Balancing Acts

by Emily Franklin

  “Yes, this is James Benton-Marks. I’m in gondola …” He points to Harley to check the number on the side. She peers down out the closed window and shrugs, holding up a five. “We’re in gondola five.” Harley registers the we in his sentence and hopes it’s the beginning of the usage. She decides when he finishes talking she’ll say something, just come clean.

  “We read you, five, and are aware of the situation.”

  James coughs. “What is the situation?” He looks at Harley, hoping she’s not too worried.

  “A malfunction on the lines at the top. We’re going to try and get it working again, but sit tight.”

  “What else could we do?” Harley says quietly. James stops talking to the controller and turns back to Harley.

  “Looks like we might be stuck for a while.” James cups his hands to the tinted window and looks at the other gondolas, each swinging back and forth in the steady wind.

  Harley leaves her side of the gondola and sits next to James. If we have this much time up here, she thinks, I’m making the most of it. James looks at her. “You have that look,” she says.

  “What look?” he asks, doing it again, head tilted, eyes up at an angle.

  “That look guys get before they kiss you.” Harley smiles, waiting.

  James doesn’t change his look, and stays in the same seat, but his voice comes out different than it was before, tender, quiet. “Harley—I get the feeling that you knew me—or thought you did—”

  Harley nods. “Maybe that second part.” She looks down at her jeans, feeling the cold, wishing she’d brought warmer clothing, not ever thinking she’d be stuck so many feet in the air for so long. “You’re right…. I did read about you. All those Sports Illustrated articles, the coverage of the winter games. I mean, I’m from ski country for god’s sake. Everyone knows everyone’s rankings and tricks.”

  “You knew my tricks?” James gives her a half smile, putting his hand on her knee.

  Harley leans forward, in one motion kissing him and sitting on his lap, moving his arms so they go around her back. James kisses her, hard, but then right in the middle of it, stops and he looks conflicted. Harley is annoyed. “Are you suspending action, too?” Harley asks, looking at James and then the gondola.

  “Funny, funny.” James picks her up, depositing her back on the bench. He goes to the door and looks out at the view. “Man, we’re up high.”

  Harley lets a thin wire of panic run through her. What if they can’t fix the problem, and we’re stuck? And what if this applies to me and James as well as the lift?

  “I thought if I admitted all that to you—you know, that I’d kind of worshipped you from afar—that you’d relax. I mean, I told you the truth.”

  “Well, first of all, it’s a little overwhelming, Harley. Like, hi, I’m a pseudostalker and I like you….”

  “That’s mean.” Harley shakes her head. “I’m not like that. I just knew.”

  “Knew what?”

  “That we’d click. Hit it off. Didn’t you ever feel that way about someone, even if you’d never met them—or met them once?” She pauses, blushing and nearly in tears. “I mean, I did meet you, you know. You probably don’t remember it, but two years ago when you were on some promotional tour—you came through Breckenridge, okay?”

  “Yeah …” James looks concerned and waits for her to go on.

  “You and Gabe Schroeder had just won that cup and came into the International Burrito Shack—”

  “Snuck in is more like it,” James says, remembering. “We had to climb out three stories and walk all the way there—in the snow. But we had a …”

  “Really fun time—with the piñatas, and the famous forty-ounce margarita.”

  James looks amazed. “How do you know that?”

  Harley tucks her knees to her chin. “I was there. And I served you guys and I just thought—there’s got to be more than this. My life with cheese and beans and drinks and—these awful pageants my mother made me get into to prove I wasn’t trashy, even though I kind of was.” Harley starts to cry. It’s the first time she has since she can remember and it feels both jagged, ripping her apart, and good—a release.

  James comes over to her and hugs her. She leans up to kiss him again but he pulls back. “No. Harley. No.”

  She pushes his chest. “Why? You know it’s good. Last night …”

  James tightens his mouth, breathing in through his nose. “Yeah. Last night. I don’t want to say it was a mistake….”

