Gold Hill (16 page)

“
You may stop,” Ivan said.
“We have a little more than a half hour before the girls arrive.
You need to rest and get some nutrition.”

“
I just had my snack!”
Sissy said.

“
I haven’t eaten,” Misty
smiled. “Why don’t you come with me to get something? We can
talk.”

Sissy smiled and followed
her off stage. Ivan gave them each a towel.

“
You have a text message
from your sister,” Ivan held Sissy’s phone out to her. “I must
speak with the others.”

He leaned into Sissy and
went through his ‘you will not embarrass me’ speech again in a low
voice. Sissy nodded.

“
Your sister brought
smoothies for you,” Ivan said. “I hope that’s all right with you
Miss Copeland. We checked with your people to find out what you
liked and . . . ”

“
That’s perfect,” Misty
smiled.

“
Sandy was here?” Sissy
asked. “She didn’t stay?”

“
Read your text,” Ivan put
the phone in her hand, gave a little bow, and left the
stage.

Sissy looked down. Her
phone said: “Emergency w Tanesha. Sorry Sis. Call if you’re not
okay. Wouldn’t go if I didn’t believe you’d shine! Will be there
when I can.” Sissy nodded. She
was
okay and Tanesha never had emergencies. Plus
Tanesha’s Dad had set up this chance to dance today! She stood a
little straighter. She could do this.

“
I forgot how he could
be,” Misty said. “Very Russian.”

The ballerina sat down on
the edge of the stage. She smiled and Sissy sat next to
her.

“
He’s okay,” Sissy said.
“I’ve known him since I was little. Do you know him?”

“
Everyone either knows
Ivan or knows of him,” Misty said. “You’re a lucky girl to work
with him.”

“
Oh?” Surprised, Sissy
shook her head. “I mean, he’s just . . .
Ivan.”

“
He’s a world class
instructor,” Misty said. “You didn’t know?”

Sissy shook her head. Misty
laughed.

“
I’m not very good,” Sissy
whispered. “And I don’t go to the high school where all the good
dancers go or anything. I need lots of help.”

“
Sissy,” Misty put her
hand on Sissy’s arm. “Most girls your age couldn’t even begin the
routine we just did. You flew right through it.”

“
I’m going to be sore
tomorrow,” Sissy touched her healing breast. “I have
some . . . cuts.”

“
I heard,” Misty took a
drink of her smoothie. “This is perfect. Your sister is wonderful
for getting them.”

“
Sandy’s really great,”
Sissy said. “She found Ivan for me.”

“
I think Ivan works for
your guardian,” Misty said.

“
Right, Sandy.”

“
No,” Misty said. “Mr.
O’Malley.”

“
Uncle Seth?”

“
That was my
understanding,” Misty said. “I know the ABT was going to offer you
a position a few years ago when you were in New York at the New
York Ballet summer school. You remember you danced at the
ABT?”

Sissy nodded.

“
We were told in no
uncertain terms that you weren’t available until you were eighteen.
That’s one of the reasons I’m here. To ask you if you would
consider coming back to New York with me.”

“
To do what?” Sissy
asked.

“
To dance.”

“
With you?” Sissy flushed.
“Well I’d . . . I’d be honored to dance with you
anywhere.”

“
With the ABT,” Misty
said. “How old are you now?”

“
Fifteen,” Sissy sat up
straighter. “Next month.”

“
We were told you were
getting the instruction you needed and you weren’t available until
you were eighteen,” Misty said.

“
Who told you that?” Sissy
asked. “I’d go . . . in a heartbeat! I would have
gone and . . . ”

Realizing what she was
saying, Sissy fell silent.

“
Your guardian has told
every company you’re not available until you’re eighteen,” Misty
said.

“
Sandy and her husband
Aden are my guardians,” Sissy said. “They wouldn’t say that without
talking to me. That’s how they are. Talk. Talk. Talk. Talk.
Talk.”

