Off Balance (Ballet Theatre Chronicles Book 1)

by Terez Mertes Rose

  Lana took it upon herself to bear the terrible disappointment nobly. On Christmas morning two weeks later as they sat around the tree and exchanged gifts in a curiously joyless manner, Lana reached over and patted Mom’s hand.

  “It’s all right,” she murmured. “I didn’t need another little brother anyway.”

  Mom’s eyes widened from the half-mast position they’d maintained since her return from the hospital. She reared back as if she’d been struck. Then she jumped up from her chair, the little ceramic bowl Lana had made for her tumbling off her lap. She ran down the hall, into her bedroom, door slamming shut behind her, and in the appalled silence of the living room, they could all hear her low keening moans. Not even crying, but something infinitely more frightening.

  “Nice going, Lan,” her older brother Danny commented. Lana felt too awful to even throw back a reply, a defense.

  They all lived in that terrible grief-saturated limbo for another month, a ghastly period that filled Lana with such fear, she found it difficult to sleep, eat, or focus at school, until the day that Mom left and they thought they’d lost her, all that evening, the long terrible night.

  That had been the bottom.

  The blackest of black.

  When Mom finally came back home—after they’d found her, after her long stay in the hospital that healed your insides, not your outsides—she didn’t seem much better than the Mom who’d scared Lana with her zombie expression. But now there was counseling and “happy pills” and people coming by the house to check up on Mom and the kids as well, and somehow they hobbled through the next few months, all of the kids cowed into obedience, into getting along, not creating any discord. Which they managed for several months, a feat that Lana, to this day, found to be nothing short of a miracle. A collaborative effort. It worked, slowly but surely.

  What they couldn’t do for Baby John, they did for Mom. They brought her back to life.

  She stirred from the bed, glancing at the clock on the nightstand. Ten-thirty. She rose, changed into a nightshirt, checked her phone to see if Gil had left a message. He hadn’t; he’d told her he’d be out with Julia tonight. She could visualize him, having glanced at the incoming phone number, smiling to himself, maybe, but turning to Julia with a “oh, it’s nobody—I’ll let them leave a message” comment.

  She turned off the lights and slid between the bed sheets. From the other room she heard the reassuring sound of Alice’s voice, high and sweet, talking to her cat, and a corresponding meow. The bed was comfortable, luxuriously so. The sheets were a soft, rich cotton; who knew cotton could feel so silky to the skin? A feather comforter managed to feel both weightless and warm on her body. If it hadn’t been for the conversation with Mom, she would have been reveling in the experience of this new home.

  She thought of Mom and found herself resorting to prayer, the way she’d done as a little kid.

  Please, God. Let her be okay. Don’t let her go to that black place again. Whatever it takes to protect her, we’ll do it. I’ll do it.

  Chapter 13 – Confrontation

  Alice would have thought, given Lana’s relocation, that Gil would act a bit more deferential to her at work. But at their weekly two o’clock meeting, during which she confirmed the Redgrave Foundation proposal’s delivery, she caught on to how they weren’t the “everything’s equal” buddies she’d thought.

  Their two o’clock meeting was a breezy, Thursday affair where one of them wandered to the other’s office sometime between two o’clock and two-thirty, reclined in the guest chair as they updated each other on key client issues, sharing whatever good joke happened to be circulating. Sometimes they headed to the café to conduct it over coffee. They’d been known to step across the street to Murphy’s to discuss business over a pint of beer.

  Today, after Alice had shared the news about the Redgrave proposal, she leaned back in her chair and regarded Gil.

  “So, you’ve been closemouthed, but I have to know. What really happened that night with him? You can trust me.”

  No conversation topic had ever been too bawdy for Gil in the past. The more scandalous, the bigger the smile on his face as he told the story, even when it involved him. The wealthy, widowed octogenarian who’d seduced him over drinks back at her place; the mother and daughter duo who’d had no problems sharing him; the famous actor, a buff, macho man’s-man, who’d propositioned him one night. But now, to her surprise, a dull red flush came over his face and he frowned.

