Chapter 29
Twenty-Nine
En arrière: to travel backward.
Alexander
I landed back in Seattle on a cold, gray, rainy afternoon that perfectly echoed my mood.
My apartment was hauntingly empty. I collected a stack of mail, nearly all of which was marketing materials.
Absent my mother’s eye for cozy style or Rudy’s colorful thrift tastes, my apartment felt sterile, shades of black and gray that echoed the weather.
Had I put thought into a single item in the place?
My fridge was bare, and I couldn’t be bothered to deal with groceries, so I placed an order for takeout I didn’t eat and climbed into bed, where I didn’t sleep.
I missed Rudy. No surprise there. But I also missed the pool house and chicken soup and the smell right before a big snowstorm.
I missed our nightly routine of playing the game.
Hell, I missed ice on my knee, and Rudy taking care of me.
I missed kissing and sex and simply being close.
He was right though. I had unfinished business here.
I’d had no choice but to return, but I’d left a part of me behind in Pennsylvania.
In the morning, after a sleepless night, I trudged into the Seattle Ballet Company’s studio for class.
Time to march right back into the life I’d left.
No one here would care about my moping around.
Accordingly, I showed up early, worked hard, and pushed through all the distractions that wanted to trip me up.
I was a ballet robot, cold and clinical but technically perfect, each move carefully calculated to win the approval of the artistic director who’d arrived to watch my first class back.
“Alexander!” Patrice waited until after class to approach me as the other dancers took their break. She was a legendary evaluator of talent, and I had no doubt she’d decided on my next three roles simply from observing me during class. “You’re looking strong. No lingering tightness or pain?”
“No pain.” Well, no pain in my knee, but we weren’t discussing my heart.
I couldn’t afford to be anything other than confident with other dancers milling around.
It was a blessing to be part of such a large, prestigious company, but the talent glut made for hungry younger dancers waiting for an opportunity to break through.
Patrice had been nothing other than supportive during my recovery, and my fellow dancers had said all the right things upon my return.
However, I couldn’t shake the worry that I hadn’t truly been missed.
As Patrice continued her pointed questions, I glanced around the large studio.
Did I know any of these people? I’d been to a few of their parties.
I’d danced with several for a decade now.
Yet I couldn’t say as I knew any of their non-dancing interests or significant others’ names, or kept up with their major life events.
Shame on me. I knew more about the people in Rudy’s play group than I did my longtime coworkers.
That thought dogged me the rest of the day.
In the late afternoon, I emerged from the building that housed the studio and company offices into another gloomy day.
It wasn’t quite four, yet what little light there was had already started to dim.
Welcome to January in Seattle. I had zero desire to be alone all night in my apartment with my depressing musings.
Unfortunately, I had equally low desire to fetch groceries or do anything else of use, so I ended up wandering from the office building past our theater into the rest of the Seattle Center area.
After passing the stadium, as I neared the International Fountain, my phone buzzed in my coat pocket.
I almost ignored it, but what if it was Rudy?
Heart pounding, I pulled it out only to see a call from Victoria. Our only prior communication had been a few logistics texts for rehearsal and a thank you for the gift certificate. I’d told her she could reach out, though, so I dutifully answered.
“I need advice.” Victoria bypassed a traditional greeting in favor of a mournful moan. All the time with Kitty had evidently worn off in a tendency toward the dramatic, but if nothing else, the call was a decent distraction for me.
“I’m probably the last person to give advice.” Each hour away from Rudy made me feel that much more confused. Apart from that, my well-known bluntness meant few people sought me out for advice.
“Which is why I trust you.” Victoria was unfazed by my admission. “You’re brutally honest, and I need someone to tell me I’d be stupid to skip the summer intensive.”
“I’m not going to call you names.” If Victoria wanted harshness, she’d come to the wrong place. I tried to never cross the line into cruelty, even if I was truthful to a fault. “But I will remind you that if you skip the summer intensive, you might not be invited to stay for the school year.”
“I know.” Victoria groaned. There was a distant thumping noise like she’d flopped onto some piece of furniture. “I know.”
She would have been far better served calling anyone other than me, but I was here now.
My initial inclination was to give her a quick pep talk, but what if I was wrong?
I sank onto one of the benches rimming the large fountain.
In the summer, the bowl of the fountain would be full of children splashing in water and going right up to the many sprinklers on the huge silver dome.
Right now, though, the area was as empty as my brain.
What would Rudy say? I took a breath, trying to unpack the subtext in Victoria’s sighs and groans.
“Does part of you want to stay in Hollyberry?” I asked at last.
Victoria was quiet for so long that I was certain I’d chosen the wrong tactic, but then she exhaled hard.
“Maybe.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Kitty and our friends keep talking about senior year plans, and all I can think is that I won’t be here.”
“That’s hard.” I channeled Rudy again, making a sympathetic noise. My chest pinched. He’d been good for me, softened my sharp edges. God, I missed him.
“But sacrifice is all part of this life, right?” Victoria stopped my head from wandering away with thoughts of Rudy. Returning to a normal volume, Victoria firmed up her tone. “Tell me it will all be worth it in the end.”
“I can’t tell you that.” Every young dancer I’d ever known flashed in front of my eyes.
Brilliant careers, but those were the exception in a parade of disappointments, injuries, and flashes of success snuffed out by circumstances.
Behind every principal dancer were hundreds of dreamers who never reached that peak.
My own younger self joined the line of dancers pliéing along an imaginary barre.
