The Daddy Dance

by Mindy Klasky

  Jenny sighed, but she shuffled down the hallway. Kat leaned down to brush a kiss against her father’s forehead, easing an arm beneath his shoulders as he started to manipulate the mechanical bed, fighting to raise himself into a seated position. When she was certain he was more comfortable, Kat said, “Come sit down, Mama.” She heard the hard New York edge on her words, and she smiled to soften her voice. “Why don’t you rest, and let me take care of that for a while?”

  Even as Susan settled on the edge of the double bed, Kat heard the distant whistle of the Clipper, the New York-bound train, leaving town for the day. The wild, lonesome sound immediately made her think about Rye Harmon, about how he had offered to come inside, to help. He’d scooped her up from the train station like a knight in shining armor—a friendly, easygoing knight whom she’d known all her life. Kat blinked and she could see his kind smile, his warm black eyes. She could picture the steady, sturdy way he had settled her into his truck.

  She shook her head. She didn’t have time to think about Rye. Instead, she handed her father his medicine, taking care to balance her weight, keeping her spine in alignment despite her cursed walking boot. She had come to Eden Falls to help out her family, to be there for Susan and Mike. And as soon as humanly possible, she was heading back to New York, and the National Ballet Company and the life she had worked so hard to attain. She didn’t have time for Rye Harmon. Rye Harmon, or anything else that might delay her escape from Eden Falls.

  Chapter Two

  Three hours later, Kat wondered if she had made the greatest mistake of her life. She leaned against the headrest in her cousin Amanda’s ancient sedan, resisting the urge to strangle her five-year-old niece.

  “But why isn’t Aunt Kat driving?” Jenny asked for the fourth time.

  “I’m happy to drive you both home, Jenny,” Amanda deflected, applying one of the tricks she’d learned as a schoolteacher.

  “But why—”

  Kat interrupted the whining question, spitting out an answer through gritted teeth. “Because I don’t know how!”

  Amanda laughed at Kat’s frustration. The cousins had been quite close when they were children—certainly closer than Kat had been to her own sister. Nevertheless, Amanda always thought it was hysterical that Kat had never gotten her driver’s license. More than once, she had teased Kat about moving away to the magical kingdom of Oz, where she was carried around by flying monkeys.

  Jenny, though, wasn’t teasing Kat. The five-year-old child was simply astonished, her mouth stretched into an amazed O before she stammered, “B-but all grown-ups know how to drive!”

  “Maybe your Aunt Kat isn’t a grown-up,” Amanda suggested helpfully.

  Kat gave her a dirty look before saying, “I am a grown-up, Jenny, but I don’t drive. The two things are totally separate.”

  “But how do you go to the grocery store?”

  “I walk there,” Kat said, exasperated. How could one little girl make her feel like such a sideshow freak?

  “But what do you do with the bags of groceries?”

  “I carry them!”

  Kat’s voice was rough enough that even the headstrong Jenny declined to ask another follow-up question. It wasn’t so ridiculous, that Kat couldn’t drive. She’d left Eden Falls when she was fourteen, long before she’d even thought of getting behind the wheel of a car. She’d spent the next ten years living in Manhattan, where subways, buses and the occasional taxi met her transportation needs. Anything heavy or bulky could be delivered.

  But try explaining that to someone who had never even heard of the Mason-Dixon line, much less traveled above it.

  Amanda’s laugh smoothed over the awkward moment as she pulled into the driveway of a run-down brick Colonial. Weeds poked through the crumbling asphalt, and the lawn was long dead from lack of water—just as well, since it had not been cut for months. One shutter hung at a defeated angle, and the screen on the front door was slashed and rusted. A collapsing carport signaled imminent danger to any vehicle unfortunate enough to be parked beneath it.

  “I don’t believe it!” Kat said. The last time she had seen this house, it had been neat and trim, kept in perfect shape. Years ago, it had belonged to her grandmother, to Susan’s mother. The Morehouses had kept it in the family after Granny died; it was easy enough to keep up the little Colonial.

