The Dancers: An Artist Story

by M.L. Cameron

“Weren’t those supposed to be for desert or something?”

  “If the maid was stupid enough to put desert on the table while we’re eating our entrée then yes and you should fire her. Or maybe the chef listened when I said I like strawberries.” She used her fork to stab a strawberry.

  I sighed but didn’t say anything.

  ♪♪♪

  “Ana!” I called through her shut door. “Are you ready yet? The plane leaves in two hours. Come on!” I heard the kitten meow at her, why she had named it Fish was beyond me. “Ana!”

  She was supposed to be changing and then we were going to leave. I opened the door and saw Ana sitting cross legged on her bed, half dressed. Her white jeans matched the white lace in her bra. She was reading her mom’s journal and she seemed too wrapped up in whatever she was reading to pay me any attention. I sighed and said her name again, she didn’t react. And then I realized she wasn’t moving… Well her chest was moving up and down so she was obviously breathing. “Ana!”

  I looked around the room and saw her shirt sitting on the foot of the bed, Fish making herself very comfortable on her new bed. I sighed and went to Ana’s closet. I grabbed another solid color t-shirt, pink, not purple. When she still hadn’t moved and I gently eased the journal away from her fingers and guided her arms through the holes in the fabric. “Come on Ana, we have to get you to the airport and to your grandparents.”

  One the shirt was completely covering her torso I set out to finding her purse, she always had a stupid purse and it would just get in the way at the airport but if she wanted it I didn’t care. Finally she snapped and I heard her gasp. “Oh gosh… I’m sorry… How long was I there?”

  “Where?”

  “In the memory…”

  “Ten… Twenty minutes. Not too long…” She looked down the bed and saw Fish sleeping on her shirt. “Come on, we’ve got to go.”

  She nodded and looked down at her shirt. “What… Did you?”

  “Yeah.” I tugged on her hand and she stood up, fixing the hem of her shirt, smoothing it over her jeans.

  “Perv,” she grumbled and I just grinned. “I have something to tell you about,” she said louder and grabbed her purse from where it sat on her desk.

  I nodded and turned her light off, it still glowed gold. As we walked out of the house her maid came into the foyer. “Make sure Fish gets fed,” she called as I pulled her to the car. “What’s the rush?”

  “We have an hour and a half to get you through security and onto the plane.”

  “Me, what about you?”

  “I don’t have anything besides my phone to take on the plane. You, on the other hand, have a purse and a carry on. And we have to get our luggage checked and everything.”

  I opened the door for her and got in the driver’s side.

  Jack

  I heard the doorbell ring and smiled to myself. I knew who was there, Kaitlyn had no idea though. I had been avoiding her for days, waiting and waiting for the perfect moment. I didn’t know when it was going to happen, but I knew that they were going to show up. It was the perfect moment. I heard a greeting and then Luke, I didn’t know why he seemed so familiar, why he reminded me of someone I once knew…

  Then I heard the soft gasp of my eternal Passion. She sighed, a very feminine sigh, and I waited. “Jack,” she called softly, “Jack they’re here.”

  And then she appeared in the room, followed by Luke and then my granddaughter. She seemed so different, but I hadn’t seen her in almost two years. She resembled her mother in so many ways… Oh I missed them both so much. Her eyes met mine and I saw a mirror of myself in her deep pools of blue. She smiled and glanced away. Luke took her hand and I stood up.

  “Look who came to see us,” I said and Anastasia took a deep breath. “We’ve missed you Doll.”

  She tugged her hand free of Luke’s and slowly walked to me. I knew that she was seeing what I saw, bright blue eyes with light blond hair. Very suddenly she threw her arms around my neck and I sighed. “I missed you,” she whispered and I knew neither Luke nor Kait had heard.

  “She was always close to her grandfather,” I heard Kait say to Luke.

  And just as quickly as she had hugged me, she was crying. I didn’t understand why but I knew that there didn’t have to be a reason for women to cry. I held her tighter and the tears streaked rapidly down her cheeks, staining my red shirt and breaking Luke’s heart.

  I knew Luke hated to see her cry, he hated to see her upset in any way at all. It had been that way since they were young children. That was how it worked with Dancers… Or with any Artist. Your eternal love was always there to comfort and to protect. I missed being so young, when everything was new and understanding things didn’t really matter. But sometimes I would look back and be happy that I knew what was going to happen almost every day.

  Kaitlyn

  I pressed play on the TV remote and waited for the video to play. The screen flickered and suddenly there was small Anastasia sitting on a bench, crying enough tears to drown the world. Her knees were skinned and Jack was attempting to put the antiseptic spray on the worst of the cuts. He sprayed and she screamed.

  “Come on Doll, don’t you want it to be safe?” She whimpered but nodded as he sprayed again. And again she screamed. “There, you’re done. I’m going to clean it up a little more and we’ll find some bandages. All right?” She nodded and her chin quivered. A little Luke toddled up and sat next to her on the bench. She didn’t look at him, just watched Jack go to the water-fountain and wet a cloth.

  “Hello Luke,” Jack said and Luke stared at him.

  “Is she going to die?” he asked and Jack’s eyes went wide.

  “No, it’s just a few scrapes.” He set to cleaning the bloodied knees.

