Petals on the Wind

  I got up and went out on the upper veranda to stare up at the moon. I saw Chris standing near the railing, gazing up at the moon too. From the slump of his shoulders, usually held so proud, I- knew he was bleeding inside, just as I was. I tiptoed over to surprise him But he turned as I neared and held out his arms. Without thought I went straight into them and put my arms up around his neck. He wore the warm robe Momma had given him last Christmas, though it was much too small. He'd have another from me when he looked under the tree Christmas morning, with his monogram--CFS--for he wanted never to be called Foxworth, but Sheffield.

  His blue eyes gazed down into mine. Eyes so much alike. I loved him as I loved the better side of myself, the brighter, happier side.

  "Cathy," he whispered, stroking my back, his eyes bright, "if you feel like crying, go ahead, I'll understand. Cry enough for me too. I was hoping, praying that Momma would come and somehow give us a reasonable explanation for doing what she did."

  "A reasonable excuse for murder?" I asked bitterly. "How could she dream up one clever enough? She's not that smart." He looked so miserable I tightened my arms about his neck. One hand stole into his hair and twined there. My other hand lowered to stroke his cheek. Love, it was such an encompassing word, different from sex and ten times more compelling. I felt full of love for him when he lowered his face into my hair and sobbed. He murmured my name over and over again, as if I were the only person in the world who would ever be real and solid, and dependable.

  Somehow his lips found mine and we were kissing, kissing with so much passion he was aroused and tried to draw me into his room. "I just want to hold you, that's all. Nothing else. When I go away to school, I need to have something more to hold to-- give me just a little more, Cathy, please." Before I could answer he had me in his arms again, kissing me with such burning lips I became terrified--and excited too.

  "Stop! Don't!" I cried, but he went on, touching my breasts and pushing my gown aside so he could kiss them. "Chris!" I hissed, angry then. "Don't love me, Chris. When you're gone, what you feel for me will fade away like it never happened. We'll force ourselves to love others so we can feel clean. We can't be our parents in duplicate. We can't make the same mistake."

  He held me tighter and didn't say a word, yet I knew what he was thinking. There wouldn't be any others. He wouldn't let it come about. One woman had hurt him too deeply, betrayed him too monstrously when he was young and very, very vulnerable. There was only me he could trust.

  He stepped back, two tears shining in the corners of his eyes. It was up to me to slice the bond, now, here. And for his own good. Everybody always did everything for someone's good.

  I couldn't go to sleep. I f t hearing him calling me, wanting me. I got and down the hall and again got in his'where he lay waiting. "You'll never be free of me, &thy, never. As long as you live, it will be me and you."

  "No!"

  "Yes!"

  "No!" But I kissed him, then jumped from his bed and raced back to my room, slamming and locking the door behind me. What was the matter with me? I should never have gone to his room and gotten into his bed. Was I as evil as the grandmother said?

  No, I wasn't.

  I couldn't be!

  PART TWO Visions of Sugarplums

  . It was Christmas. The tree touched the twelvefoot ceiling, and spread under it were gifts enough for ten children! Not that Chris and I were children anymore. Carrie was thrilled by everything Santa had brought for her. Chris and I had used the last of our stolen hoard of money to buy Paul a luscious red lounging robe, and a brilliant gown of ruby red velvet for Henny----size fifty-eight! Dazzled and pleased, she held it before her. Then she wrote a thank-you note, Make good church dress. Make all friends jealous.

  Paul tried on his lavish new lounging robe. He looked divine in that color and it fitted him

  beautifully.

  Next came the biggest surprise of all. Paul strode over to me and hunkered down on his heels. From his wallet he pulled five large yellow tickets. If he had sat down for a year and thought about nothing but a way to please me most, he couldn't have been more successful. There, fanned in his large, finely shaped hand, were tickets to The Nutcracker, performed by the Rosencoff School of Ballet.

  "It's a very professional company, I hear," explained Paul. "I don't know much about ballet myself, but I've asked around, and they say it is one of the best. They also teach beginner, intermediate and advanced lessons. Which level are you?"

