Rose Read online

  As the clock ticked closer to the hour at which I would have to prepare myself. I began to understand the concept of stage fright. I wasn't sure I would actually be able to get up and go, much less dance in front of hundreds of people.

  "I'm going up to take my bath." I told them. "I need some time alone," I whispered to Barry.

  "No problem. Rose. I'll help Evan get himself dressed. We men have to work on ourselves, too," he added in a deliberately loud voice.

  I filled the tub and lit a candle. While I soaked. I listened to some soft music and tried to keep myself calm. I couldn't help thinking about Daddy and how carefree he had been about everything in his life. He seemed a man who shrugged off tension and pressure as easily as a duck shook off water. Didn't I inherit any of that? I wondered.

  Maybe it all caught up with him, I thought. As hard as it was to face, maybe all the pressure and tension he had locked up in some secret place in his heart overflowed finally and he exploded. Maybe he did take his own life.

  I could hear him at my side, reciting. "Your eyes are two diamonds. Your hair is spun gold. Your lips are rubies and your skin comes from pearls. My Rose petal."

  "Oh, Daddy," I moaned. "Oh, Daddy. I need you now. I've always needed you. Sinner or not, you were my Daddy," I whispered and swallowed back my tears.

  Somehow the forces that drive anyone to achieve, to go forward and try to accomplish something significant in his or her life, took over inside me. I fixed my hair and my makeup, dressed, and went down at the appropriate hour. Both Barry and Evan were waiting patiently, both looking very handsome and trying not to look nervous for me.

  "You're both very handsome," I said.

  "You," Evan said before Barry could get the words out. "look fantastic."

  "Ditto," Barry said.

  He helped get Evan into his car and we were off, my heart no longer pounding. It was more like a snail that had pulled itself into a shell, the beat so low, I had to put my hand over my breast to see if I was still alive.

  The size of the audience made it impossible for me to swallow. I thought I would simply faint at the feet of all these elegantly dressed adults and my classmates. This was surely a super critical audience, rich people who had been to one professional performance after another, I thought, and nearly turned and ran from the auditorium.

  Barry took charge of Evan, wheeling him to a place in front of the stage while I went backstage to meet Miss Anderson.

  "I can't do this," were the first words out of my mouth.

  She looked at me askance, smiled, shook her head, and put her arm around my shoulders to walk me away from the others.

  "Do you think I would ask you to do something I knew you couldn't do, Rose?"

  "That audience..."

  "Will be blown away. You'll see," she promised. "What's the worst that can happen anyway`'"

  "I'll fall on my face." I said. She shrugged.

  ''So you'll pick yourself up and start over while I come out and do a two-step.'

  That brought a smile to my lips.

  "I know you're going to do well. When it's over, I'll have a surprise for you," she said.

  "What?"

  "If I tell you, it won't be a surprise, now will it? Just go get into your costume and do your warm-up exercises. We're starting the show. You're number five."

  She squeezed my hand and left me so she could tend to the others.

  Something happened when I walked out and into the spotlight. I wouldn't think about it until much later, when I was alone and after all the applause had long died down, even its echo in my ears. Alone and quiet. I would first realize and remember how Miss Anderson had hugged me when I came off and into the stage wing, how my classmates in the show had gathered around me to congratulate me, some of them so impressed they just wanted to touch me. I would first realize and remember all the people, strangers who came up to me after the show to make a special point of complimenting me. Later I would hear. "You were fantastic. You were wonderful. You were so good you brought me to tears." It was as if all the words, all the accolades had been frozen, put on pause just outside my ears, and then later. when I had a chance to reflect, they were released to flow through my ears.

  I couldn't forget Barry's and Evan's faces. however. They were both beaming so brightly. I thought they could light up the whole school. Barry kissed me and Evan reached up to take my hand. I hugged him. too.

  "Your mother's a fool for not being here," Evan whispered.

