“Speaking of which, want to get the full experience tonight?” they ask with a crooked smile, and Halina nods.
She shakes her shoulders in an approximation of a shimmy. “Let’s go dancing.”
Ari snorts when they jump off the stage to follow her. “Come on, boss, let’s get you settled while I find us a bar to go to tonight.”
Halina closes her eyes as she lets her instincts take over. Her body follows the beat of the music, and Ari’s presence is a nice shield against the dance floor crowd. This bar is the right choice for her mood, and the sapphic clientele is the right choice for the purpose of the night.
They dressed similarly, she and Ari, in tight, dark tank tops and black linen pants. Until her assistant changes their hair color yet again, they could be mistaken for twins, or at least siblings. They have the same willowy, slender body type and the same fair hair.
Halina lifts her arms above her head. Her long braid moves from side to side on her back. Ari puts one hand on her waist.
“You need to drink, Lina,” they say in her ear to cover the volume of the music.
“Not thirsty.” She opens one eye when they lightly pinch her arm, only to find them smirking.
“You need to drink,” they insist while they make Halina turn toward the bar, “and I need to get to the bar pronto.”
Halina glances at the bar. Ari’s sudden and unquenchable thirst is due to the man behind the bar. Sleeves of tattoos cover his impressive muscles and dark skin; eyeliner circles his eyes, their green shade catching the light of the lamp over the bar. The other bartender is much more to Halina’s taste. Her dark skin is almost blue in the bar’s lights, and her small breasts and tight abs are artfully hinted at under a pastel pink top. She has the most dignified posture Halina has seen in such an establishment. She would love to make her less dignified, take her apart with her fingers as though she’s a complicated piece of music to bring to life.
“Maybe I am thirsty,” Halina says. She stands with her forehead against Ari’s temple, never taking her eyes off the bar. Ari laughs and plays along until more eyes are on them.
At the counter, Ari bends over the metal bar top, arching their back and twirling the one long strand of hair on the left side of their head between their fingers until the barman finally approaches them. From the dark-eyed leer he gives Ari, Halina is confident of two things: It’s a good thing she doesn’t care to fight Ari for the man’s attention–she would lose—and she needs to find herself a companion for the night.
As she waits for a potential companion to come her way, Halina keeps her back against the bar to show off the long line of her body in the best light possible. She sips the drink Ari slid her way and watches the crowd. From the corner of her eye, she spots the dignified bartender gazing at her, a dark sunflower drawn to Halina’s starlight. Halina doesn’t react. It’s better to let her come to her at her own pace, which gives Halina the upper hand, so she keeps her eyes away from her.
Her eyes land on a short woman who dances by herself. She’s not spectacular in any way: short, dark hair stuck in curls against darkish skin, compact and curvy body wrapped in a black dress with no regard for the fashion rules for her body type. But her attitude is enough to catch Halina’s attention. She moves as if she’s alone, as if she doesn’t care about being the subject of more than one conversation. It’s not an act of seduction, her dance. It’s pure, unadulterated self-pleasure, right there in the middle of the group.
Halina keeps her eyes on her, and the bar’s lights help her catch gray eyes and a wide smile. While she’s not usually attracted to that body type, she could be tempted by the dancing woman if she doesn’t manage to seduce the bartender.
“Bonsoir.” A deep voice behind her pulls her from the hypnosis of the plump woman’s hips. Her eyes find black ones surrounded with sparkly eyeliner.
Bingo.
“Hello,” she replies, draping herself against the counter as she deepens her accent for the “exotic” factor. The way the bartender’s expression turns predatory before she slides a glass toward Halina means it’s certain she’ll get to unravel Miss Regal’s impeccable posture before the end of the night.
