I smile. “Brandon said he had some torrid love affair with a dancer twice his age. Maybe she dumped him and he went on a binge.”
“Palomer mentioned that. From what he said it was an amicable break-up. I think Evan attended the woman’s wedding. That doesn’t sound very torrid to me.”
“You’ve been holding out on this Evan-information?” I accuse gently, but Sinclair shrugs.
Sinclair tells me the dancer’s name. I make a mental note to look up her picture in the ABT season guide. Then he settles into dousing his waffles in maple syrup and slicing them into Isosceles triangles.
“Tell me about your Man That Got Away,” I venture, slurping my coffee.
“What’s to tell? We were together for eight glorious months, fourteen years ago.”
“Fourteen is my favorite number,” I encourage. “The time has come to speak of many things, of shoes and ships and sealing wax, of cabbages and kings,” I quote Lewis Carroll, in the hope of encouraging him.
He smiles and sighs deeply, as if resigned. “It seemed that we had everything, the same ideas and sense of humor, and similar ambitions; we liked the same sort of holiday destinations. He used to go with me to my knee doctor appointments. It was the only truly complete relationship I’ve ever had, a true partnership.”
“What happened?”
“Timing. That’s what he claims, anyway. He said he needed to put all his energy into his career. He started calling himself Joseph, instead of Joe. He wanted to forget where he came from. He was embarrassed of his family, of their small-town ways. He reinvented himself completely. He took on all new friends, Ivy League types, and venture capitalists, high rollers in the financial field.”
“But why couldn’t you fit into his new life? I don’t understand. You’re so cultured and cosmopolitan, with your rapier wit, and your regal bloodlines. You’re a Scottish Count, for cripes sake, Sinclair. You would have been a great asset.”
“Well, I know that!” he says, feigning smugness. “He got married, you see.”
“Married? I don’t understand. To a woman?”
“Yes, to a woman.” Sinclair chuckles at my naivete. “Some of us do that,” he mocks.
“You mean there are unsuspecting women out there, married to gay men?”
“Yes,” he says, with a hearty stab at his waffles. “Four years after we broke up, I heard something on the radio, someone named Joseph had dedicated a song to his wife for their anniversary. I knew that song was his favorite; something in my gut told me it must be him. Shortly after, I heard from a mutual friend that he was married, to the daughter of the VP at the brokerage house where he worked. Who can say why? Perhaps he thought it was the right thing to do, or perhaps it would help him in his career, or perhaps he wanted children. I heard he worked ninety hour weeks up until only recently.”
“So, you wouldn’t have been happy. You might have been lonely, with someone who was so obsessed with work, or with someone who could so easily live a lie, or cast aside love,” I console. “Have you seen him since the break-up?”
“No.”
“Not for fourteen years? But he’s right here in the city. Weren’t you ever curious to see him?”
“I only recently discovered, through a mutual friend—who I ran into over the baklava at Balducci’s—that he owns his own investment firm, over on Forty-Fourth and Park. Before that, I really wasn’t sure where he lived or worked. Oh, and he’s getting divorced, apparently.”
My eyes grow wide. “Do you ever think about contacting him?”
Sinclair shakes his head no, his mouth full of maple syrup. I down another cup of coffee, haunted by the image of those poor unsuspecting society ladies living as beards.
“And there’s been no one since?”
“After we broke up, I nursed my wounds for about five years, oh a fling here and there, but nothing really. I’m a relationship kind of guy; I don’t go for casual encounters. Then I was with someone for five years. He died three years ago.”
This news stuns me. My colorful coffee cup slips from my hand, clattering onto the plate. “From—“ I hesitate to say the word.
“Yes. Don’t worry, my dear. I’m perfectly healthy. I’m not going anywhere anytime soon. It was more of a great friendship, than a great love.” Sinclair seems eager to change the subject. When the waitress returns with his forgotten side of fries, he chats amiably with her.
“Did you ever love anyone again, the way you did Joseph?”
