I was wondering, not for the first time, why I was so incredibly naive.
‘Perhaps I’m wrong,’ she continued. ‘Anyway, you need to put him out of his misery. I’m not convinced you want him to leave his wife. Why don’t you very nobly just tell him not to leave, you’re happy as things are for now.’
‘But I’m not,’ I said, tears starting to sting my eyes.
‘Ooh look! It’s our little stallion!’
I turned and saw Rowan lighting a cigarette, shielding it with his hand from the wind, then drawing on it like it was the fount of life itself.
‘He needs to pack that in. Find another way of calming himself down. Take up meditation. A musical instrument. A middle-aged woman who can kick the habit with him – who’s got flexible working hours, even if somewhat inflexible joints,’ she said, laughing, trying to change the mood.
‘I could teach him the piano,’ I said, still trying to pluck up the courage to tell her about Ali.
‘Well get out there and make him an offer then, payment in kind at the end of each term,’ she said, drawing smirking glances from the two businessmen who’d just sat down at the table next to us.
‘Is okay, signore? Anything else for you?’ asked Luigi.
Emma wasn’t sure, but I ordered two more coffees even though I was already getting a jittery headache from the first one.
‘Actually I’ve already got a ballet dancer piano pupil, and he’s handful enough,’ I said, eating a sugar lump to spur me on.
‘Oh yes? Is he a Rowan or Alejandro of the future?’
‘No, an Alejandro of the present.’
‘What, an adult? Gosh, that must be interesting. Who does he dance with?’
‘No... I mean he is Alejandro.’
Even then she looked like she was assuming my pupil just happened to have the same name. I started laughing, nodding my head.
‘What? No! How? And how long’s this been going on? Bloody hell Rosie!’
‘We’ve only had four lessons so far.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me before, you crazy woman? I don’t understand you.’
I couldn’t answer that. I just explained how his girlfriend had come to the hospital, we’d got chatting, and the next thing I knew I was their piano teacher. No train. No research. No stalking. No tap sampling. I thought I’d tell her the rest later. I didn’t. But I amused her, over the champagne she’d insisted on ordering, with tales of his thighs not fitting under the piano, the double-entendres, his unstoppable enthusiasm. A strongly-edited account of his tactile nature, and we were soon back to our prurient selves, with the inevitable jokes about fingering, technique and dynamic climaxes.
After a while, complaining about hurting throats and wiping the corners of our eyes, we started to calm down. She poured the rest of the bottle and looked at me seriously for a moment. ‘There’s no possibility that you and he – ’
‘No,’ I said quickly. ‘But it’s fun. It’s great. And obviously it’s nice to look even if you can’t touch!’
‘Well, as they say, it doesn’t matter where you get your appetite as long as you eat at home, or in your case, additionally, in the boardroom.’
‘The chapel,’ I corrected her.
‘There’s no likeness is there?’
‘No. Well, not really. Dark, of course.’ The olive skin, the arms. Something about the way they spoke. I didn’t want to think about it.
‘Well, it must make it easier. Anybody in contact with that divine man is going to need an outlet!’
I finished my champagne.
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean that. But Rosie, look at the timing. You must be able to see a connection.’
I put on a puzzled face, in respect for Ricardo. But good old Emma – as usual she’d read me like a book – and she sensed that I didn’t want to talk about it anymore. We paid and thanked Luigi and made our way to the Opera House shop.
‘I say, check out the opera talent,’ said Emma, as she clacked through the boards displaying the posters.
There was a bare-chested long-haired rock star type, his mouth open in song; an elegant curly haired Italian in a dark suit, leaning against a pillar.
‘Yeah but operas are so sad: everyone ends up betrayed, murdered or dying of a broken heart.’
‘Well we’re used to that with ballet,’ said Emma, examining a Manon poster in which Ali and Maria were clutching each other in exquisite anguish.
‘There’s a fantastic one of your friend back here,’ she said loudly, flipping back the boards, ignoring the two French girls – obviously dancers, with their long necks and turned out feet – who were trying to choose a poster.
