Petals on the Wind

  "But . . . but . . ." I sputtered. "I've always hated it when the rain beats hard and the wind blows at night. This is the first time I've felt warm and protected, here, with you, before the fire."

  "Safe?" he teased lightly. "You think you're safe with me, as you sit on my lap, and kiss me like that? What do you think I'm made of?"

  "The same as other men, only better."

  "Catherine," Paul said, his voice softer and kinder now, "I've made so many mistakes in my life, and you three give me an opportunity to redeem myself. If I so much as lay a hand on you again, I want you to scream for help. If no one is here, then run to your room, or pick up something and bash me over the head."

  "Ooh," I whispered, "and I thought you loved me!" Tears trickled down my cheeks. I felt like a child again, chastised for presuming too much. How foolish to have believed love was already knocking on my door. I sulked as he lifted me away from him. Then he gently lifted me to my feet, but kept his hands on my waist as he looked up into my face.

  "My God, but you are beautiful and desirable," he said with a sigh. "Don't tempt me too much, Catherine--for your own good."

  "You don't have to love me." My head bowed to hide my face and my hair was something to hide behind as I shamelessly said, "Just use me when you need me, and that will be enough."

  He leaned back in the chair and took his hands from my waist. "Catherine, don't ever let me hear you offer such a thing again. You live in fairyland, not reality. Little girls get hurt when they play grown-up games. You save yourself for the man you marry--but for God's sake, wait to grow up first. Don't rush into having sex with the first man who desires you."

  I backed off, scared of him now, while he stood to come within arm's reach. "Beautiful child, the eyes of Clairmont are fixed upon you and me, wondering, speculating. I don't have a gilt-edged reputation. So, for the health of my medical practice and the good of my soul and conscience stay away from me. I'm only a man, not a saint."

  Again I backed off, scared. I flew up the stairs as if pursued. For he wasn't, after all, the kind of man I wanted. Not him, a doctor, perhaps a womanizer--the last kind of man who could fulfill my dreams of faithful, devoted and forever-green-springtimeromantic love!

  The school Paul sent me to was big and modem with an indoor swimming pool. My schoolmates thought I looked good and talked funny, like a Yankee. They laughed at the way I said "water, father, farther" or any word that had an "a" in it. I didn't like being laughed at. I didn't like being different. I wanted to be like the others, and though I tried I found out I was different. How could it be otherwise? She had made me different. I knew Chris was feeling lonely in his school because he too was an alien in a world that had gone on without us. I was fearful for Carrie in her school, all alone, made different too. Damn Momma for doing so much to set us apart, so we couldn't blend into the crowd and talk as they did and believe as they did. I was an outsider, and in every way they could all my schoolmates made me feel it.

  Only one place made me feel I belonged. Straight from my high school classes I'd catch a bus and ride to ballet class, toting my bag with leotards, pointes and a small handbag tucked inside. In the dressing room the girls shared all their secrets. They told ridiculous jokes, sexy stories, some of them even lewd. Sex was in the air, all around us, breathing hotly and demandingly down our necks. Girlishly, foolishly, they discussed whether they should save their bodies for their husbands. Should they pet with clothes on or off--or go "all the way"--and how did they stop a guy after they had "innocently" turned him on?

  Because I felt so much wiser than the others I didn't contribute anything. If I dared to speak of my past, of those years when I was living "nowhere" and the love that had sprung up from barren soil, I could imagine how their eyes would pop! I couldn't blame them. No, I didn't blame anyone but the one who'd made it all happen! Momma!

  One day I ran home from the bus stop and dashed off a long, venomous letter to my mother--and then I didn't know where to send it. I put it aside until I found out the address in Greenglenna. One thing for sure, I didn't want her to know where we lived. Though she had received the petition, it didn't have Paul's name on it, or our address, only the address of the judge. Sooner or later though, she'd hear from me and be sorry she did.

  Each day we began bundled up in heavy, woolen, knitted leg-warmers, and at the bane we exercised until our blood flowed fast and hot and we could discard the woolens as we began to sweat. Our hair, screwed up tight as old ladies' who scrubbed floors, soon became wet too, so we showered two or three times a day-- when we worked out eight or ten hours on Saturdays. The barre was not meant for holding onto tightly, but was meant only for balance, to help us develop control, grace. We did the plies, the tendus, and glisses, the fondus, the ronds de jambe a terre--and none of it was easy. Sometimes the pain of rotating the hips in the turnouts could make me scream. Then came the frappes on three-quarter pointe, the ronds de jambe en Pair, the petite and grande battlements, the developpes and all the warmup exercises to make our muscles long, strong and supple. Then we left the barre and used the center arena to repeat all of that without the aid of the barre.

  And that was the easy part--from there on the work became increasingly difficult, demanding technical skills awesomely painful to do.