  “That doesn’t concern you.”

  “Yes, well.” She paused to finger the papers on her desk before looking up at him. “I need to know if this is going to be a problem at any point.”

  “Problem, like what?” He enunciated each word carefully, with disdain.

  “Like, um, the wrong kind of interest?”

  The disapproving, “mind your place” frown deepened, her cue to drop the subject.

  She needed to know. She sat there, smiling politely at him, waiting.

  Finally he replied, in a dignified fashion. “Our interest in each other is professional only. Aside from that momentary, drunken deviation at the party, the sole component of my relationship with Andy and the Redgrave Foundation is business.”

  “Oh. Okay. That’s great to hear.”

  She offered him a big, stupid smile, made a mental note to never bring it up again, and they moved on to the next client issue.

  Lana was the cause of the change in him. Alice had known from the start that something like this would happen. What she hadn’t known was how personally involved she’d become, how ambivalent her feelings would continue to be toward this pretty, talented, lonely girl, who, unfathomably, seemed to like and respect Alice, no matter how prickly she acted.

  There was not one thing to complain about in regards to Lana living with her. She was neat, polite, helpful and unobtrusive. Something about the whole situation unnerved Alice, however, saying nothing for the nocturnal presence of Gil, who’d slip in late after Alice had gone to her room for the night. He’d head out just as quietly in the early hours of the morning. Seeing him at work a few hours later, all fresh and shaved and smiling, felt awkward.

  Everything felt awkward, off kilter.

  Montserrat called her that afternoon, to her considerable surprise and joy. Alice knew how the autumn months were for her friend; it was prime concertizing season, with back-to-back engagements through much of the period. But Montserrat had found time to call. Better yet was learning she was in town, if only for a day and a half more.

  “Carter told me about you and Niles,” she said in a voice so warm and contrite it made Alice’s throat constrict. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you. You were so weird that night, I should have known something was up and called you.”

  “It’s okay,” Alice told her.

  It was. Because she had her best friend back, albeit temporarily, who was now insisting that Alice stop by that night after work for a glass of wine. Alice happily agreed.

  Montserrat was on the phone when Alice arrived. She opened the door to Alice’s knock, blew Alice a kiss and offered a “make yourself comfortable” gesture, before shifting her attention back to her phone caller. Alice went into the kitchen, poured herself a glass of wine and returned to the living room, settling in on a corner of the couch. Montserrat talked for a few more minutes, alternately listening while she leafed through documents and sheet music on the nearby table. She wandered into the kitchen as she finished up her call.

  As soon as she hung up, she called out a hello to Alice. There was the soft clinking of glass, and a moment later she showed back up in the living room with her own glass of wine and a bowl of olives.

  “Sorry about that,” she said. “I thought I was answering a question or two but it turned out to be a full interview.” She set down the bowl on the table between them and with a happy sigh, eased herself into the oversized armchair adjacent to Alice.

  “It’s always so nice to slip in a few days at home in bet
ween tours. Some musicians would rather avoid the extra travel time and just spend a free day in the next city, but this is what I want. Home. Sitting in my own comfy chair.” She allowed her head to fall back against the pillows.

  “And a glass of wine,” Alice added.

  “Oh, yes. A glass of wine is part of the equation. As is a visit from my dear friend.” She lolled her head over to smile at Alice. “How are you?” she asked.

  “Right at this moment, I’m good.”

  “Glad to hear that. So, what’s new, besides this bad news of our Niles getting himself too involved in work once again?”

  “Well, I have a new housemate.”

  “Another cat?”

  Alice laughed. “No. Is that all you think I’m capable of housing?”

  “Well, I’m just saying, from a cat’s perspective, it’s a great place to move into.”

  “No, this is a roommate of the human persuasion.”

  Montserrat looked puzzled. “I’ve only been gone for ten days. Who’d you conjure up so fast, and why?”

