‘Ah, you drop things, so... you are excited...’ he said, breaking into a grin at last.
‘Maybe.’
‘Is good thing. Makes best performance, best teaching.’
‘Right.’ Then I had an idea. ‘Actually perhaps I’ll be putting you under pressure... I think we’ll have a joint lesson tonight.’
‘Ah. Like masterclass.’
‘Sort of. But with a bit of healthy competition thrown in.’
‘Oh no,’ said Jessie, coming in with the drinks.
‘It’ll be fine,’ I said, shaking my head to reassure her. Adapt, improvise and overcome, I was saying to myself from that Clint Eastwood film. ‘I’m afraid we’re going to start off with the pliés of piano playing scales – but bear with me.’ So after an explanation I let them each have a go, and although Ali had better technique, Jessie was more careful with the fingering so it was round one to her. From there we moved on to chords, where Ali’s big hands gave him the edge. Then I launched into the concept of music being in a key, playing a few bumbled snippets of well-known classics including Ali’s hated Swan Lake – as examples.
‘But you can’t be sure that every happy piece is in a major key and every sad one in a minor key,’ I told them. ‘Or perhaps... it’s just there are different kinds of sadness.’ I played a simple made-up hymn-like piece. ‘What d’you think, major or minor?’ I asked them.
‘Is trick?’ asked Ali.
‘No, you just have to describe how it makes you feel.’
‘Sad. Definitely,’ said Jessie.
Ali shook his head. ‘For me is relajante... so must be major?’
Exactly. It’s both, major and sad. But perhaps a nostalgic sort of sadness.’ Jessie smiled in agreement, but Ali looked puzzled. ‘Looking back to the past, like being homesick,’ I added, translating.
‘Ah,’ he said nodding, ‘this I can feel.’
‘Or resigned – accepting that something’s gone.’ Something I needed to feel. About my marriage. About the child Seb used to be. It suddenly occurred to me that the little piece I’d been making up was based on the Bach-Gounod Ave Maria that Seb had sung at a school concert. Only about three years before, but it seemed like another life, another child...
They were both looking at me, waiting for me to go on. I faltered for a moment and wondered if I could just stop there; I wanted to get home. But I took a sip of cold coffee and let the haunting piece suddenly link me to the final piece of the lesson. ‘And now for a bit of improvising,’ I said with a grin.
Jessie slapped a hand over her face and even Ali looked gratifyingly anxious. But they enjoyed having a plonk around on top of the resigned-sad chords, and Jessie had a flair for it and was thrilled when even Ali had to admit she was the best.
‘You compose new music together!’ said Ali.
‘Well, I’m afraid I’m stealing a bit from a Bach prelude... but actually, there was this composer called Gounod who improvised a melody over the same piece one evening and his father-in-law wrote it down and it became a famous song...’ I got out my Preludes and Fugues book and played it, humming the Gounod theme over the top and desperately trying not to picture the little blond boy at the concert.
***
Seb was sitting on one sofa, we sat on the other. He was examining a cigarette burn scar on the back of his hand, wanting to get back to the friends whose messages were donging their arrival next door; we were weary, keen to offload some of our anger and depression.
‘You’ve lost your scholarship,’ I said. Calmly. Revenge is a dish best served cold, they say. Well, so is parental disappointment, we’d decided. Bringing our own feelings into it would have blunted the effect; disappointment in himself was the goal.
For once he didn’t blame all the teachers for being two-faced, fucking head-cases or patronising bitches. And didn’t blame us for always going on. He just slouched there, leaning back, legs straight, reminding me of one of those Thunderbird puppets getting ready to be slid into his craft; waiting for directions, the plan. ‘I’m a complete fuck-up,’ was all he could say. There were tears in his eyes – something we hadn’t seen for a long time. I seldom saw him in his uniform, hair soft and un-gelled; he looked younger, vulnerable.