  "Advanced!" proclaimed Chris while I could only stare at Paul, too happy to speak. "Cathy was a beginner when she went upstairs to live. But something wonderful happened to her in the attic--the ghost of Anna Pavlova came and took over her body. And Cathy taught herself how to go on pointe."

  That night all of us, including Henny, sat enthralled in the third row, center section. Those dancers on stage weren't just good--they were superb! Especially the handsome man named Julian Marquet who danced the lead. As in a dream I followed Paul backstage during intermission, for I was going to meet the dancers!

  He led us toward a couple standing in the wings. "Madame, Georges," he said to a tiny woman sleek as a seal and a not much larger man by her side, "this is my ward, Catherine Doll, who I was telling you about. This is her brother Christopher, and this younger beauty is Carrie, and you have met Henrietta Beech before. . . ."

  "Yah, of course," said the lady who looked like a dancer, talked like a dancer, and wore her black hair just like a dancer would, drawn back from her face and pinned up in a huge chignon. Over black leotards she wore a floating chiffon dress of black, and over that a bolero of leopard skins. Her husband, Georges, was a quiet man, sinewy, pale-faced, with startlingly black hair, and lips so red they seemed made of congealed blood. They were a pair, all right, for her lips were scarlet slashed too, and her eyes were charcoaled smudges in pale pastry dough. Two pairs of black eyes scanned me and then Chris. "You too are a dancer?" they asked of my brother. My, did they always speak simutaneously?

  "No! I don't dance," said Chris, appearing embarrassed.

  "Ah, the pity of that," sighed the madame regretfully. "What a glorious pair the two of you would make on stage. People would flock to stare at beauty such as you and your sister possess." She glanced down at small Carrie, clinging fearfully to my hand, and casually disregarded her.

  "Chris plans to be a doctor," explained Dr. Paul. "Ha!" Madame Rosencoff scoffed, as if Chris must have taken leave of his senses. Both she and her husband turned their ebony eyes on me, concentrating with such intensity I began to feel hot, sweaty, selfconscious.

  "You have studied the daunce?" (Always she said "daunce," as if it had a "u.")

  "Yes," I said in a small voice.

  "Your age when you started?"

  "I was four years old."

  "And you are now . . . ?"

  "In April I will be sixteen."

  "Good. Very, very good." She rubbed the palms of her long, bony hands together. "Eleven years and more of professional training. At what age did you go on pointe?"

  "Twelve."

  "Wonderful!" she cried. "I never put girls on full pointe until they are thirteen, unless they are excellent. Then she frowned suspiciously. "Are you excellent, or only mediocre?"

  "I don't know."

  "You mean no one has ever told you?"

  "No."

  "Then you must be only mediocre." She halfsneered, turned toward her husband and waved her hand arrogantly to dismiss us.

  "Now you wait a minute!" flared Chris, looking red and very angry. "There's not a dancer on that stage tonight who is as good as Cathy! Not one! That girl out there, playing the lead role of Clara--sometimes she is out of time with the music--Cathy is never out of time. Her timing is perfect; her ear is perfect. Even when Cathy dances to the same melody, each time she varies it just a little, so she never duplicates, always improvises to make it better, and more beautiful, and more touching. You'd be lucky to get a dancer like Cathy in your company!"

  T
hose slanted, jet eyes turned to him, savoring the intensity of his report. "You are an authority on the subject of ballet?" she asked with some scorn. "You know how to separate the gifted dancers from the horde?"

  Chris stood as if in a dream, and spoke as if his feet were firmly rooted there, and even his voice had a huskiness to betray his feelings. "I only know what I see, and what emotions Cathy makes me feel when she dances. I know when the music turns on, and she begins to move with it, my heart stands still, and when her dance is over, I know I am left aching because such beauty has gone. She doesn't just dance a role, she is that character; she makes you believe--because she believes--and there's not a girl in your company who reaches out and grabs my heart and squeezes it until it throbs. So go on and turn her away, and let some other dance company benefit from your stupidity."

  The Madame's jet eyes fixed on Chris long and penetratingly, as did our doctor's eyes. Then slowly Madame Rosencoff turned to me, and from head to toe I was assessed, weighed, measured. "Tomorrow, one o'clock sharp. At my studio you will audition for me." It was not a request, but a command--not to be disobeyed--and for some reason when I should have been happy, I was angry.

