A Little Learning

by Margot Early

  She liked this man for spending time with his children, for knowing his children.

  But his interest in her just now was inconvenient.

  And she had already begun to wonder exactly what his relationship with his children was like. In her presence, he’d revealed his ignorance of the name of his youngest daughter’s stuffed animal. To Rory, Belle had introduced her “stuffy,” as she called it, as Mouse. Either she’d never bothered to tell her father its name, or he’d forgotten.

  They were like a family, and not. The children seemed to tiptoe around Seamus, seemed to want to please him, and yet…well, it was a bit strange, that was all.

  In any case, she’d never experienced a truly successful parent-child relationship. Her parents’ marriage had been brief and it was still a mystery to her. And, well, her grandmother was one way and her mother had been another, and her father was different, still.

  Rory knew that her mother had been athletic, as her father was, and comfortable in the outdoors. Her grandmother said that Rory’s mother had been into everything natural. Rory thought she herself was probably more like Gran. Gran had been a lounge singer, had worked on cruise ships, had been worshipped by many men—admittedly, Rory hadn’t yet experienced that—and was a true free spirit. Rory’s mother, Kristin Nichols Gorenzi, had died after skiing into a tree. Rory’s father hadn’t been there. Another man had—her mother’s lover. Gran had told

  Rory this.

  Rory’s mother had been pretty, small and blond, with a bright, wide smile. Rory couldn’t even imagine what her mother had been like. But she could believe that the fact she’d died while skiing with another man had helped drive Kurt Gorenzi from his daughter’s life.

  “Why don’t I call the ski shop,” Rory said to Beau, “and if the owner’s keen, I’ll take you over tomorrow to meet her. She has one other employee. He’s college age, and he’s really nice. He actually helps my fire-dancing troupe a lot.”

  “Your what?”

  It was Seamus who’d spoken. Rory glanced up. His green eyes were long-lashed, and his sharp, elegant features and wavy long black hair reminded her of Viggo Mortensen in The Lord of the Rings.

  “Oh, my roommates and I are fire dancers. Actually, we belly dance, too. It’s both. We call it fire fusion. Our troupe is named Caldera.”

  Seamus continued to gaze at her intently, as if he were trying to see inside her. “A woman of unusual talents. How did you get into that?”

  “In college… Well, when I was in college—” another failed enterprise “—I saw a troupe perform. And then I took some classes and I was hooked. I actually preferred belly dance and fire-dancing to school.”

  The puppy cried and Beau stood up. “I’ll take him out.”

  “Thank you, son,” his father said and forced his eyes back to his questionnaire.

  Again, Rory caught it—that hungry look, this time on Beau’s face. It was a hunger for words from his father, anything resembling attention from his father.

  “What exactly do you do with fire?” Seamus asked.

  “Poi and staff twirling. Poi are balls that are attached to tethers—cords. We swing them in patterns, making them go around each other. It’s fun. Poi comes from New Zealand, originally, and fire-dancing is practiced all over the world. The belly dance we do is called American Tribal Style, which was developed by a woman in San Francisco.”

  “Aren’t you afraid of being burned?” asked Seamus, abandoning his questionnaire entirely.

  I’m perplexed by how little attention this man is paying to his kids. What is wrong with him? Obviously, her original assessment of him as an involved father had been somewhat off the mark. She was reminded of her own father; and, consequently, she felt for the Lee children.

  “Well—I’ve been burned. It happens.” She pulled up her sleeves to display minor scars on her forearms. “We try to avoid it. And we’re extremely good at first aid. But we practice and practice and practice, repeatedly, without fire, before we ever light up.”

  Seamus tried to shift his attention away from Rory’s heart-shaped face, which struck him as elfin and mysterious. She plays with fire….

  Too much like Janine.

  But completely unlike his wife, too.

  Because he could tell that Rory wasn’t a boaster. She was clearly…just Rory. Already, he felt completely at ease in her presence.