The sultry Ali leaning against the barre. ‘Oh God no, that’s hideous. Looks criminal. He’s not like that – he spends a lot of time grinning from ear to ear.’ Unless you’re very late for his lesson.
The French girls were unperturbed: one was saying dix-neuf and the other was pulling the rolled up poster with nineteen on it out of the tub. He was everyone’s property. Ballet fans all over the country – and in several others too – were fantasising about him, worshipping his picture on their wall, watching his documentary over and over. In the ballet world, women at his feet wherever he went. What does this do to a man? It gives him choice, that’s what.
‘And he’s not my friend,’ I whispered, ‘and keep your voice down.’
‘Okay, okay. How about this one from La Fille then? The picture on the front of the DVD.’
A grinning Ali on one knee, supporting an arabesqued Daniela, the Argentinian ballerina we adored, especially since she warmly returned our ‘Feliz Navidad’ when she passed us in a corridor on a tour before Christmas. Yes, this was the Ali I knew. How wonderful, I thought, to have this picture on my study wall. But should I be encouraging myself to gaze at his elegantly parted muscular legs, the profile of his pert bottom? I settled for yet another Royal Opera House pen, while Emma stocked up with two DVDs and a hefty book of Pas de Deux pictures that the shop would have to hang on to until later so that she’d have hands free to try on numerous outfits in the pricey clothes shops round the Piazza.
She didn’t like having me with her in the boutiques, said I was a distracting little killjoy. So as usual she deposited me in the quirky gadget shop near the Opera House – a kind of adult crèche for tiresome non-shoppers – and said she’d join me later.
I sat down on an inflatable pair of lips; set off an unbelievably lifelike trotting and yapping Highland terrier and bought it as Seb’s birthday present for Kenny, wincing at the price that I’d stupidly misread; switched on some vibrating plastic insects that claimed to get rid of headaches when you made them straddle your head. Just the job, I thought, and was considering whether to go for the purple-green ant or the pink-black spider when I felt hands on my shoulders, thumbs pressed into the taut area between my shoulder blades so hard that I groaned.
‘I don’t think these little insectos can give you what you want,’ he said as I turned round.
‘Oh! Hello.’
He kissed me on each cheek. ‘You are very early for performance, Rosi,’ he said, grinning like in the poster.
‘What performance?’ I said, teasing.
His face clouded for a moment, and then he smiled again. ‘Yes, you come. Your husband is here?’ he asked, looking round the shop.
‘No, I’m with a friend. She leaves me here when she goes to the clothes shops.’
‘A woman who not like shopping. Is very unusual!’ he said, nodding his head. ‘I buy dog for the boy of my sister, and then we get a drink, no?’
So we queued up and he bought the Labrador, and insisted on getting the ant for me, and then we crossed the cobbles to a table and ordered two orange juices and a camomile tea.
He was wearing a cap that he said was sweaty but stopped people recognising him. He was stretching his neck, twitching his shoulders, couldn’t sit still and was looking at his watch. I wondered if he was nervous but didn’t like to ask. He downed his tw
o glasses quickly, tipping back his head as I remembered him doing when he drank my coffee on the train.
My tea was boiling hot. ‘If you’ve got to go, that’s fine. Don’t wait for me,’ I said.
‘No. I like sit here with you. Difficult to relax in Opera House, with everybody always talking of dance. But I have rehearsal at three so must look at the time.’
‘Rehearsal? Before a performance?’
‘Oh yes. They work us hard you know. Is for Jewels. You are coming to see it?’
‘No, doesn’t appeal I’m afraid.’
‘Oh, I know, you prefer the story ballet. Romance. Boy meet girl, girl in love with boy, boy cheats girl etcetera, etcetera.’
I shrugged. ‘I like the Macmillan ballets best,’ I said.
‘Of course you do. The pasión,’ he said, laughing and patting my hand.
My phone rang and I was glad to have to look down and delve into my bag to find it.
