Ballroom: A Novel

by Alice Simpson

  Myra put her arms around his neck and kissed him passionately, then laughed. “Gabe, you handsome darling, my paintings and drawings are not about you.”

  “And as to your drawings, Myra, I’ve watched you at work.” Françoise interrupted. “And I’m envious how you lose self-consciousness in your connection between mind, hand, and paper. Your line work is lyrical. Believe me, your show in Paris will be a smash!”

  “And will you put that in writing in your review after the show, Françoise?”

  Once Françoise had told him just how renowned Myra was in the Paris and Berlin art world, Gabriel was willing to give up his need for partying. Until he met Myra, he had known little about the art scene. While he would have preferred to spend time on the beach, at bars, and parties on yachts and discos, he enjoyed the idea of being immortalized, and the social recognition Myra brought.

  He was used to conquering women, but somehow the struggle for Myra’s attention fueled his arousal. Consumed by her work, she often resisted his advances, and the more she refused, the more ardent his pursuit became. Initially their lovemaking was wild, but soon it became perfunctory.

  You only want sex,” Myra told him.

  “That’s not true. You never have time for me. All you do is work.”

  “You don’t even try to excite me. There’s no foreplay. You’re selfish, Gabe.”

  “What is it you want from me?” He felt completely beaten down. “Nothing I do pleases you, Myra.”

  “Slowly, slowly. Make love to me slowly.”

  “No one’s complained before.”

  “Oh, my pet. You are so handsome when you’re cranky.” She’d moved closer to him in bed to caress him. “Next time I’ll show you what I want.”

  Insulted, he turned away from her and fell asleep.

  Gabriel didn’t like Myra’s criticism, but he had rarely stayed this long in a relationship. He’d always preferred one-night stands.

  He did everything to win Myra’s approval and her love, drawn to her despite the discomfort she caused him. His longing knocked him off balance. The two months with her left him feeling inadequate. He’d never struggled so hard to appear under control. He began to secretly worry that she might leave him.

  When he least expected, she would reward him with tender words, touches, or expensive gifts, yet they were always unexpected. He imagined it was the way a gambler felt. As though she almost loved him, that she was almost available to him. But he wanted all of her attention. He needed her to stroke his ego, admire his special qualities, his success, clothes, intelligence, and good looks.

  At the end of August, two weeks before the opening of her exhibition, Gabriel and Myra flew to Paris and stayed in her apartment in the seventh arrondissement. Their evenings were a social whirlwind. Even Myra seemed to enjoy the glamorous spotlight. But then, she was at its center. During the day Gabriel was able to take care of some business, searching for and negotiating for diamonds while she worked with the gallery.

  Going back generations, the Katz family had established themselves in the upper echelons of the international diamond industry as diamantaires, highly skilled artisans responsible for purchasing, cutting, polishing, and transforming rough stones into finished gems. Before the exhibit opened, Gabriel had flown to Antwerp’s Diamond Quarter to meet with a master diamond cutter. He selected a stone and created a ring, which would be ready in time for Myra’s opening. He planned to surprise her. If they were married, he believed, she would be more attentive, even pliant. Especially if he got her back to the States and away from friends like Françoise and Bernard, whom he detested.

  He extended his vacation to attend her exhibition, which was the talk of the city. There were twenty large paintings of him sleeping. Reviewers praised the model as well as the artist, compared her work to Caravaggio.

  Gabriel had decided to surprise her by proposing at the opening, in front of a wall-size nude painting that one critic described as “an electrifying image that captures a languid time; a portrayal of the dark powers of seduction. Her magic is his magic, an astounding portrait.”

  “Myra embodies all that diamonds stand for.” Gabriel placed the large yellow diamond, one of the most perfect he’d ever seen, on her finger. “Myra is fire, life, and brilliance. Like fire, she disperses light in a rainbow effect. Like life, she scintillates and sparkles in motion; and like brilliance, when she is still, she reflects light.” He’d found this quote in an article about De Beers. High on champagne and compliments, a surprised Myra accepted his proposal.

