Finding Center (22 page)

One Year Later
Aly

I wake early in the morning, my body wired for sound, and I wait, listening. But in her crib in the next room, our daughter Piper Mae Miller-Harrow sleeps soundly on. After sleeping through the night for several weeks, she woke twice last night, as if to retaliate for my first ballet back since my maternity leave. If she wakes now, it’s Zed’s turn. But she doesn’t wake. She remains quiet on the monitor on the nightstand.

“You’re awake,” Zed mumbles, stretching next to me. I roll my head to the side as he props himself up on an elbow. His eyes in the dim light follow his fingers down my cheek, my throat, between my breasts, to my stomach and swoop to the side over my hipbone. His fingers leave trails of heat and stardust on my skin, fireflies bumping into each other in my veins.

His hand skims across my stomach to my other hip and he rolls me sideways, toward him. We fell asleep last night, naked and tired and entwined with each other in an attempt to find some time for ourselves in the hectic newness of our life. And now, I find him hard and ready again, like it’s not 5:00 a.m., like our daughter’s not sleeping in the next room, like she’s not going to wake any moment.

“Shit,” he whispers.

I blink. “What?”

“You’re giving me a headache,” he says. “Tell your brain to shut up.”

I laugh, then relax forward and let my mouth bump into his. Sometimes our kisses are messy and casual, less careful than we used to be, and I like that. He nips at my lower lip and heat floods my body, sinking lower through my core and settling between my legs. Zed’s grin is victorious, his fingers slipping between us and sliding over my wetness.

“You still thinking?” he whispers.

I can’t think much at all, right now. My thoughts collapse into the rhythm of his fingers, the skim of his thumb over me, the arch of my body against his body. The white noise in my mind grows and grows and grows until I can feel it trembling, overwhelming my systems. I press a hand, hot and sweaty against Zed’s chest. His heart slams against my fingertips.

“Close,” I manage to say. “I want you inside me.”

He slips his fingers out of me, and into my mouth, his pupils dilated, dark. He loves this, almost as much as I do. I suck my own wetness off his fingers, and then he rolls over, reaching for his bedside stand.

We’re not taking chances these days, not until I can find a more reliable method of birth control. We never used condoms before Piper was born, but now, now they’re a daily part of our life. He tears open the foil and I roll the condom over him. He wastes no time, tugging at my hips. I straddle him and sink down slowly, a hand on his chest, a hand on my own leg. I wince only a little bit.

He waits for a moment as we both breathe in at the fullness, at the expansion of the universe inside us both every time we come together like this. Then I rise slowly, and sink down again, beginning to set a rhythm that carries us both away. I love this, the sure way we know each other’s bodies, the confidence of his hand on my waist, holding me up, the way my fingers know the sweat on his chest, our eyes never leaving each other.

When we come together, it’s a crescendo of music, it’s the swelling and crashing of the epic moment, strings falling down on top of each other and cymbals clattering. I sink down against him, letting him support my weight, and he brushes my hair off my sweaty neck. It takes us a few breaths before I roll sideways and he slides out of me, leaving me a little tender while he takes care of the condom.

We say nothing in the dark, tracing patterns in the sweat left on each other’s bodies.

Then the baby cries. We both suck in a breath at the same time, half hoping she’ll soothe herself back to sleep, but there’s the hiccup, and then the scream. I deflate against Zed who laughs a little bit.

“Her timing was good at least,” he says roughly. He slides out from under me. “Shower. I’ll get her.”

“Okay,” I say, and then yawn. “Oh damn you.”

He freezes, sliding his stump into his leg. He never ever picks up Piper without wearing his prosthetic. “What?”

“I just want to go back to bed,” I mutter, even as I turn toward the doorway and the screaming baby. Instinct’s strong. I can get there in two steps while Zed’s still fitting his leg on. “And I have to go dance.”

“Happy as a kitten in sunshine,” he drawls, far too self-satisfied for my liking. He slips on pajama pants and heads out of our room to rescue the wailing baby. “Think about me in there.”

I think about him always. Doesn’t he know this?

When I get out of the shower and quickly dress for morning class and then rehearsal before our performance tonight, I hear the soft hum of piano music downstairs. We have a piano now, our own, but it doesn’t sound like Zed playing it. I head downstairs and find him dancing slowly around the room with Piper in his arms. The iPod rests on top of the piano, playing softly. His cheek rests against her head and he’s murmuring the words to a song I only half know. A mostly finished bottle sits by the windowsill. Our life, in a single room.

“Ah, there’s Mama,” Zed whispers loudly. He walks over and kisses me chastely. “Piper Mae, you have the prettiest mama in all the land.”

