Counterpointe

by Ann Warner

  That was the rub. “I didn’t want you to think...well, that I had no faith you could solve your own problems.”

  “Even though, in this particular instance, I couldn’t.”

  “You’d already turned me down, but when I read that ballerina/Bull Shark piece, I wanted to stick a spoke in Hortz’s wheel. Selfish impulse. I didn’t expect you’d ever find out.”

  “I don’t believe it was selfish. Did you ever meet Hortz?”

  “Devaney said his nickname is Hortz’s ass.”

  Clare laughed. “Thank you for that. It’s perfect.”

  “I have another question. I want to know if you like the ballet?” She’d asked Rob that question before, the first time they’d gone out. Then, he’d smiled and said with her help, he was working on it. This time he didn’t smile.

  “I used to. I don’t anymore.”

  “Why not?”

  He gazed at her steadily before looking away. “I once knew a principal dancer. I saw how the ballet treated her after she was injured. I hated it after that.” His voice held a deep undertone of anger, but he wasn’t angry with her. Or maybe he was. For going back.

  “You weren’t there.” The words pushed their way out.

  “I wasn’t where?”

  “At the benefit.” She sucked in a breath. “I was afraid...that my ankle might give out in the middle, or that it wouldn’t, but my dancing would be...that people would pity me. Then I realized if you weren’t there, nothing else mattered.”

  “I was there.”

  Her head came up and she stared at him.

  “I’ll never forget it. You were... Your performance...it...” He stopped, took a deep breath, raised his face to hers. “It made me cry.”

  For a time they met each other’s gaze across a short gap of table.

  “You always took care of me and I took it for granted. As if it were my due. I don’t think I ever thanked you, at least not properly.”

  He reached out and touched her under the chin, then smoothed the corners of her eyes with his thumbs, wiping away the wetness. “It was never a hardship doing anything for you, and you showed me in all kinds of ways you were grateful.”

  “But when I was injured, I kept kicking and screaming instead of buckling down and dealing with it. Until you said ‘enough’ and went away.”

  “I...I couldn’t stay.” His voice was flat, his face shuttered. “It wasn’t my finest hour either.”

  “I understood. Your leaving was necessary. It forced me to stop hiding from life, you know.”

  “You must hate me.”

  “Oh, no, Rob. I’ve never hated you. How could I?” She looked down at her plate. “After I started going to Hope House, I realized everyone has problems, some large, some small. Some huge. What matters is how a person deals with them, and I made a mess of it.”

  “You’re being too hard on yourself.”

  “No. No, I’m not. I had a chance. To be courageous. I blew it.”

  “It took awhile, but you figured it out.”

  She shook her head.

  “It took courage to dance for the benefit.”

  She ducked her head, looking away from the blaze in his eyes. “No. It was—”

  “Admirable. Difficult. Brave.”

  “I’m glad you came.”

  “I would have hated to miss it.”

  They sat staring at each other.

  “You folks decide on dessert yet? We’ve got fresh cherry pie.”

  “Sure. Bring us one piece, two forks.” When the waitress left, Rob smiled at her. “We’ve been working hard. We deserve a treat.”

  Driving back to Boston, they didn’t talk much. Clare tuned the radio to a country music station then sat back and dozed, occasionally waking enough to visualize combinations of steps to fit the music. When they got to her apartment, Rob walked her to the door. He bent his head and kissed her briefly on the mouth. She wanted more than that fleeting contact. She wanted his arms around her, holding her tight against him. She wanted...she took a breath and curbed her desire.

  It was good Rob wasn’t forcing the pace. The work they were doing, sorting through the past, explaining, asking forgiveness, forgiving, was complex. Best to finish before they took any other step.

  Tuesday evening, Rob took Clare to dinner at Legal Seafoods in Chestnut Hill.

  “I don’t have any furniture yet,” she said, as they finished eating. “How would you like to spend a few minutes window-shopping with me?”

  Of course. It was what he should have done when they first married. Gone with her to choose things for the apartment. Instead, he’d handed her a checkbook.

  In that, he’d been following his father’s example, but he now understood that a home should reflect both people living there.

  In the furniture store, Clare indicated a table with an intricate, gilded design. “What do you think of that?”

