‘All right, everyone—back to work. You too, Christine. We’re paying you for dancing, not for tears.’
Chris stood. Her neck and back were very straight. Her voice was as even as a grade-school ruler. ‘I won’t dance with him.’
Ballerina Page 46