  Luke seemed to think about it for a second. “Are you okay Ana?” Anastasia nodded and Luke looked at her skeptically. He smoothed his small hand over her little cheek and he leaned over to kiss her knee. Ana made a face and he made the face back. “My mommy says kisses make everything better.” Jack chuckled and Luke ran off yelling that Anastasia wasn’t going to die.

  I glanced over at Anastasia as the screen faded to black. Her knees were drawn up to her chest and one of her hands was intertwined with Luke’s. He glanced at her and she met his gaze. They both smiled and then turned back to the screen as the video continued. Anastasia sat beside Holiday on the top of a high hill. They were watching the sunset fade from blues to purples to reds and finally to black.

  Luke and his mother walked up and sat beside them. Anastasia laid down and rested her head on Luke’s lap, yawning. “All that playing must have tuckered them out,” Luke’s mother said and Holiday laughed. “They weren’t too much of a handful?”

  “Oh never. They’re both good children.” Luke began to drift, leaning on his mother’s shoulder. “He’s so protective, never letting anything bad happen to her. It’s sweet really.”

  “I’ve noticed. I think it’s going to get worse as they get older.” They both chuckled. “I’m going to take him home, he’s got to get registered for school tomorrow.”

  Holiday nodded and Luke was carried away. “Mommy,” Anastasia whined sleepily. “Mommy’s where’s Luke? Mommy?” Holiday smiled down at her exhausted daughter and brushed her hair from her face, picking her up and standing.

  “He’s going home to go see his family. You spent all day together. You’ll see each other soon.”

  “But… Mommy…”

  “I know baby, it’s going to be all right. You’ll see each other soon. It gets easier, letting go,” Holiday continued as Anastasia slept on her shoulder. “It gets a lot easier. I know it feels bad now but after some time it won’t hurt, it’ll just feel a little awkward. Like a part of you isn’t there that should be. Maybe he isn’t your Passion though. I think he could be but I can’t see your mind like I can with everyone else.”

  The screen flickered again. “Ana?” Luke whispered, the room was very dark and you could barely tell th
ey were lying on the floor wrapped up in a blanket. “Are you awake?” She didn’t respond. “Ana?”

  “I’m awake,” she breathed and giggled. “We’re supposed to be sleeping…”

  “I know…”

  “I have butterflies living in my tummy. I’m nervous about dancing tomorrow. What if I mess up?”

  Luke was silent for a long moment. “You won’t mess up…” They were quiet for a long time until Anastasia’s breath steadied and Luke was the only one awake. “You’re perfect.”

  When I looked over again Anastasia was leaning on Luke’s shoulder, her eyes were closed. I smiled and Luke tilted his head so his cheek rested on her hair. She sighed and he pulled her closer. I grabbed the TV remote and his the power button. “I think everyone should get some sleep. We can talk more tomorrow,” I said. “You two can take the room upstairs. It’s the first one on the left.”

  Jack started to protest as Luke lifted Anastasia into his arms. “But… They’re not even eighteen…”

  “How long did we wait?” I asked and he grumbled about it but stopped talking.

  “Thank you Mrs. Lovet.”

  “Kait,” I corrected automatically and he nodded. “I’ll see you two in the morning.”

  Luke walked away with Anastasia and Jack moved to sit next to me on the love seat. “How long did we wait?” he asked and rested his arm over my shoulder.

  “Well, we met when we were two… We started dating when we were fifteen and had Holiday at twenty-two. So, seven years.”

  “Did we ever talk about it?”

  “Yeah…” I laughed, remembering. “When we were sixteen. You wanted to have sex but I said no. We didn’t talk for a little while after that. Elizabeth talked to me and told me that we couldn’t just ignore it and that we had to talk about it.” He nodded. “And then I told you that I wasn’t ready… You said that you didn’t understand it and broke up with me.”

  “I remember. My brother got so mad at me because he knew what was going on. He punched me in the gut for trying to pressure you into it. And told me if I ever forced into doing something you didn’t want to do then he would make sure I could never sleep with any girl. I believed him and told you that it was okay if you wanted to wait…”

  I nodded and rested closer to him. “And we waited.”

  Luke

  I sat at the dining room table with Kaitlyn. Jack had taken Ana somewhere and we had been spending our day in separate rooms. She sat across from me and smiled at her scrapbook. She looked up at me and smiled. “Do you like not ever getting older?” I asked.

  “I like it for the most part. We stopped at a good age so we’re not really questioned. We’ve lived here… Pretty much our whole lives. But we’ve been everywhere.”

  “Do you know a lot of people?”

  “We know hundreds… Maybe thousands of people. But they get older and die while we stay here… You know, Jack thinks he’s met your parents somewhere,” she murmured.

  “What?”

  “You’re parents.”

  “Well… If I kind of grew up with Ana and you two were always around then I’d imagine he met them.”

  She looked down at her scrapbook and gasped. “You don’t know… Oh gosh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to tell you that… I thought they told you… I’m sorry. For—”

  I cut her off. “What do you mean, you thought they told me? You thought who told me what?”

  “I really shouldn’t be the one to tell you. It’s not my place to tell you about it. I’m sorry, please forget that I said anything. Please?”

  “No. That’s not fair. I want to know.”

  “I… Obviously your parents didn’t want you to know or they would have told you. So, forget I said anything at all.”

  She stood up with her scrapbook and I put my head in my hands. “What’s wrong? It’s not really that important…”

  “No one ever tells me anything. They