Pretending to Dance

by Diane Chamberlain

  At least, most of it.

  51

  Morrison Ridge

  At breakfast Saturday morning, I stared at my pancakes and grapefruit, unable to eat. Tonight was the family meeting and I hadn’t heard a word from Stacy about Chris getting together with me at the springhouse. She was supposed to talk to Bryan about it and he was supposed to talk to Chris and get the map of Morrison Ridge to him, but I didn’t know if any of that had happened. I’d tried calling her a couple of times, but there was never any answer at her house. I worried she’d forgotten. Or worse, that Chris was seeing that other girl and no longer cared about me and Stacy was afraid to tell me.

  Russell fed my father an entire stack of pancakes in the time it took me to eat two segments of my grapefruit.

  “What’s the matter, Molly?” Mom asked. She’d eaten two pancakes herself and was now sipping her coffee, one hand locked with my father’s on the arm of his chair. She didn’t usually sit right next to him at the table like that, especially not when Russell was feeding him.

  “Nothing,” I said. “Just not very hungry.”

  “I’d like some time with you today,” Daddy said to me. Russell blotted a drop of syrup from my father’s chin with a napkin.

  “To type?” I asked.

  “No, just to visit.” Daddy smiled. “We could meet in the springhouse if you like.”

  That suggestion completely derailed me. The thought of spending time with my father in the springhouse hours before I’d—maybe, possibly—be there with Chris felt too weird.

  “Maybe someplace else?” I said. I really didn’t feel like a big talk with him today, either. Ordinarily, I loved time with my father, but right now I wanted to be by myself. I wasn’t going to be able to concentrate on anybody or anything with all I had on my mind.

  “Want to suggest a place?” he asked.

  “Maybe the screened porch?” I said.

  He nodded slowly, his gaze so intent on me that I looked down at my nearly intact grapefruit half again.

  “All right,” he said. “I want to spend some time with Nanny this afternoon, so how about this morning? Say an hour from now? Do you have anything else on your agenda today?”

  I shook my head. “Just reading,” I said.

  “I’ll take you over to your grandmother’s a little before seven tonight,” Russell said.

  “Okay.” I looked at my mother. “May I be excused?”

  “You didn’t eat a single pancake,” Mom said.

  “I’ll eat hers,” Daddy said with a smile. “Wouldn’t want them to go to waste.”

  * * *

  Stacy finally called later that morning as I was heading out to the porch to sit with Daddy. I answered the phone in the kitchen, and when I realized it was Stacy, I stretched the cord so that I could talk to her from the hallway, afraid my father might be able to hear me through the kitchen window.

  “It took forever!” She sounded breathless. “But Bryan finally reached Chris last night, and he’ll do it! He’ll be there at ten tonight.”

  “Oh my God,” I whispered.

  “You’ll be there, right?”

  “Absolutely. Does he have the map?”

  “Bryan’s dropping it off at his house this afternoon,” Stacy said. “What are you going to wear?” Then she laughed. “Not that it matters. You won’t be wearing it long.”

  I didn’t answer. I felt prickly all over, as though I might be breaking out with a rash.

  “Is someone there?” Stacy asked. “You can’t talk now?”

  “Right,” I said. “I’ll call you tomorrow?”

  “I can’t wait to hear everything!” she said, and then she was gone. And for the first time since I’d given the palm stone to my father, I wished I had it back to hold in my pocket.

  * * *

  “Glad to see that smile,” Daddy said, as I sat down on the old white rocker next to his chair. “What’s up?”

  “Oh, Stacy just called.”

  “You two still high from the concert?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. It was awesome.” The concert seemed like a lifetime ago.

  He looked toward the mountains in the distance. “Nice out here,” he said. “I’m glad you suggested the porch. I haven’t simply sat and admired this view in a long time.” He looked thoughtful. “I should have done more of that,” he said.

