The heat rose to my cheeks. “I assume you’ve discussed the matter with Jack Dorian? He might have a fair bit to say on who plays the lead.” And who doesn’t. “Besides that, I wouldn’t care to work with him.” Being around Jack felt like nearing the edge of a balcony and looking down. He stretched me and poked at my comfort. And when he was near, all I could think about was the last time I’d spoken to him. What I’d told him, and his response.
He heaved himself up against the arm of the chair. “And why is it that Jack Dorian seems so intolerable to you of late? For the past year you’ve flinched at every mention of his name.”
The man truly did notice everything. Every last thing. I may have left the stage, but my life was still on display a bit.
“Has he done something to you?”
“No, it’s simply that he’s arrogant, he’s impetuous and utterly wild, untamable and flirtatious, with such grandiose notions that he will always bring trouble. You should see the way he is around the other dancers, Grandfather. He makes me even more thankful to know someone like Philippe, who is so utterly different.” I swallowed, hoping he wouldn’t see this for the wretched excuse it was. “I shouldn’t work on his ballet. Truly, it’s best if I don’t.”
“We might be able to arrange private practices for you, just as we did for my Viola. It isn’t unheard of. You wouldn’t have to work with any of them for very long.”
My voice grew soft as temptation played at the fringes of my heart. “Perhaps someday, if ... things change ... at Craven.” Like the hiring of a new choreographer.
“If you’re waiting for Craven to be rebuilt, it won’t happen. Not without this ballet, at least. The insurance money did help a little, but I cannot afford a total rebuild of the stage area if no one will come, and nothing short ofLe Fantome de Cravenwill make them.”
“The Ghost of Craven. A fitting name.” I sighed. “I cannot do it, though. You know I’d do anything to help you, Grandfather. Especially after all you’ve done—”
He stepped closer and drew out a tissue-wrapped parcel, placing it on my lap. “Think it over and we’ll talk again.” He turned and walked toward the door. Conversations always ended when he decided that they should, his cane the period that punctuated it.
Had he not heard my refusal? “My answer will be the same.”
“One cannot escape who she is.” He paused, one hand on the door. “By the way, you’d be dancing opposite Philippe Rousseau. I assumed that would be a welcome treat.”
I caught my breath, melting from somewhere deep inside.Dancing opposite Philippe Rousseau.“What makes you think—”
“Jack told me.” He hesitated, fingers resting on the edge of the door. “You know, if you desire something as deeply as all that, you have only to tell me. I delight in giving you these things.”
I smiled. How strange it was to be loved this way—and by him, the Great Fournier. When he rose to go, I untied the string and folded back the paper and there they were—a new pair of scarlet slippers, all my own. I clutched them with wonder, running my fingers over the red satin and remembering the day I’d laid similar ones onherlap.
I looked up at the doorway, and Fournier stood there watching me.
“How did you—”
“Where do you think they came from in the first place? I gave both Jane and your mother those red shoes myself, before every glorious performance.”
They were exquisite. Timeless. Just like my mother. The sight of them brought me back to myself, stirring my desire for beauty, for being a part of it all, once again.
I lifted my book as he slipped out, but my heart pounded and my mind wandered back to that old forgotten materials room on a starry night a million years ago, when a girl with these red satin shoes danced the most brilliant pas de deux of her life with a most perfect partner. Philippe had been by a few times over the months, but he disappeared often still. I had not allowed my heart to pursue anything with him, or to even hope.
Yet with the warmth of the fireplace, I felt myself melting into his steady arms once again, following his movements as if our very souls shared a rhythm. How deeply I still felt that dance, how ardently. I could have that again. It was being offered to me if only I would accept it. I looked down at the shoes again, my fingers still running over their surface, along the length of the ribbons. Then before I knew it, quite against my will, the dancer’s heart in me was awakening, sparking with life, and answering yesagainst the silence of the room.
The adventure began a mere three days after my reluctant acceptance, and nothing went as I’d imagined. Dancing with Philippe in rehearsals had been harder than I had anticipated. With everyone watching, the pressure of a grand performance,there was none of the smooth magic of that first midnight dance in the materials room years ago. My own heightened awareness of the situation, the magnitude of a dream now reached, infused my limbs with a terrible awkwardness that was at times hard to press through. He was patient always, working through the paces over and over again, but I often left frustrated with myself.
We saw each other only in the theater in those days, which was for the best. I couldn’t fathom how my parents had carried on a love affair off the stage while dancing as partners on it. I was simply too rattled.
It was manageable until the night before we were to perform, and suddenly after the final dress rehearsal, I couldn’t stop shaking. I ran down the empty corridor, past the glowing sconces on the wall, and released my breath in the dusty old materials room that continued to be my sanctuary. Yet it wasn’t sanctuary I needed. I had once again become afraid of heights—afraid of dancing the lead before the wild expectations of a packed audience, afraid of grasping my years-long dream that had been at star height for so long—and I desperately needed someone to remind me how to fly.
Philippe, kind and attentive, had his feet too firmly planted on the ground for such things, and there was no one else who understood. No one who compared. Once I’d experienced a night lit with vibrant stars, every other light seemed dim and inconsequential.
I’d hardly spoken to Jack since returning for his ballet. He flitted from this complication to that, attending everything at once as he’d done before, and he didn’t stand in place long enough to have a conversation. Perhaps he intended it that way.
I caught him looking at me a handful of times throughout the rehearsals, but I couldn’t read his bright-eyed look. I hadhoped in time the scars his rejection left on my heart would heal, but they only intensified every time I watched his vibrant energy and remembered what it was to be touched by it.
Still shaking, and growing desperate, I returned to the backstage area that had emptied so quickly, but Jack was gone. In the familiar hush of the place, I walked across the great space illuminated only by two high covered gaslights and frowned at the emptiness—but his coat was still there. That gray wool thing with large black buttons in place of brass, because Jack had enough shine for his entire person.
I walked over to it and picked it up, holding it close and drinking deeply of the trapped scent of him. It was all life and vitality mingled with strong black tea and warm sunshine. I closed my eyes and was back in that barn looking at the trapeze in the loft, that smile radiating nearby. I couldfeelit, much as one felt the sun.
A tiny sound shuddered through the empty space and I spun to look. A small gust of wind curled over my skin. No one was visible, but I could sense someone there. I waited for several heart-pounding seconds, but no one appeared. The past would always haunt this old theater, it seemed—all the tragic love stories played out on the stage and behind it, all the passion released here vibrating through the emptiness with an air of tragedy.