  Easy enough, that was, until Rachel got her hands on the place. Susan and Mike had let Rachel move in after she’d graduated from high school, when the constant fights had become too difficult under their own roof. The arrangement had been intended to be temporary, but once Rachel gave birth to Jenny, it had somehow slipped into something permanent.

  Now, though, looking at the wreck of Granny’s neat little home, Kat could not help but begrudge that decision. Did Rachel destroy everything she touched?

  Amanda’s voice shone with forced brightness. “It always looks bad after winter. Once everything’s freshened up for spring, it’ll be better.”

  Sure it would. Because Rachel had such a green thumb, she had surely taken care of basic gardening over the past several years. Rachel always worked so hard to bring good things into her life. Not.

  Kat swallowed hard and undid her seat belt. One week, she reminded herself. She only had to stay here one week. Then Jenny could return to Susan and Mike. Or, who knew? Rachel might even be back from wherever she had gone. “Well…” Kat tried to think of something positive to say about the house. Failing miserably, she fell back on something she could be grateful for. “Thanks for the ride.”

  Amanda’s soft features settled into a frown. “Do you need any help with your bag? Are you sure—”

  “We’ll be fine.”

  “We could all go out to dinner—”

  That was the last thing Kat wanted—drawing out the day, eating in some Eden Falls greasy spoon, where the food would send any thinking dancer to the workout room for at least ten straight hours, just to break even. Besides, she really didn’t want to impose on her cousin’s good nature—and driver’s license—any more than was strictly necessary. “We’ll be fine, Amanda. I’m sure Aunt Sarah and Uncle Bill are already wondering what took you so long, just running Jenny and me across town. You don’t want them to start worrying.”

  At least Kat’s case was bolstered by her niece’s behavior. Jenny had already hopped out of her seat and scuffed her way to the faded front door. Amanda sighed. “I don’t know what sort of food you’ll find in there, Kat.”

  “We can always—” What? She was going to say, they could always have D’Agostino deliver groceries. But there wasn’t a D’Agostino in Eden Falls. There wasn’t any grocery store that delivered. She swallowed hard and pushed her way through to the end of the sentence. “We can always order a pizza.”

  That was the right thing to say. Amanda relaxed, obviously eased by the sheer normalcy of Kat’s suggestion.

  As if Kat would eat a pizza. She’d given up mozzarella the year she’d first gone on pointe. “Thanks so much for the ride,” Kat said. “Give my love to Aunt Sarah and Uncle Bill.”

  By the time Kat dragged her roller bag through the front door, Jenny was in the kitchen, kneeling on a chair in front of the open pantry. Her hand was shoved deep in a bag of cookies, and telltale chocolate crumbs ringed her lips. Kat’s reproach was automatic. “Are you eating cookies for dinner?”

  “No.” Jenny eyed her defiantly.

  “Don’t lie to me, young lady.” Ach, Kat thought. Did I really just say that? I sound like everyone’s stereotype of the strict maiden aunt. Annoyed, Kat looked around the kitchen. Used paper plates cascaded out of an open trash can. A jar of peanut butter lay on its side, its lid teetering at a crazy angle. A dozen plastic cups were strewn across the counter, with varying amounts of sticky residue pooling inside.

  On top of the to
aster oven curled three bananas. Kat broke one off from the bunch and passed it to her niece. “Here”, she said. “Eat this.”

  “I don’t like them when they’re brown.”

  “That’s dinner.”

  “You said we were ordering a pizza.”

  “Pizza isn’t good for you.”

  “Mommy likes pizza.”

  “Mommy would.” Kat closed her eyes and took a deep breath. This wasn’t the time or the place to get into a discussion about Rachel. Kat dug in the pantry, managing to excavate a sealed packet of lemon-pepper tuna. “Here. You can have tuna and a banana. I’ll go to the grocery store tomorrow.”

  “How are you going to do that, when you don’t drive? It’s too far to walk.”

  Good question. “I’ll manage.”