We started to talk of the future, how he’d be seeing a psychologist, could have counselling. How he’d rebuild his confidence, bit by bit. There were a couple of stories of famous personalities who’d had teenage crises. Everything was still possible. Adapt, improvise and overcome. When I got up to make the three of us some hot chocolate he followed and put his arms round me, said he was really, really sorry, said he was really, really going to try and do better. Perhaps he was. Perhaps he did.
20.
A text bleeped at seven.
‘What? Not that neurotic friend of yours again. Tell her to ditch this arsehole,’ said Jez.
Surely he wouldn’t do it again, I thought. But it wasn’t Ricardo, it was Emma. I got up and called her back.
‘Rosie. Remind me not to book ballet with anybody else. We’ve got a backstage tour and tonight’s La Fille with the delectable Señor Cortés, and Sophia’s forgotten all about it and flown off to Milan on business. Come on, take a day off and come and join me. High time we caught up with each other anyway. What d’you say?’
‘I’ll call you back. Give me five minutes.’
But it only took two. Jez looked pleased and said it would do me good; he didn’t mind taking Kenny to school the next day. Gone were the usual sneers about Emma and her ballet-obsessed hedonistic life style. I really should have wondered at his change of heart. He really should have wondered if I’d wonder.
I’d tell her everything. There’d be time, during the day, sitting in the Covent Garden Piazza or in the window of the Italian opposite the stage door. Offer myself up for judgement. Commiseration. Listen to her big-sisterly advice. I could start from the beginning: how that half-hour journey had somehow caused a shift of the axis around which my life revolved.
***
‘Shit, it’s Ruth again,’ said Emma in a stage whisper. We had a half-serious fear that one day a guide would report the frequency of our visits and we’d be hauled up in front of some Opera House Somebody and questioned about our motives. Be blacklisted as peeping Thomasinas. The fact is that nine quid for ten minutes of watching principal dancers rehearse at close quarters was superb value for money, in our opinion. And of course this is how we’d met: our rapt faces pressed to the glass to watch a passionate pas de deux. After we’d been spoken to three times and then physically pulled away by the exasperated tour guide we’d got talking, gone for lunch together, and had been ballet mates ever since.
This time I was less anxious about Ruth’s suspicions than about the possible occupants of the rehearsal room. Supposing Ali was there and saw me gawping at him as if he were some exquisite animal at the zoo? What I should have done was go to work for the morning and join Emma for lunch after she’d done the tour alone. But it was too late now; we were sitting under the photographs while Ruth gave her intro, which was already through the two destroying fires and up to the use of the theatre as a popular dance hall in the Second World War.
‘She’s the best, but I don’t like the way she looks at us,’ said Emma into my ear.
‘We can’t be the only ones who do this. Perhaps some people come every week,’ I whispered back.
She was glaring at us, not happy with our talking-in-class. Then we were off: the futile visit to the auditorium, which surely we’d all seen many times already or we wouldn’t be there; views of the massive scenery on wheels; more interesting occasional sightings of dancers padding with duck feet along the corridor, always – unbelievably – unrecognised by anybody else in the group.
And then we arrived. I approached the window cautiously, preparing to invent a sudden need to find a toilet, but it was okay – Ali wasn’t in there. It was the diffident young Englishman, looking as uncertain as ever despite the encouraging smile of the mature Italian ball
erina known for her affable nature.
‘What is this guy’s problem?’ said Emma, sounding like Seb.
‘Being English?’ I offered, watching him gently lower Maria to the floor and apologise profusely, first to her and then to the coach.
‘When’s he going to learn to love himself? I thought it reliably came with the male dancer package. And speaking of package, how can he be so lacking in confidence with one like that?’
‘What?’
‘Oh come on, don’t say you hadn’t noticed. The boy’s blatantly hung like a horse.’
‘He’s tall. Maybe he just wears a larger size support belt,’ I said.
‘And why would that be? You’re very coy today Ro. What’s the matter with you?’
‘Oh no, now what,’ I said, watching him slope off to the side of the room with a cloudy face, drink from his water bottle, sit down and massage his thigh. ‘Come on Rowan.’