  When I had first stepped into the wings about to go onstage, I had thought about Mommy and wished she was out there. I had even imagined her surprising me and showing up. After the performance, she would come rushing backstage to throw her arms around me and cry with happy tears. She would say. "I woke up halfway to Hilton Head and realized I couldn't miss this and am I ever so glad I did."

  It was one of those soap-bubble fantasies. Of course. it popped and was gone. She wasn't there.

  As soon as I had changed and come out to meet Barn,, and Evan. Miss Anderson reappeared with a man at her side. He was tall and very elegant looking. but very slim with dark, thin lips and strong dark eyes.

  "Rose. I'd like you to meet someone," Miss Anderson said. "He's an old friend of mine.'

  "Not so old," the man said quickly.

  "A good friend of mine." she corrected. "Edmond Senetsky."

  "Hi." I said. I was looking for Barry and Evan and gazed past him. I saw him smile and glance at Miss Anderson.

  "I'm not as impressive as I imagined," he told her.

  "I didn't tell her anything about you," she explained to him. He raised his eyebrows.

  "Oh?"

  "I didn't want to make her any more nervous than she was."

  "She didn't seem very nervous to me," he said.

  I looked more attentively at him. Who was he?

  "Rose. Edmond is a theatrical agent, but more important, he is the son of Madame Senetsky, who runs the famous Senetsky School of Performing Arts in New York. He was visiting one of his clients in Atlanta and I asked him to stop in tonight to see you."

  "Oh," I said. What does this mean? I wondered.

  "I didn't tell you about him because I didn't want you to have any disappointments."

  "Very diplomatic of you. Julie," he told her. "You knew I wasn't going to be disappointed."

  "I hoped you weren't."

  "I trust your eye for talent almost as much as I do my own," he said. I thought he sounded terribly arrogant. He turned to me.

  "I think-- no. I know my mother would want you to attend her school. You'll remind her of herself," he added with a smile. "She was a dancer as well as an actress. She had classical training, the same sort you'll get in her school."

  "I'll get?"

  Miss Anderson smiled.

  "My mother permits me to choose one student a year for her. It's taken years and years of proving myself to get her to do that," he said.

  "You think I should go to her school?" I asked.

  "Precisely."

  "But..."

  "We'll talk about it later. honey. I know you have people waiting for you."

  "It's nice to have met you." I said to Edmond.

  "Yes, well, if you're smart, and lucky, you'll meet me again," he said.

  I thought that was quite odd and quite egotistical. but I didn't say another word. I hurried to join Barry and Evan and bask in the glow of my great success with the two people I loved the most in the world. hoping I wouldn't cry when I thought about Mommy.

  Epilogue

  In the end I suppose there was more than one reason I decided to go to Madame Senetsky's School of Performing Arts in New York City. I was upset because it was almost a week after the variety show performance before Mammy called me. There was a letdown after the show anyway. All the preparation, practice, dedication had reached a peak. Miss Anderson and I still danced after school, but it wasn't the same, and there was a heavy cloud of depression hovering over me from morning until night. Every tim
e the phone rang, I waited to hear my mother's voice, but I didn't and I began to wonder if I ever would,

  Finally. I did. "Rose sweetheart, how are you?" Mommy cried.

  "I'm all right," I said.

  "Tell me about your little show. Was it as successful as you hoped?"

  "Yes, Mommy."

  "I wish I could have been there. I should have been there," she added, a dark note in her voice that cracked at the end of her sentence.

  "Mommy? Are you all right?" She was silent. What's wrong?"

  "Oh, Rose. I've been a stupid schoolgirl, it seems," she said, her voice so choked it was only a whisper.

  "I don't understand."

  "Grover left me this morning. And it was embarrassing. too. He didn't pay the hotel bill."

  "What? Why?"

  "He got up earlier than I did, and when I went looking for him, I was given a note he had left at the desk. He said he had made a mistake thinking he could be with only one woman. He said he didn't want to hurt me any more, so it was best he just leave.'

  "Why haven't you come home?"

  "I'm too embarrassed. I had to sell some of my jewelry to pay the bill here."

