A Tender Thing

by Emily Neuberger

  Eleanor looked past Charles at Don, hands poised over the piano keys. All of this passion existed inside that man. As cold as Don might have been, as awkward and uncomfortable, he had written this. For the first time, it sank in.

  Don had written Molly and Luke’s love. He’d created this passion, love, surrender. The sound of this music came from his very soul. This was his love. Her stomach dropped, and she went warm.

  “Luke,” she said, pounding his chest. “I care. If something should happen to you, I’d never be able to go on.”

  “So we’ll run away,” he said. He pulled her up close, fitting his body against hers. Eleanor let herself enjoy the warmth of human touch. “Molly Sheeran, I can’t imagine God could have brought us together only to take it all away.” He swallowed. “Marry me.”

  Don had begun to play, and the notes resonated in her heart, her bones. “Yes, Luke.”

  It was so easy. She threw her arms around him, covered his mouth with hers. Luke lifted her off her feet, turning her in a circle and then setting her down once more. His musical entrance was coming up, but she made him pull away, fighting to detach himself.

  When he began to sing, she used the measures to catch her breath. By the time it was her turn, she was still panting, but fighting to sustain the phrases made them better. She was desperate to get the words out, to express herself. The music seemed to come from inside of her.

  When they finished, Charles kissed her once more. It wasn’t in the script, but even before he leaned down she knew he would. It was natural and right.

  They kissed for long moments, the excitement from the scene coursing through her, until he broke off, ending the scene.

  She was trembling. Charles looked at her, triumphant, and squeezed her arm.

  Harry’s voice broke through. “Nice job.”

  It was all they would get, but it was enough.

  * * *

  Don walked them out while Harry finished his notes. “I’m heading to see my mother,” he said.

  It was the first time he’d mentioned his family. For some reason she’d imagined they were all dead. “Where does she live?”

  “New Rochelle, going on three years,” he said. “I finally got her out of Indiana, but she says she’s never coming to Manhattan.”

  Charles waved goodbye before splitting off from them.

  “Give my best to Gwen,” Eleanor said.

  She dragged behind, wanting to extend her time with Don as long as possible. Maybe they could walk together as far as Grand Central. As soon as they were alone, she turned to Don, but someone touched her shoulder. It was Tommy.

  “You look surprised to see me.”

  She blushed. “Long day.”

  He extended a hand to Don, game smile back on his face. “Tommy Murphy.”

  Don looked him up and down, observing the details of Tommy’s uniform, checking his rank. He finished by glancing at Tommy’s shoulders, jaw, and hairline, beard ready to grow behind his skin. Eleanor felt caught between the urges to distance herself from him and to show off his youth and vigor.

  She felt a lurch. What if Don hadn’t warned her off Tommy because he was afraid of her getting pregnant, but because he was jealous? It was preposterous, but as Don looked at Tommy, Eleanor noticed a hardness in his eyes.

  “Don Mannheim.” He shook Tommy’s hand.

  “Don, this is Tommy, my . . .” She fell quiet.

  Tommy’s hand clinched her shoulder. To anyone but Eleanor, the grin looked friendly. “Eleanor chatters on and on about rehearsals.”

  “This show is so important,” she said. “I can’t get it out of my head even after rehearsals are over.”

  “For those of us who love the theater,” Don said, his eyes flicking behind the two of them, “it isn’t merely a job. Eight hours would never suffice.”

  He looked at Tommy until the younger man looked at the ground, then up again.

  “I don’t know about that. I’m not much of an artist.”

  Don smiled. “No.”

  The air was tense. “Tommy, I’m hungry.”

  “Well. See you soon, Eleanor,” Don said, eyebrows raised as he turned away.

  “So that’s the fellow you go on about,” Tommy said as Don walked off. “Odd one.”

  Eleanor watched his back, somehow vulnerable in his dark wool coat. “I don’t know what your problem is.”

  “All I said’s I think he’s off.”

  “Have you even seen one of his musicals? You don’t know anything.”

  “I didn’t know we were talking about his musicals. I was talking about him.”

  “They’re one and the same.”

  “There’s something weird about that guy. I can’t picture him, say, getting a beer with anybody.”

  “Some people care about more than beer with the guys.”

  Tommy snorted.

  Eleanor tried to look fierce enough to cover her blush. “He wouldn’t be able to see the things he does about people if he was just like everybody else. And for that matter, neither would I. You do know I’m good in this show, don’t you?”

  Tommy had the sense to look repentant. “I didn’t say anything to suggest you weren’t.”

  “Do you understand that it’s not some school play? This is a masterpiece. It’s going to be on Broadway. It’s about justice. It’s about equal rights.”

  Tommy laughed again. “Oh, honey, don’t pretend you’re in this because of equal rights. You might be friendly with that Negro you work with, but you know the moment the show’s over you’ll say your goodbyes and never see him again.”

  The tears she’d been fighting finally arrived. Emotions flooded her, too numerous to analyze. “I knew you had a problem with Charles!”

  “This has nothing to do with him. You want to be on Broadway. You want people to see you and say, ‘Wow, isn’t she special. What a star.’”