  Beau had opened Seuss’s crate, and the puppy rushed out, wiggling all over. He jumped on Beau and the boy petted him enthusiastically.

  “Don’t do that,” Rory said before she could stop herself. Engage brain, then mouth, she reminded herself too late.

  “Why not?” Seamus asked.

  “Because soon that dog’s going to be eighty pounds or more, and you don’t want anything that size jumping on people. So don’t reward him with attention for it now.”

  Beau looked up at her, with his father’s eyes. He stopped petting the puppy and tried to hold him by his collar.

  The puppy’s lead lay on top of the crate, and Beau fastened it to his collar. They headed out the front door.

  Seamus gazed at the questionnaire. What are you hoping to get from your experience at the Sultan Mountain School?

  He bent over the coffee table and wrote, I’m doing this for my kids. I want to get them away from Telluride, from the atmosphere of entitlement there. I want them to live someplace where things are a bit different and to understand that they’re not better than other people, just luckier than most of them. Maybe I should’ve taken them to Rio de Janeiro instead, to the favelas. But I thought a town here that hasn’t yet been spoiled by money might be the answer. For myself, I’d like to feel more competent in the outdoors and more aware of my environment. Some avalanche knowledge would also be a good thing.

  The next question: Anything special you’d like to do during your time at the Sultan Mountain School?

  He reminded himself that Kurt might read his answer. See Rory Gorenzi fire dance, wouldn’t be the most tactful response. He wrote, Surprise me, and then put down his pen.

  Lauren finished filling out her questionnaire, brought it to Rory and sat down on a stiff velvet couch.

  “Well, he’ll be good protection,” Seamus finally said, thinking about the dog.

  Rory reminded herself that saying too much tended to get her in trouble. But she had to say this. “Actually, that’s one of the biggest misunderstandings people have about dogs. In truth, we protect them. We’re their only protectors. Yes, a trained protection dog can bite and hold on to an assailant. And, yes, some people will think twice about messing with you, if you’re accompanied by a big, powerful dog. But our role with all pets is that of their protector. The best way to protect dogs is by obedience training them.” As she spoke, Rory thought of Lola. Yes, in taking Lola into her home and her life, Desert had agreed to be the snake’s protector. It didn’t matter that Lola was a reptile and would never have a special attachment to Desert, and that the python might kill any of them randomly, for reasons unknown to them.

  Rory turned her attention to Lauren Lee. The girl was tall, coltish and blond. She carried herself in a way that suggested she was used to being admired, used to popularity.

  Rory picked up her questionnaire, skimming the answers.

  Since I’m here, I’d like to improve my snowboarding, progress into backcountry snowboarding, become more self-sufficient.

  Since I’m here?

  Lauren, perhaps, would have preferred to remain in Telluride.

  “Tomorrow,” Rory said, “avalanche conditions willing, you and I can go up to Colorado Bowl and snowboard.”

  “You snowboard?” Lauren asked, possibly the longest sentence she’d yet uttered to Rory.

  “I do. We’ll snowshoe up, packing our boards. Why don’t you have your stuff together at eight? We’ll check our packs to make sure we have everything.”

  *

  THAT EVENING, WHILE Beau stayed with Caleb and Belle, Seamus and Lauren walked the puppy around th
e block and returned through the alley between their house and what turned out to be Rory Gorenzi’s home. Seamus knew where they were when he and Lauren saw swirling fire inside the pink house’s chain-link fence. The fire seemed to streak through the air as three women made tethered fireballs swing and arc around each other. The young man Seamus had seen that morning at the Sultan Mountain School sat drumming. He was dressed for frigid weather, but his hands were covered only with thin fingerless gloves. The women wore winter athletic tights and jackets, and their heads were covered with hats.

  Their walk had been quiet, with observations related to air temperature (frigid), the amount of ice on the streets (lots), and Seuss’s strength (considerable). A conversation for strangers. Seamus knew his daughter—and yet he didn’t. They lived in the same house, and yet their paths almost never crossed.