  The word stings like a welt and Harley covers her face with her hands. This can’t be happening—everything I wanted, rippling away from me.

  “Last night—was great,” James says. Harley looks up through her tears and smiles, using one finger to try and dry her eyes. “But—”

  “Oh, shit—there’s a but?”

  “Just let me talk, okay? But what it did was tell me sort of what you just said.”

  “Wait, I’m confused,” Harley says. “Was it great or not?”

  “You know how we—that we didn’t …”

  “Yeah, I was there? So, I know we didn’t go the entire ski route, if that’s how you want to phrase it,” Harley says.

  “I prefer to complete the entire revolution—boarding terms,” he says, smirking. Then he goes on. “I would’ve. Obviously—I mean, look at you. You’re an inferno in terms of hotness; you’re a kick in the pants to be with—witty, mellow….”

  “Please don’t say I’m your buddy,” Harley says.

  “No,” James says. “Not like that. Maybe if it were another time. Or another place….” He looks away from her, out the window, his face glazing over with other images.

  Harley stares. “You like someone. This isn’t about me. This is about you liking someone else, isn’t it?”

  Without looking at her, James nods. “Yeah.”

  “So … what does that mean?”

  He turns to her. “It means—last night goes down in the record books as a fun thing, Harley. A typical thing. But not what I’m looking for.”

  A typical thing? That sucks. Harley’s breath catches in her throat. Maybe this is what it feels like to be rejected, to lose. Harley tries to accept this. That she woke up next to him, still partially clothed, and saw her new boyfriend, and he woke up next to her and wanted to leave. “And in the future?”

  James shrugs. “I’m not a forecaster of futures. Coach taught me that. You can try and try and use up all your energy figuring out what might happen, but it doesn’t change what will. Better to use the time to reassess what you want.”

  “Or who?”

  He nods. “Yeah.”

  Harley’s heart is heavy with the rejection—but the door isn’t completely closed. He said another time, another place. Maybe in the off-season. Maybe some other resort. Maybe not now doesn’t mean not ever. Harley braces herself for the long haul. You want to play like that? Fine. “So who is this lucky girl?”

  James crosses his arms over his chest. “That is classified information.” He stops, presses the button on the control panel, and waits for a response. Then he whispers to Harley, “Someone is going to catch your attention—and he’s going to be one hell of a lucky guy.”

  Harley thanks him with her eyes, and feels herself sway back—back to when she’d never even seen a picture of James—and forward to now where they’ve been together and won’t be again—and further forward, to what lies ahead. Maybe someone new, or maybe James, still, but somewhere else. Anywhere but here in Rejection Central.

  “We still haven’t fixed the problem,” the commander says. “We’re sending ski patrollers to rescue stranded passengers. They’ll traverse the cable using rescue equipment.”

  “Like James Bond!” James says.

  “I can’t believe you’re happy about this,” Harley says.

  “Well, we are missing cupcakes,” James says. He takes her hand, squeezes it, and waits for further word from the ground. “They’ll have to take us down by snowmobile.”
/>   “Yep,” Harley says.

  “See? Another point in your favor,” James says. “So many girls would be freaking out up here about all this.”

  Harley shakes her head, shoving her hurt way inside. “Not me. I don’t get flustered by sudden situations.” She looks at James again, wondering if they’ll meet some other place—or if they’ll hook up again this season, and if it would mean anything. Maybe I don’t need to be his girlfriend, Harley thinks, as long as I’m able to be near him. I can work my way into his life, being his friend, and then—boom—suddenly we can be more.

  “Well, then I’ll tell you something else,” James says. “I’m taking off tomorrow.”

  “What?” Harley’s voice goes high up with concern. “Why?”

  “A race—more training. There’s a place called Der Vannimore over the border—guess coach thinks it’s best I go there for a while.”

  Harley doesn’t know what to say or what to do. Her reason for being at Les Trois is trickling away.

  “Hey,” James says, trying for levity. “Don’t look so sad.” He reaches inside her bag. “Here—let’s split a carrot.”