  I looked toward the mountains myself. I briefly wondered how much of the view he was able to see, but the truth was, all I could think about was me, tonight, opening the springhouse door and finding Chris inside. I didn’t know how I was going to survive until then.

  “What did you want to talk about?” I asked.

  “Nothing special,” he said. “Just wanted time with my daughter.”

  “Well, here I am.” I felt awkward. I didn’t usually feel that way with him, but I worried he would somehow know what I was up to, as though it might be written on my face.

  He looked at me. “Ever since you and I talked about that day Amalia brought you to us, I’ve been thinking about it.” He smiled. “Remembering it. It was such a shock. Can you imagine? Suddenly there’s this fully formed little human being you created but who you never knew existed.”

  “Must have been weird,” I said. I was over that whole topic and surprised he was still thinking about it.

  “So, what do you think you’d like to be when you’re older?” he asked. The question was so insanely out of the blue that I thought I’d misheard him.

  “What?” I asked.

  “What are you hoping to do with your life?”

  I was exasperated by the question. I wanted to be upstairs in my room, looking through my closet as I figured out what to wear tonight. Maybe I should change the sheets on one of the beds in the springhouse, I thought. And I should probably take down the New Kids and Johnny Depp posters, too.

  “Molly, are you in there?” Daddy asked, and I sighed.

  “Why are we talking about this?” I asked.

  “Just wondering,” he said. “Humor me.”

  I sighed again. I’d give in. Get it over with. I hadn’t thought about that question in a while, though. What did I want to do with my life? Last summer’s plan to become an entomologist had lost its allure for me. I thought what my mother did was pretty cool, the way she understood how drugs worked, how they interacted with one another and I felt proud of her when I saw her in her white coat. But my father had the coolest job of all, helping people feel better about themselves. “Maybe a pretend therapist,” I said.

  “Really?”

  I saw a spark of joy in his eyes.

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “You’d be very good at it. Your sensitive nature would be an asset.”

  I tried to imagine myself in an office like his—the one he didn’t go to any longer—helping a girl like that Dorianna from the tape. I could picture it. I couldn’t quite see myself counseling an adult, though.

  “Maybe just with kids,” I said.

  “Do you want to have kids yourself?” he asked.

  “You mean … when I get married?”

  “Of course. Marriage first. Please.”

  “Sure,” I said. “And definitely more than one.”

  He laughed. “Are you saying you haven’t adored being an only child?”

  “That’s what I’m saying,” I said dryly.

  “I imagine it’s been rough at times.” He looked thoughtful, then smiled at me. “I like the idea that I’ll get to live on through you and your children,” he said.

  Whatever, I thought. It seemed like a weird thing to say.

  “Do you think you’ll live here when you’re an adult? At Morrison Ridge?”

  I tried to read the time on his watch, but the angle was wrong. “I’ll always live here,” I said. Living any place else was unimaginable.

  “Where will you build your house?”

  “Maybe on the other side of Nanny’s.” I pictured the thick woods at the northern end of the Ridge.

  D
addy smiled. “You mean as far from home as you could get and still technically be in Morrison Ridge.”

  I returned the smile. “Right.”

  I wanted to ask him if we were done talking for now. I thought again about the sheets in the springhouse. Mom would be suspicious if I changed them. It was better if I left them alone. Chris wouldn’t care.

  “I just wanted to tell you that I’m proud of you, Molly,” Daddy said, pulling my mind back onto the porch. He’d told me he was proud of me any number of times, but the fact that I was planning something I should be ashamed of made me wonder what he was talking about.

  “What for?” I asked.

  “Well, I’m always proud of you just for being a great girl and for how well you do in school, and how uncomplainingly you’ve helped me with my writing and … everything. But I also know this has been a rough summer for you. All your friends have been away and then we cracked down on how much you could see Stacy. Plus we cut you off from Chris, and you had feelings for him and thought he was ‘the one,’ but there will be lots of other guys in the future. Guys who are better suited to you.”