  “You’re not going to believe it.”

  “Who?”

  Alice was enjoying the suspense. “Let me give you a hint. You know her.”

  She watched the confusion work over Montserrat’s face, the way her eyes widened in surprise only to narrow immediately afterward as if to rule out the idea, until she finally looked up at Alice.

  “Not Lana,” she said, more as a statement than a question.

  “Yes, Lana.”

  Montserrat sputtered comically like something out of a cartoon. “Well. I didn’t see that coming.”

  “Trust me. Neither did I. That’s Gil for you, though.”

  “Care to explain?”

  Which Alice did. Afterward, Montserrat gave an approving nod. “Good for you. Really. That was a big gesture.”

  “Yes, it was rather big. It’s just now sinking in how big.”

  “You and Lana.”

  “Or shall we say, me and Lana and Gil.”

  “So, the two of them obviously worked everything out.”

  “I’ll say.”

  “Oh, that’s good to hear. She looked like a little lost lamb when I saw her at the performing arts library that afternoon.”

  That afternoon, less than two weeks ago, when Alice had still had her secure, functional relationship. A pang of hurt shot through her. “Well,” she said, “she’s a survivor.”

  “I agree. I must say, it’s been a pleasure getting to know her. It’s exciting, really, observing a hardworking young woman who’s on the cusp of actualizing as an artist.” Montserrat paused, swirled the wine around in her glass and regarded it thoughtfully. “She reminds me of myself at that age. All focus and determination, but at the same time, quite rudderless, deep down.”

  “Ah, but I wouldn’t know about your past, would I?” Alice strove to keep her voice light. “Aside from what I learned the night of your dinner party. When you and she were confiding in each other.”

  She immediately regretted the words, their petty insinuation. Worse was the pity that came over Montserrat’s face.

  “Oh, Alice. She’s just a girl. Don’t feel threatened by her.”

  A surprise resentment welled up in Alice. She didn’t welcome Montserrat’s easy smile just then, her smooth dismissal of her past as something Lana was privy to, but not Alice.

  “Maybe I’d like to know more about you.”

  “Trust me, there’s nothing pretty about my past. Nothing worth listening to.” Montserrat leaned over, selected an olive, and popped it into her mouth.

  “Why don’t you let me be the judge of that? You’ve heard about my childhood, after all.”

  “And I loved hearing about it.” Montserrat extracted the olive pit and tucked it into a napkin. “Especially the happily-ever-after when Marianne turned all of you back into a family and kept it going that way. I loved imagining it, in that pretty house of your family’s.”

  “Why? What was so bad about your youth?”

  The same nervous undercurrent that now permeated her house seemed to have followed her to Montserrat’s living room. Alice could feel it around them, swirling and uncoiling, like cigarette smoke.

  “Honestly, it’s not that dramatic,” Montserrat said. ”I’ve told you how my parents were, all wrapped up in their acting, dragging me all around Europe like a piece of luggage. Emotional neglect is probably the worst I can pin on them. But I was a levelheaded kid and I learned from an early age to fend for myself. Playing the violin? My idea alone. When they told me it was impossible, that they couldn’t pay for lessons, I made it happen. Every goal I achieved from then on was through my persistence and diligence alone. That’s why I feel like I can relate to Lana, even though her circumstances sound quite different.”

  Montserrat settled back in her chair. The room was silent as she took a sip of her wine.

  “And so you went on to London’s Royal Academy of Music for four years and played your way to international acclaim?” Alice asked.

  Montserrat paused, for the briefest of instants, before nodding.

  “Hard work alone got you there, huh?”

  “That’s it. Endless hours of work and practice. No glamour in that story.”

  She was lying. Alice could tell.

  “So, your conservatory days. Were your parents living there in London too?”

  “No. They alternated between Paris and New York during those years.”

  “How did you get by?”