  "I'll pack and come to you. Mommy. Tell me where to come."

  "No, honey, no. You're in a safe place with your brother. Stay there. I'll work things out for myself."

  "Have you called Charlotte?"

  "Not yet."

  "Well, call her. She'll send you money."

  "I will. I want to spend some time alone, thinking about my life. I might try to get some work for a while. I'm not Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire-- I don't want to depend on the kindness of strangers anymore. I'll be all right, Then I'll come back and well figure out what to do."

  It was then that I told her about the Senetskv school and what had happened. She was very happy for me.

  "Oh, you should do it. Rose. Do it."

  "I don't know yet." I said. "There's money involved."

  "Well find a way. Do it," she pleaded.

  "Mommy, I can't do anything until I know you'll be all right."

  "I'll be all right if you will," she promised. "and you will if you have something to achieve. I'll call you in a day or so. I promise. I've been such a selfish, selfabsorbed fool and neglected you. Rose. I'm so sorry."

  "Mommy..."

  "Get yourself in that school. Do it," she said before hanging up.

  Evan knew how much I was waiting for her call. He was in the hallway, watching for me. We went into his room and I told him what had happened. He looked very suspicious.

  "She's telling me the truth. Evan. by are your eyes so full of doubt?"

  "Remember 'something is rotten in the state of Denmark'?" he said cryptically.

  "Yes."

  I had no idea what he meant.

  "There's something you should know," he said. "I never told you because I didn't want you feeling worse or angrier at your... our father. The night my mother was killed by that drunken driver, she was going to rendezvous with our father. My aunt Charlotte made her go. I overheard their conversation. She wanted her to blackmail him, make his life miserable. I don't think she was going to do that, but I know my aunt Charlotte. When my mother was killed, she felt cheated."

  "What does this have to do with what happened to my mother?" I asked,

  "Maybe nothing," he said. "I don't know."

  He thought a moment and then he said. "Just follow me."

  He wheeled out and I followed him to the office. He went to the desk and opened a drawer to take out a checkbook.

  "What are you doing?" I asked. He didn't reply. He turned the pages and then he looked up.

  "Just as I suspected," he said. "I guess I always had it in the back of my mind, but your mother and Grover seemed so happy together. I didn't want to even suggest such a thing and make you worry more."

  "What are you talking about. Evan?"

  I came up beside him and he pointed to the record of checks paid. Charlotte had been giving Grover Fleming money.

  "I sort of knew that he was one of those Southern gentlemen with a rich name and no bank account," Evan said. "There was a time when he tried to court my mother, but Aunt Charlotte discouraged it. I never liked him much."

  "I wish you had told me." I said. He nodded.

  "I wish I had. too."

  "Well," we heard, and looked up to see Charlotte in the doorway. "And what do we have here?"

  Evan closed the checkbook and backed away from the desk. "Why did you do this?" I asked.

  "Do what?" She entered the office, with a big, sweet, innocent smile on her face.

  "Be the devil and tempt my mother into the abyss of self-indulgence," I said.

  "My, my, such dramatic words. Evan, you didn't give them to her, did you?"

  "She does pretty well for herself. Aunt Charlotte," he said. "Yes. I suppose she does.'

  "Why? Why did you arrange for Grover to hurt her like this? Why did you really bring us here?"

  Anger deepened the lines in her face and turned her eves into orbs of darkness and hate.

  "Your father destroyed my sister's life. Everything that's happening now is just."

  "You're a sick, evil woman." I charged.

  "Really? I'm sick and evil?" She smiled and moved closer. "Did I bring this poor child into the world without a father, a child who needs more attention and love than most children? Did I try to buy off my guilt with an occasional check in the mail and keep a poor, innocent girl strung along on promise after promise, lie after lie?"

  "But why punish them. Aunt Charlotte?" Evan asked for me.

  "She knows. I told her when I first met her," Charlotte said. "The sins of the father are visited on the head of the child.'