“Flirt,” I whisper back and then lean up, pressing a kiss against my daughter’s warm hair. A smile, her father’s entirely, bursts across Piper’s face and she arches backward, reaching for me. I swing her into my arms and kiss her. “Bye-bye, baby. I’ll see you tonight.”

“Bye-bye baby,” croons Zed, sweeping her out of my arms again. “We’re going to see Mama dance, Piper.”

As I wrap my scarf around me for the unseasonably chilly October we’ve had, Zed slides onto the piano bench with our daughter on his lap. He’s been determined to have her playing piano before she speaks and at this rate, before she crawls. He touches the middle key and says, “See? We always start here at the center.”

There’s a burst of discordant music as Piper smacks her hands on the keys and Zed murmurs, “Gentle, gentle.”

“I’m leaving!” I call from the front hall.

“See you soon!” Zed calls back.

Some days, leaving them is harder than others. And I’m anxious for tonight. Tonight’s the fall gala, a year after I danced it with Zed, and the first time I’m dancing for an audience since giving birth six and a half months ago.

It’s only mildly terrifying. And by mildly, I mean worse than coming back after a year off from performances and worse than coming back from the accident all those years ago. This time, my body’s different and my approach to ballet’s changed a little bit. I’m a little more careful. I listen to the music a little differently. I don’t know if it was the break or if it’s motherhood, but it’s one of those things.

Either way, I’m nervous, and I haven’t been nervous for ballet in God knows how long.

But at least now I know I’ll still have Zed and Piper there waiting for me afterward.

Zed

Piper and I make it to the Kennedy Center safely, which honestly, feels like a hell of an accomplishment. Six-month-old babies sometimes have minds of their own and unsurprisingly, Aly’s daughter is definitely headstrong. And stubborn. And all without saying a word. She cries half the Metro ride and finally settles for a bottle, which is fun to juggle up the escalator and out into the crisp fall weather. She’s placated momentarily with a handful of leaves we find in the park on the way.

I stop only to take a picture of her and text it to Aly with the caption
this dress is stupid cute. I’ve taken about a hundred photos of her in it. I’m tagging you in all of them.

She texts back immediately.
That’s the one that your mom got her! She looks skeptical.

I laugh and reply as we reach the Kennedy Center.
She still doesn’t like the Metro. She’s clearly a DC baby.

My parents, Aly’s parents—all three of them, including Will—and Noelle are waiting for us when we get there. And my mother’s more than happy to sweep the fussy baby out of my arms and take her for a walk. I sigh with relief, watching them go off, Piper already quieter, staring into the face of the grandmother she’s seen more in the past six months than I’ve seen my mom in the past six years.

“She’s a good baby,” Cara says fondly, in that way that only grandparents can say.

“She’s not a fan of being bundled up,” I say, watching after her carefully. “But it’s too cold out. I don’t want her to get sick.”

“Helena will take care of her,” my dad says confidently. He claps a hand on my shoulder. “We’ll get our seats. She’ll be back in soon.”

I linger, adjusting the diaper bag on my shoulder. “She might need another bottle. Or to be changed.”

“Zed,” says Will gently. “Come on in. Your mother will be happy to worry over Piper.”

So I let my family guide me into the Kennedy Center. Noelle links her arm through mine and I smile down at her quickly. She bites her lip, looking around anxiously like she’s looking for someone. Noelle’s been at Georgetown for all of two months, and so far, she’s doing great. Or she seems to be anyways. She comes over once a week for dinner and she’s watched Piper a few times too, though I think it’s not particularly her thing. We get our tickets and then our pamphlets at the door.

Noelle bends her head over, studying the paper like she’s going to be quizzed on it, and I sink forward, resting my elbows on my knees. The curtain in front of me is more daunting than normal and I say a quick prayer that the performance goes well, for Aly’s sake. (And thus, everyone’s sake.)

As it turns out, I had nothing to worry about. My mom and Piper return to the Center just before the lights dim and I settle my daughter on my lap. I give her a bottle before the lights dim and brighten for the fifteen-minute call and she falls right asleep when the music begins. The curtain comes up, and the ballet begins. This year, for the fall gala, Jonathan chose Wayne McGregor’s
Chroma
, and now—now I see why.

It’s an ode to classical ballet with all the hope and promise of contemporary ballet. It’s both grounded and airy, dreamy and real, light and dark. And Aly, right up there, with her legs and her perfect feet and her exquisite lines, shines like a beacon, like the lighthouse this company needed—and like I will always need.