Ch 3
A Above Middle C
Royal Blue
More than anything, going out dancing tonight was a celebration, a way to let out her enthusiasm lest it overwhelm her. The email from Loupan is still fresh in her mind; for something so important to their future, it was surprisingly short: two lines to tell them their work convinced the board. Their proposed budget was deemed satisfactory “if you can meet the time limit,” and they are to come to her office in two days’ time to get their proofs of accreditation. Leo and she needed to read it a couple of times to let the message seep in: work was entirely impossible.
She decides to connect with the life she left behind across the Atlantic and across North America too. Christ, the West Coast is far away.
The lilac of the Skype ringtone can bring excitement or dread, depending on who is on the other end. Alexandra bites her little finger’s nail while she waits, but she stops when her mother’s face fills the screen.
“Alexandra!” Pauline exclaims, Independence blue filling Alexandra’s mind. Alexandra can see her eyes going soft despite the pixelated image.
“Mamuschka,” Alexandra replies with a wave.
“How are you, bubbeleh?”
The Yiddish term of endearment makes her grin, and she sighs happily. “I’m good, Mom,” she replies. “Lots of work, but it’s exciting.”
“Good, good.” Pauline pauses. She runs her hand through dark hair streaked with white, and her eyes avoid Alexandra’s gaze. Alexandra’s heart squeezes in her chest.
Not today, please, Mom, not today…
“And how are things with Jeannette and Georges?” Pauline asks happily, ultramarine blue now.
Now, Alexandra’s heart is beyond squeezing, it’s breaking. “Mom,” she starts slowly, “Aunt Jeannette is dead, she… she has been dead for eight years now.”
A frown appears on Pauline’s face; doubt and confusion are clear in her gray eyes, so similar to Alexandra’s own. “Has she?” she asks. Her voice is small and childlike; blue veers into green.
Alexandra nods, and it takes a lot to keep her tears away. “I’m sorry.”
Pauline shakes her head. “No, bubbeleh, I am the one who’s sorry,” she says, in a stronger voice.
“Mom, do you take the pills the doctors prescribed?” Alexandra asks, anxious to take advantage of this moment of lucidity.
“I do,” she replies, “but…”
“But?”
“But,” Pauline says with a sigh, “it’s been a while since I went to the doctor.”
“Mom!”
“I know, I know.” Pauline’s defiant pout is too far out of character for Alexandra’s liking. “I just didn’t want to go.”
“And Dad just let it happen?” Alexandra asks, fighting the pain in her chest at the mention of her father. Her pain must appear on her face nevertheless, if her mother’s softened gaze is any indication.
“Your father…” she starts, wiping the side of her face, “…he’s a good man. He doesn’t want to hurt me so he just—”
“Does nothing.” Alexandra groans. “Mom, all Henry needs to do is take you to your appointments, whether you want to go or not.”
“I know, bubbeleh.”
“I don’t—I don’t suppose he’ll agree to talk to me?” Alexandra asks. She has to ask, although there is no reason for any different outcome than in all her previous calls.
“Bub…”
“No, it’s—it’s okay,” Alexandra says. A dismissive wave of her hand ends the discussion. “No point in forcing it.”
Alexandra inherited her stubbornness from the Graff side of the family. She and her father were cut from the same cloth: loyal to
their opinions and beliefs and as headstrong as wild horses.
Ten years have passed since their falling-out, since her coming out. Ten years, and her father still doesn’t want to mend the bridge he burned. Alexandra won’t apologize for this part of her, and, if Henry wants them to stay on the worst of terms, so be it.
“And how is your Leo?”
Alexandra squints at the screen and fiddles with the brightness to properly examine her mother’s face. Is it a joke or another episode?
“Um, we work well together.” She is still on edge. The moment her mother’s deep laugh booms in her speakers, though, as sweet and amber as date honey, relief floods through her.
“Just kidding,” Pauline says, dark eyes sparkling in the light of the California morning.
Alexandra pokes out her tongue, and her mother only laughs harder. “Go and see your doctor today, Mom? Please? For me?”
“Scout’s honor,” Pauline replies, lifting three fingers in a jaunty salute.
