Chapter Twenty Ben
Dear Mr. Hawthorne,
Thank you for your application to the NYU Summer Poetry Intensive. We are pleased to inform you that you have been awarded a spot in the program. Please see the attached materials for information on fees payment, the program syllabus, and required reading. The Intensive begins on July 27 and concludes on August 29. We look forward to meeting you.
I stare at the email for several long minutes—a habit I’ve developed over the past couple of days since it first appeared in my inbox. I can hardly believe it.
I wasn’t expecting to get in. I wasn’t even expecting a response—rejection or otherwise.
The day after Ruby and I returned to the city, I knew I had to shift my life around. I thought about what it might be like to devote myself to the board at the NYC Ballet for the next decade or two of my life. I would enjoy it, of course, but making big decisions while wearing a suit doesn’t sound like my idea of a truly rewarding career.
I kept thinking about what I admitted to Ruby—what I’ve never said aloud to another person before because it felt stupid and whimsical and pointless. I like poetry, I told her. Even though she laughed at me, she agreed that she could see it happening for me.
It’s all because of her. Whether she knows it or not, she’s inspiring. She made me feel like I have a real purpose in life. Like I don’t have to just sit back and watch other people do beautiful, artistic things. I can create too. Maybe people won’t like what I create—maybe people won’t even like me—but it’s worth it.
As soon as I received the email from NYU, I fired off my resignation letter to the Board of Directors. It took a grand total of twelve minutes before my father was blowing up my phone. I received an earful about wasted opportunities and how much I’ve embarrassed him, but I took it all in stride. I am a Hawthorne, but I am also just Ben. My siblings might be satisfied with the paths they’ve chosen, but I need something more.
Maybe after this summer program, I’ll apply for an MFA. Maybe I won’t. Maybe I’ll decide that I actually hate writing poetry and I’ll switch directions. Maybe I’ll become a painter or a violinist. All I know is that I want to do something meaningful.
I stare at the email for a moment longer.
Then I reach for my phone.
When I call Ruby, it goes straight to voicemail. I check the time and see that it’s half past three. She’s probably in rehearsal. Or in a costume fitting. Or meeting with the company’s massage therapist.
Or maybe she’s just ignoring me.
For a while, all I can do is pace around my apartment. In all honesty, I hate this apartment. I bought it when I turned twenty-one and the full depth of my trust fund became available to me. It’s the sort of real estate that many people covet—a penthouse in a high-rise with advanced tech and sleek design. Obviously, it’s nice, but I’d rather live somewhere like Ruby does. Somewhere more authentically New York, with exposed brick walls and rickety stairs and the persistent scent of old dust. That sounds like the kind of place a writer should live.
At half past four, I try calling her again. It rings and rings, then goes to voicemail. I think about leaving a message, but what I need to say can’t be explained within ten or fifteen seconds.
Ruby, I text her. Are you busy? Can I see you?
I go back to pacing. Half an hour passes. I check my phone again and see that she’s read the message, but hasn’t responded. Has she already heard about me leaving the board? Word travels fast in a ballet company, even when it’s something as mundane as one of the many administrative roles leaving.
Is she angry at me for it?
At five o’clock, I decide that I can’t wait around another minute. I have to see her. I have to explain myself. If I don’t have the bittersweet benefit of being stuck in a car with her, then I need to go find her myself.
In the elevator on the way down, I tap my foot impatiently and scroll idly through my email. There’s a newsletter from an international ballet news website that I subscribed to when I joined the board with a headline that catches my eye.
Beloved Prima Ballerina Retires Early…
I click on it, thinking it’ll keep me distracted at least long enough for me not to completely implode on the walk through the parking garage to my car.
The article is short and simple.
Katia Nikov, famed principal dancer at the New York City Ballet, has announced an early retirement this week. The dancer, who was already out for the season due to a minor wrist injury, states that she’s leaving the sport in order to start a family with her husband, celebrated costume designer Jack Brown.
“What?” I whisper aloud to the empty elevator. It hits the bottom level with a cheerful ding—the doors sliding open as I try to remember how to move my legs.
Katia Nikov is retiring. That’s the same dancer that Ruby was supposed to take over for in Giselle… before I unknowingly screwed everything up.
I jog to my car, thinking of nothing but Ruby. The raw ruby in my pocket seems to grow heavier as my mind hums out the syllables of her name like a metronome. I’ve been carrying the stone with me for the past week. I’d rather trust the guidance of the wise woman of the beach than take my chances with disobeying fate.
The drive to her apartment is torturous. From Tribeca to Little Italy, it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes, but I idiotically forgot about the reality of rush hour. I fidget in the seat, suddenly understanding how Ruby feels when she’s too anxious to sit still.
Katia is gone. There’s a spot open for a new principal dancer.
It has to be Ruby. The company might want to poach another dancer who already has experience in principal roles, but if they’re eager to give a soloist a life-changing promotion, then Ruby will definitely be the first choice. I’m not biased when I say that everyone in the higher levels of the company knows her name.
She has promise, Gerald himself said just last month.
They have to promote her. I know Ruby would kill me if I interfered, so I refrain from calling Gerald myself. He probably wouldn’t even listen to me, despite the weight of the Hawthorne name, since I’ve now resigned.
Instead of waiting another moment in traffic, I parallel park on the avenue in a residential spot that will probably earn me a ticket, but I don’t care. I leap out of the car, dodging a taxi as I do, and start running toward Ruby’s apartment.