  Eleanor had never seen Tommy angry before. He didn’t raise his voice, but red patches appeared on his cheeks.

  “I know this is important to you, and I’ve been a nice guy about all this. But I thought you were my girl and I haven’t hardly seen you in weeks. And when I do get a chance to see you, you’re giggling over some fruit because he can string together a nice sentence.”

  “He’s not a fruit.” She couldn’t catch her breath. “Did your friends say that too?”

  Tommy ran a hand over his face.

  “You would never understand how much I love this, because you don’t love anything like I love this. I don’t just care about being onstage.” She struggled to find the words, her throat closing up. “I love the theater. I want to be at the center of it. Maybe it’s not about equal rights, but it’s not about being the star. It’s my life. It’s me.”

  Tommy put his hands in his pockets and looked at her. “You know, I thought maybe I could love you. But how can I love someone who doesn’t care about anyone else?”

  She opened her mouth to argue, but he held up a hand.

  “I hope you get everything you want from this,” he said. His eyes were wide and pained, and she got the sense that he wasn’t trying to hurt her. “I hope the theater loves you back.”

  * * *

  Eleanor was still shaken when she got to Don’s apartment for rehearsal the next day. It was just her in the morning, and Charles had solo time in the afternoon.

  “Tea?” Don wore a midnight-blue sweater with the sleeves pushed to his elbows, showcasing his forearms, taut from piano playing. The blue made the gray in his eyes seem soft; he was so handsome that her body tightened at the sight of him.

  “No, thank you.”

  “Problem with the yeoman?” he asked, turning to his rehearsal notes.

  She’d wanted the sadness to come, but it hadn’t. “I think I’m a monster.”

  Don looked u
p at that.

  “Tommy and I are finished,” she said. “I tried to explain how much I love the theater. He said I don’t care about people.”

  “He isn’t an artist. You can’t expect him to understand.”

  “That’s not even the problem,” she said. “He doesn’t know how hard it is. I can’t get distracted.”

  Don said nothing, but he kept his eyes on her.

  Eleanor sat down on the couch, dropped her head in her hands. “I hate that he thinks I didn’t care. I didn’t love him, maybe, but I cared. But as soon as it became a threat to this”—she gestured at the piano—“I didn’t want him anymore. And every time I think of him I just remember how much more time I’ll have now to run lines.”

  “The first time we met,” Don said, “you told me you understood what it was like to feel alone. But did you?”

  Back in Wisconsin, she had felt alone, even with Pat and Rosie. But she had been truthful with Don, even if she expressed it poorly; she remembered her desperation, the feeling that if she’d stayed, she would have lost herself. “I could never have had the life I want in Wisconsin.”

  “But you didn’t know you’d be any happier here,” he said. “It’s easy to turn against your hometown, say ‘No one understands me,’ and assume it’s because they’re fools. It’s harder in New York, surrounded by different people and education and culture, theater lovers, to still find yourself lost. Now it’s not them. It’s you.”

  “I thought you were trying to make me feel better.”

  He played a chord. “I thought we were just talking.”

  She couldn’t sit still; she opened her binder and paged through the music from the show, an agitation growing inside her.

  “You told me we were alike,” Don said. “I thought you were crazy. You think it’s hard to feel alone? How old are you—twenty?”

  “Twenty-one.”

  He snorted, but she felt the dry humor directed at himself, not her. “I’m forty-two. I’ve never not felt lonely. Ambition has always come first—it doesn’t even feel like a choice. Imagine how it feels to go through this for twenty more years. I had to write the musicals, just to get the pain out of my own head.”

  Eleanor crossed the room, recognizing the magnitude of his confession.

  “I didn’t believe you because I’d been alone so long,” Don said. “I didn’t think it was possible that I could meet someone like me. At the audition, or in the theater that night at Charades . . .” He shook his head. “I didn’t know what I was seeing, but I certainly saw it.”

  She stepped closer.

  “You’re really an artist, Eleanor. Because you can’t do anything else. It’s a lonely life,” he said. “But you understand that already. And you aren’t a monster. It’s just how you’re built.”

  “Neither are you.”

  He laughed, a frightening sound. Eleanor sat beside him on the piano. Don did not move away. His hands were on the keys, curled with tension. With all the courage she had, Eleanor reached out and placed her hand on top of his.

  Don looked at her. Eleanor met his gaze. Up close, she examined his eyebrows, the heavy bone beneath, the masculine lines of his face. Barely breathing, she watched his pupils move as he took in her expression. She wanted to kiss him, or twist away. Staying still was too much sensation.

  Don moved his hand out from under hers, then took her chin in his hand. “You have a special mind, Eleanor. I know you will do something interesting to the theater.”

  Eleanor felt his words move her and knew that this would be one of the most significant moments of her life.

  “I have never said that to an actress before.” Don smiled like he’d told a joke.

  * * *

  Don coached Eleanor for three hours, not stopping again. He made her speak the lyrics of songs like a monologue, then repeat them as fast as she could as she ran around the room in a circle. Once she was out of breath, he would begin to play, and she delivered the song fighting for air. He taught her to warm up her voice with her thumbs between her teeth, to create enough space for resonance in her throat. In the course of one morning, she learned more than ever before.