‘You jumped the playpen. Where are you?’
‘I bumped into a friend. We’re having a drink at Edouard’s.’
It was time for him to go. He kissed me on each cheek again and strode off. I watched in amazement as he moved through the crowd, unrecognised. If he were a footballer he would be mobbed, with or without a hat; if he were an actor he’d have signed a few autographs or exchanged some words between here and the stage door round the corner. But as a ballet star, with all the athleticism of a footballer and larger-than-life charisma of an actor, and beautiful with it, he could walk through the crowd unheeded. Ballet was ballet: even yards from the Opera House, the majority of the public were totally disinterested in it. Or rather, they’d never looked.
Emma was cross that she’d missed him, sat down where Ali had sat and made inevitable comments about backsides.
Then there was an irritating text from James asking why I wasn’t answering his email, where was his PhD student’s Ethics application that I was supposed to be editing, did I realise it was due in tomorrow. I could suddenly visualise the damn thing, with all its signatures, lying next to my computer at home; I was going to have to dash off after the performance and get the train back, rather than stay with Emma, so that I could bring it in the next day. It was annoying, but we got on with enjoying the time we had: sitting with our legs out in the sun, discussing the new season’s ballets and which casts we’d like to see, deciding which books we’d read should be made into new ballets if the funding could ever be found.
Eventually it was time for the cloakroom queue and then the even longer one for the ladies’ loo. I stood there imagining him limbering up, doing those doll-like sideways splits on the floor, jumping up and down to keep his muscles warm, trying a few steps. Two months earlier I’d wanted to be disappointed in his performance; now I was feeling nervous for him, worried he’d slip or miss a lift again. Rather like how I used to feel for Seb’s performances. Ridiculous really.
We took our seats, poring over our programmes as usual.
‘That’s him: Widow Simone – Gerard Thomas,’ said Emma, flicking through. ‘God, the biog pic doesn’t do him justice at all.’
‘And nor will tonight’s costume – calm down girl.’
‘So... have you got Alejandro’s – sorry, Ali’s – mobile number then?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you send a message, telling him to break a leg or whatever?’
‘No of course I didn’t.’
‘But you’ll text him after, surely... Or are we going to the stage door?’
‘I’ll have to dash for the last train, won’t I. And anyway, I dunno... might look a bit weird.’
Emma’s face fell.
‘Well maybe next time.’
‘You alright Rosie? Look a bit tense. Never mind, you soon won’t be – not with this silly rural froth of a ballet about to unfold before you. Wouldn’t have been my choice – I picked it for Sophia, thought it would be a good one for her to start with.’
‘It’s enchanting froth – I love it. And so did Seb – he couldn’t stop laughing. Is it actually the only ballet with a happy ending? Oh – here we go.’
We were in the countryside with the wholesome farm workers, the rooster and his hen harem, Daniela’s lively country girl and her pink ribbon, and her mother, Gerard’s Widow Simone – accompanied by a nudge from Emma. And then in came love-struck lusty young swain Colas, but from the front row, and seeing those hands, his grinning mouth – and thinking how they’d touched me only hours before – it was difficult to see him as anybody but Ali. All that virile half-boy charm and cheekiness; something I saw – looked forward to, coped with, tried not to be in love with – every week.
After his first solo I stopped my ludicrous worrying for him: he was in his element with this ballet, jumping and spinning with superhuman power and precision. Delight in himself. Taking extra bows for the mid-scene thundering applause after his solos. Effortlessly lifting an ecstatic Daniela high in the air and enjoying her rapturous gaze. And, very obviously, that of every girl on the stage.
Once on the train – our train – I grinned to myself and took out my phone to re-read the text. ‘Hope you enjoy performance. Next time let me get ticket for you and friend. I look forward to Monday. And Rosi, if the insecto not cure the headaches, I can show you how. Ali xx.’
21.
I didn’t ring to say I was coming home. Why would I? I thought Jez would be asleep by the time I got back. The night bird guitarist had long gone; he was working so hard on the garden that he’d become a strictly diurnal creature, grumpy and weary as soon as the light faded.
