“You should take ballet,” she told him.
“No chance.”
But just like that, the very next week, Tom was in Mrs. G’s Beginners class, and no need to say that Mrs. G was over the moon to have him. And after just a few weeks of him grinning through every exercise at the barre, then bounding wildly across the floor when Mrs. G gave a big jumping combination, Tom invited René to his birthday party.
René stayed by Tom’s side as everyone had pizza and cake. After he’d opened his presents, she grabbed his arm and tilted her head toward a darkened room where his mother had put a stack of records on a turntable. “Let’s dance,” she said. “Come on.”
They went into the other room, and Tom secured his hands around her waist as she linked her arms around the back of his neck, resting her head on his shoulder. They were used to being close to each other from their afternoons at René’s house, but as they began to sway, René could see that the girls from her class were starting to pile up in the doorway, with some of the boys right behind them, on tiptoe. They were all leaning in, keeping their feet behind the threshold, the girls raising their hands to cover their gaping mouths.
“We should go steady,” she said in Tom’s ear. It was something Leon’s friends had been doing—giving tokens to the girls they liked best—and René figured it was a sure thing for her and Tom.
When he didn’t answer, she said it again. “I could be your girlfriend.”
“What do you mean?” Tom said, pulling away, suddenly noticing the crowd.
“I bought a medallion,” she said. She’d walked all the way downtown for that express purpose. “You could just give it to me.”
“I don’t want to,” Tom said.
“Why not?”
Tom stopped. He didn’t want to dance anymore.
“Maybe we could go steady later?” René tried as he stepped away, clearly ready to get back to the party.
“No,” Tom said. “I don’t want to at all.”
Then Tom was out of the room, back with the others, and René was left standing alone with the music still going. And while the boys broke away and fell in with Tom, putting their arms around his shoulders and slapping him on the back, she could tell by the way the girls stayed glued together, grinning at each other and raising their eyebrows, that mainly, they were thrilled to see her left behind.
She followed Tom out, but the party wasn’t the same. The girls were once again in a huddle, and Tom was off with the boys, so she went outside and sat on the steps by herself in the moonlight, feeling disembodied—as if the faintest breeze might cut right through her—until Eve showed up to take her home.
* * *
—
Kenny Bishop lived in one of the flat-topped underground houses René passed on her way to school. It was more like a basement for a house that would never be built. He was tall, loose-knit, and oafish, and sometimes out of the corner of her eye, René would catch him picking his nose. She invited him over and took him up to her room.
“Kenny,” she said, getting right down to business, “do you want to be my boyfriend?”
He gazed at her wide-eyed, like she was his fairy godmother.
“Sure,” he said, his body twitching as his voice caught.
“Take this medallion,” she said. “And give it back to me. Then we’re going steady.”
“Okay,” he said. He took the medallion, then handed it back.
Though Kenny’s hands were dirty and his teeth looked many days’ worth of unbrushed, she put the medallion around her neck.
“What do we do now?” Kenny said. “Do we kiss?”
“No,” she said. “Nothing.”
They walked to the edge of her driveway, and she sent him home.
The next day, Tom took one look at the medallion hanging from René’s neck and Kenny Bishop hovering at her elbow, turned his back, and walked away.
René broke it off with Kenny that very afternoon. He walked her home without talking and came up to her room. She took off the medallion, handed it back to him.
“Why?” he said. “What did I do?”
“It’s just a mistake.”
“You’re a bitch,” he said, giving her back the medallion, since it was hers in the first place. “Everybody says so.”
And she didn’t have one word to defend herself. In fact, she thought maybe she agreed with him. It didn’t matter. Either way, there was no reason to keep up the lie. She put the medallion in a drawer and just tried to forget about it.
But Tom didn’t speak to her again, and after school he didn’t meet the others behind the church anymore. If he saw her at school, he’d go the other way. And if she saw him coming out of the Beginners class at Mrs. G’s, she’d nod, but they wouldn’t talk. Then sometime before the year was over, he simply disappeared.
Mrs. G told Eve that Tom’s family had moved out of town, that she should have known better than to think a kid like that might stick around, that having him in class had been too good to be true.
“Lord knows he’ll have a better chance in North Carolina or wherever the hell else he ends up than he’d ever have here in South Dakota. Right, Eve?” Which made René understand that Tom, having just weeks ago stepped out of Leon’s bedroom, giggling and prancing idiotically in Leon’s tights, was now going to have chances she’d never have, simply because he could pack up and move away.
At school, she pretended the whole thing didn’t interest her, but her stomach was upset, and her face felt pinched. Still, whenever the other girls looked her way, smirking as though they could see the loss etched on her features, René would let her eyes slide right past them, trying to seem absorbed with something they couldn’t discern, something glittering and full of promise, waiting just for her on the far horizon.
26
The Fates Allow
Mrs. G was selling her studio. She wanted Eve to take it over. The two of them had put on Nutcracker performances and spring recitals for the past three years. They’d taught all the classes, kept all the books, designed and made all the costumes. Now Mrs. G was ready to retire. She kept saying she was tired of the winters, she was moving south.