  Kat took a quick tour of the rest of the house while Jenny ate her dinner. Alas, the kitchen wasn’t some terrible aberration. The living room was ankle-deep in pizza boxes and gossip magazines. The disgusting bathroom hadn’t been cleaned in centuries. Jenny’s bedroom was a sea of musty, tangled sheets and stuffed animals.

  Back in the kitchen, Jenny’s sullen silence was nearly enough to make Kat put cookies back on the menu. Almost. But Jenny didn’t need cookies. She needed some rules. Some structure. A pattern or two in her life. Starting now.

  “Okay, kiddo. We’re going to get some cleaning done.”

  “Cleaning?” Jenny’s whine stretched the word into four or five syllables at least.

  Kat turned to the stove—ironically, the cleanest thing in the house, because Rachel had never cooked a meal in her life. Kat twisted the old-fashioned timer to give them fifteen minutes to work. “Let’s go. Fifteen minutes, to make this kitchen look new.”

  Jenny stared at her as if she’d lost her mind. Squaring her shoulders, though, and ignoring the blooming ache in her foot, Kat started to tame the pile of paper plates. “Let’s go,” she said. “March! You’re in charge of throwing away those paper cups!”

  With the use of three supersize trash bags, they made surprising progress. When those fifteen minutes were done, Kat set the alarm again, targeting the mess in the living room. The bathroom was next, and finally Jenny’s room. The little girl was yawning and rubbing her eyes by the time they finished.

  “Mommy never makes me clean up.”

  “I’m not Mommy,” Kat said. She was so not Mommy—not in a million different ways. But she knew what was good for Jenny. She knew what had been good for her, even when she was Jenny’s age. Setting goals. Developing strategies. Following rules. When Kat had lived in her parents’ home, Susan had built the foundation for orderly management of life’s problems. Unlike her sister, Kat had absorbed those lessons with a vengeance. Her rules were the only thing that had gotten her through those first homesick months when she moved to New York. As Jenny started to collapse on the living-room couch, Kat said, “It’s time for you to go to bed.”

  “I haven’t watched TV yet!”

  “No TV. It’s a school night.”

  “Mommy lets me watch TV every night.”

  “I’m not Mommy,” Kat repeated, wondering if she should record the sentence, so that she could play it back every time she needed it.

  Over the next half hour, Kat found out that she was cruel and heartless and evil and mean, just like the worst villains of Jenny’s favorite animated movies. But the child eventually got to bed wearing her pajamas, with her teeth brushed, her hair braided and her prayers said.

  Exhausted, and unwilling to admit just how much her foot was aching, Kat collapsed onto the sagging living-room couch. Six more days. She could take six more days of anything. They couldn’t all be this difficult. She glanced at her watch and was shocked to see it was only eight-thirty.

  That left her plenty of time to call Haley. Plenty of time to catch up on the exploits of Adam and Selene, to remember why Kat was so much better off without that miserable excuse for a man in her life.

  Kat summoned her willpower and stumped over to her purse, where she’d left it on the kitchen table. She rooted for her cell phone. Nothing. She scrambled around, digging past her wallet. Still nothing. She dumped the contents out on the kitchen table, where it immediately became clear that she had no cell phone.

  And then she remembered spilling everything in the cab of Rye’s truck in her rush of surprise to see him standing beside her. She had been shocked by the elemental response to his body near hers. She’d acted like a silly schoolgirl, like a brainless child, jumping the way she had, dropping her purse.

  But even as she berated herself, she remembered Rye’s easy smile. He’d been truly gallant, rescuing her at the train station. It had been mean of her to pretend not to remember him. Uncomfortably, she thought of the confused flash in his eyes, the tiny flicker of hurt that was almost immediately smothered beneath the blanket of his good nature.

  And then, her belly did that funny thing again, that flutter that was part nervous anticipation, part unreasoning dread. The closest thing she could compare it to was the thrill of opening night, the excitement of standing in the wings while a new audience hummed in the theater’s red-velvet seats.

  But she wasn’t in the theater. She was in Eden Falls.

  And whether she wanted to or not, Kat was going to have to track down Rye Harmon the following day. Track him down, and retrieve her phone, and hope she had a better signal at Rachel’s house than she’d had at the station.