  “It would make excellent kindling.”

  “You like it that much?”

  “Actually, I believe I’d chop that up first.” He pointed at a sofa. Its sibling sat in his parents’ living room. With sudden clarity, he realized how much he disliked it.

  Clare was obviously trying not to smile. “I take it French Provincial isn’t your favorite.”

  He shuddered. “If that’s what this is.”

  “Why don’t you like it?”

  “Where to start.” He rubbed his chin. “Well, it’s fussy and pretentious. It looks like it expects to be dusted frequently but aside from that you can bloody well leave it alone, and for God’s sake don’t even think about sitting on it.”

  Clare laughed. “So what do you like?”

  “The opposite of this, I guess. I have no idea what you’d call it. How about you?”

  “I agree. This is too fussy.”

  The offerings of the second furniture store were equally unacceptable. “Looks like it’s going to take more work than I thought it would,” Clare said. “Although, I can’t really afford to buy anything yet.”

  He found himself almost saying not to worry, he’d pay for it, then stifled the impulse, realizing it was part of the pattern he was determined to alter.

  The shopping trip did accomplish one thing. He and Clare learned more about each other’s home decor likes and dislikes in a couple of hours than they had during their years of marriage.

  Although Clare arrived at the Danse Classique practice center early, she found Justin already halfway through a pot of coffee.

  She’d awakened excited and happy. Easily explained, of course. A new job. Back in the world she loved. And the progress she and Rob were making was adding to her feeling of well-being. She broke off thoughts about Rob to pour herself a cup of coffee.

  Justin leaned back and breathed in the steam from his own cup. “Have you watched the videos?”

  “I have.”

  “Any ideas yet about a new piece? Not that I’m expecting it, of course.”

  “Actually, I do.” Clare sipped her coffee, smiling to herself. She hadn’t planned to think about the program until she’d settled back in, but then Rob had given her the perfect idea. “What I’m thinking is a dance based upon the third act of a classical French farce. With its careful timings of entrances and exits, a farce is very like ballet, pulled into a different shape. It would provide multiple opportunities for brief pas de deux in various combinations. I’m also thinking that throughout the dance, pieces of fussy furniture would collapse and, for the finale, the wronged men would bond as they gather up the debris and toss it into the fireplace.” She waited while Justin sat, obviously thinking.

  “We have several people who could handle the comedic aspects of such a program.” He named four dancers, the same four she’d decided would be the best choices for the two intertwined and mismatched lovers. “It’s unconventional. Interesting.” Justin rubbed his hand back and forth across his lips. “I like it.”

  Excitement bubbled inside Clare and threatened to overflow. It was the best
first day she could ever remember.

  “How did it go today?” Rob asked when he picked her up for dinner.

  “Amazingly well. It’s good to be back.”

  “Well, it looks like it agrees with you. Guess that means I better suck it up and get used to it.”

  “You’re also going to have to suck it up and share creative credit with me when I choreograph the inspiration you gave me.”

  “What inspiration is that?”

  “Justin wants me to come up with a short piece for a program of new works for next year. You’re responsible for giving me the idea to do a dance based on a French farce involving hoity-toity furniture. Justin loved it.”

  “So a professor and a dancer isn’t such an odd combination after all.”

  “Not odd at all.”

  “You need to bring your parrot hat with you.” Rob said when she opened the door to him on Sunday.

  “You’re not kidnapping me to go off to a Jimmy Buffett sing-along are you? Because I’d rather go sailing.”

  “No sing-alongs. But I have a surprise, and it definitely requires a parrot hat.”

  Intrigued but uneasy, she retrieved the hat from her bedroom. The last time Rob tried to surprise her, by renting the beach cottage, it ended badly.

  “Do I get any hints at all?”

  “Nope. You’ll just have to wait until we get there.”

  When he took the usual turnoff to Falmouth, she sighed in relief that the surprise wasn’t replacing the sail he’d promised her. When they arrived at the yacht, Rob transferred on board bags of provisions along with a large carton. She stored the food then sat in the shade of the cockpit watching as he prepared to get under way. Once they did, he set course to sail along the south coast of the Cape. It finally hit her where they were going, after Rob pulled out binoculars and scanned the beach. She waited to see if she was right.