  He walked her to the door and watched while she put on her coat.

  “I have to go to a dinner on Friday,” he said. “At Yale. The music department is awarding me an honorary doctorate. Will you come with me?”

  “If you thought I was out of place with the producers, imagine me at a university.”

  Don didn’t smile, but nor did he look like he agreed. He stepped closer and hooked her scarf around her neck.

  “Think of it as more promotion. I despise this sort of thing perhaps more than you do.” Eleanor recognized the truth there. “And I don’t think I could find a lovelier date at such short notice.”

  “What will I wear?”

  “I’ll find you something.”

  Eleanor wanted to appear cool but could not keep the eager expression from her face. “It’s a date.”

  * * *

  Though she had been exhausted, after Don’s invitation Eleanor was flying high. She walked all the way down through Central Park and Fifth Avenue. Red bows were tied on the lampposts for Christmas, and the windows at Bergdorf’s were decorated. They were elaborate and beautiful, showcasing satin gowns with elbow-length gloves, set into snowy winter scenes like in a fairy tale. The lights twinkling in one display shone on a mannequin’s silver gown. Diamonds dripped from her wooden neck. Eleanor knew whatever she wore to this dinner would be far less formal, but what if this was only the beginning? She could see herself on Don’s arm at industry parties, by his side at the Tony Awards.

  She made it all the way down to Times Square. The place was still so beautiful to her. At the intersection of Seventh Avenue and Broadway, she took a moment to appreciate how far she’d come since she stood there on that first day with Tommy and Rosie. For weeks, she’d been moving so fast that every experience mounted over the last, until her new life barely resembled the one she had left behind. She looked at the theaters all around her and felt tears in her eyes. This was her place now. She had done it.

  To celebrate, she stopped at the My Fair Lady box office and bought a ticket to the matinee.

  She went to her seat and opened her Playbill. Her mood drooped; Julie Andrews was no longer in the role. A woman named Sally Ann Howes had replaced her. How had Eleanor not known this?

  Perhaps the rehearsals had kept her from being on top of the musical world gossip as she normally was. She was in an awkward spot; she had a large Broadway-bound role and was not yet part of the community. It felt silly to harp on the casts of new shows or pore over reviews of leading ladies; that was the occupation of a girl in Wisconsin. Once they opened A Tender Thing, she would be one of those ladies. As the houselights went down, she imagined herself entering the opening-night party on Don’s arm. She’d wear a gown like the ones in the window. She’d be in the New York Times.

  * * *

  By the time she made her way home, it was dark. High from her encounter with Don and her solo afternoon, she had never felt more like an adult. Look at her; she’d moved to New York and in months she’d snagged a role on Broadway and a date with Don Mannheim.

  When she got to the door, she heard Rosie laughing. She stopped and listened; she heard a male voice. Tommy. Eleanor had forgotten they had arranged for him to pick up the belongings he’d left behind in her apartment. She was more than an hour late. Smoothing her hair, she opened the door.

  Tommy and Rosie sat on the couch, a beer in each of their hands. Rosie had her legs crossed beneath her and relaxed against the pillows.

  “Hello.” Rosie’s smile was slow to leave her face. “How was rehearsal?”

  Tommy stood. “Thanks for the beer, Rosie. Let me know if you need help with those hemlines.”

  “Get on with you,” Rosie said, laughing more.<
br />
  Tommy grinned, then turned to Eleanor, his face going businesslike. “Eleanor, do you have my things?”

  Eleanor had thought it would be painful to see him, but it wasn’t. Her plans with Don gave her glimmering strength. “Sorry I’m home late.”

  Rosie looked between them. “Tommy was telling me about Ned’s Christmas list. What an industrious little fellow.”

  “Ned?”

  Tommy didn’t smile. “My little brother.”

  Rosie was peeling the label off the beer with her fingernail, her eyes on Tommy. When she noticed Eleanor’s gaze, she looked away.

  “I’ll go get your things,” Eleanor said. “I won’t be a minute.”

  Eleanor could hear their happy chatter pick up once she was gone. In one piece, a plan fell into Eleanor’s head. How did she not see it before? Perhaps this afternoon had changed her perspective; she was so happy. Now that she had who she wanted, she could see more clearly.

  She opened the door. “All righty then.”

  Tommy was leaning against the kitchen table. “Thank you.”

  “You two seem to get along.” Eleanor raised her eyebrows at Rosie. “I had a grand idea.”

  “What’s that?” Tommy took the bag from her.

  “Well, Rosie, you’re my best friend.”

  Rosie had stood from the couch, her hands clasped in front of her, brow furrowed.

  “And, Tommy, I know things didn’t quite work out, but you know I think you’re swell.”

  He looked at the clock. “Er, thanks, Eleanor. I really need to get on home, you know—”

  “Just listen.” She clapped her hands. “I know it’s awkward—”

  “Eleanor.” Rosie’s tone was short.