  Elizabeth’s right, he thought. I don’t know them.

  It had always seemed right for his children to have full schedules. Lauren spent many weekends and summers away at camps—soccer camp, dance camp, cheerleading camp. So did the others, all but Belle, and Belle had a nanny. They all, of course, had Fiona, too, that remarkable woman who had entered their lives like Mary Poppins the year before Janine’s death. The children all had Fiona, always.

  Except at the moment.

  His name’s Mouse, Belle had told Rory. He’s a stuffy.

  Stuffy. How long since he’d heard that word? Belle must have learned it from Lauren. The kids were much closer to each other than they were to him. Protective of each other, as well.

  Lauren gazed at the three fire-spinners. “I’d like to do that.”

  Seamus thought it looked dangerous and remembered what Rory had said about getting burned. But he didn’t discourage his daughter. Hadn’t he brought the children to Sultan to embrace a different lifestyle? Though, of course, there must be a fire dancer or two in Telluride. Certainly, such troupes had performed there.

  Janine would have wanted to try spinning poi, just to prove she could and that she wasn’t afraid. Everything she did was intended to illustrate her strength, her independence.

  Including the gun.

  Seamus and Lauren lingered at the fence, watching. Seamus’s mind shifted to Ki-Rin, to the character he had created—the character who was his livelihood. He could easily develop an anime character like Rory to fit into the world of Ki-Rin. Perhaps a fire goddess of some kind… Ten cold minutes later, the women finished dancing and extinguished their poi.

  Rory glanced up and saw them. She walked over to the fence.

  Seamus said, “Very impressive.”

  “It was a good practice. Everything went right.”

  “Can we hope for a glimpse of the snake?” he asked.

  “Beau would be disappointed,” Rory told him, “if you got to see Lola and he didn’t.”

  Of course, she was right. Understanding his kids better than he did.

  She told Lauren, “I better get to bed, so I’m ready for snowboarding tomorrow.” And to Seamus, she said, “You’ll be starting avalanche school. It will be a four-day session, with classroom activities in the morning and field practice in the afternoon.”

  “The kids should have it, too,” he remarked. “At least, Lauren and Beau.”

  “They will. Just not on the same schedule as you.”

  Watching her smile, Seamus wondered if she had some surprise up her sleeve. “I thought you would be teaching all of us,” he said.

  “I will—on different days. All the instructors rotate. I’m your program coordinator.” Her breath steamed as she spoke, and Seamus thought again how pretty she was.

  There was no reason for his attraction to Rory Gorenzi to feel so inappropriate. Except that this was the first extended amount of time he’d spent with his children—all of them together—since Janine’s death. He feared that the temptation to pursue Rory was just another way to avoid their company.

  I need to avoid them.

  He had found Janine after the accident. Forensic evidence had proved that neither he, nor anyone else, had killed her—and had established that it wasn’t suicide.

  No way would it have been suicide, in any case. Janine would never have taken that way out, and she hadn’t wanted to go.

  It had been an accident. A stupid accident. Because she’d decided she needed to carry a gun. Because she’d wanted to carry one. Because she’d needed to prove to the world how tough she was.

  The anger simmered within him all over again, and he tried to block it out. And hoped that none of his children would mention the subject of their mother for the next three months.

  *

  “I WANT FIONA!”

  Belle’s sobs were something Seamus hadn’t anticipated. Even less had he anticipated that his own daughter would not be comforted by his arms.

  Lauren reached for her. “Baby Belle, it’s okay. Look. You’re upsetting Mouse. He’s going to cry, too.”

  “He misses Fiona!” Belle said.

  Seamus thought in amazement of the slim, sure elderly woman now kayaking in Baja. Fiona, with her long white braid and her love of poetry and opera and ballet and openness to learning about all that was new.

  Seamus surrendered Belle to his oldest daughter. The four-year-old turned and gazed at him with what looked like a combination of suspicion and curiosity. He could still smell the child scent of her and marveled that it should seem foreign to him, instead of familiar.