‘Okay ladies...’ Ruth was saying, but it was only the first time so we ignored her.
The coach was giving directions to the pianist and then to Rowan, managing to elicit a weak smile. And then he got up and danced his solo – jumping, turning, hanging in the air, landing all noble six foot two of himself into an arabesque, reaching out to Maria’s Giselle. To every woman in the world. Even Ruth had noticed and had stopped spouting on about the number of rehearsal rooms, changing rooms and floors.
‘He’s good, isn’t ‘e?’ said a square-bodied woman to her lumpy friend, and two young Oriental girls were probably saying the same thing. Emma was ecstatic and banged loudly on the window, causing everyone in the rehearsal room to look over and see two women manically applauding while another gasped in horror. Rowan put his hand to his face as he listened to the coach and then turned towards us and bowed. There was a relieved laugh from Ruth, who then dragged us away as we grinned and made thumbs up signs to Rowan.
Then there was the usual dismay at the excitement among our fellow tourists about the visit to the Hats and Jewellery department; they couldn’t seem to wait to get away from the sweaty dancers, more interested in the costumes than the artists who wore them.
‘I rather wish I’d booked to see Rowan in Giselle, rather than Alejandro,’ said Emma, passing me the feather-light Roman helmet.
I felt a pang of absurd possessiveness just hearing her say his name.
‘Had enough of this now. Time for a fag, ravioli and a catch up,’ she said, causing Ruth to look over. She’d already been pulled aside and spoken to about the window-banging.
Eventually we were counted and ushered out into the public area. I waited while she had a cigarette, then off we went to the Italian, where we argued as usual about whose turn it was to have the seat facing the stage door. But I sat myself down with my back to the window before she could.
Luigi came over and asked how we were. ‘Not many dancers at this time,’ he added sympathetically, ‘but we have, special today, risotto primavera, with asparagus – is very good.’
I asked after Emma’s children and I learnt that Cassie had been too busy to visit until her washing machine broke down and Lawrie was out of work but in love. She was looking forward to the end of the school term so she could concentrate more on her private language students, all of whom, as usual, appeared to be male and flirtatious. They currently included a handsome Dutch antique dealer; she’d been considering succumbing to his charms until she’d heard him speaking in Dutch to a work colleague and mentioning his wife, fatally underestimating her linguistic expertise. It hadn’t stopped her before – what about that Italian businessman? Or perhaps I’d got that wrong – he may have been separated. I wondered if I was going to lose the courage to tell her about Ricardo. Then she wanted to know about Seb. She always did: she had strong pedagogic and maternal instincts, among others. I had to bring her up to date on the shedding of his dramatic aspirations, scholarship funding, left eyebrow and trouser belts.
We were nearly finishing our risotto when I realised that the conversation was not going to plan. Or rather, it should have had a plan.
There was the background anxiety about Ali’s possible appearance at the stage door. He had a performance that night so would definitely be in there somewhere. It would be just my luck for him to pop out to Boots to get some Neurofen and see me sitting there in wait for him. I wished I’d taken the outfacing seat after all: it would have been easier than the agonising face-reading game I had to play whenever a dancer emerged.
‘Oh,’ she said, with a reassuringly low-key, puzzled smile on her face, ‘it’s... oh, what’s his name? Character artist, played the Widow Simone a couple of years ago – in fact I think he’s doing it tonight. Heavens – he’s really lovely, I never noticed. Take a look.’
I turned round and saw him chatting into his phone, running his hand through his tousled hair like Jez does all the time.
‘He keeps looking at you, Ro.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ I said, turning back to consider the dessert menu.
‘No, really,’ she said. ‘Look.’
I turned round again and was surprised – flattered – to find myself meeting his eyes. I grinned and waved briefly – he was a magnificent Widow Simone after all -- and then turned back again.
‘Go and ask him for his autograph. He probably doesn’t get asked very often, he’d love it.’
‘We don’t ask for autographs, remember?’
There was further coaxing. Another time I probably would have done as I was told, but I couldn’t risk standing out there and bumping into Ali.