  “You don’t even know him,” I said, “so how can you say he’s not suited to me?” I didn’t want to argue with him—I really didn’t—but the words popped out before I could stop them.

  “I know his age and that’s all I need to know for now,” Daddy said.

  “That’s so lame,” I said. “You’re three years older than Mom.”

  “And if I were seventeen and she was fourteen, we wouldn’t be right for each other, either. Not until we were considerably older.”

  “You were nine years older than Amalia,” I argued.

  “We were both adults,” he said.

  “You should have given him a chance!” I said. “It’s not his fault he’s seventeen.”

  “We’ve already settled this, Molly,” he said.

  “No, you settled it,” I snapped. “I didn’t get to have anything to say about it. I just had to go along with what you say.”

  “In this case, yes. You did. You do.”

  I stood up. “I think you’re being very unfair.”

  He looked up at me with those big eyes. They reflected the sky and were bluer than I’d ever seen them. “I know you think that,” he said, “but—”

  “You always say, ‘Oh, Molly, tell me how you really feel about things’ and you tell me how you admire me and you’re proud of me and everything, but you don’t trust me. If you admire me so much, why don’t you trust me to know what’s right for me?”

  “Because you’re fourteen.”

  “That’s such a cop-out!” I took a step toward the house. “I’m done talking.”

  “Molly!” he said. “Stop.”

  I did. I stopped mid-step. Shut my eyes.

  “I know you don’t understand, darling,” he said. “I wouldn’t have understood it when I was your age, either. But you will. When you’re older, you will.” He paused for a moment. “That’s the best I can do,” he said.

  I looked at him. “Can I go now?” I asked.

  Time stretched between us as I stood there, staring at him, waiting to be released. Any other kid my age might have simply left, but I couldn’t seem to take another step toward the door.

  “Those kids you’re going to have?” Daddy said finally.

  “What about them?”

  “Be sure to hug them a lot,” he said, “in case someday you can’t.”

  I knew he needed me to hug him right then. I knew it, but my anger was too raw. I walked past him to find Russell. I’d tell him our visit on the porch was over.

  52

  Mom stared at me across the dinner table that night and I was afraid she was going to tell me I was old enough to be at tonight’s family meeting. I loved that I’d been left out of whatever boring talk was going on at those meetings and I was particularly glad to be left out tonight. I was ready to argue that Nanny needed my company, since she wasn’t coming. I figured Nanny had had it with talk about the land. As long as she went to bed by ten, everything should work out fine, though I had to admit the thought of walking through the dark all the way from Nanny’s house to the springhouse was freaking me out a little. It would be worth it, though, to be with Chris.

  Mom had made Daddy’s absolutely favorite food tonight: meat loaf with mashed potatoes and gravy. He was the only one of us who seemed interested in eating, though. Russell didn’t even have a plate. The four of us were weirdly quiet, and I didn’t know if Daddy was still upset with me for the way I’d acted on the porch or if I was still upset with him or what. I had this terrible fear Mom and Daddy and Russell were all on to me, though I didn’t know how they could be. I thought I felt their eyes on me, but when I looked at each of them, they didn’t appear to be interested in me at all. Mom was no longer looking in my direction. Instead, she stared at her plate, poking her fork slowly in and out of the meat loaf without lifting a bite of it to her mouth. Daddy’s meat loaf was nearly gone and he asked Russell to put another spoonful of potatoes on his plate. Then he looked over at my mother.

  “You’re not eating,” he said.

  When she turned her face toward him, I could tell she was trying to smile, but her eyes were full of tears. What was going on? “I have no appetite,” she said. She pushed her plate in his direction. “Want mine?”

  Daddy shook his head. “No, darling,” he said. “It was perfect, though. Russell, you have to have some.”

  “Later,” Russell said.

  “Do me a favor and put your hand on my miserable wife’s hand for me,” Daddy said to him.