Piper wakes up for the reception but she’s in a surprisingly good mood, even as she gets passed around from family member to family member. And then finally, between the flutes of champagne and the murmuring of voices, comes the round of applause that means the dancers and the staff have entered the reception. Noelle takes Piper right out of my hands and I cross the room, my heart pounding.

I see her before she sees me, but she hears the crowd laugh and clap as I practically shove my way to her. When she sees me, all the lights in the heavens can’t compare. She bursts into laughter when I sweep her up, arms around her thighs, and turn her in a slow circle. Everyone applauds and she ducks her head, all her hair falling forward to shield us.

“You. Were. Beautiful,” I whisper each word with the exact same amount of weight because it’s Aly. Aly, and Aly is, and Aly is beautiful. All the words mean the same because they’re all about the woman in my arms. I let her slide back down to the floor and she kisses me gently, her mouth moving against mine like we’re nowhere important at all, like it’s still summer outside and I taste like lemonade.

I slip my hand around hers and pull her back through the crowd. I pull her past all her admirers and people carrying flowers and all the important donors who keep her company afloat, back to our families and our daughter, back to her friends arriving around us. Yevgeny, and Yana, and Sofia. I pull her back the people who keep
her
afloat. Back to the people who keep
us
afloat. And when she picks up her daughter, swinging her around in a big circle that makes Piper laugh, I can’t think of anyplace I’d rather be here.

Here. Here is the best place on earth.

* * * * *

To purchase and read more books by Katherine Locke please visit Katherine’s website here
http://katherinelockebooks.com/districtballetcompany/

Now Available from Carina Press and Katherine Locke

What they lost on the side of the road that day can never be replaced, and grief is always harshest under a spotlight...

Read on for an excerpt from
SECOND POSITION

Zed

Some things you’ll never erase from your memory. In front of me, the ice-blond braid swinging on a primly dressed woman’s back makes me sway on the spot. I know that braid, and it doesn’t belong here. Not where I am. Anywhere but here, here where it brings with it a tide of memories I’ve worked hard to bury. Images, bright and sharp and very red, slam around in my head, and I curl my fingers into my palm, hard. The pain pushes the memories back where they belong.

My first thought is,
It can’t be her.

My second thought is,
Oh
,
God
,
please don’t let her see me walk.

It might not be her. Lots of women have blond hair, and a lot of women dye their hair to get her particular shade of gold. Three people between us, and I can’t see her profile. I study her neck, her shoulders, the way she stands. I’m almost positive it is her. A certain unmistakable, accidental grace to the way her hands shake when she unsnaps her wallet.

“Small tea, one orange tea bag, one vanilla. I’ll pay for both.”

Her tea order hasn’t changed in the four years since I’ve seen her, or the eleven years I’ve known her. Her voice is a little smaller, a reflection of her body. But she still likes to taste things vibrantly. And she’s the only one ordering a hot drink in the late July heat.

In the last memory I have of her, she’s stretched out next to me in bed, wearing nothing but a smile. She glowed, on and off the stage. This girl, at the counter now, is anything other than bright. She moves dully. She used to lean on counters and flirt, regardless of who was at the register. She hasn’t flipped her hair once. Everything I know is in the past tense.

I almost say her name, almost call out to her against all my better instincts. Then they ask her for the name for the cup, and I hear her say, “Aly.”

I watch her in the sea of girls called into the audition room. It’s easy to follow her. She’s all legs and square shoulders and collarbones. Her hair’s got so much hair spray in it that it looks dark. She walks away from me, her pointe shoes slapping the floor. Just before she goes into the room for her audition, she yells over her shoulder, “It’s Alyona, not Aly. But you can call me that if we both get in.”

“Cheer up, miserable.” Roseanne grins at me. She picks up a cup and writes a
Z
on it. “The usual?”

“Thanks,” I tell her, distracted. I hand her my credit card and she rolls her eyes. I smile a bit, the routine comforting me. “Just swipe it, Rose.”

“As you wish,” she teases me. I sign the receipt and step as gracefully as I can to the end of the counter, where they put everyone’s drinks. I used to move gracefully. I used to know the word
grace
to the center of my bones. Now I seek it every day and fall short, inevitably, every day. I lost grace.

Aly may have lost her sparkle, but she didn’t lose grace. She stands perfectly still, her eyes fixed on her phone as she scrolls down the screen. Everything about her is still long, elegant lines, everything a ballerina should be.

Of course. She was—or is—the youngest principal dancer in Philadelphia Ballet history. One of the youngest in American ballet. She was born to dance. So was I, but I guess terrible things happen to terrible people. I stand heavily on my left leg. The bite of the prosthetic into the stump of what used to be my knee is punishment for my thoughts.