“I can’t do it,” Eve said for the umpteenth time. “I don’t feel capable, Helen. I don’t have the training.”
“Well, if you really don’t want it, then I’m going to have to find someone that does,” Mrs. G said, finally giving up the campaign. “I guess we’ve done enough damage.” She laughed.
“I’ll miss it,” Eve said. “I really will.”
“There’s no one better than you to run this place. I built it. I ought to know.”
Eve shook her head. “And what would I do with the Advanced class, when it’s me who should be taking lessons from them?”
“René and Leon could help you,” Mrs. G suggested.
René glanced up, then quickly stuck her nose back in her book. She was going through Mrs. G’s Cecchetti method manual on classical technique. She knew the eight body positions, but she saw there were also five Cecchetti arabesques.
“That’d go over like a lead balloon with the other kids,” Eve was saying. “Not to mention the parents.”
“What if you started your own little school somewhere else, like someplace up in the hills? Tried it out? It’d be all beginners,” Mrs. G said. “And I’ll be here for the next year or so anyway before the hubby’s ready to leave. I could help you. We could give it a shot.”
“That’d be interesting,” Eve said. “And it certainly wouldn’t hurt to be making some extra money.”
“That’s the spirit!” Mrs. G laughed. “I’ll go ahead and get a photographer to take some pictures of this place so I can get it on the market. Who knows? Maybe someone’ll move into town and solve all our problems. Right, Eve?”
René closed the book, put it back on the shel
f.
“What’re you doing with that all this time?” Mrs. G asked her.
“Memorizing arabesques.”
Mrs. G raised her eyebrows at Eve. “Well, then,” she said. “Let’s see.”
So René showed her, reciting as she executed each one. “First arabesque, second arabesque,” she said, continuing up to five.
“Did you learn those just now?” Mrs. G asked. “Just looking at that book?”
René nodded. Was it a trick? Had she got one of them wrong?
“Looks like you’ve found your little helper,” Mrs. G said to Eve, cackling.
René’s face tightened. Never, she thought, grinning fiercely at her mother. Not ever.
“Good idea,” Eve said, laughing along with Mrs. G as they all started out the door, René shivering with the cold, buttoning her coat high around her neck as Mrs. G locked up behind them.
* * *
—
Mrs. G found a photographer to take pictures of the Academy of Ballet. He offered his services to photograph some of the kids, so she told him she’d let him know if anyone was interested.
“I don’t care, Eve,” she said. “But he says he’s not charging anything, so if you wanted to take Leon and René down to his studio, maybe you could get some good photos out of it. Maybe there’d be one to use for the new school.”
Eve had taken Mrs. G’s advice and signed rental papers on a church hall in Belle Fourche, South Dakota—a cattle-trucking outpost about an hour north of Rapid City, where ballet wasn’t even a word yet. She and Mrs. G were already busy making preparations for her trial year of teaching there.
So Mrs. G made an appointment for them with the photographer, and when the day rolled around, Leon and René got their costumes together while Eve and Jayne waited in the car. Then they all drove downtown to the photographer’s studio.
The photographer shook Eve’s hand with both his hands. He was tall, with broad shoulders, dark, curly hair, and a thick mustache, and he was flirtatious and open, as if he thought just about anything was possible. He kept smiling and twinkling his eyes at Eve, which was causing her to brighten more every minute.
After giving them a short tour of his studio, the photographer showed them to a dressing room in the back with a large, lighted vanity.
“You can change in here,” he said, lightly touching his hand to the small of Eve’s back. “Just come out when you’re ready.”
Leon dressed in black tights and a white T-shirt, René put on her pink tutu, and they headed out to where the photographer was waiting.
The photographer took Leon by the shoulders and positioned him under the lights, telling René to stand with him, in the same spot. He was using a large-format camera on a tripod, he explained, so they had to be where he could get to them. He went back and forth, adjusting the camera, the lights, chatting with Eve as he set up his equipment.
“Ready,” he said, finally. “Now just go ahead and do whatever you like, and I’ll take pictures.”
Leon supported René in various poses—arabesque and penchée, attitude en avant and derrière. They turned sideways and René faced Leon in passé, bending away from him. They did a fish dive, a shoulder lift, whatever they could think of.
Then the photographer wanted photos of Leon by himself. So Eve brought out one of Leon’s costume tunic tops, and he changed where he stood, handing Eve the shirt he’d just taken off, leaving his smooth, bare chest exposed for an instant to the rich, hot lights of the studio.
“Just us boys,” the photographer laughed, stepping out from behind his camera.
Leon posed on one knee, smiling. He put both hands on one hip, twisting his torso like a toreador. He did tours and leaps, then jumped straight up and split his legs in the air, touching his toes.
“Wonderful!” the photographer said. “Magnificent! Oh, your children are just terrific,” he said to Eve, coming out to shake her hand, as if to congratulate her. “So talented.”