“No. Which is why you must not give up on Evan, not without a genuine concerted effort to win his heart, not these half-ass attempts, these coy cat and mouse games that you two play.”
“I hardly call this coy!” I tug at my handkerchief of a dress.
“Forget tonight. We’ll start fresh in the morning with a new plan, Viv.”
“Tomorrow,” I say, adopting the drawl of a southern belle, “is another day!”
~ 13 ~
The Joseph, The Bear & The Woody
Three weeks pass. The last of the leaves vanish from the trees; the cold sets in. Sinclair throws himself into his gig designing the Christmas window display for Bergdorf’s. I get a weekend job at Bloomingdale’s, spraying perfume samples in the cosmetics department, or as Sinclair calls me, “One of those crazed birds who blind unsuspecting shoppers.” It’s rough being on my feet for eight hours, but it provides me with endless time to daydream about Evan, and to think up plotlines for stories.
Sinclair and I go ice-skating at Rockefeller Center. It’s my birthday, and that’s what I want to do, to go skating in the bright bracing sunlight, in the open air. It’s a Monday, my day off from Bloomies. Mom and Dad called this morning from Maryland. Mom’s birthday card with a big fluffy white cat on the cover—and a sizeable check signed by Dad—arrived three days ago. Dylan called this morning from his cubicle at the accounting office, to wish me a happy birthday and to promise me a future dinner at the commie café of my choice. Sinclair gives me a card with a black and white photo of Vivien Leigh as a ballerina in Waterloo Bridge, and a gold-leaf edition of Lewis Carroll’s Through The Looking Glass And What Alice Found There. It has the original Tenniel drawings. Sinclair has underlined in pale lavender pencil his favorite passages.
I take a few turns around the rink, in my red skating tights, short black skirt and white turtleneck sweater and short coat, my hair falling in springy ringlets around my shoulders.
I look up at the crowds peering down from above, and I think I’m hallucinating when I spy Evan, his face flushed from the cold, his sweater jutting above the collar of his jacket and meeting with his edge of brown hair that has grown to his collar and matches the rich cocoa color of his sweater. But it is him, and he’s making his way toward us.
“What’s he doing here?” The words squeak out.
“I don’t know,” Sinclair fibs rather badly. “Oh, wait, yes, I did call to thank him for getting me the gig at Bergdorf’s, and I may have mentioned—“
“Oh cripes, why did I wear these red tights? I look like Pippi Longstocking.”
“From Polly to Pippy.” Sinclair struggles around the bend as two people sluice past him. He quotes the Red Queen. “Speak in French when you can’t thing of the English for a thing—turn out your toes as you walk—and remember who you are!”
I smooth my mittens over my sweater, and give a fluff to my curls.
“I will skate away at the precise moment and leave you lovers to yourselves!” Sinclair wears his usual black trousers and black turtleneck and black coat, and a pair of super insulated gloves that I’ve tried to coax him into trading with mine. His striking cashmere scarf, flung about his neck, floats behind him, Red Baron style.
Evan lifts his head slightly to keep us in sight above the crowd, as he makes his way onto the rink and toward us. Sinclair begins to fan himself, feigning exhaustion. “I am shot. I must sit this one out!” His acting is rather good. “Au revoir!” Sinclair skates away, leaving Evan and I to take our turns alone around the c
rowded rink.
“This is what you wanted to do on your birthday?” Amused, Evan’s glance skims over my little girl attire. “Isn’t this kind of touristy?”
I shrug. If I felt silly before in my red tights, now I feel positively goofy.
“I love this rink. It’s my favorite thing to do in the whole city,” I state with such conviction that he nods with what seems to be a glimmer of admiration. “I love the music, and the people, and the flags, and the big gold guy.”
“The big gold guy? You mean Prometheus?” He glances at the gigantic reclining statue.
“Where’s my birthday gift?” I venture.
“I’m working on it.”
“Really? Are you knitting me a sweater?”
He chuckles. “Big things take time.”
“You bought me the zeppelin!”
