The Music and the Mirror
Page 39
“Not if they want you enough to swoop in now. You’re too good for that. You know that better than anyone.” Anna huffs out a strangled laugh. “I’d tell Irina to go to hell and come be your muse in a Paris apartment for a few months, but we both know you wouldn’t be interested in the girl who gives up everything and does that.”
Victoria shrugs. There’s never been any pretense about that. “I really do love you. How could I not, when you’re being noble enough to let me go?”
“I love you too.” Dressed now, Anna steps closer, as though the floor might give way beneath them. “I just… One more…” She kisses Victoria with every bit of power and feeling that’s crackled between them these past few months. As goodbyes go, it’s a classic.
“I’ll call,” Victoria promises. “I want us still to have that. Please?”
“You don’t say please very often,” Anna points out, wiping tears. “You must really mean it. Give me a little while? Before you do.”
She’s walking away, and this is the point in old movies where one witty, heartfelt remark is enough to undo it, to find the magical solution where everyone gets to be happy. Victoria waits for inspiration to strike, but instead there’s just a weak “see you tonight” because broken hearts or not, the show must go on. At least for the remaining performances.
Victoria pulls the blanket tighter around herself, the apartment so much colder as the front door closes behind Anna. Picking up the newspaper, she looks at the frozen image of Anna smiling like her heart might burst.
It doesn’t have to be forever, she tells herself, crawling back beneath the covers. Because Victoria wants Paris, and she wants Anna, and she loves Anna as much as ballet itself, which may be the first time ever. She’ll find a way to make this work, even if not right away.
Anything else would be unacceptable, and Victoria’s standards have always been too high for that.
November 10
METROPOLITAN’S STAR ON THE RISE ONCE MORE
BY ELAINE GREENBERG
Though many feared the Metropolitan Ballet might fold in the wake of another star departure, the return to a classical program under its former prima, Irina—the ballerina who needs only one name—has been a steady triumph.
Central to the post-Victoria Ford success is her former protégé, and in Anna Gale the company has a principal to be reckoned with. Dazzling in Don Quixote, heartbreaking in Onegin, last season’s youthful exuberance has been rubbed away on the European tour, and she returns to New York a more complete dancer. The technique improvements come from Irina, but the talent is Ms. Gale’s alone.
June 21
L’INVASION AMÉRICAINE: THE AFTERMATH
BY LUCILLE MEYER
As the first American to hold the prestigious artistic director role, Victoria Ford has had her share of trials at the Palais Garnier. After firing two soloists in as many months, her shaking up of the repertoire and casting seemed set to cause a mutiny. Far from quitting, the Queen of Ballet has doubled down on her regeneration efforts. Her second thrilling season begins tonight, but the sniping critics and political battles of her first year are consigned to history. As we say here in Paris, vive la reine!
April 6
DANCING DIVAS COUPLING UP?
BY STAR SPOTTING TEAM
Has absence made their hearts grow fonder? Rumor has it that two of the world’s best-known female dancers haven’t let the Atlantic Ocean keep them apart. A swanky gala in Berlin had the best and brightest of the arts world mingling in close quarters, and these two tore up the dance floor in style more Dirty Dancing than classical. We’d love to say more, but we don’t want a certain Madame sending us to the guillotine.
EPILOGUE
“You are sure?” Anna’s guide asks one more time, and she tells him that she is. They’ve had quite a journey so far, down diverging staircases, footsteps echoing on marble floors. The gilt-edged trim of everything outside is barely an introduction to the opulence of rich reds and gold that greets her inside the theater.
With a melodramatic sigh, he straightens his tie, fusses with his mustache, and leaves her alone in the auditorium. She runs one hand over the dark wood of a seat frame, contrasting it with the plush red velvet that makes up the rest. Looking around, it’s hard to take in the sheer majesty of the place. The low lighting makes the colors seem to bleed—a wet canvas just waiting for Anna to insinuate herself into the scene. She strides down to a seat on the aisle, five rows back, and takes a seat.
“Êtes-vous perdu?” comes a voice from the wings. Even to Anna’s untrained ear, that’s not a native speaker. “Are you lost?”
“No,” she calls back. The fact she’s been asked in English gets her hopes up even higher. The echoes make it impossible to be sure just yet. “I heard you were looking for a dancer?”
“Auditions are next week.”
Footsteps come on the stage. Anna holds her breath.
“Hi” is all she can think to say when Victoria emerges, squinting through the lights at her. Oh, she looks fantastic. The usual dark clothes, of course, but the black pants are cut high on her waist, and barely skimming the ankles. The gauzy blouse is translucent, hinting at dark silk beneath.