  This produced a small frown. “I was eighteen, Alice. I’d supported myself for years with my laundry business. By fourteen I was able to charge for music gigs—weddings, parties, events. I knew how to live on a tight budget; I’d done it all my life.”

  Alice straightened from her relaxed position on the couch. “Did you make good friends?”

  Montserrat looked uneasy. “I’m not following this. You want to know what, precisely? Yes, I had friends there. A few. But conservatory is not intended to be a social experience. You’re there to work hard, learn music and technique from world-class teachers, and perform whenever possible. What else do you want to know?”

  Where did it come from, this dark, distressing urge to challenge, to take down such an artist? Was it the pinnacle of admiration or the pinnacle of envy? Or perhaps the two met, there at the very top, and there was no difference.

  “Tell me about your good friends back then,” she insisted. “Your most intimate friends.”

  Montserrat’s brown eyes had grown bright; color had crept into her cheeks. She’d never looked more lovely. She’d never looked more trapped and uncertain.

  Good.

  Montserrat rose abruptly and left the room. She returned a minute later, bringing with her the bottle of wine, pouring each of them more without speaking. Afterward she sat back and met Alice’s eyes. Gone was the trapped, afraid look. In its place was a chilliness that sent a jittery thrill down Alice’s spine.

  “Let’s see. Is it Len Stevenson you want me to talk about, Alice? For whatever reason God only knows.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Who do you think? The intimate friend from conservatory days you seem so keen to hear about. Ah, Len. A true friend in need. Do you want to know how much he helped me? I’m thinking you do, or you wouldn’t have brought this up.”

  Montserrat didn’t wait for her to reply.

  “Len was the owner of the Vuillaume back then. He was a very wealthy, well-connected arts philanthropist and patron. He asked me if I’d like to test it out and borrow it. For the duration of my career. This was a pretty heady proposition for a twenty-year-old to hear. As you see it here in this room right now, you can probably guess the answer. Of course it came with a price. Let me tell you all about that price, Alice.”

  Montserrat’s eyes were flashing now. Alice knew the trapped, uncertain expression was now on her own face and that Montserrat was taking equal grim pleasure in being the one to put it there.

  “A young w
oman’s virginity carries a premium at the bargaining table. Good thing I saved mine for the right occasion. And after that? The Tourte bow, mine for the asking. Imagine having to shell up 25,000 quid for a bow on my own and yes, that would be pound sterling and not U.S. dollars. What’s a blow job or two, or six, between friends? And how to put a price on the introduction to Judith, my New York manager? Handles only the best, only by referral. Then there were the calls to some big-name conductors. Cigars and chocolates sent alongside a demo CD to presenters who pretty much control the concert circuit. You think, for a second, a nobody like myself could have made that kind of action happen?”

  Alice’s mouth opened but no sound came out. She shut it, chastened. Montserrat took another gulp of wine, picked up the bottle and slopped more wine into each of their glasses.

  “Len became very important the season I finished up my conservatory studies, when I was competing in the Royal International Violin Competition. That’s one of those big, prestigious, career-launching competitions, and it was held that year, right there in London. The stress of it, the pressure to excel were just unbearable. I made it to the finals. The night before my final concerto performance, after fourteen hours of practice—par for the course throughout the entire fourteen-day competition—my nerves were so fraught, I was close to a breakdown. Len took one look at me, made me set down the Vuillaume and go out with him and his wife to dinner. Drinks beforehand, drinks during, drinks after. Stupid idea, yes. That’s stress for you. Back at their home, Len dropped his bomb, telling me that unfortunately they might have to sell the Vuillaume, that they had an interested buyer offering a price they couldn’t refuse.”

  Alice stared at her. “That bastard! How could he? And why?”

  “In retrospect, I think he was worried that I’d outgrow him and the need for the Vuillaume, which, after all, wasn’t a Strad. Big competition winners attract lots of sponsors, who like their names and instruments affiliated with winner musicians. But, then again, Len knew how much the Vuillaume meant to me. And we both knew it was his to sell.