Off Balance (Ballet Theatre Chronicles Book 1) (15 page)

“Alice and I will have to come watch you perform,” Niles said. He turned to Alice with an expectant smile.

Her reply was automatic. “I don’t attend the ballet.”

Niles looked confused. “Why not?”

“Because I don’t do that anymore.”

“But you work there. And now there’s Lana to see.”

“Sorry.”

“Oh, come on. All women want to drag their boyfriends to the ballet, and here I am offering.”

“I believe I’ve stated my position.” Her voice grew sharp. “All right?”

Niles blinked at her, twice, then flashed the others a smile. “And that’s my cue to go creep off and get Alice some more wine.” He hesitated, looked at the empty glass, perplexed. “But wait. I thought I just poured you a glass, ten minutes ago.”

“You did.”

“Oh. I see.” His confused frown deepened. “Sweets, you’re not driving tonight, are you?”

“No. I took a taxi here,” she bit out. “Thinking you might give me a ride home.”

“Of course I will. I’d love to.” He laid a hand on her thigh, massaged it softly and looked, really looked into her eyes. It felt like a life raft. She reached out and clutched his hand.

“You okay?” he murmured.

“Sure.” She eased her grip.

“Okay. Good.”

He turned to Lana, and to Alice’s dismay, proceeded to offer her a ride home as well. “Or do you have a car nearby?” he asked.

Lana laughed. “Me? I can barely afford to live in this city, much less own and park a car.”

Because only rich people had cars and private parking in San Francisco.

Here we go again.

“But I don’t need a ride,” Lana added, casting a nervous glance at Alice. “I can take a bus, no problem.”

“Buses aren’t too efficient in this part of town, after nine o’clock,” Montserrat said.

“Well, a taxi,” Lana said, but Niles cut her off.

“Absolutely not. Not when I’m headed in that direction to drop off Alice. You said you lived near the Civic Center?”

“On Taylor, close to Market Street.”

Niles frowned. “That’s the Tenderloin. Oh, we’re definitely not letting you take public transportation back there.”

Great. They’d pass her own neighborhood en route; what if Niles decided to drop her off first? She was not ready to watch Niles and Lana drive off together as she stood on her steps, alone for the night. “Um, Niles?” she asked, an edge creeping back into her voice.

“Alice,” Niles said. “This is the Tenderloin we’re talking here. Look at her.” They all looked at Lana, so cute and delicate, sitting there on the couch, now squirming under their gazes.

There was no elegant way out of this mess. Except to drink more red wine. And more.

Twenty minutes later Niles looked at his watch. “Whoops. How did it get that late? I really need to get moving.”

They all rose from the table. The room was starting to come at Alice in blurry angles. When she walked it was in a distorted, ponderous fashion, as if someone had affixed ten-pound weights to the bottom of each shoe while she’d been sitting.

At the front door, Montserrat studied Alice. “Everything all right?” she asked.

“Everything’s fine.” The words came out strident but slurred. Montserrat nodded, told her to get a good night’s sleep, that she’d call her when she returned from her East Coast tour.

On the drive back toward the Civic Center, Niles glanced at the dashboard clock. “Ten-thirty,” he muttered. “Damn. This is going to be a challenge.” Alice kept silent, holding her breath until he’d driven safely past her street without turning. Lana, sensing tension, remained quiet as well, speaking up from the back seat only to offer directions to her apartment. Once they’d arrived, she slid out of the back seat quickly, thanking them both. Alice offered her a polite nod but Niles was more animated, smiling warmly, telling her no problem, nice to meet her. Even after they’d returned to traffic, he was still smiling over the exchange. “She’s a cutie,” he said.

Alice gave no reply and within moments, his preoccupation had returned. They drove the rest of the way in silence. He parked his car in her driveway and, to her relief, cut the engine and joined her on the sidewalk, taking her hand. Inside the house, Odette came padding into the entryway with a glad meow. Niles stooped to rub behind Odette’s ears, murmuring his hellos before stepping away to use the bathroom.

Alice plopped down on the sofa with a sigh. The room spun and stopped, spun and stopped. Niles was here, she told herself. The rest would now fall into place. He’d make the spinning deeper inside of her stop.

Niles returned to the living room a minute later holding a can of Diet Coke. “You don’t mind, do you?” he asked, raising the can.