  All things considered, though, she couldn’t get too upset about the lack of signal that she’d encountered. If she’d been able to call Susan or Amanda, then Rye would never have given her a ride. And those few minutes of talking with Rye Harmon had been the high point of her very long, very stressful, very exhausting first afternoon and evening in Eden Falls.

  By noon the next day, Kat had decided that retrieving her cell phone was the least of her concerns.

  Susan had swung by that morning, just after Kat had hustled a reluctant Jenny onto her school bus. Looking around the straightened house, Susan said, “It looks like you and Jenny were busy last night.”

  “The place was a pigsty.”

  “I’m sorry, dear. I just wasn’t able to get over here before you arrived, to clean things up.”

  Kat immediately felt terrible for her judgmental tone. “I wasn’t criticizing you, Mama. I just can’t believe Rachel lives like that.”

  Susan shook her head. Kat knew from long experience that her mother would never say anything directly critical about her other daughter. But sometimes Susan’s silences echoed with a thousand shades of meaning.

  Pushing aside a lifetime of criticism about her sister, Kat said, “Thank you so much for bringing by that casserole. Jenny and I will really enjoy it tonight.”

  Susan apologized again. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of giving you anything last night. The church ladies have been so helpful—they’ve kept our freezer stocked for months.”

  “I’m glad you’ve had that type of support,” Kat said. And she was. She still couldn’t imagine any of her friends in New York cooking for a colleague in need. Certainly no one would organize food week after week. “How was Daddy last night? Did either of you get any sleep?”

  Susan’s smile was brilliant, warming Kat from across the room. “Oh, yes, sweetheart. I had to wake him up once for his meds, but he fell back to sleep right away. It was the best night he’s had in months.”

  Glancing around the living room, Kat swallowed a proud grin. She had been right to come down here. If one night could help Susan so much, what would an entire week accomplish?

  Susan went on. “And it was a godsend, not fixing breakfast for Jenny before the sun was up. That elementary school bus comes so early, it’s a crime.”

  Kat was accustomed to being awake well before the sun rose. S
he usually fit in ninety minutes on the treadmill in the company gym before she even thought about attending her first dance rehearsal of the day. Of course, with the walking boot, she hadn’t been able to indulge in the tension tamer of her typical exercise routine. She’d had to make due with a punishing regimen of crunches instead, alternating sets with modified planks and a series of leg lifts meant to keep her hamstrings as close to dancing strength as possible.

  As for Jenny’s breakfast? It had been some hideous purple-and-green cereal, eaten dry, because there wasn’t any milk in the house. Kat had been willing to concede the point on cold cereal first thing in the morning, but she had silently vowed that the artificially dyed stuff would be out of the house by the time Jenny got home that afternoon. Whole-grain oats would be better for the little girl—and they wouldn’t stain the milk in Jenny’s bowl.

  There’d be time enough to pick up some groceries that afternoon. For now, Kat knew her mother had another task in mind. “So, are you going to drop me off at the studio now?”

  Susan looked worried. “It’s really too much for me to ask. I shouldn’t even have mentioned it when I called you, dear. I’m sure I can take care of everything in the next couple of weeks.”

  “Don’t be silly,” Kat said. “I know Rachel was running things for you. She’s been gone for a while, though, and someone has to pick up the slack. I came to Eden Falls to help.”

  Susan fussed some more, but she was already leading the way out to her car. It may have been ten years since Kat had lived in Eden Falls, but she knew the way to the Morehouse Dance Academy by heart. As a child, she had practically lived in her mother’s dance studio, from the moment she could pull on her first leotard.

  The building was smaller than she remembered, though. It seemed lost in the sea of its huge parking lot. A broken window was covered over with a cardboard box, and a handful of yellowed newspapers rested against the door, like kindling.

  Kat glanced at her mother’s pinched face, and she consciously coated her next words with a smile. “Don’t worry, Mama. It’ll just take a couple of hours to make sure everything is running smoothly. Go home and take care of Daddy. I’ll call Amanda to bring me back to Rachel’s.”