“What did the engaged intellectual give you?”
“A headache,” I say, recalling my last conversation with David, who seems to be waging a campaign to win me, with phone calls, cards, books left on my doorstep. “Oh, and tickets to Gypsy.” I hum a few bars of the theme song. “He’s not engaged anymore. He broke it off.”
“I saw that coming. It would be hard to give you up.”
“And yet you do it so effortlessly!” I say with sarcastic effervescence.
“What would you like me to give you for your birthday?” His tone is sultry.
I blush to my ears, and he seems to enjoy this. U2’s “Desire” is blaring on the sound system, as we round a corner of the rink. People lunching at the American Festival Café watch us through the glass windows. I almost lose my balance, but lean away from Evan’s helping hand, though I’m not sure why.
“Of course you’re a better skater. Is there anything you can’t do?”
“I can’t find a way to have you.”
“Have me? Is that a euphemism for wanting to sleep with me?”
“Yes, to sleep with you. All the days of my life.” Something seems different about Evan, as if there was a weight on his otherwise light-as-air frame. This is not the cocksure Depp-haired, Deniro wannabe of the Halloween party.
“Is that a proposal?”
“I’m not in a position to propose.”
“No, you’re not. The position is generally on bended knee,” I quip. Why am I quipping? “I’m not in a position to accept anyway.” Why do I say that?
“I came home for your birthday.”
“Why don’t I believe that?” I address the reclined Prometheus, as if he might solve the riddle of Evan Candelier.
“Are you going to move to England with Lord Warburton, now that he’s free?” He adopts that tone of mockery and earnestness that is an indelible part of his charm. “Sylvia Plath moved to England, and it was the end of her. She stuck her head in an oven.”
With impudence I say, “I prefer to be free myself,” which is generally true, except in regard to Evan.
“You don’t want to belong to anyone?” he asks, sincerely.
“I don’t think that I do,” I lie, wanting to belong to him with every fiber of my being.
“You left the party that night without saying goodbye.”
“Did I?”
“Your forgot your coat.”
“Oh, I didn’t notice.”
“It was pretty cold that night. Weren’t you freezing in that skimpy outfit without your coat?”
“It wasn’t skimpy. It was quite warm, like a second skin.”
“It was beyond warm. It was hot.”
“Was it?” I say in an offhand manner, as if I hadn’t given it a thought until now, although my heart begins to thump so hard I fear he can hear it.
“I have your coat. It’s an interesting coat. It’s very you.”
“Meaning?”
“It looks like a magician’s coat.”
“Oh, now I’m Merlin? Don’t pull any rabbits out of the pockets when the iguana’s around.” I explain that the curious curlicues on the coat are quarks and leptons.
“You bought a coat because of him?” I like the way he says him; he almost sounds injured.
I explain that Sinclair sewed me the coat long before I met David. The explanation that it’s An Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat gives him relief.
“I think I’m going to keep it.”
“Yes, a Victorian velvet coat is the perfect fashion accessory for your Hollywood premieres. Besides, I don’t think it would fit you.”
“I like the idea of having something of yours. You still have my bandanna, right?” His tone takes a quantum leap into solemnity.
“Yes, I’ve had it insured at Sothebys.” He regards me, unblinking. “I keep it in my lingerie drawer, with all my delicate items.”
“What else have you got in there? I think I should know what kind of questionable items are rubbing up against my bandanna.” The way he says ‘rubbing’ gives me butterflies.
“Well, play your cards right, and someday you may see one of those questionable items.”
“Why did you leave the party so suddenly?”
“Oh, Sinclair had another party that he wanted us to go to.” I pull a knit headband from my pocket and slip it over my hair because the wind keeps blowing my dark curls into my eyes and obstructing my view of Evan’s beautiful face. “So, are you famous yet? Will you remember me when you’re a big television star?”
“The question is, will you remember me? There will never be a time when I don’t think of you,” he sings, rather off-key.
“I found something you can’t do. You can’t sing!” I’m consumed with delectation.