God, I’d been so arrogant. My voice turned distant as I sifted through these seldom-entertained memories.
“I can tell you that I never had a Kitty. Never had a single close school friend. All my dancer friends were also competition, and we lived solely for ballet.” The words tumbled out, one after another, freed from decades of repression.
“I don’t remember graduation. If there was a prom, I didn’t go.
Isabella sent pics of her senior prank, but I was too busy prepping for a Sleeping Beauty production to really look.
The absolute only thing I wanted was to dance professionally. ”
“It’s all I’ve ever wanted too.” Victoria sounded more earnest than certain.
“Is it?” I kept my voice as gentle as I could manage.
“Because it’s also okay if it’s not the only thing for you.
I told you all that because those were not healthy years.
” Standing from the bench, I paced in front of the fountain.
This was the first time I’d dared admit that fact aloud, but it was true.
Honestly, it was a wonder I’d survived. Many of the early dancers I’d known hadn’t lasted nearly this long.
“If you can imagine doing anything else, you might want to do that. This is a hard, unforgiving life, and you’re allowed to want a different path. ”
“I’d be letting so many people down.” Victoria was back to a near whisper.
“But what about you?” I asked. My drive had always been internal.
My father said if you were going to do something, you might as well be the best, but I’d never had the impression my parents’ love was conditional.
Over the course of The Nutcracker, I’d been around Victoria’s mother enough to know she had similar high standards to my father, but she also clearly adored Victoria.
“People who love you want to see you happy.”
“Yeah.” Victoria didn’t sound convinced.
“And if that happiness comes from boarding school into a trainee position into apprenticeship and so on, that’s wonderful, but if that thought doesn’t fill you with joy, it’s okay to choose something that does.”
“So ballet is the only thing that makes you happy?” Victoria asked softly, tone curious like I was an oddity. Which was good. I was glad she had so much more going on in her life at this stage.
I opened my mouth to say yes. Yes, this was my sole source of happiness.
But then, the wind whipped past me, a chill racing through me not unlike the night Rudy and I had wandered the neighborhood with all the holiday lights.
I saw the look in his eyes right before we kissed, the same wonder every time.
I felt the rush of winning a round of the game.
A laugh bubbled up at the memory of the game-night antics and how good it felt to beat Troy and Chris.
I’d been happy back in Pennsylvania, truly happy.
“It was. For a long time,” I said instead, feeling each word out. On the other side of the fountain, a young mother pushed a shiny black stroller with a bundled-up toddler. She stopped to adjust the stroller blanket, and my chest did a strange flip. “I simply couldn’t see another life for myself.”
“Because you had so much talent.” Victoria was quick to agree and also dead wrong.
“No. Talent only got me so far.” I wasn’t so egotistical as to think of myself as divinely blessed.
“I’ve met plenty of talented dancers who chose other paths, like college.
I had…” I trailed off, teeth digging into my lower lip.
The sharp sensation reminded me of every ache and twinge of pain along the path to be here.
Non-dancers wouldn’t understand, but Victoria might.
“A drive I can’t really explain. A fear almost.”
“You were afraid to not dance?” Victoria’s voice went up on the question, and I could visualize her tilting her head at me.
“It sounds silly, doesn’t it?” I gave a self-conscious chuckle. “But I didn’t know who I’d be without ballet.”
“And you didn’t want to find out,” Victoria said flatly, disappointment radiating through the phone.
“No. But that meant I missed out on a lot.” The park lights had started to come on.
Across the fountain, a man had joined the woman with the stroller, greeting each warmly, an idyllic little family.
The toddler clapped, and my chest gave another of those weird pangs.
“It’s okay to want to find out if you can live without ballet, Victoria. ”
“That’s not what I expected you to say.” Victoria gave a groan accompanied by a soft slapping sound like she’d hit a pillow. “I thought you’d tell me everything you gave up was worth it and that you’d do it again in a heartbeat.”
“Trust me, I’m surprised too.” A new gust of wind swept through the park, and I shoved my free hand into my pocket, encountering a stiff piece of paper.
“Whatever you choose, you don’t want to have regrets.
” I fingered the card in my pocket, knowing exactly what it was before I pulled it out.
“Even if it means changing directions, follow your heart.”
“And if my heart says to go to the summer intensive?” Victoria sounded resolved, but I didn’t like the wooden note to her tone.
“Then that’s what you do. But make sure it’s your heart you’re listening to.
” Lord knew I’d listened to my ego for years and years.
My brain had been loud too, that all-encompassing drive never shutting up.
My fears had drowned out a lot as well, a static to run from, not toward.
But my heart? Had I ever truly stopped to listen before?
Victoria gave a quiet sigh. “You’re awfully smart.”
“No, actually, I’m quite dumb.” I turned the embossed card over in my palm. Had I made a terrible mistake? The young family had stopped to sit on the bench nearest to mine, the parents holding hands. I missed Rudy with a fierceness that defied all logic. “You have no idea.”
“Want to tell me about it?” Victoria brightened like my woes would be an excellent distraction.
“Nope.” I chuckled. Much as I needed answers, they needed to come from within me.
“Okay.” Victoria laughed along with me. “Thank you for answering my call.”
“The pleasure was all mine.” I ended the call with a familiar pleasantry, but I actually meant it.
I wasn’t sure if I’d helped Victoria at all, and I’d made a terrible muddle of my own thoughts, but for the first time in days, I felt a glimmer of hope.
Perhaps this situation was something to be solved rather than endured.