Blue Rose In Chelsea (17 page)

     “
And on that day/on that fateful day/when you are far away and free/If you happen to remember/stop and think of me
.”

     I glance up only briefly to gain a feeling for what’s unfolding in the room.  Everything has gone still, like the eye of a hurricane.

     “
Though it was clear/though it was always clear/that this was never meant to be/if you happen to remember/stop and think of me
.”

     It’s as if someone has lanced my side with a sword; these words seem meant for Evan and I.

     The Gum Goddess suspends the last note, and I suspend breathing, and then the room breaks into applause and cheers.

     “Don’t play it again, Sam,” Sinclair whispers in my ear.

     I slip away from the piano and pull Sinclair with me.  No one is eager to lay wreaths at the feet of the lowly accompanist; all praise and adoration is heaped on the singer.

     “We are getting out of here now!” I hiss-whisper.

     We sidle up to the elevator, stiff and suspicious looking, as if we are about to stage a coup de’tat.  Mercifully, the Down elevator is within the loft, unlike the Up elevator, which is out in the hallway and around the bend.  The lizard impedes our path, but I stomp my stiletto.

     “It’s not a cat.  Apparently reptiles don’t frighten easily.”  Sinclair attempts to encourage the slow-as-syrup creature along with his shiny loafer, but the lizard is having none of it.

     With my back to the wall, I manage to discreetly press the elevator button behind me.  I don’t want to draw attention to our departure.

     “I’ll get your coat.  Don’t you want to say your goodbyes?”

     “No!  I want to vanish like the Cheshire Cat, never again to be seen by the cretins of Chelsea.”

     “You can’t leave behind the Technicolor Dreamcoat,” Sinclair bleats, and then to the lizard, “Off with your head!”

     As the elevator door closes, I edge backwards into it, and jam my finger on the button.  The door closes, slowly collapsing into a crescent of light.  I flatter myself to think that Evan witnesses this with some measure of alarm and disappointment, that his face floats into view at the very last moment, but it could only be wishful thinking on my part, or the wistful effects of the gin.

     I dash out into the street, where the subway rumbles underground like some great waking beast.  Despite having no coat, I don’t feel the cold; the heat of defeat burns bitterly within me.  Half of me longs for escape, the other half hangs back and listens, straining to hear footsteps, hoping that Evan will flee the party and find me.  I could swear he witnessed my great escape.  Is it possible he may follow me, chase me down this dark pavement drenched with the milky glow of streetlights, and grab hold of me, beg me not to go?  I hear it then, the door opening, and footfalls on pavement hurrying to catch up with me.  Oh, this is the best thing!  He is coming after me!  Now I have to dry my eyes.  What will I say?  I hope my mascara has not run.  What should I reveal?  This is the moment that I will confess everything to him, or perhaps he will speak his feelings first.  A newfound strength surges through me, as if someone has plugged me into the city’s enormous power grid.  I run quicker, challenging my pursuer to catch me.  The pace behind me quickens, and an arm grabs my arm.

     But it’s only Sinclair.

     I burst into tears.  “It’s only you!”

     “Yes, just me,” he says, but with great sympathy.

     “I always knew this would happen!  Did you see her?  With her perfect shoes, and perfect teeth, and her perfect costume that is just the proper balance of sultriness and sophistication, unlike this in-your-face-bid for attention, this cheap get-up?”

     “That is not tinky!  That is Belgian lace!”  He gently smacks my hand away from the apron, which I’ve scrunched in my fists.

     “Who am I kidding?  I’m not sexy.  I’m not chic.  I’m Polly Purebred, in my little shoes with bows on the toes!”

     “I would have nixed the bows,” he agrees, with a glance at the white polyester ribbons on my black patent leather pumps.

     “I always knew that one day The Fabulous One would appear to replace me.”

     “My dear, you haven’t been replaced.  You were never put in place.  But we can still get you in position,” he states, with the cool resolve of a military strategist.