“
Mr. O’Malley is very
powerful in ballet and symphony circles, especially in New York,”
Misty said. “No one would risk crossing him. He might pull his
funding or ban a company from using his work
or . . . No one would cross him.”

“
Uncle Seth?” Sissy asked.
“He’s not my guardian. He wouldn’t have a say.”

“
I’ll tell you what,”
Misty said. “I’m staying with him tonight. I’m taking a piece of he
wrote back to New York with me, something special. If I bring it
back, I get to dance to it when it’s debuted. I’ll ask him about
the guardian thing tonight.”

Sissy nodded.

“
Why aren’t you eating
your smoothie?” Misty asked. “The Denver Ballet Company picked a
few of their students to dance with us tonight. We have a long
night ahead of us.”

“
I just had my snack,”
Sissy said.

“
Drink.” Misty put the
smoothie in her hand. Sissy took a polite sip and set it down.
“Anorexia or Bulimia?”

“
Um . . . ”

“
How long have you been
out of rehab?” Misty asked.

“
Few months,” Sissy said.
“But I live with my sister now and I’m not screwing up. It’s
just . . . hard.”

“
I know how you feel,”
Misty said.

“
You do?”

“
To dance, you must be
tall, thin, and . . . ”

“
Like a bird,” Sissy
sighed. Her eyes filled with tears. “I’m not very bird like. I want
to be a ballerina so bad but it’s
like . . . ”

“
You’re body isn’t right
enough to do it,” Misty said. “I’ve felt like that.”

“
I bet.” Sissy
nodded.

Not sure what else to say,
Sissy drank some of her smoothie.

“
Is it hard?” Sissy
asked.

“
Being a dancer?” Misty
asked. “It’s brutally hard and it’s amazing. I really love it. Do
you?”

“
I love dancing,” Sissy
said. “When I’m dancing, I’m really happy. I didn’t dance for a few
years because . . . of some family stuff. And life
was barely worth living without dancing. But then Sandy came and
her husband insisted we live with them and now . . .
everything’s better. And I get to dance. But not at
school.”

“
Why don’t you go to the
arts school?”

“
I was sick when they had
try outs,” Sissy said. “And . . . I like where I go
now. It’s close to where we live and my new brother will be there
next year. My older brother plays basketball there. He’s really
good.”

“
He must be tall like
you,” Misty said.

Sissy nodded.

“
Is there anything you’d
like to know about being a dancer?” Misty asked.

“
Do you think I stand a
chance?” Sissy’s voice came out as a whisper.

“
I think if you work hard,
with your talent, you’ll do really well,” Misty said.

“
I’ll be
really . . . ” Sissy made a gesture to her
chest.

“
Join the club,” Misty and
Sissy laughed. “What about boys? A lot of really talented girls
don’t make it because of boys.”

“
Oh,” Sissy shook her
head. “I don’t have a boyfriend. I used to think that I might have
a boyfriend. This guy Wade? I met him in rehab. But he decided that
he was a girl in a boy’s body.”

“
Not much of a boyfriend,”
Misty said.

“
No,” Sissy said. “But
we’re good friends still. He’s Wanda now and goes to school with
me.”

Sissy sighed.

“
So you don’t have to
worry about boys and me,” Sissy said. “Do you have a
boyfriend?”

“
I date,” Misty said. “But
right now, I’m married to my dancing. Everything I do revolves
around dancing – workouts, practices,
performances . . . There’s not a lot of space for a
man.”

“
Me too,” Sissy said.
“With practice and Ivan and dance school and regular school,
chores, family . . . ”

“
It doesn’t get any
easier, Sissy,” Misty said.

“
That’s okay,” Sissy said.
“I like it.”

Misty gave Sissy a big
smile.

“
What?” Sissy
asked.