Luigi came to take our dessert orders, a further reminder of how time was racing on. Emma was looking at me with a puzzled expression.
‘You’re different Rosie. What’s going on? Not pregnant are you? In love? Or heaven forbid, gone over to opera?’
‘Er... definitely not; possibly; and never.’
‘Ah... newly so with Jez, or with... let me guess... the snake-hips guy in your salsa class?’
‘Too young.’
‘A patient you’ve been looking into the eyes of.’
‘Much too young – they’re all under sixteen you idiot.’
‘A doctor then.’
This wasn’t how I’d imagined telling her about Ricardo. I’d thought she’d be more shocked at my first infidelity. Perhaps she just thought I had a crush.
‘Yes. He’s a consultant at the hospital.’
Now she did look shocked. ‘I thought you said doctors were planks. What’s this one got going for him? Ballroom dances in his spare time? Has a beautiful baritone voice?’
‘No. Well not as far as I know.’
‘Please, not some egg-headed public school turd.’
‘No!’ I said indignantly, Lisa’s Damian springing to mind. ‘He’s Brazilian.’
‘Ah. Now I understand. A Latin. We all fall for one or two of those in our time,’ she sighed.
‘Well, it wasn’t intended,’ I replied, wondering what on earth I meant. And so did she, waiting for me to continue. But when I thought about it I realised for the first time that it had been intended: dazed and frustrated with my infatuation over Ali I’d given him the encouragement he’d wanted for many years, and now I was in an unintended holy mess. ‘It’s all got a bit out of control,’ I said, beginning to feel shaky.
She lowered her voice, looked at me with a sympathy that was going to undo me if I wasn’t careful. ‘You’re actually... are things that bad with Jez?’
‘Well yes... it looks like he’s having an affair again... possibly two affairs actually –’
‘What?’
I recounted my suspicions about the Sarahs.
‘He’s probably just flirting, wants a bit of attention. I mean, how much time do you two actually spend together these days? He probably feels a bit neglected.’
‘Well one of us has to earn some kind of a living.’
‘Come on, it’s not just that. Think about it.’
I stopped playing with my napkin and looked at
her, fought down the bolshie question as to whose side she was on.
‘Anyway, why don’t you just come out and ask him?’
‘I don’t know... I think I’d find myself having to tell him about Ricardo. And once I’ve done that, I don’t know what would happen... And how would the boys cope if we... Oh God. I keep thinking that sooner or later it’ll become obvious what to do.’
‘Perhaps, but not if you don’t know what’s going on. You could be completely wrong. And I’ve got a friend who had an affair and then started to see her husband in a new light, as if from a distance. Realised how lucky she was. Fell in love with him again. Don’t give up on Jez too quickly, Rosie.’
I tried to explain how separate our lives had become, how comfortable and passionate I was with Ricardo, but somehow I sounded like a character from a feeble TV drama. And Emma was nodding knowingly. So I concluded by telling her that he was going to tell his wife when they were in Brazil.
She shook her head. ‘If he was going to tell her, he wouldn’t be able to help himself, he’d just do it.’
‘He thinks it’ll be easier for her with her family around.’
‘Oh come on – it would be the worst place to tell her. She could immediately start planning her return to Brazil with the son, and he wouldn’t want that, would he.’
‘He’s adamant he’s going to leave her.’
‘They all are. “Be patient, it’s going to be fine,” Federico used to tell me.’
She’s one of those women who, much as she loves men, believes that nine out of ten of them are let-downs or cheats. And probably both. Even her dead husband, who had almost certainly been faithful, was still blamed for letting her down, trying to cheat death by driving to his friend’s stag do when he was still feverish with flu and unfit for a rain-blasted M25. But she could see I was starting to wobble so she proceeded more gently.
‘He may really want to leave, but the fact is, if he’s a nice guy, it’s always going to seem like the wrong moment to do it. A parent’s awaiting tests. A child’s got school exams. The builders are in. A difficult time at work. Look I’m sorry Ro, but I’ve just had too many friends go through this.’
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