     “It’s too late!  Oh, I hate this.  I tried to get him out of my mind, but it’s not possible!  There is no cure for this!  There is no cure for this!”  I shout, circling about like a cat after it’s own tail, in my tiny wisp of a dress, my legs freezing in the black fishnets.  I stumble on a grate in my four-inch heels.  People trot by and turn to stare, but with the usual jaded lack of concern; they take me in as the passing curiosity that I am.

     “There is no cure for this!”

     “Polly, people will think you’re a hooker who’s suddenly gotten some bad lab results,” he warns, slipping his devil cape off and draping it across my shivering shoulders.  I can see in the reflection of a shop window that my mascara is smeared.  Sinclair steers me down the street, propping me up with his pitchfork when I occasionally stumble.  Eventually we duck into a diner, taking refuge in a blue vinyl booth out of the way, in a corner.  Above us is a bronze-toned photo of Marilyn Monroe in her early years, sprawled on a sandy beach in a vintage bathing suit.

     “I don’t want to be with an actor!”  I’m emphatic.  Our coffee arrives and Sinclair dumps three packets of sugar into his, as if I’ve driven him to such extremes.  “What kind of a profession is that anyway?  It’s a namby-pamby profession, that’s what it is!”

     “I’ve never heard anyone but my grandmother use the term namby-pamby.”  He lifts his eyebrows, impressed.

     “It’s all vanity.  What kind of job is that?  Pretending to be someone else?  Actors are spoiled, pampered narcissists.  Men ought to be masculine, they ought to build things, to do something that requires brute strength!”  I brandish my fork like a brigadier, and then, “Oh, I’m sorry, Sinclair, of course, I don’t mean you.”

     He waves his hand.  “It’s impossible to offend me.  I take too great a delight in myself.  And I will have you know that it takes a testosterone-fueled thumb to thread a needle skillfully.”

     “I don’t want that kind of life.  I wouldn’t want that kind of life, a movie, Hollywood life, but I do want him.  Oh, why do I want him so badly?”

     “That is a paradox,” he says.  “Perhaps you can convince him to take up professional bowling.”

     I giggle.

     “Perhaps he’ll be a big flop at acting, and then you can steer him into some proper profession, like plumbing.”  Sinclair nudges my coffee toward me, blotting some of his red devil makeup off his cheeks.

     “Oh, sure, great!  That’s what I’ll do,” I say, rolling my eyes.  “I’ll stand on the sidelines, silently rooting for the demise of his dreams.  The strange thing is, I can’t bear the thought of him being unhappy, isn’t that odd?  Did you see her?  She’s perfect for him.  She has the same translucent complexion; the woman hasn’t got a visible pore!  She’s so poised and polished.”

     “Oh pooh on poise.  And what good is a pore, if you can’t see it?  Silver should be polished, not people.  You, my dear, are an original.”  He waves on the waitress to sprinkle more confectionary sugar on his waffles.

     “And she’s an actress, which puts them completely in sync.”  I entwine my index and middle finger, in illustration of my point.

     “Or in competition.  Men don’t want to date themselves.  A man prefers someone who is different from him.  Of course, most men don’t discover this until after the age of thirty-eight.  Up until then, they generally seek out someone who reflects back their own idealized image.  But I digress.  And if they are so in sync, why couldn’t Evan take his eyes off of you when you were playing the piano?  He wasn’t looking at Aphrodite when she was singing her Aphro-ditty.”

     I giggle, almost choking on my coffee.  “Is that true, or are you trying to make me feel better?”

     “I do not fib when it comes to important matters.  I only fib for the trivial.  And, I might add, he witnessed your rather auspicious exit.  I don’t think anyone else noticed.  You executed it so brilliantly, slipping soundlessly onto the elevator like a shaft of light.  It was as if Scottie himself had beamed you up.  You were there, then gone, in a flash!” He snaps his fingers an inch from my face.  “But he saw it.  Now, what does that tell you?”

     “It gives me hope,” I say.  My heart, previously sunk somewhere around my ankles, floats slowly up to my knees.

     “You know, Haley, Evan may not be the person you think he is.”

     This statement seems full of hidden meanings, especially since Sinclair, for the first time, calls me by my actual name.