  Russell and my mother exchanged a look of surprise, but Russell leaned across the table and set his hand on my mother’s.

  Daddy looked at her intently. “You are stronger than you know,” he said.

  She turned her hand so that she and Russell were palm to palm and she smiled at my father, though the tears never disappeared. “I’ll try to remember that,” she said.

  If it had been any other night, I would have asked, “What’s going on?” Tonight’s meeting marked some kind of change, I could tell. Were they going to give in to Uncle Trevor and sell our land after all? Was that why Nanny didn’t want to be there? I didn’t have the patience to invite that sort of conversation tonight. My mind was on one thing: Chris. That was why my own meat loaf was barely touched.

  Russell let go of Mom’s hand and got to his feet to clear my father’s plate from the table. I stood up, too. “I’m going to get ready to go to Nanny’s,” I said. I felt like I’d been drinking coffee, something I’d only done once in my life and once had been enough. It had made me feel like squirrels were running around inside my body.

  My father looked up at me. “Hug?” he asked.

  I debated a moment before leaning over to give him a little hug. I was still angry.

  “Longer,” he said, and with a sigh, I gave in to him. I held my arms around his shoulders. Rested my cheek on his temple. “You’re so beautiful,” he said, and in spite of myself, my eyes stung.

  When I stood up, I saw that my mother had turned away from us. She stared out the window with such concentration that I followed her gaze, but I saw only trees and, in the distance, the mountains.

  “Bye,” I said to all three of them as I headed for the door to the hallway.

  No one said a word in reply.

  53

  San Diego

  Aidan treats me as though I’m very ill, and that’s the way I feel. He makes me tea and tucks an afghan around my shoulders and we sit together in the corner of our sectional. I rest my head on his shoulder and begin to tell him all the things I should have told him long ago.

  “That family friend I told you about?” I say. “The one who broke her leg?”

  He hesitates and I know he doesn’t really remember the conversation. “Yes?” he prompts.

  “She wasn’t really a family friend,” I say. “She was…” I lean my head back to look at him. At his pretty, lovin
g brown eyes behind his glasses. “She was my birth mother.”

  I feel his body stiffen next to me. “What are you talking about?” The words come out slowly. I try to listen to discern if there is any anger behind them.

  “I haven’t told you the truth about my childhood,” I say. “About Morrison Ridge. I’ve left things out because … I was afraid.”

  “Afraid of what?” No, there is no anger, I think. Not yet.

  “You know I was engaged before we met, right?”

  “I’d forgotten, actually,” he says. “Jordan somebody?” He’s frowning, and I turn my head so I don’t have to see his face.

  “I told Jordan everything about my family,” I say. “It was two months before our wedding and he called it off, he was so … so disgusted by it all, and so I decided never to tell you. I didn’t see any reason to.” I’m sorry, Molly, Jordan had said. This is too much.

  “He was disgusted by what?” Aidan asks.

  “He said I was screwed up and he didn’t want to raise a family with me,” I say. “And maybe I was screwed up back then, but I’m not now. Or at least I thought I wasn’t. But now—”

  “Molly,” he says, “would you start at the beginning, please? I can’t follow you, and frankly, you’re scaring me right now.”

  I take a deep breath.

  “I told you my mother is dead,” I say, “but she’s not. Well, she’s dead to me, but she’s still alive.”

  “I thought your cousin just called to tell you she died?”

  “That’s my birth mother.” I tell him about my father’s relationship with Amalia and how she disappeared once she realized she was pregnant with me. How she showed up on our doorstep with the social worker. How Nora adopted me.

  “My father set it up so that she could live on our land,” I say, “so I would have her close by. I lived with my father and Nora—my adoptive mother. And Amalia lived nearby.”

  “Molly…” Aidan’s voice is incredulous. “Why didn’t you tell me this? With all we’re going through right now with the adoption, and you’ve had this experience, I just don’t get—”

  “I know you don’t,” I say. “I know it’s—”