  For several weeks curators, collectors, artists, and editors wined and dined them, but Gabriel began to look forward to returning to the States.

  Baby! He’s lying on the patio. I think your father’s dead. What should I do?” Lila had discovered Hy’s body when he didn’t come in for supper one summer night, three days short of his sixty-eighth birthday. Her first reaction was to call Gabriel in New York.

  “What do you expect me to do? I’m in New York, in a meeting. Call the police.”

  “I need you here, baby.”

  “I can’t drop what I’m doing. I’m in the middle of an important sale. Manage.”

  “What will I say? He’s not dressed. He’s in his shorts . . . his underwear.”

  “Call nine-one-one. Tell them your husband is dead. It’s simple, Mother.”

  He and his new bride flew to Florida the next morning. In the Jewish tradition, the burial was that afternoon, and within two days his mother had hired a professional cleaning service to come in. Much to her chagrin, in the last five years of his life Hy had taken to smoking his Cuban cigars in the house. They were his territorial marking, like a male dog peeing, announcing his presence in Lila’s chintz and satin den.

  “Tell them to park around the corner,” she pleaded.

  “What’s the difference where they park?” Gabriel hadn’t seen Lila in quite a while, and was disappointed in how she had aged. She had developed a widow’s hump, which he found quite unattractive. He reminded himself to stand up straighter.

  “I don’t want the neighbors to see me cleaning when I should be sitting shiva.”

  “They’ll have to carry everything around the block.”

  “That’s what they get paid for,” she snapped.

  Why, I didn’t imagine you were such a big girl,” his mother had exclaimed as she opened the door to greet them when they arrived from the airport. “Gabe, dear, do you smell cigars?”

  He thought Myra rather gracefully ignored his mother’s tactless mention of her height.

  “Come in, come in. Gabe tells me you’re a stewardess, Myrna.”

  “I’m a painter, Mrs. Katz. It’s Myra.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. I must have confused you with someone else.” His mother continued to call her Myrna the entire afternoon.

  “My girl Sonia is off today. I’ll get the drinks. Can I get you something to drink, dear? Iced tea, Scotch and soda, white wine, soft drink?” Lila indicated a chair for Myra; then, taking Gabe’s hand, she led him to the couch.

  “White wine would be lovely, Mrs. Katz.”

  “Baby? Diet Coke, six ice cubes, as always?”

  “You know what I like,” he granted as his mother went into the kitchen.

  When she returned with a tray, Myra’s wine wasn’t on it.

  “You forgot Myra’s white wine, Mother.”

  She sat down next to Gabriel on the couch. “Oh, so I did. Sorry, dear. You know, baby,” she said, taking his hand, “we will have to decide what to do with all your father’s clothes. Perhaps you could take care of that for me, Gabe. This is all quite unpleasant.”

  “What would you like me to do with them?”

  “Well, the painters are coming in next week, and I would like to have the closet empty by then. You decide, baby. I need to have all my dance clothes cleaned. I worry they smell of cigar. Myrna, do you dance?”

  “It’s Myra, Mrs. Katz. No, I don’t. Why do you ask?” Myra looked puzzled. />
  Gabriel was annoyed that his mother was bringing this up.

  “Well, Gabe is such a marvelous dancer. He never told you? Oh, I miss dancing with him.”

  “No, the subject has never come up.” Myra’s expression was one of derision, touched with surprise.

  Lila seemed incredulous. “Why, he’s the absolute best. No one dances like Gabe. His father was just adequate. I’ll never forget the night Gabriel and I won the trophy at Roseland in 1978. Remember, baby?” Placing her hand on his knee, Lila moved her manicured fingers in a caressing motion. “It was the night before your high school graduation.” She paused, reached over to pat Myra on the hand. “Oh, dear, you never got your drink. I’m so thoughtless.”

  “She won the trophy,” he explained to Myra, “and I got a Mustang, and my first tuxedo. From Paul Stuart. She made me grow a goddamn mustache. For one night. Of course I shaved it off when we got home.”