  Finally, Rob turned and handed her the binoculars and pointed. It was difficult to focus given the movement of the boat, but she didn’t need the binoculars to know where they were—about a hundred yards out from the cottage.

  Rob reefed the sails and set the anchor. “Okay. Time to get out your parrot hat.”

  She pulled it out of her tote, and he took it from her and settled it on her head. Then he reached into the box he’d carried aboard and took out the panama with the disgruntled-looking parrot she’d chosen for him. He handed it to her and she, in turn, placed it on his head.

  Next he lifted a portable tape player out of the box, placed it on the bench, and hit the Start button. The first notes of “Margaritaville” began to play, transporting her back to that wonderful, silly day before Rob and she knew each other well, but had already learned to laugh together. Tears filled her eyes, although it wasn’t exactly sadness she was feeling.

  Next, Rob reached into the box and pulled out several sheets of paper. “Now that I’ve set the proper mood, I’m hoping you’ll help me dispose of these. That is, if you agree they aren’t needed any longer?” He looked at her intently as he handed her the pages. She knew what they had to be. The divorce agreement with her signature affixed to the last page. Rob’s signature was still missing, thank God, and what a near thing that had been.

  She handed him back half the sheets, keeping the last page for herself, and while the song continued to play, they each tore their respective pages into tiny pieces. The fragments of their mistakes swirled around them like miniature seagulls, until a gust of wind swooped them up and over the rail to skim along the water. A whitecap broke over them, and in an instant, they were gone, leaving only the crisscrossing pattern of the waves behind.

  The notes of the song ended, and Rob pulled her into his arms, holding her as if he had no intention of letting her go again.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

  Kahlil Gibran

  Clare sat on the bench in the sailboat’s cockpit, watching Rob fish lazily off the side. It seemed incredible that for once this wasn’t a dream. Whenever she’d tried to remember him while he was in Peru, this was the image that came to her. Rob, either turned away from her, or facing her but backlit by the sun so she’d been unable to see his face.

  “Did either of us have a clue?” she said.

  He turned his head and gave her a steady look, then he reeled in his line. “Doesn’t seem like it.”

  She looked at his dear face as he came and sat on the bench next to her.

  “While I was in the jungle, I thought about us. Did you do that, Clare? Think about us?”

  She nodded, meeting his gaze. How odd to be able to live in physical intimacy with a person and yet hold back so much of yourself you remained strangers. Her heart felt like it was swelling and, after a moment, she recognized the feeling for what it was. Love. She loved Rob.

  She’d first felt this way the night of the benefit. Since then, the feeling had grown until it filled her whole consciousness. She loved this man. Loved him passionately and wholeheartedly.

  But without the abrupt demarcation of his leaving, she might never have known. “You make everyone else seem...insubstantial.” Wonder filled her. “But I have so little to offer you.”

  “Yourself. That’s enough.”

  They sat without touching, looking in each other’s eyes. She leaned toward him and cupped his cheek with her hand. “It’s really quite simple. Isn’t it?

  “What, Clare?” His voice was soft, although she heard a faint tremor in his words.

  “Rob. I...” She closed her eyes for a moment seeking courage, then opened them and met his clear gaze. “I love you. I think I always have, and I didn’t know it. How could I not have known?”

  “You were hurt, uncertain.”

  “I wasted so much time.”

  “It’s all right now, Clare.” He reached out to lay his hand on her head, as if in benediction.

  The sun traversed overhead, and the yacht lying at anchor bobbed gently in the swell. The two people joined together in the small cabin moved in their own rhythm. Touching and blending. Discovering. Forgiving. Asking silent questions neither was any longer afraid to answer. Transcending the hurt they’d done each other.

  After they joined, they slept, rocked in the arms of a quiet sea.

  Back to the Beginning

  A Note to Readers

  Thank you so much for reading Counterpointe.

  If you enjoyed the novel, I would appreciate it if you would help others discover it. You can do this in a variety of ways:

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  Thank you!

  About the Author

  A former clinical chemist/toxicologist and university professor, Ann took a turn down a different road when she began writing fiction.

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