“Of course not.” She patted the couch cushion beside her.

He approached, leaned over and kissed her, but straightened right back up. “I’m off, then,” he said.

She stared at him. “Wait. Not so soon.”

“I’m sorry, sweets. I told you I’d need to get moving.”

She rose with some difficulty, took the can out of his hand, setting it down on the coffee table before looping her arms around him. His arms slid around her waist, hands pressing into the small of her back. He squeezed her, gave her a soft kiss on the cheek. All too soon, he released her. She hadn’t let go of her own grip yet, though, so he couldn’t reach down and get the Coke can from the table, as seemed to be his intention.

“Niles,” she murmured, pressing her lips against his neck. “Please stay.”

“I can’t.”

He finally reached up and unclasped her hands from behind his neck. He gave them a pat, kissed her again, an impersonal little peck this time. Then he reached down and picked his can back up.

She hated this turbulence inside her, this desperate sense of ungroundedness. “Please. I really want you to stay a little longer.” Her voice broke.

“Alice,” he said, “this is such bad timing.” He shifted from foot to foot, as if frantic with the need to keep moving.

“Well,” Alice snapped, patience now spent, “it was pretty bad timing, as well, that Lana had to pick tonight to join us.”

He paused. “What does Lana have to do with anything here?”

“Oh, forget it. Never mind. Just go.”

He stood there, perplexed, hands out, elbows bent, as if expecting her to deliver her next comment in a ten-pound potato sack that he’d need to catch. But she said no more. He let his hands fall with a little slap against his legs.

“Fine. Fine. I’ll stay. Let’s go upstairs.”

Like hell. She dredged up the last vestiges of her pride, lying there in a neglected heap on the floor, much in the same way their clothes used to do. “I don’t think that’s a good idea anymore.” She marched, albeit unsteadily, over to the door and swung it open. “Good night.”

He was still standing in the same spot, looking at her. “Look. I’ll call you. Tomorrow it will seem—”

“No.” Alice’s voice cut through his words. Gone, the drunken slurring, the weepy, needy emotions. In its place was the Alice who’d always saved her when no one else could. Her inner bitch. A friend in need.

“No, Niles. Do not call me tomorrow. Do not call me until you are free. Work on your goddamned report. Achieve your goddamned checkpoint. Go on your business trip and wow everyone. But don’t expect me to sit in the corner and wait for you.”

“I never asked or expected you to do that.” He looked sad.

The truth of his words cut through her.

“No. You didn’t. I guess I overestimated my importance in your life.” She drew in a ragged breath and before she could stop them, the terrible words slipped out.

“Maybe we’re better off as just friends. So neither of us has to worry about the unreasonable demands I appear to be making on you.”

Worse than the words was the fact that he didn’t reply. No protest, no heated defense. Just silence.

Terrible silence.

He studied her grimly, his chin working. Without a word he walked to the front door. She was unsteady; she clutched the door for support. Odette came up and mewed anxiously. They both gazed down at her.

“Alice,” Niles began a moment later, but one look at her angry eyes made him fall silent. He leaned forward as if to kiss her forehead. She recoiled.

He exhaled, let his shoulders drop in an exaggerated “I tried” fashion. “Fine. We’ll talk when I return. Because clearly there’s nothing right I can do or say at this moment. Except wish you a good night.”

“Good night.” She offered him a curt nod, watched him descend the steps and make his way to his car. She shut the door, locked it, gathered up Odette, who’d been brushing against her leg. Clutching the cat, she buried her face in the silky fur, not even realizing she was squeezing until the cat meowed in protest.

What had she done?

What had she just
done
?

She could only think of one positive aspect of the disaster she’d just made of her precious, nurturing, too-good-to-be-true relationship.

Life couldn’t snatch away from you what you’d already destroyed yourself.

When Lana arrived at her Tuesday afternoon rehearsal for
Autumn Souvenir
, the eight corps dancers were still rehearsing their parts. Denis saw her, offering her a quick, distracted smile and nod. She smiled back and claimed a spot in a corner of the room where she stretched, pulled out a pair of pointe shoes and began to put them on. They were in the smaller studio that day, which had a piano in the corner, a black, taped-down marley floor and a high open ceiling, the ventilation tubing still visible. She could smell the hazelnut coffee someone had brought in. It was a soothing smell.