  They stay there, sharing the carrot, suspended from the ground, both of them waiting for their rides back to earth.

  20

  Even on your day off, you’re still on.

  “NO,” DOVE SAYS, CRADLING the phone as though it were actually attached to William. “We should have a day off, but we don’t. Just call it another mark on the board of the unjust.”

  She says this, and then wonders if maybe she should also add herself—or her actions—to the same board. She and William are past the hellos, and despite starting the conversation filled with anger about the fact that William bagged the ritual call, Dove now finds herself so guilty about the stolen kiss with Max that she doesn’t even bring it up.

  “Have you forgotten what today is?” William says.

  “Oh, you didn’t mean my day off?”

  “No, something else.” William’s voice sounds different now. Of course it’s the same tone, the same person—maybe it’s just going longer than one day without hearing him. Or maybe it’s that tiny fraction of her that’s broken away.

  “Tell me then,” Dove says. She sits on her bottom bunk, phone to her ear, her feet splayed onto the springs above her.

  “Exactly twelve days until I see you.” William’s smile is audible—Dove can imagine it, how one side slopes up a little higher, how those quirks were the kinds of details that made someone hard to forget. She thinks of Max, how the hair that falls onto his forehead covers a scar way up into the hairline from when he’d jumped into a swimming hole as a kid and bashed himself on a rock. She feels guilty for knowing that, too, even though it’s innocent when compared to a kiss.

  “Twelve days—and then I’ll be with you,” Dove says. “It still seems unreal.”

  “Well, get real,” William says. “You’ll love it here—Nevis is like this untouched beauty. Except that it’s been touched by a lot of wealthy vacationers.” He laughs. “But that’s not such a bad thing—I mean, it is affording me my life on the Seventh Wave.”

  “How is the boating life?” Dove looks at the snow outside, thinking William is looking at sea and sand and how that very dissimilarity makes her feel sad, like there’s no way he can understand her world right now.

  “It’s …” William pauses, talking to someone else in the background. “I’ll be there—just hang on. Sorry about that,” he says, coming back to Dove. “That was Becca—she works on a schooner on the other side of the dock.”

  “A schooner?” Dove nods as though William can see her. “She’s a friend?”

  “Yeah,” William says. “She’s from Florida—a real beach girl—she’s a kick.”

  “Sounds it,” Dove says, her voice tight. All of a sudden she feels like crying.

  “What’s up, Dove? Don’t be weirded out by Becca—she’s just a friend.”

  Dove sits up, bumps her head on the wooden slats of the bunk, and holds her forehead. “Right, she’s probably just a bikini-wearing buddy, of course.” She hates herself for sounding so pissy and jealous—and all because she’s the one who did something wrong.

  “Dove, what is it?” William’s voice sounds concerned. She’s sure that if he were here, his brow would have the V-shaped crease in it, his mouth in a frown. “You’ve got to tell me what’s going on—this isn’t like you.”

  What is like me? She wonders. Am I a princess with long hair waiting for my prince to fetch me on a boat that’s not his? Am I a pixie-haired girl who can cook and stand on her own two feet? Or just a duplicitous girlfriend who doesn’t deserve anyone’s affection? Then she remembers. “Why didn’t you call me?”

  William coughs. Dove hears water running and William sipping. “Um.”

  “Um? That’s what you have to say? You who’s usually a boundless talker?”

  “I was going to—totally. I’ve never missed a day, right?”

  “Right,” Dove says. She looks outside the window to the pathway, sure she can see shadows of her make-out session with Max. But it wasn’t just a kiss, was it? It was more—like a tying together of who she was, and who she is. Not superficial—is that better or worse? She tries not to think about it. “Which made it more confusing, like I had to interpret it even more—I was so upset, Will….”

  “I know. I’m sorry. I wish I had a good excuse, and I could try hard to make one up but I don’t want to be that guy.”

  “What guy?”

  “The guy who messes up and then covers it with some clever tale or some lame but heartfelt lie.”