  “I had no idea you dance, darling.” Myra stood and walked toward the picture window, which overlooked the golf course. “How charming.” Her voice was mocking, with the sharp edge she used when she didn’t like someone. “You live on a golf course. Just think, Gabe, we might have danced at the clubs while we were in Par—”

  “I tell you, that was the best night of my life,” Lila interrupted. “No one dances like my son.”

  Gabriel was still amused that the worst night of his life was her best.

  Myra turned to look at him and rolled her eyes. “Is that right? Well, we’ll have to go dancing sometime. Won’t we?”

  “Why, my dear, perhaps we can all go,” Lila said, brightening.

  Gabriel and Myra stayed at a nearby hotel. Myra told Gabriel she wasn’t interested in visiting with his mother again, and to send her regrets. She seemed defeated. Several times she mentioned returning to Paris, but Gabriel ignored her.

  Myra was anxious about flying. Heavily sedated for the trip home, she insisted on drinking, and he had difficulty waking her when they landed at La Guardia.

  Within a month of Hy’s death, Lila had found a dance partner. When Gabriel visited her again, he noticed that she’d had more work done on her face and form.

  “He’s a far better dancer than your father ever was,” she said. “Frank is almost as good as you, baby.”

  “God, he’s at least twenty years younger than you are, Lila.”

  “I like younger men. He reminds me of you.” When she placed her hand on his, he noticed how withered it was, liver spots giving her age away.

  “I can’t stand to be in the same room with him. He’s like some sort of lounge lizard.”

  “How can you say that, baby? Why, the other night, Adele said that he looks like you.”

  A year later, at one o’clock in the morning, Gabriel and Myra were awakened by a phone call from Frank.

  “Gabe?”

  No one called him Gabe other than his mother and Myra.

  “I don’t know how to tell you this. Your mother passed this evening. It was quite sudden. We were dancing at the Meadows Annual Ballroom Bash. It was her heart. She was such a wonderful woman. Everyone here loved her so much. Especially at the ballroom. We wanted to win the gold in the Peabody. It would have meant so much to her. It was what we’d both been hoping for. God knows we worked hard enough. We were so close. She was such a beautiful person. I loved her. Everyone did.” Frank began to cry.

  Gabriel didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t stand all the we’s.

  He flew to Florida to make the arrangements for her burial. Myra refused to go. Expecting an important shipment of diamonds, he didn’t stay long. He was surprised at how little he felt that he was now an orphan, so to speak . . . but then, he was a wealthy one.

  “Everything out of the closets. Empty the drawers,” he ordered Lila’s Cuban housekeeper, Sonia. “Everything goes.”

  “Everything is in cleaner’s bags, Mr. Gabriel,” Sonia explained proudly. “Madam wore nothing twice.” She carried on about his mother’s Regency pieces, which she’d spent years waxing and polishing under Lila’s scrutiny. What could he possibly want with six rooms of antique furnishings? Gabriel turned everything of value over to auction. He sold the condo, liquidated Lila’s stocks and bonds, sold her jewelry. Within a year he had a check in his hand for more than $3 million. The only thing he kept was his grandfather’s snake ring.

  Myra pleaded with him to buy a loft, claiming that if he did, she could paint again. Instead, he bought a big three-bedroom penthouse condo in Forest Hills. He installed a black marble master bathroom with a Jacuzzi, and of course an enormous cedar dressing room to house his ever-expanding wardrobe. All the apartment’s furnishings were black, leather, granite, or chrome; Corbusier chairs, a matching sofa, and his beloved Eames chair. Myra hated everything. She began threatening to return to Paris, and he began to wish she would. With Lila’s money, he could finally have the apartment, the furnishings—the life of his dreams.

  Darling, I’m going to start painting again,” Myra said when the apartment was finished. “All this renovating and decorating has been very time-consuming, and now that it’s complete, I need to get back to work.”

  “Time-consuming?” he snapped. “I did all the work.”