  “Mouse wants you to sleep with us,” Belle told Lauren. “Please.”

  Seamus’s reaction was to forbid it, on the impulse that Belle should be taught independence. Then, as if from long ago, he remembered the fears of his other children when they were younger, back in the days when he had known them. He would have to be a monster not to want this child, with her small tear-streaked face, to feel safe and comforted.

  “Is it okay?” Lauren asked hesitantly, looking at him.

  He realized that she didn’t call him Dad. She didn’t call him anything. “Of course.”

  Lauren smiled and told Belle, “We can’t let Mouse feel lonely. I’ll sleep in the other bed.” She nodded to the room’s second twin. “We’ll share. Okay, baby?”

  “Mouse loves you,” Belle told her sister.

  CHAPTER THREE

  EARLY THE NEXT MORNING, Rory and Lauren strapped on snowshoes over their snowboarding boots. They carried packs made by CamelBak, with water reservoirs, as well as emergency blankets, and small first-aid kits. Rory also wore an avalanche beacon and carried her shovel in her pack, though they were not going into any avalanche zone.

  “This looks pretty tame,” Lauren pointed out, although she was breathing hard from the hike uphill.

  “Good. We’re just starting out with this. The country around here has a lot of avalanche danger, so I don’t want to take you anywhere hairier until you’ve gone through the course and learned to use a beacon.”

  “I wish I could take a course in fire-dancing,” Lauren said.

  “I don’t know how your dad would feel about that. And I’ve never taught a minor with fire. Of course, you don’t actually learn twirling or poi with fire. You learn without. It’s essential to practice for months, to get really good, before you bring fire into it.”

  “I’d practice without fire,” Lauren told her. “But I’m not afraid of fire.”

  Rory glanced at her, noting the remark. She turned the comment over in her mind, knowing it would have relevance to snowboarding and everything else this girl did.

  “I am,” Rory said. “I’m afraid of getting burned and I’m afraid of breaking bones snowboarding and skiing, and I’m afraid of being buried in an avalanche. It doesn’t stop me doing any of the things I like to do, but it does make me determined to do things the right way. Fear is what helps us stay alive.”

  “I guess,” Lauren said without conviction. “Our family’s not fearful, though. I’m not, in any case.”

  Why did she point that out? Rory wondered. What was wrong with a litt
le healthy fear?

  They made the run together, Rory following Lauren. Lauren was obviously an accomplished snowboarder. Her form was excellent. Probably, she’d had the best teachers in Telluride.

  Rory led her up another slope, breathing hard as she made her way over the powder in her snowshoes. They snowboarded together for three hours, then headed back to the Empire Street house in Rory’s car, a black Toyota RAV4 that she’d bought used. As they turned down Main Street, however, Rory spotted a familiar shape wearing a day pack and walking with the help of an ornately curved walking stick. Her grandmother wore black wool pants and an imitation ermine coat, and her still-thick white hair was swept up in a French twist beneath her matching fake fur hat.

  Snow fell heavily as Rory pulled up beside her and rolled down the window. “Gran, do you want a ride?”

  “Of course not, Rory.” Her mother’s mother frowned with interest at Lauren. “I will fall apart if I don’t keep up with my walking.”

  Walking, dancing, singing, yoga, Rory filled in. The way Sondra had raised her—good grief, she’d learned to ski by being guided down slopes between her grandmother’s legs—seemed to have determined that she pursue an active, healthy lifestyle. Part of her love of fire-dancing and belly dance had come from her grandmother’s enthusiasm when she’d learned of Rory’s new interests; without being told, Sondra had seemed to understand that what Rory liked was the peaceful concentration required to work with fire.

  Feeling a surge of love for Sondra, Rory told the woman, “This is one of my dad’s clients, Lauren Lee. This is Sondra Nichols,” she told Lauren, “my grandmother.”

  “It’s nice to meet you,” Lauren said dutifully.