It was the only soothing thing coming from the room, however. Denis did not seem happy. He’d shooed away the four male dancers, who now lounged off to the side, watching.

“Take it again, ladies, from your second entrance,” Denis said. The accompanist cued their entrance but after sixteen counts, Denis slapped his hand down on the back of the metal fold-up chair he’d straddled. “
Non, non!
Gabrielle, what is that supposed to be? Autumn? You’re giving me frozen winter, not winds of autumn. You must give me some air, some space under those feet in the petit allegro section. Again.”

Lana could see by the obstinate tilt to Gabrielle’s chin and the tension between her and Denis, that it had been a contentious rehearsal. Gabrielle glanced over at Lana and her expression grew even tighter. The four women danced the same passage again, and once again Denis stopped them.

“Lana,” he called out. “Are you warmed up? Would you please show Gabrielle how to give me some air beneath her entrechats-quatre?”

He turned to Gabrielle. “You watch this dancer. She has what I’m looking for here. She is airborne all the time—that is what the eye sees. You? Your feet are heavy clumps of mud. That is what the eye sees with you.”

As Lana rose, Gabrielle’s lip began to tremble. “I can’t believe you’re doing this to me,” she said to Denis.

Lana froze, bewildered. They were all a tableau of stillness, the other corps dancers, Gabrielle and Denis, gazes locked in a standoff. Lana looked from one to the other.

“Gabrielle,” Denis said, “your job is to dance this part in the way I instruct you. Your other sadnesses, your difficulties, do not belong here.”

“Excuse me, Denis, but maybe this is hard for me.”

“This is not hard. Dancing with an injury, yes, that is hard. Dancing when influenza is consuming you, that is hard too. You are feeling sad? Aggrieved? This is a child’s version of hardness.”

Gabrielle said nothing. A moment later she began to sniff, dab at her eyes.

Denis scowled. “We have work to do here and I need cooperation, not resistance. Lana. Come over here.”

“Fine,” Gabrielle cried, “let her take that role, too. Let her take everything!” She swung around in an abrupt turnabout, ran over to her dance bag beneath the barre, grabbed it and fled from the room. The others heard the
clop-clop
of her pointe shoes on the hallway’s linoleum, the hoarse sobs that receded as she made her way to the locker room.

The studio was silent.
“Merde!
Shit!
J’en ai ras le bol!”
Denis’s curses bounced off the walls, reverberating through the room. “I am fed up with dancers who cannot leave their petty problems at the door. Do you think we have time for this? Do you?” He glared at the other dancers, most of whom avoided his gaze.

Javier appeared at the studio door, frowning. “What was that about?” He gestured with his head in the direction of Gabrielle. “Denis. Was she being difficult again?”

Denis heaved another disgusted sigh. He looked at his watch, told the seven remaining dancers they were out of time anyway, called out for the accompanist to return in ten minutes for the next rehearsal. He joined Javier in the hallway where the two of them began to talk.

The remaining dancers exchanged bemused looks, shrugs. The tension in the room now dissipating, they began to chat among themselves and collect their things. Courtney spied Lana and walked over to her.

“You don’t know what’s going on, do you?” she asked.

Lana shook her head.

Courtney glanced over at the open door where Denis and Javier were still talking. “Here’s the thing,” she said in a low voice. “It’s just been kind of awkward. You being here, and Gabrielle in the corps of your ballet.”

Gabrielle was one of the better corps dancers; Lana understood immediately. She drew an unsteady breath. “She was the corps dancer they might have promoted to soloist, if they hadn’t given it to me.”

Courtney looked at her in surprise. “So you did know.”

“No. I mean, I had a hunch someone had lost out, but I didn’t know who. And I’ve been afraid to ask.”

“Well, now you know.” Courtney shot another furtive look over her shoulder before continuing. “And further, just between us, it was nearly a done deal. The news that you’d gotten it was a huge shock to her. Because, no offense, we all thought you were going to be in the corps. The roster was pretty well set.”

“With her as the new soloist.”

Courtney gave a noncommittal shrug, as if reluctant to be the bearer of such uncomfortable news.

Right then, Lana wished the other scenario could have been the case. She would have had friends, support, commiseration. Gabrielle might have been the one earning the dark looks, the envious muttering that she hadn’t deserved a lead role. Courtney could have been a friend, not some wary advisor of Lana’s wrongdoings.