“Anna.” Not a question. No note of surprise. They haven’t talked much in the past week or so, but Anna didn’t want to tip her hand before showing up here in Paris.
“Your boss invited me,” Anna explains. “Trying to give you options for your new prima. I’m not sure if she knows our history. Please, don’t be mad at me.”
“Mad at you?” Victoria comes down the orchestra steps and into the parterre where Anna is sitting, gripping the seat in front of her for dear life. As she comes closer, Anna sees the few tears that have been permitted to fall, right before they’re brusquely wiped away. “You have no idea how glad I am to see you. And you’ve had quite a time with Irina.”
“She’s good. Drives me insane, but we did some amazing things. My sister married her, last month. You didn’t RSVP.”
“I hate weddings. And we’d just seen each other in Berlin. That was quite a long weekend.”
Direct as ever. Anna doesn’t answer.
“Did you come to tell me off for not replying?” Victoria looks amused at the thought.
“No, I’m here to dance, if you’ll have me,” Anna says. “I’m ready, you know I am. I’ve done my time, two seasons of it. So if you still want me…”
“How could I not?”
Victoria is practically in her lap a minute later, and when they kiss it’s electric. Breathless and half-sobbing, Anna takes Victoria’s face in her hands. “I’m sorry we had to be apart. There were so many times…”
“Me too,” Victoria says. “Every bad day, every sneering review, all I kept asking was why I gave you up for this.”
“The reviews have improved,” Anna can’t help pointing out. “They’re calling you a savior now.”
“Well, they call me other things, too, but you probably don’t have enough French slang for those terms. I do believe we’ve come to a truce, though. Which means I can choose the best dancer for the job without politics. You always did have perfect timing.”
“You certainly yelled at me a lot when it wasn’t perfect.” Anna nudges Victoria, and they both stand. “Everything I’ve done, all the blood and sweat and tears, it’s been to bring me here. I’m sure of it.”
“So you think we might find a new romance in Paris, hmm?” Victoria teases. “It’s not every ballet that gets a happy ending, you know.”
“True, but we’ve had our little tragedy already.” Anna puts her hands on Victoria’s hips, pulling her near once more. “So I think we’re owed, don’t you?”
Victoria answers her with a tender, lovely kiss.
“I suppose you’ll want to see my apartment,” Victoria sighs, as though taking Anna there now, and probably straight to bed, is an unthinkable hardship. “Unless you’d like a tour of the city first? We could spend hours—”
“Apartment,�
�� Anna interrupts. “Now, preferably.”
A gaggle of dancers open a door to the side of the stage, clearly intent on taking a shortcut. One glare and they go back the way they came.
“I can’t go getting soft on you, Anna. I have a reputation to uphold.”
“You’re saying I should get back on a plane? Go be someone else’s principal dancer? Someone else’s…whatever it is when you reunite with the person you’ve been in love with for two years? I want more than a stolen weekend between tour stops.”
Victoria rolls her eyes. “Of course that’s not what I’m saying. There hasn’t been anyone else this whole time. I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Then let’s not wait any longer, Madame Ford.”
“I don’t think we’re waiting for anything ever again, do you?” Victoria kisses her soundly, then offers Anna her hand.
Paris is ready, a new life for both of them just waiting to be started. Anna takes Victoria by the hand, and together they take their first, unchoreographed step.
ABOUT LOLA KEELEY
Lola Keeley is a writer and coder. After moving to London to pursue her love of theatre, she later wound up living every five-year-old’s dream of being a train driver on the London Underground. She has since emerged, blinking into the sunlight, to find herself writing books. She now lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, with her wife and three cats.
CONNECT WITH LOLA
Website: www.lolakeeley.co.uk
Facebook: www.facebook.com/lolakeeley
Twitter: @lolasmish
E-Mail: hello@lolakeeley.co.uk
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The Music and the Mirror
© 2018 by Lola Keeley
ISBN (mobi): 978-3-96324-015-7
ISBN (epub): 978-3-96324-016-4
Also available as paperback.
Published by Ylva Publishing, legal entity of Ylva Verlag, e.Kfr.
Ylva Verlag, e.Kfr.
Owner: Astrid Ohletz
Am Kirschgarten 2
65830 Kriftel
Germany
www.ylva-publishing.com
First edition: 2018
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to locales, events, business establishments, or actual persons—living or dead—is entirely coincidental.
Credits
Edited by Lee Winter and Amanda Jean
Cover Design by Adam Lloyd
Cover Print Layout by Streetlight Graphics