  "Tomorrow is too soon," I said. "I have no costumes, no leotards, no palates." All of those things had been left behind in the attic of Foxworth Hall.

  "Trifles," she dismissed, with an arrogant wave of her shapely hand. "We will supply what you need-- just be there--and don't be late, for we demand that our dancers be disciplined in all things, including punctuality!" With a queenly gesture we were dismissed, and gracefully she drifted off with her husband in tow, leaving me stunned. Mouth agape, speechless, I caught the strong study of the dancer, Julian Marquet, who must have overheard every word. His dark eyes shone with a glow of interest and admiration. "Feel flattered, Catherine," he said to me. "Customarily she and Georges won't take anyone unless they've waited months, or sometimes years, for an audition."

  I cried that night in Chris's embrace. "I'm out of practice," I sobbed. "I know I'm going to make a fool of myself tomorrow. It isn't fair that she won't let me have more time to prepare! I need to limber up. I'm going to be stiff, clumsy, and they won't want me, I know they won't!"

  "Aw, come off it, Cathy," he said, tightening his arms about me. "I've seen you in here holding to the bedpost, and doing your plies and tendus. You are not out of practice, or stiff, or clumsy--you're just scared. You've got a great big case of stage fright, that's all. And you don't need to worry, you're terrific. I know it, you know it."

  He brushed a light good-night kiss on my lips, dropped his arms and backed toward the door. "Tonight I'll go down on my knees and pray for you. I'll ask God to let you wow them tomorrow. And I'll be there to gloat when I see their stunned expressions-- for no one is gonna believe the dancing wonder of you."

  With that he was gone. And I was left aching and wanting. I crawled under my covers to lie wide awake and full of trepidations.

  Tomorrow was my big day, my chance to prove what I was and if I had that special something you had to have if you were to reach the top. I had to be the best, nothing else would do. I had to show Momma, the grandmother, Paul, Chris, everybody! I wasn't evil, or corrupt, or the Devil's issue. I was only me--the best ballerina in the world!

  I tossed, turned, fretted in and out of nightmares while Carrie slept on peacefully. In my dreams I did everything wrong at the audition, and, what was worse, I did everything wrong throughout my whole lifetime! I ended up a withered old lady begging on the streets of some huge city. In the dark I passed by my mother and begged for alms. She was still young and beautiful, richly gowned, bejeweled and furred, and escorted by forever-young and faithful Bart Winslow.

  I awoke. It was still night. What a long night. I stole down the stairs to find the Christmas tree lights burning, and on the floor, Chris was lying and staring up into the tree branches. It was what the two of us used to do when we were children. Though I should have known better, I was irresistibly drawn toward him, and I lay down beside him I gazed up into the sparkling other-worldliness of the Christmas tree.

  "I thought you'd forgotten," Chris murmured without looking my way. "Remember when we were in Foxworth Hall, the tree was so small and it was on a table and we couldn't lie under it like this--and look what happened. Let's never forget again. Even if our future trees are only one foot high, we will hang it up high, so we can lie underneath.'

  It worried me the way he said that. Slowly I turned my head to stare at his profile. He was so beautiful, lying there with his fair hair changing colors. Each strand seemed to catch a different rainbowed hue, and when he turned his head to meet my eyes his eyes were glowing too. "You look . . . so divine," I said in a tight voice. "I see candy in your eyes and the crown jewels of England too."

  "No--that's what I am seeing in your eyes, Cathy. You're so very beautiful in that white nightgown. I love you in white nightgowns with blue satin ribbons. I love the way your hair spreads like a fan, and you turn your cheek so it rests on a satin pillow." He moved closer, so his head was on my hair too. Even closer he inclined his head until our foreheads met. His warm breath was on my face. I moved so my head tilted backward and my neck arched. I didn't feel quite real when his warm lips kissed the hollow of my throat and stayed there. My breath caught. For long, long moments I waited for him to move away. I wanted to pull back myself, but somehow I couldn't. A sweet peace stole over me, quivering my flesh with a tingling sensation. "Don't kiss me again," I whispered, clinging harder to him and pressing his head to my throat.