“I love you, Mamuschka.”
“Love you too, bubbeleh.”
The screen goes dark when her mother hangs up, and Alexandra buries her face in her hands. Telling her parents, her mother at least, about her professional success was the whole point of her call. Instead, Alexandra just piled more worry on her shoulders.
She needs to collect herself before she calls her twin sister. She has no doubt about Elisabeth’s ability to read right through her as if she’s made of glass, but she can hope. She lets the dark colors of the nightlife wash over her and replace the worrisome variations in her mother’s voice, then makes the call.
“Sasha!”
“Hey, Liz.” Alexandra’s mouth stretches into a wide smile at the sight of her sister.
During their childhood, their parents encouraged them to dress and behave as identically as possible. Time has passed, and their paths have created differences: They wear their hair differently; they have put on weight in different areas. Now they are mirrors for each other’s inner selves, which are still intimately connected, no matter how far from each other they may be.
Elisabeth is usually immaculate, the perfect Jewish princess, not a hair out of place and wearing a pristine outfit. Who is the woman filling her screen with bags under her eyes? She wears a messy braid, and Alexandra notices creases and stains on her videogame-themed T-shirt. Elisabeth Yael Graff-Abernathy does not own T-shirts, much less geeky, dirty ones.
“What’s wrong?” Alexandra asks.
Elisabeth twists her mouth into a grimace. “Am I so obvious?”
“I wasn’t aware you could do casual, Sis,” Alexandra points out.
Elisabeth examines herself, puzzlement written over her face. “Oh.”
“Seriously, Liz, what’s going on?”
Elisabeth attempts a smile, but her chin quivers. “I petitioned for a gett this morning.”
Alexandra’s eyes open wide, and she scoots closer to her screen. “You’re getting a divorce? For reals?”
“Oh, yeah.” Elisabeth pushes a stray strand of hair away from her face. “I kicked Matthew out of the house last night.”
“Fuck.”
“Yep.” Elisabeth clenches her jaw and sits back in her chair. “Fucker took me for an idiot one time too many. Or maybe banged one. I don’t want the sordid details.”
“He cheated on you?”
“He didn’t even try to hide or deny it, Sasha.” She bites her lower lip as a couple of tears roll down her cheeks. “He had lipstick on the zipper of his pants! The idiot just put the pants in the laundry basket, like I—as if it didn’t matter what it did to me.”
Alexandra’s jaw drops. She’s so angry she could take a plane, find her piece-of-shit, soon-to-to-be-ex-brother-in-law, and kick his sorry ass. “The fucking garbage reject.”
Elisabeth nods through her sniffles. “Should be settled fairly quickly,” she says, wiping a stray tear.
“And how did the munchkin react to the whole mess?” Alexandra asks, and Elisabeth brightens.
“The munchkin is fourteen, Sash.”
“My nephew is still very much a baby and will always be, thank you very much.”
“And to answer your question, Zach helped me pack his father’s stuff.”
“Oh?”
“As in, he threw the opened suitcase down the stairs.”
“How very helpful.”
“I know, right?” Elisabeth exclaims, with more enthusiasm in her voice than in her eyes. “You should have seen the way he signed his insults. I was so proud.”
“Me too.” Alexandra mirrors her sister’s posture and rests her chin on her closed fist. “Will you be okay?”
Elisabeth shrugs, in a perfect imitation of her teenage self. Her braid is visible as it swishes side to side. “I’ll get over it. Perhaps I’ll spend our birthday with a bottle of Shiraz for company, but it will still be better company.”
“You’re more than welcome to my couch. I’m sure Punshki misses you,” Alexandra insists.
“You know what, it’s a great idea.” Elisabeth smiles, her happiness now clear in her eyes. “Maybe not for our birthday though; it’s too soon, isn’t it…”
“We can take care of the logistics whenever you choose to come, Liz. Put those frequent-flyer miles to good use. God knows Matthew doesn’t have a say in how you live your life anymore.” Alexandra pauses. “As if he ever had any. He never deserved you, and you’re too smart not to be aware of it too.”