     “What do you mean?  Spill it!” I command, when he opens his mouth but no words come.

     “The guy, Palomer, that Evan put me in touch with for a job, he told me that Evan was fired from the ballet company.”

     “Fired?  No, he’s mistaken.  Evan quit to pursue an acting career.”

     “I don’t think so.  He said Evan was fired for failing to show up to rehearsals, and for coming in hung over and unable to work, sometimes drunk.”

     “That’s crazy.  Evan’s a teetotaler.  I’ve seen him nurse one beer for hours on end.  Even tonight, the most you could say of him was that he was tipsy.”

     “Perhaps he was going through some sort of trauma at the time, that caused him to drink and lose his job,” Sinclair suggests.

     “Evan doesn’t lose jobs.  Evan doesn’t lose anything.  He gets everything he wants, he achieves everything he attempts.  He’s Midas; everything he touches turns to gold.”

     Sinclair sighs deeply, and flaps his sugar packets.  “Five minutes ago he was a namby-pamby narcissist.  You’ll have to give me some hint, some sort of heads up, so that I know whether it’s a Praise Evan or Trash Evan day.  Perhaps a simple thread tied around your pinky finger to cue me.  Pink for praise, and green for guillotine.”

     I smile.  “Brandon said he had some torrid love affair with a dancer twice his age.  Maybe she dumped him and he went on a binge.”

     “Palomer mentioned that.  From what he said it was an amicable break-up.  I think Evan attended the woman’s wedding.  That doesn’t sound very torrid to me.”

     “You’ve been holding out on this Evan-information?” I accuse gently, but Sinclair shrugs.

     Sinclair tells me the dancer’s name.  I make a mental note to look up her picture in the ABT season guide.  Then he settles into dousing his waffles in maple syrup and slicing them into Isosceles triangles.

     “Tell me about your Man That Got Away,” I venture, slurping my coffee.

     “What’s to tell?  We were together for eight glorious months, fourteen years ago.”

     “Fourteen is my favorite number,” I encourage.  “
The time has come to speak of many things, of shoes and ships and sealing wax, of cabbages and kings,”
I quote Lewis Carroll, in the hope of encouraging him. 

     He smiles and sighs deeply, as if resigned.  “It seemed that we had everything, the same ideas and sense of humor, and similar ambitions; we liked the same sort of holiday destinations.  He used to go with me to my knee doctor appointments.  It was the only truly complete relationship I’ve ever had, a true partnership.”

     “What happened?”
     “Timing.  That’s what he claims, anyway.  He said he needed to put all his energy into his career.  He started calling himself Joseph, instead of Joe.  He wanted to forget where he came from.  He was embarrassed of his family, of their small-town ways.  He reinvented himself completely.  He took on all new friends, Ivy League types, and venture capitalists, high rollers in the financial field.”

     “But why couldn’t you fit into his new life?  I don’t understand.  You’re so cultured and cosmopolitan, with your rapier wit, and your regal bloodlines.  You’re a Scottish Count, for cripes sake, Sinclair.  You would have been a great asset.”

     “Well, I know that!” he says, feigning smugness.  “He got married, you see.”

     “Married?  I don’t understand.  To a woman?”

     “Yes, to a woman.”  Sinclair chuckles at my naivete.  “Some of us do that,” he mocks.

     “You mean there are unsuspecting women out there, married to gay men?”

     “Yes,” he says, with a hearty stab at his waffles.  “Four years after we broke up, I heard something on the radio, someone named Joseph had dedicated a song to his wife for their anniversary.  I knew that song was his favorite; something in my gut told me it must be him.  Shortly after, I heard from a mutual friend that he was married, to the daughter of the VP at the brokerage house where he worked.  Who can say why?  Perhaps he thought it was the right thing to do, or perhaps it would help him in his career, or perhaps he wanted children.  I heard he worked ninety hour weeks up until only recently.”

     “So, you wouldn’t have been happy.  You might have been lonely, with someone who was so obsessed with work, or with someone who could so easily live a lie, or cast aside love,” I console.  “Have you seen him since the break-up?”

     “No.”