No car in the drive. My heart thudded with the fear that one of the boys had been rushed to hospital. I opened the door and somehow already knew I was alone. Empty beds. Then a chill ran through me: the alarm wasn’t on. This was so unlike Jez that I knew he must have left in a distracted state.
I dropped my bags and found my phone: no missed calls or messages. Jez’s number was switched off. Perhaps because he was in part of the hospital where it had to be. I started to panic, tried to think of an alternative explanation. Terry: perhaps he’d been taken ill. But it was gone midnight; I didn’t want to ring and worry him unnecessarily about his son.
So I looked around for clues. Three phone messages: an exasperated James repeating the message on my mobile; a whiney girl complaining that Seb wasn’t answering his phone; an irritated Elizabeth, asking if Jez could please call her back, she really needed to speak to him. The impression, apart from that of a family letting everyone down, was that the three of them had been out from early in the evening.
Kenny’s room: the usual chaos, but Sheepy was missing, and so was the backpack he used for overnight stays. No school bag and lunch box. It looked like Kenny had gone for a sleepover at Terry’s.
Seb’s room: chaos on a larger scale and of a more disagreeable nature. There was no way the room was going to tell me anything I didn’t already know. But seeing his mobile charger gave me the idea of calling him. I waited for the inevitable drawling message.
‘Hullo?’ As if he didn’t know who it was.
‘Where are you? Is everyone alright?’
‘Well... why wouldn’t they be? I’m at Ben’s.’
‘On a school night? When you’ve been suspended?’
‘His parents don’t mind. They’re cool. Dad had some meeting thing. Wouldn’t let me babysit Kenny. I really don’t know why I – ’
‘So Kenny’s at Grandpa’s?’
‘Yeah. Course. Calm down Mum. Gotta go – Ben’s made toast.’ The line went dead.
Some meeting thing. Until midnight? Still no reply on the mobile. I decided to call Elizabeth; perhaps he’d had too much to drink and they were putting him up for the night.
‘Elizabeth, I’m really sorry to wake you. It’s Rosie. I’m worried about Jez... his phone doesn’t seem to be working... I wondered what time he left.’
‘Oh... Rosie,’ she said. She didn’t seem to be properly awake.
‘He w
asn’t expecting me home tonight,’ I added, and then wondered what she was making of this.
‘Hang on a minute,’ she said.
Why? Either he’s there or he isn’t.
‘Look, he must have had a meeting for something else... perhaps his illustrating... I’m sorry I can’t help.’
She sounded rather faint. Or embarrassed. I apologised and said goodbye.
I sat there staring at the phone. He wouldn’t despatch the boys and forget the alarm in his excitement just to spend an evening with his mate John. There was really only one explanation, and really I’d been aware of it from the minute I pulled into the drive.
I took a glass and a bottle of wine to my study, shoving the wretched Ethics application into my work bag even though I doubted I’d be in a fit state to be doing anything with it the next day. I switched on the computer.
Sarah Hilliard. She wasn’t the humorous, slightly chubby cropped blonde; she was the quieter one with the plaited ponytail, teased by the others in the programme about her insistence on a romantic water feature for every garden. I maximised a picture of her with the other three Gardenmakers on the front cover of the Radio Times. And then I realised. It was her. Or rather, they were both her: Elizabeth’s daughter Sarah was Sarah Hilliard.
My heart thudded and my hand was over my mouth as if trying to stop myself screaming. I desperately tried to work it out, calm myself enough to think it through. Still find some possible explanation. Why hadn’t he told me who she was?
But then what was the point of lying to me when it was going to be so obvious when she came to film the garden? Maybe they just looked alike... I punched her name in again. An interview of the team in which her contribution was minimal. A column about ponds in Gardeners’ World magazine. A book, about to be published, about water features. I went to Amazon and enlarged the front cover. The auburn hair, the smile... it was definitely her. I went back to Google, tried to carry on reading through a film of tears.
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