  "You didn't get to punish him, so you decided to punish them?"

  "Justice for you and your mother," she told him.

  "You never really knew my mother, knew your own sister. She would hate you for what you've done, hate you almost as much as I do now!" he said.

  Her cruel smile of victory turned into a sneer.

  "Your mother was always too weak and too trusting. That's why she suffered. There are only two kinds of people in the world. Evan, the strong and the weak. I chose to be the strong. Sometimes, the choice is already made for you," she added, looking down at him. "You should be grateful you have me to protect you."

  "Like a rabbit's grateful to a snake." She laughed again.

  Then she looked at me sternly.

  "I won't blame you if you decide to leave and join your mother wherever she is."

  "She's not leaving to join her mother. She's going to a prominent school for the performing arts," Evan said firmly.

  "Whatever,'" Charlotte replied. "I have a dinner date with Grover. I must get myself ready." she said, then turned and left us.

  "She's right," I said, my eves burning with tears of self-pity and tears of anger. "There are only two kinds of people."

  "So you be one of the strong. Succeed. Succeed for both of us. Rose.'"

  "How can I do it. Evan? I don't have the money."

  "Yes, you do." he said. "I'm going to give it to you and she can't do anything about it."

  I started to shake my head.

  "You're my hope, too, now," he said. "Help me get out of this chair, out of this... prison, by being a successful dancer. I'll be there with you whenever I can," he promised.

  He reached up for me and I knelt down and hugged him. We held onto each other, tied by blood, tied by dreams, tied by hope and love.

  He was able to give me the money. He had funds Aunt Charlotte didn't even know about. He had taken some of his trust fund and played the stock market over the Internet, and he had easy access to the money. The very next day Miss Anderson was able to tell Edmond I would attend his mother's school.

  A week later. Mommy called to tell me she had landed a decent job in Atlanta. She was going to work far a local television station. When she had learned what Charlotte had done, she wou
ld have nothing more to do with her. She came to my high school graduation and she, Evan, Barry, and I went out to celebrate. Afterward, before she left to return to Atlanta, we had some time together. We sat and had coffee on the patio of a little cafe.

  "I really don't have anyone but myself to blame for what Charlotte did," she told me. "I let myself believe in fairy tales."

  "You were very vulnerable, Mommy, and she took advantage of that."

  "There's a sign on the wall in the offices where I'm working now. It reads. IF YOU ACT LIKE SHEEP, THEY'LL ACT LIKE WOLVES, Your Daddy used to say that. The trouble is:' she added with a thin, little laugh, "we women need to be sheep sometimes. We need to be devoured by a good wolf once in a while."

  "Never. Mommy. We never need that." She shrugged.

  "I've never been strong. But you're different. Rose. I'm not worried for you You're going to make something of yourself. I'm so proud of you."

  "I'm worried about you. Mommy."

  "Don't," she ordered."I'll be fine. There's got to be a real prince out there for me somewhere. Someone has the glass slipper that will fit my foot and magically turn me into a princess."'

  Who's better off!' I wondered. People who have no fantasies, no dreams, or those who can't seem to shake them off. who walk about with a hopeful smile and eagerly turn themselves to the sound of any soft voice, any jeweled promise?

  We said good-bye and hugged and held each other and promised to stay in very close touch, even when I lived and studied dance in New York. When she walked away, I couldn't help feeling she was the daughter now. I was the mature one. It filled my heart with such fear for her.

  Actually. it was harder saying good-bye to Evan. He and Barry were the only people I cared about besides Mommy. I knew I would be able to see Barry in New York since he was attending NU, but once I left. I had no idea when I would see Evan again. Travel was not going to be easy for him.

  On a beautiful afternoon with clouds so white they looked made out of milk. Evan and I said goodbye by his tree.

  "'Will you be all right here. Evan, living with her still?"

  "It doesn't matter. It hasn't up until now. She has her life and I have mine. We have little to do with each other really."

  "I don't like the thought that you'll be locked up in your computer world again, never getting out."