“That’s our song.”
“Oh, you sing duets with The Gum Goddess?”
“Who?” Then it registers. The moment I say it I wish that I hadn’t, because an expression washes over his face that can only be described as cocky, as if he suspected something, but now it is confirmed.
“She’s in Japan, filming a commercial.”
“Of course! How cosmopolitan! How downright globe-trottingly international!” I ramble, because a fury of frustration wells up within me. I’m tired of his flirting, his innuendoes, and his double meanings. I decide to go for broke.
“You don’t like Carol?” he asks. So, she has a name.
“What’s not to like? She’s perfect. She probably never says the wrong thing, or gets drunk with drag queens, or writes odes to cats, or steals books, or leaves clearance tags on the soles of her shoes, or stumbles on stage. I’ll bet she wouldn’t be caught dead in some tourist trap of an ice rink, in red tights on her birthday!” I am hyperventilating.
Evan looks as if he’d like to wrestle me into a straitjacket, but a sniff of laughter escapes. I have a talent for making Evan laugh. No one else seems to have this effect on him.
“No, she’s not you.” His tone is difficult to discern.
“So, is that what you came all the way here from the west coast to tell me on my birthday? That the two of you have a song together?” I skate away from him.
My red knit headband is blown from my hair. I tack awkwardly to retrieve it, and am ambushed by an exuberant skater all of three feet tall in a pink pom-pom dress. I fall, but I’m on my feet in a flash, before Evan has time to take in what’s happened.
There’s a bit of a pile-up, but Evan, of course, who sails through life on some luxurious and invisible magical carpet, is unscathed. I step off the rink, with Evan following.
“When I said, ‘our song’ I meant us, Haley, you and me. That’s our song.” He ducks his head at all angles to get me to make eye contact, as I glance everywhere but at him.
Sinclair zooms over, worried that I’ve been injured.
“Is our Sylvia alright? You must take better care of our Sylvia!” Sinclair scolds Evan, jocularly.
“I’ll hold her hand next time, I promise, Satan.”
It takes Sinclair a moment to realize that Evan is referring to his devil costume at the party.
“Ah, yes, but I have retired my horns, in part due to t
he influence of a certain angelic presence.” Sinclair winks.
“Sylvia has that effect on people,” Evan says, and I suddenly realize that I’m having a fun birthday. I’ve got a gash in my knee that stings like hell, but my inspired choice of red tights provides camouflage for the blood, and Evan is near enough that I can smell his Halston cologne, and I am the topic of conversation between my two favorite men.
“Our Sylvia possesses an ineffable quality. I’ve tried these many months to pinpoint it. It is like the secret ingredient in my grandmother’s sauce, although Sylvia’s is not attributable to an heirloom tomato.” Sinclair drifts into hyperbole and dives into metaphor, rubbing his chin where a slight five o’clock shadow of a goatee has gained ground.
“Sylvia is without guile,” Evan states simply.
Sinclair claps his super-insulated gloves. “By George, I think he’s got it!” He does his best Rex Harrison. “That is it. That is Sylvia’s ineffable quality. She is without guile. She has no agenda. She is perhaps the one true and only sincere person in this whole sorry city!”
Evan is not looking at me, but at the crowds of skaters swirling past us, and I wonder if he is suddenly embarrassed by his sentiment, or if he didn’t mean what he said at all, perhaps he only said it off the top of his head.
“Now, you must say something nice about him,” Sinclair instructs me as if I was a child, and standing there in my torn red tights with my bruised knee, I feel like one.
Evan looks to me with a smirk of anticipation, awaiting his compliment.
“Evan is like the moon. You don’t always see it, but you are never free of its influence.”
Sinclair flutters his hands in a flustered manner, touching his fingertips to his temples like a psychic at a séance. “Okay, that’s a bit too deep for me. I just sew buttons on things for a living. I must absorb this a moment. Now, if I were God, and omnipotent, the deeper meaning of this would be immediately evident to me—“
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