For four years, I wanted nothing more than to run into Aly, to find out what went wrong and how we lost everything on the side of the highway that day.

Standing so close to her, I wish I could be invisible. I want to sink away. My heart aches from her proximity. If I’m terribly quiet, if I don’t move, she won’t see me. And then we can pretend this never happened. That in a world of seven billion people and a country of almost four hundred million, we ran into each other in a city where neither of us should have ever been.

Then Carmen, the barista, says, “Hey, Zed. How’re you doing today?”

My hands unfurl as Aly’s head snaps around. I keep my eyes trained over the counter. If I look at her, I will stop seeing her in pieces. I will stop seeing her as a braid, thin arms, nimble fingers, big eyes in a pale face. I will see all of her, all over again. If I look at her, I will fall to pieces and I don’t know that I can put myself back together again. The last time literally almost killed me.

I force a smile onto my face and into my voice. I sound tense and hollow even to my own ears. “Alright. What’s up?”

“Busy morning,” Carmen says, wiping off a steam wand. “How’s summer camp?”

“Over, thank God. I couldn’t take another moment of it. My hearing still hasn’t recovered.” For a second, it’s just Carmen and me, bantering about the music camp where I’ve taught two summers in a row now. “Only a few weeks left before the usual mayhem begins.”

“I’ll miss your face in here.” She gives me a flirtatious smile and a wink. My stomach turns. Normally I flirt back, but I can feel Aly’s eyes burning into me. I shrug and smile at Carmen. She gives me a puzzled look but shrugs it off. She’s not surprised by my moods. No one should be at this point.

Carmen puts a cup of hot water with two tea bags on the counter. “Tea with vanilla and orange for Aly?”

I can’t help turning to look at her now. She’s always been the type of girl people’s eyes follow, even when she tried so hard to disappear. Willowy, with only the hint of curves at her hips, legs that go for miles. Her eyes are still that electric blue that used to make my heart stumble about like a drunken gawker. She stares, her lips parted. I used to know that space so well.

Four years ago, she’d be tucked under my chin. I’d kiss her and she’d taste like her tea, both citrus bright and vanilla mellow. She liked to slip her fingers against my scalp and hold me in place when she kissed me. I remember this. I don’t remember the accident’s details, but I remember her. I couldn’t forget, even if I tried. Even when I tried.

She doesn’t move. She had no idea, then, that I live and work here. She didn’t come to DC looking for me. I wait for the feeling of relief. Instead, disappointment creeps up my throat and I swallow it back. As though my motion released her, she steps forward, takes her cup and stands there stupidly. We haven’t broken eye contact. I don’t want to lose her again, and I’m afraid my eyes are telling her that despite the way I can’t feel my hands and the way sweat gathers on my forehead.

“Miss, you’re in the way.”

I blink. A portly, middle-aged guy stares at her. At my Aly. At...no one’s Aly. He’s trying to reach his drink on the counter, and she’s still staring at me.

She takes her cup, steps backward and blows on the surface of her tea. I wonder if she gets the memories too, if the bright, unfocused world fell back into her head when she saw me. It’s fucking stupid to think I know anything that goes on in her head though. I didn’t even back then. I say her name too soft for her to hear, but her eyes follow the shape of my mouth.

She steps backward again. If I didn’t know her, if I didn’t know every single way this woman ticks, I would have missed the very slight shake of her head. But I see it, and I respect it. I can’t follow her. I lost that privilege a long time ago, and I thought I’d come to peace with what we both did back then. Now, again, walking away from me is all of my regret and all of everything I ever thought I wanted out of life.

I watch her, though, as she retreats out of the café. What’s she doing in DC? I hadn’t heard that she left Philadelphia Ballet. Maybe she’s down here dancing with a local company or maybe it’s her rest weeks between seasons. I don’t know the ballet schedule anymore. I’ve deliberately avoided thinking about it for four years. My thoughts run away from me, down a wormhole into the past, full of questions I won’t ever get answered.

Carmen calls my name twice and raises her eyebrow. Her gaze rakes over to the door and the thin blonde woman hurrying down the street. She looks back at me. “Am I going to see you two on Craigslist’s Missed Connections tonight?”

I shake my head. “No.”

I tip her and Roseanne more than I usually do so I don’t have to explain. Aly and I were a Missed Connection years ago. It’s too late and they don’t archive that shit.

Aly

Even outside, I can’t find enough oxygen to replace what he just stole from me. At the corner, I double over, desperately trying to pull air into my lungs. People pass me by and no one asks if I’m okay, even while I’m clutching my tea in one hand, my knee in the other. Everything spins and moves too fast. The buses pass me, screeching and honking. Suits blur together as they shove past me to cross at the white-striped crosswalks. Overhead, the Walk sign beeps insistently, like a heart monitor. It’s supposed to mean it’s safe to walk, but nothing feels safe right now. Nothing at all.