“Why, thank you,” she said, beaming, her face coloring. “I like to think so.”
“Nice job, Leon.” The photographer placed his large hands on Leon’s shoulders, nearly encircling Leon’s neck, and René was left to wonder why he didn’t say the same to her and why he hadn’t wanted pictures of her by herself.
“You kids want to look through the camera?”
The photographer set a box behind the tripod so they could all see through the eyepiece, and Eve stood in place against the backdrop, pretending to pose.
“Beautiful,” the photographer called to her. “Now lift your leg.”
“You’re joking.” She laughed.
“It’d be fun to be a photographer,” Leon said.
“His dad’s a cattle dealer,” Eve explained. “He’s out of town all the time.”
“It is fun,” the photographer said to Leon.
“It’s a great job,” Eve confirmed, still lifting her arms and tilting her head for the camera. “You could travel the world.”
Leon nodded and smiled his bright, bashful smile, which none of them had seen in a very long time.
“I’m going to be developing this film tonight, Leon,” the photographer said, “if you want to give me a hand, see how it’s done? If it’s okay with your mom, that is.” He flashed Eve a smile.
“That’s an awfully nice offer,” Eve said, stepping away from the backdrop, rejoining the others.
“You’ve got some awfully nice kids here,” the photographer answered. “And if Leon’s interested in photography, there’s no better way to learn than to get in there and do it himself. Get his hands dirty.”
“That’s what I always say. See, Leon? The world’s a great big place. You want to learn photography? He says he’s happy to teach you.”
“It’d be a good introduction.” The photographer slapped Leon on the back and, with an air of tremendous ease and well-being, went to snap the spent film from his camera. “Could be fun.”
Leon nodded. “Sure,” he said.
“Okay,” the photographer said. “How about I stop by your house when I’m done here, around six-thirty, and we’ll head over to the darkroom. Sound good?” He looked to Eve.
“Sounds fine,” Eve said, happy and grateful to have finally found someone willing to step in for Leon, to fill the void left by his absent father. It was just what Leon needed—a grown man to take an interest, to pay some attention.
So Eve gave the photographer directions, and he pulled up to the house after dinner, tooting his horn. Al was out of town, as usual. Eve and Leon were waiting in the living room, watching for the photographer’s car, straining to see through their darkened front window.
“That’s for you,” Eve said. “See? I told you, Leon. It’s a big, wide world out there. You can be anything you want to be.”
But Leon was already out the door.
“Bye, honey!” she called after him.
* * *
—
It was only as Eve watched the photographer’s car pull away, his taillights disappearing down the street and around the corner, that she remembered he hadn’t told her where they were going. When he’d given them the tour of his downtown studio, he’d made a point of telling her he had no space there for a darkroom. She could still hear him saying something about having to develop his film off-site, across town. There’d been no sign or business card at his place, and he hadn’t offered her any information, so she didn’t have a phone number or an address. She was stunned to realize that she didn’t even know his name.
The car was long gone, melted into the darkness, and Mrs. G, who was the only one who knew who the guy was and how to get ahold of him, was out of town, visiting friends somewhere in Colorado.
Eve lit a cigarette and told herself to calm down. She hadn’t just sent Leon off without asking him whether he wanted to go or not,
as Al had done; she hadn’t shipped him clear out of state without warning, not giving him a choice, hog-tying him in front of company so that he couldn’t even speak up for himself. She’d never do that. She was broadening his horizons, giving him options, showing him that his choices were wide open. And no, it just wasn’t accurate to say she’d let a total stranger carry her boy off into the night. She simply needed to calm down.
She sat for a long time, looking out the window, trying to see past the point where the photographer’s taillights had vanished. She started to pace, then forced herself to sit back down. She smoked and figured. Where could the darkroom be? How long could it take to get there? How long to set up? How long to wait for each image to come to life? How long? How long? She knitted and smoked, made coffee and watched, trying not to panic. And as the hours crept by, she reminded herself that it took time to develop film, probably more time than she knew, that she had to be patient, that most likely everything was fine. Not having the man’s number was simply an oversight, she told herself, as much her fault as his.
By ten-thirty Eve felt light-headed and feverish, damp with sweat. There was a phrase that kept coming back to her, ringing in her ears, something about boys…boys…just boys. Just us boys. That was it. That’s what he’d said, she realized, when Leon had changed costumes under the lights. Just us boys. Then he’d laughed. She drew a shallow breath and pushed the haunting noise away from her, out of her mind, but still she could hear the edges of it, ringing in the distance—Just us boys. Just us boys, then laughter.
At ten forty-five, Eve vomited. She rinsed her mouth but felt her insides burning up. She was just picking up the phone to call the police when a car pulled into the driveway.
“Oh, God. Hallelujah,” she cried when she saw Leon getting out. And when he came through the door, she thought she’d die of relief. Tears sprang to her eyes as she ran to greet him, to collect him.
The Distance Home Page 17