  "I love you," he choked. "There will never be anyone for me but you. When I'm an old, old man, I'll look back to this night with you under the Christmas tree, and remember how sweet it was of you to let me hold you like this."

  "Chris, do you have to go away and be a doctor? Couldn't you stay on here and decide on something else?"

  He lifted his head to stare down into my eyes. "Cathy--do you have to ask? All my life it's been the only thing I've wanted, but you . .

  Again I sobbed. I didn't want him to go! I tickled his face with a tress of my hair, until he cried out and kissed my lips. Such a soft kiss, wanting to grow bolder, and afraid I'd turn away if he did. He began to say wild and crazy things when our kiss was over, about how much I looked like an angel. "Cathy--look at me! Don't turn your head and pretend you don't know what I'm doing, what I'm saying! Look and see the torment you've put me in! How can I find anyone else, when you've been bred into my bones-- and are part of my flesh? Your blood runs fast when mine does! Your eyes burn when mine do--don't deny it!" His trembling hands began to fumble with the tiny, lace-covered buttons that opened my nightgown to the waist. I closed my eyes and was again in the attic, when he'd accidentally stabbed me in the side with the scissors, so now I was hurting, bleeding, and I needed his lips to kiss and take away the pain.

  "How beautiful your breasts are," he said with a low sigh, leaning to nuzzle them. "I remember when you were flat, and then when you began to grow. You were so shy about them, always wanting to wear loose sweaters so I couldn't see. Why were you ashamed?"

  Somewhere above I hovered, watching him tenderly kiss my breasts, and somewhere deep inside me I shivered. Why was I letting him do this? My arms drew his body tighter against me, and when my lips again met his, maybe it was my fingers that had unbuttoned his pajama jacket so his bare chest was against mine We melded in a hot blend of unsatisfied desire--before I suddenly cried out, "No--it would be sinful!"

  "Then let us sin!"

  "Then don't ever leave me! Forget about being a doctor! Stay with me! Don't go and leave me! I'm afraid of myself without you! Sometimes I do crazy things. Chris, please don't leave me alone. I've never been alone, please stay!"

  "I have to be a doctor," he said, then groaned. "Ask me to give up anything else, and I'd say yes. But don't ask me to give up the only thing that's held me together. You wouldn't give up dancing--would you?"

  I didn't know, as I responded to his demanding
kisses, the fire between us growing larger, overwhelming us both and taking us to the brinks of hell. "I love you so much sometimes I don't know how to handle it," he cried. "If only I could have you just once, and there would be no pain for you, only joy."

  The unexpected parting of his hot lips, his tongue that forced my lips open, shot through me with a jolt of electricity! "I love you, oh, how I love you! I dream of you, think of you all day." And on and on he went, while his breath came faster, until he was panting and I was overcome by my body ready and willing to be satisfied. While my thoughts wanted to deny him, I wanted him! I gasped with the shame of it!

  "Not here," he said between kisses. "Upstairs in my room."

  "No! I'm your sister--and your room is too near Paul's. He'd hear us."

  "Then we'll use your room. Carrie can sleep through a war."

  Before I knew what was happening he had me in his arms and was racing up the back stairs and into my room where he fell with me on my bed. He had my gown off and his pajamas too when he fell down beside me and started again to complete what he had begun. I didn't want this. I didn't want it ever to happen again! "Stop!" I cried, then rolled away from under him. I fell to the floor. In a flash he was on the floor with me, wrestling. Over and over we turned, two naked bodies that suddenly collided with something hard.

  That was what stopped him. He stared at the box with Oreo cookies, a loaf of bread, apples, oranges, a pound of cheddar cheese, a stick of butter, several cans of tuna fish, beans and tomato juice. Out spilled a can opener, dishes, glasses and silverware. "Cathy! Why are you stealing Paul's food and hiding it under your bed?"

  I shook my head, fuzzy about why I had taken the food and hidden it away. Then I sat up and reached for the gown he'd tugged off, and modestly I held it before me. `Get out! Leave me alone! I don't love you except as a brother, Christopher!"