Ru-by. Ru-by. My feet pound out the sound of her name.
As I round a corner and spot a bodega’s sidewalk overflowing with fresh flowers, I skid to a halt.
I can’t show up to her place empty-handed.
“Think,” I mutter to myself. “Think, think, think.”
I stare at the flowers. Surely, she must have said something at some point about what her favorite kind is. Maybe she mentioned it in passing last year when we met for the first time.
If she did, I can’t remember. I curse my useless memory.
There are bouquets of red roses. Red like rubies. But is that too romantic? Too presumptuous? Too cliché?
Does she like peonies? The only pink I’ve ever seen her wear on purpose is the soft pastel pink of her pointe shoes, but that doesn’t mean she dislikes the color.
What about hydrangeas? Orchids? Sunflowers?
Does she even like flowers at all?
Am I fretting over this only to make a fool out of myself in the end?
My eyes land on a bouquet of heavy lilac stems.
Lilacs. Of course. A smile curves my lips as I recall her stunning performance as the Lilac Fairy this past spring. Perfect.
I grab the flowers, toss a twenty-dollar bill at the bodega guy, insist that he keep the change, and then carry on down the street.
I dodge tourists and residents alike as I go, weaving through the crowds as they form lines for the countless Italian eateries in this neighborhood. Strings of tiny Italian flags wave in the hot summer breeze overhead. Across the street, a portly man shouts to a younger man about Getting the damn dough started. I laugh to myself. It’s so different from Ruby’s hometown, yet somehow still the same. Small town or big city, there is so much life to witness, share, and participate in. So many people to appreciate, avoid, and admire.
Leaping over the back wheel of a rusted bicycle as a teenage boy locks it up, I narrowly avoid clipping the side of a table from a dining area that has overflowed onto the pavement. Someone hurls a curse in my direction, but I ignore it and clutch the lilacs close to keep them safe.
Flinging myself around the corner of Ruby’s street, I pause for a moment to catch my bearings. At least I can remember which stoop is hers. I walk to it, grateful that this tiny side street is emptier than the others. If this goes badly, there will be less witnesses to my shame.
Climbing the steps, I stare at the array of doorbells. The name Sullivan is printed on a tiny strip of paper next to apartment 3FE. I press the button and hear the dull buzz of the bell echoing all the way up on the third floor.
There’s no answer. One more glance at my phone tells me she hasn’t answered my text yet, either.
What do I do now? I hop back down to the street and start pacing. A woman with a stroller, yapping away on her phone, gives me a wide berth.
Back and forth, I pace in front of her stoop. Will she be at the studio late tonight? How long is it reasonable for me to wait out here before someone reports me for suspicious activity? Is Ruby close with her neighbors? Are they protective of her?
Am I completely and utterly insane?
“Ben?”
I halt so fast that my momentum almost sends me tumbling forward into an overflowing recycling bin.
When I spin around, there she is. There she is. Tall, beautiful, and painfully intimidating. Her hair is pinned in a ballerina bun, her face flushed from the June heat. She’s yanked on a pair of track pants over her blue leotard and, despite the fact that it’s summer, is wearing a pair of Uggs. The strap of her athletic bag digs into her bare shoulder as she stands there, keys in hand, and stares at me.
“Hi,” I say.
“What are you doing here?”
She doesn’t look angry or freaked out. So that has to mean something good, right?
“You didn’t answer my calls,” I answer.
Ruby snorts softly. “So, you came to my building?”
Her eyes land on the lilacs. I watch her brow furrow with confusion.
I hold out the flowers for her. “I left the company.”
She stares at the heavy purple flowers, so dense that the stems bend under the weight of the petals.
When she accepts them, I breathe a sigh of relief.
“I heard,” she answers.
“And Katia is retiring,” I add.
Ruby nods. “Yes.”
“You’re going to be promoted to principal.”
“It’s hasn’t been decided yet, but—”
“But you will be promoted, Ruby. I know it.”
She presses her lips together. “Why did you leave? I thought the position on the board was important to you.”
I shake my head. “No. It was important to my family. And I don’t think that’s a good enough reason to keep doing something. Especially if it keeps me away from the girl I’m falling for.”
Ruby glances down at the flowers in her arms. A strand of hair has escaped her bun, curling in the humid air. Without thinking, I reach out and touch it. She lets me.
“Ben…”
I take her hand. “Go on a date with me, Ruby. Let me at least try to convince you to like me as much as I like you.”
She squeezes my hand. A spark comes to life in her eyes. It fills me with delirious hope.
“That won’t take much convincing,” she whispers.
“Is that a yes?”
“Yes, Ben. I’ll go on a date with you.”
“We—”
“Just one,” she clarifies. “For now. And it has to fit into my schedule. Also, ballet will always be the priority. If I’m really going to be promoted, I can’t afford any distractions. I really shouldn’t… well, I won’t be the easiest person to be in a relationship with, Ben.”
“I don’t want easy,” I tell her. “I just want you.”
She rolls her eyes at the cliché words, but that pinkness in her cheeks deepens.
In the distance, a group of people burst out laughing. Two taxi cabs blare their horns at each other. A tiny dog barks viciously. It’s the music of the city, wrapping around us with its harsh affection.
“Are you going to kiss me now?” she asks.
I laugh. “I thought you’d never ask.”
Without wasting another moment, I sweep her into my arms and press my lips to hers. She leans into the embrace naturally, as if she has been waiting for this since that very first time. And so have I.