“You always told me so.”
“Always thought so.”
“Hmm.”
“I also always said the world was yours for the taking, and your recent loss of two hundred pounds or so of unhelpful flesh should help.”
Alexandra and Elisabeth share a smile and both reach for the screen in a virtual joining of hands.
“Keep me posted,” Alexandra says before blowing her a kiss. “Paris and I will welcome you with our arms wide open.”
“Will do.” Elisabeth’s lips are puckered in a kiss, far too close to the camera, but just what Alexandra needed in order to laugh. “And we need to talk about your side of the pond, Frenchie.”
“Will do.”
She wants to talk with her sister about their mother, the recent development in her mental illness, and how they need to be more watchful of her decline, but this is not the time. Next week—next week for sure, she’ll talk with her sister to make sure the burden of the situation doesn’t fall on only one set of shoulders. She also wants to share the good news about the Philharmonie’s commission and how she won the contract, but this, too, can wait. Clearly, sharing her big step was not in the cards for tonight.
The energy from the club is not entirely dissipated, not enough to let her find sleep. Worse, it now walks hand in hand with anxiety over her loved ones, too far away for her to protect them.
Alexandra puts on her jacket and goes out. Who cares if the clock is striking morning hours? When one walks the streets of Paris, there is always somewhere to go, something to see and, given her neighborhood, something sweet for comfort.
* * *
With all the delays due to weather and construction, they need to work more quickly than usual to respect the approved timeframe. Completion before the start of the next year seems to be an impossible task, and yet it is the timeframe they agreed on.
They set up their work stations in the space allotted to them; they have two large tables on which to pin the blueprints of the windows so they can cut each piece of glass without fuss. At a safe distance, they set up a sturdier table to pull the lead without hitting a piece of glass or each other. They also install a welding table to work on the LED system Leo will put behind the panels. And then they begin work on the simpler panels while the orchestra starts rehearsing.
It seems everybody has been set back, Alexandra muses as she rolls
the bubble wrap from one of the orange panels that will frame the whole structure and give it its dynamic. From the concert room below them comes the muted, indistinct noise of instruments being tuned and people shouting at each other in various languages. Far from an annoyance, it makes Alexandra relax. This Tower of Babel suits her and her mindset just fine.
As Leo slides one of the biggest pieces out of the crate, Alexandra freezes. She catches a change in the chaos reigning over the orchestra. It’s much more harmonious; all the instruments come together around a single note, staggering in its clarity, in its purity. The note, a tuning A if she isn’t mistaken, lasts, hangs in the air, and even gains momentum. Alexandra can’t for the life of her move away from it. She’s captured in the perfect space of royal blue euphony.
It stops, abruptly, and Alexandra brings herself back to the world around her. She gets dizzy and shakes her head. Be it in the central panel or as a recurring detail, she has to incorporate this particular royal blue in the composition. Now if she could only—
“Ahem.”
Leo leans against a wooden crate. “Welcome back,” he teases gently, and points at the crate. “Now, I could use a hand with this.”
Alexandra rushes to help him. She is always embarrassed when her synesthesia gets the best of her at inopportune moments. “Of course. Here, sorry.”
They carefully hold the fragile edge of an intermediate panel. She focuses her strength on keeping it steady while Leon pulls it out of its box.
Once the glass is safely on its table, Leo laughs off her inattention. “If I wasn’t used to you going away into the music or into your head by now,” he says with a wink, “we would have a serious communication problem, carissima.”
More music comes from the concert room, but, this time, Alexandra is in control. The notes and their matching colors float around her without affecting her. They have too much to do in too little time to pay attention to rehearsals. She’ll have plenty of other opportunities to lose herself in the music.
Concerto in Chroma Major Page 3