  “Yes, but you expected me to go with you. To all the showrooms. To stand around while you made all the decisions and argued with the designers and contractor. Anyway, Bernard and Françoise have offered me a show next year, if I can complete thirty paintings. I can’t believe it’s been three years.” She paused to consider the time that had passed. “I’m certain I can do it. Especially if I have a place to work. They’ve invited me to stay with them for several months, and Françoise has offered to let me use her studio. Now that she’s writing articles and reviews, she rarely paints any more, but I’d rather find my own place.”

  “Oh, isn’t that just grand,” Gabriel said sarcastically. “I did all of this for you, and now you are going to leave. For several months? How long, may I ask, is several months?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous! You didn’t do this for me. You did it for yourself, Gabe. Besides, I miss Paris and my friends. It would be for perhaps six months. You’re so busy. You’ll hardly know I’m gone. You could come for weekends. We could travel a bit.” She embraced him. “We could even go back to Mykonos.”

  He had concerns about business. The diamond business was changing. Uprisings in foreign countries were creating problems. The price of diamonds in Antwerp had dropped below De Beers’s price.

  “I sold some diamonds to a real estate broker on Sunday night.”

  “You must have sold them to a female broker, then. I know where you were Sunday night. You were out dancing again.”

  He ignored her accusations. “I took a loss on the sale, but I’ll call the broker tomorrow to start looking for a studio for you in SoHo.”

  “SoHo is over,” she said. “No one but tourists. And there’s a Gap on every corner. Chelsea’s the place to find a workspace now. But I need to concentrate on the work, not travel from Forest Hills to Manhattan and back every day. I’ve been thinking that if I could live and work in Paris, I could get a series finished in six months. Fix me a drink. Please, darling?”

  Seeing that he was not about to pour her a Scotch, she went to the bar to pour her own.

  “You’re not moving to Paris.” He had no interest in hanging about a foreign city with her friends while she painted. “And six months? That would be pricey. Come on, now, Myra, you’ve had enough to drink tonight.” He’d hoped they could get through one night without her drinking. “Why don’t we start looking tomorrow? In Chelsea. I’m not about to leave New York. The business needs me. I want you here.”

  Any ardor he had felt for Myra in Mykonos was long gone. He would have gladly paid for a downtown studio if it would get her out of the apartment once in a while. But he didn’t want her going to Paris. She was his wife.

  “You want me here, while you’re out dancing? Perhaps you’d be willing to give up so
mething you care about,” she said bitterly as she got up and poured a drink at the bar.

  The next day, Myra stayed in bed all day.

  For a while he thought Myra had given up on the idea of Paris, and was adjusting to and accepting life in Forest Hills.

  Proud of his new place, he suggested they entertain more. Surprisingly, Myra, seemed to like the idea. She was an animated hostess, gracious and elegant—after she’d had a drink or two. She knew how to make people laugh and enjoy themselves. Before every party he gave her jewelry to wear. She was a mannequin for his diamonds. They hired the best caterers, and there was always plenty of champagne. Myra invited her creative friends when they visited from Paris and Berlin. Gabriel’s people in the diamond business were charmed.

  Myra would begin the evening animated about art, music, literature, and her former Parisian life. As the evening progressed and she drank more, though, she began to make snide remarks about him—being his prisoner in Forest Hills; how he was selfishly keeping her from painting. Then she would mention his dancing. He had never had any tolerance for people who drank. A social drinker, he believed a glass of wine with dinner was sufficient. He found heavy drinkers sloppy; they talked too much, seemed out of control. That was when he began ending parties earlier, before she began belittling him, humiliating him in front of his clients.

  It slowly became evident that she was not eager to go out. Anywhere. She had no friends. And the Scotch was disappearing. She made excuses for staying at home, turning down social engagements, then daily appointments and household responsibilities that entailed going outside the apartment.

  Returning in the evenings from the city, he would find her in her robe, drinking and smoking. Whenever she was near him, he could smell Scotch on her breath. It nauseated him.

  Let’s just relax. Have one drink with me. Come on. Then we’ll go to bed. It’s been a long time,” she purred. He had decided not to cancel their annual holiday party. It had been lively, with the jazz trio he had hired. “We’ll take our time. Make love very, very slowly, and I’ll keep you hard this time.” Her speech was slurred.