Calm down
,
Alyona.
I stare at a crack in the sidewalk and force myself to count to five slowly, taking a breath and releasing it. Details flood in: the curb, the dandelion, someone stopping next to me and touching my shoulder to ask if I’m okay. I straighten and force a smile onto my face. I’m the queen of fake. I tell her I’m fine. Her face swims before me. She backs away reluctantly. I walk another block, and slowly I can breathe again.

I flew here from New Mexico a week ago. The humidity of DC feels like I’m inhaling straight water. My hair sticks to my neck, and walking two blocks makes the sheen of sweat brighten my skin. I wonder if humidity has calories. I know, logically, that it doesn’t. It can’t. But I find it hard to believe the air can be this thick and not. It tastes like something, so it must contain some calories because things that taste like things have calories, and I count all those calories, so I’m not really sure how I’m supposed to count the air. I know I’m not supposed to being doing this, this obsessive thought, but I can’t help it right now. I need it. I need it because the DC heat is oppressive, but not as oppressive as my own mind. That’s the thing. People think that they’ve felt heavy things, but the heaviest things are the things in our own heads. I know this. I feel this.

In my mind, I sort things into light and heavy, manageable and unmanageable, tolerable and intolerable. I thought Zed was heavy. I thought Zed was unmanageable. Standing in the café with him, I realized that it wasn’t him that was heavy and unmanageable, it’s everything that comes with him. Zed, my first friend. Zed, who didn’t take any of my bullshit. Zed, who was never jealous. Zed, who shouldn’t have been in that car with me that day. Zed, whose fingers still ghost over my skin in my dreams. Zed. Zed. Zed. The end of the alphabet and the end of me.

He used to say that when people asked how we had met. He’d wink at me and say, “Oh, her? She’s
A
and I’m Zed. The beginning and the end. We’ve always known each other.”

Zed, whose arms I wanted to feel around me even after all these years. He looked at me in there like he wanted to scream at me and like he wanted to kiss me and if he could have done both of those things at the same time, we’d still be in there, scream-kissing each other into pieces. Three blocks away now and I’m not sure who was more surprised to run into the other. He mouthed my name, I watched his tongue. I don’t know what he remembers, but I haven’t forgotten his hands, his voice, his laugh, the way he knew me before I knew me.

I asked him, silently, not to follow. He didn’t. Of course he didn’t. He didn’t follow me four years ago. Why would he follow me now?

The Metro ride home doesn’t calm me. Normally, I find the Metro soothing, the train rocking back and forth, the people-watching, the anonymity. I find myself scanning the crowd and wondering if he rides the train. I wonder if he goes home to someone at night. I wonder if he wonders about me going home with anyone.

Four years ago, we were best friends who made a mistake together and were still best friends, whole and happy and enthralled with the way we complemented each other. What happened wasn’t our fault. It was an accident. Everything that came after that accident was our fault. I’m as much to blame as he is. I know that much. Instinctively, my hands go to my stomach, touching lightly. It is silent and still. It’s always still. And yet, I touch it when I think of the accident. When I think of him.

“Alyona?” My mom’s on the curb, coming into focus. I don’t remember getting off the train and down the stairs. She’s waiting by the car, watching me anxiously. She leans over. “Are you okay?”

“Fine,” I answer. I slide into the passenger seat. I close my eyes. Zed never had parents like mine. Parents who overcompensated with their wealth but who loved me and wanted me to be happy again. My dad could have done better, but my mother... I sigh and open my eyes. I say softly, “I ran into Zed.”

She almost rear-ends the car ahead of us. She stares at me. “Zed. Where did you run into him?”

“At a café.” I look out the window at the traffic jam. “What are the odds?”

“Improbable,” she murmurs. She reaches over and rests a hand on my leg. “How’d it go?”

I don’t look at her. “I ran away.”

For a long time, she doesn’t say anything. When we pull onto the road and out of the Metro station, she turns the radio to the news. I adjust the air. I’m too cold, even in this heat, for that much air-conditioning. She gives me a look but doesn’t say anything for a few blocks. Then she reaches into her purse and tugs out an envelope.

“Philadelphia Ballet sent you this. Fan mail, I guess.” She tries to keep the pride out of her voice. When I called my parents six months ago and told them I was taking a leave of absence from the company for a year, she didn’t know what to do. She asked if it was the right decision. I hung up on her. It took us a few weeks to sort that out. After all, her daughter is a prodigy. Her daughter gets fan mail.