  Dove sighs, feeling confused and tired, her nonday off catching up with her early morning and later nights. “So what is it?”

  “It was nothing—a good thing, really. Honestly. But I can’t tell you until you get here.”

  Dove chokes out a sound of disbelief. “So I have to wait with all this ambiguity and just have faith that you did something good? Something good that involved making it okay not to call me? To break your promise? And then not tell me about it?”

  William’s silence goes on for what feels like too long. “Can you do that?”

  “Do you still want me to come to Nevis?” She thinks of the borrowed money, the ticket she purchased, the thin cardstock of it in her drawer.

  “Oh course I do, Dove. And once you’re here, everything will be exactly the same between us. Trust me.”

  Dove hears his words as though he’s whispering them right into her ear, filling her up with surety. “Okay.” She smiles. “Okay—I’ll just wait then.”

  They get ready to hang up and then William asks, “One more thing.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Was there something you wanted to tell me?”

  Dove falters. “Ah, no. Why?”

  “No reason—just something in your voice—you’re the same, but different.”

  Dove gets chills, thinks that’s exactly what she’d said to herself about him. Maybe both of them had incidents best left unsaid. “Soon, right?” Dove whispers.

  “I’m counting the days—and nights,” William says. “My berth on the boat is the perfect size for us. Good thing you’re petite.”

  Dove laughs and they end with their usual miss you, but Dove is left wondering if everything will be the same when she sees him, if she should tell him about Max—although there’s really not much to tell; it was a mistake, one dumb kiss that meant nothing—and if William is expecting to do more than just sleep in that berth. If going to Nevis means something else entirely in his mind than in hers.

  Halfway through the cupcake party Harley and JMB are noticeably absent.

  Determined not to have her hard work ruined by Harley’s behavior, Melissa tries to let it go.

  “Whatever,” Melissa says. “I’m not going to think about it. He’s too much of a crush for me—one of those feelings that’ll never be returned, so I’m not even going there.” But inside, she knows it’s too late. What
the hell does she have that I don’t? She wonders but then remembers Harley’s legs, her face, her good-enough-for-gold exterior that sometimes masks her interior motivations. Never mind. If I were a vengeful person, Harley would bring it out. But I’m not. Right?

  Melissa looks around the crowded room, fountains of bubbling white and dark chocolate, the sliced fruit for dipping. Already people have rings of sweet frosting around their mouths.

  “Man, are we all going to be on sugar overload after this,” Dove says. She’s about to swipe a cupcake from the tray when Jemma swats her had.

  “These are the special ones—Melissa, is it time?”

  Melissa looks at her watch. To wait any longer to put the matching cupcake trays out would be to admit fully that she was waiting for JMB to return—in the hopes they’d match. “Sounds like now is as good a time as any!”

  Trays of beautifully decorated cupcakes—half done in white frosting, half in chocolate, but each with a design that has a twin lurking nearby—are set out on the top of the living room’s long wet bar.

  “Let the picking begin!” shouts Melissa. With everyone scrambling for a grab, the picking is frantic, with all the staff, nannies, skiers, troopers, and guests reaching for a baked good. Once they have one in hand, they hold it facing outward, speaking aloud.

  “I have a diamond.”

  “I have a thing that looks like an anchor.”

  “Me, too!”

  The splitting off of pairs is immediate. Random couples form, talking, laughing, eating their cupcakes; getting up to who knows what on the snow; trading stories inside the kitchen, or just sitting in awkward silence on the rug in front of the fireplace.

  Outside on the balcony, Luke revels in matching with Celia Sinclair. A long-range lens has them together, and Luke makes sure to smile for the paparazzi, hoping their photo will grace the cover of some magazine back home. In the bunkroom, Diggs complains about being stuck with Jemma, but she’s clearly thrilled, wanting to catch up on any and all gossip. Max shows Melissa his room upstairs. Dove, having witnessed Gabe’s switching his cupcake choice to avoid the nanny Charlie, winds up in the wraparound hot tub with him.