“
I’m glad I came,” Misty
said.

~~~~~~~~

Thursday evening — 6:45
p.m.

“
Now that you ladies are
here,” Tanesha’s Gran said. “It all seems like a lot of fuss for
nothing.”

Rodney Smith gave Gran a
hard look.

“
I’m glad we’re here,”
Sandy smiled at Gran and sat down next to Tanesha.

Heather took Tanesha’s
other side on the couch and Jill sat at her feet. Jeraine hovered
near the edge of the living room. Tanesha’s Gran sat down in an arm
chair and Rodney Smith sat across from her. For a moment, they were
silent. Heather slipped her hand into Tanesha’s.

“
What was the dream about,
Mrs. Jones?” Jill asked. “We’ve racked our brains and can’t come up
with anything. Do you know?”

“
I . . . ” Gran gave Jill a quick,
pleading look. She glanced at Tanesha and nodded. She opened her
mouth but no sound came out.

“
It sounds crazy now, but
when I was charged, Yvonne – Tanesha’s Mom – and I, we both didn’t
think even one thing about it,” Rodney Smith said. “We were so
happy, so very happy, then. I think we didn’t believe anything
could take that away. Your Dad, Jeraine, was my best-friend. He
told me that his friend O’Malley had heard weird things about this
case and that I should worry, but I didn’t. I believed in this
country. I believed in our legal system. How could an innocent man
be found guilty in such a horrible crime?”

Rodney Smith
shrugged.

“
So we continued our
life,” he said. “I was interviewed and released. I thought it was
over until one day we got a notice that I had to be in court.
Yvonne and I took the notice to Bumpy and . . .
well, he was upset. Tanesha was with us. She was just a baby, not
quite a year old. You were with your Mom on tour,
Jeraine.”

“
My Mom on tour?” Jeraine
asked.

“
She has a gorgeous
singing voice,” Rodney Smith said. “She toured nightclubs in major
cities a little while Bumpy was finishing his schooling and you
kids were babies.”

Not wanting to get in the
way, Jeraine nodded.

“
Anyway, Bumpy called a
lawyer,” Rodney Smith said. “And it all got worse. All the mess I
had ignored was worse than we thought. A lot worse. The police had
no other suspect. I was it. By the time we got home, Yvonne
was . . . ”

“
Hysterical,” Gran said.
“She was never strong, my Yvonne. Not like you Tanesha. She was
like paper. And she . . . ”

“
When we got home, she
tried to kill herself,” Rodney Smith said. “She couldn’t see her
life continuing without me, and we could see that we were going to
lose. I mean, we were poor, black, and they were sure I’d done this
terrible thing.”

“
What did she do?”
Tanesha’s voice came out in one croak.

“
I was arguing with her,”
Rodney Smith said. “Telling her she was a fool and we’d be all
right. She grabbed a knife and sliced up her wrist. You started
screaming the moment the knife hit her skin
and . . . She had this skin . . . so
thin you could almost see the blood move underneath it, fragile and
beautiful, gorgeous skin really and the knife . . .
I took off my shirt and grabbed you from your crib. You were
screaming; she was screaming; I wrapped her arm in my shirt and
called Bumpy but . . . ”

“
She’d cut a tendon,” Gran
said. “We didn’t have insurance or anything like that. They patched
her up at the hospital but that’s about all. She couldn’t use that
hand much after that.”

“
She can’t,” Tanesha said.
“She can’t. You guys act like she’s dead. She’s not dead. She
still
has
beautiful skin. She still
can’t
use her hand.”

Gran blinked at Tanesha for
a few minutes. The silence dragged on.

“
I have that tattoo,”
Rodney lifted his shirt. “It says ‘Forever Yvonne.’ She has one
that says ‘Forever Rodney.’ She . . . You know the
rest. We sold our house to pay the lawyers. I went to prison. You
and she lived with your Gran for a while but . . .
She couldn’t work as a secretary anymore because she couldn’t use
her hand. And . . . ”

“
We never got along,” Gran
said. “She thinks I’m crazy.”

“
Mean,” Sandy said.
Surprised, Gran’s head jerked to look at her. “I cut her hair once
a month. Tanesha and Heather bring her in. They have lunch, get her
cleaned up, ask her keeper if he’s ready to let her leave, and
bring her back when they have to.”