  To hear I was good, even excellent, lifted me sky-high . . . so there had been some benefits gained from dancing in the attic, dancing even when I was dying, so I thought as I plied un, deux, and on and on as Georges pounded on the old upright piano. And then there was Julian.

  Something kept drawing him back to Clairmont. I thought his visits were only ego trips so we could sit in a circle on the floor and watch him perform in the center, showing off his superior virtuosity, his spinning turns that were blurrily fast. His incredible, leaping elevations defied gravity, and from these grand fetes he'd land goose-down soft. He cornered me to tell me it was "his" kind of dancing that added so much excitement to the performance.

  "Really, Cathy, you haven't seen ballet until you see it done in New York." He yawned as if bored and turned his bold, jet eyes on Norma Belle in her skimpy see-through, white leotards. Quickly I asked why, if New York was the best place to be, he kept coming back to Clairmont so often.

  "To visit with my mother and father," he said with a certain indifference. "Madame is my mother, you know."

  "Oh, I didn't know that."

  "Of course not. I don't like to boast about it." He smiled then, devastatingly wicked. "Are you still a virgin?" I told him it was none of his business and that made him laugh again. "You're too good for this hick place, Cathy. You're different. I can't put my finger on it, but you make the other girls look clumsy, dull. What's your secret?"

  "What's yours?"

  He grinned and put his hand flat on my breast. "I'm great, that's all. The best there is. Soon all the world will know it." Angry, I slapped his hand away. I stomped down on his foot and backed away. "Stop it!"

  Suddenly, as quickly as he'd cornered me, he lost all interest and walked away to leave me staring.

  Most days I'd go straight home from class and spend the evening with Paul. He was so much fun to be with when he wasn't tired. He told me about his patients without naming them, and told tales of his childhood, and how he'd always wanted to be a doctor, just like Chris. Soon after dinner he'd have to leave to make his rounds at three local hospitals, including one in Greenglenna. I'd try and help Henny after dinner while I waited for Paul to come back. Sometimes we watched TV, and sometimes he took me to a movie. "Before you came, I never went to movies."

  "Never?" I asked.

  "Well, almost never," he said. "I did have a few dates before you came, but since you've been here my time just seems to disappear. I don't know what uses it all up."

  "Milking to me," I told him, teasing with my finger that I trailed along his closely shaven cheek. "I think I know more about you than I know about anyone else in the world, except Chris and Carrie."

  "No," he said in a
tight voice, "I don't tell you everything."

  "Why not?"

  "You don't need to know all my dark secrets." "I've told you all my dark secrets, and you haven't turned away from me.

  "Go to bed, Catherine!"

  I jumped up and ran over to him and kissed his cheek, which was very red. Then I dashed for the stairs. When I was at the top, I turned to see him at the newel post, staring upward, as if the sight of my legs under the short, rose, baby-doll nightie fascinated him.

  "And don't run around the house in such things!" he called to me. "You should wear a robe."

  "Doctor, you brought this outfit to me. I didn't think you'd want me to cover myself. I thought you wanted to see me with it on."

  "You think too much."

  In the mornings I was up early, before six, so I could eat breakfast with him. He liked me to be there, though he didn't say so. Nevertheless, I could tell. I had him bewitched, charmed. I was learning more and more how to be like Momma.

  I think he tried to avoid me, but I didn't let him He was the one to teach me what I needed to know.

  His room was down the hall from mine, but I never dared to go to him at night as I had to Chris. I longed for Chris and for Carrie. When I woke up, I ached not to see them in the room beside me; I ached more not to see them at the breakfast table, and if Paul hadn't been there, I think I might have started off each and every day with tears instead of forced smiles.

  "Smile for me, my Catherine," Paul said one morning when I sat staring down at my plate of grits and scrambled eggs and bacon. I looked up, caught by something I heard in his voice, something wistful, as if he needed me.

  "Don't ever say my name like that again," I said hoarsely. "Chris used to call me his lady Cath-er-ine, and I don't like to hear anyone else call me his Catherine."

  He didn't say anything more, just laid aside the newspaper, got up and went out to the garage. From there he'd drive to the hospitals, then back to his home offices, and I wouldn't see him again until dinner time. I didn't see enough of him, never enough of anyone I cared about.

  Only on the weekends, when Chris and Carrie were home, did he seem really at ease with me. And yet, when Chris and Carrie were back in their schools, something would come between us, some subtle spark that revealed that he was just as attracted to me as I was to him I wondered if the real reason was the same as my own. Was he trying to escape memories of his Julia by letting me into his heart? Just as I was trying to escape Chris?

  But my shame was worse than his, or so I thought then. I thought I was the only one with a dark, ugly past. I never dreamed anyone as fine and noble as Paul could have ugliness in his life too.

  Only two weeks passed and Julian flew down from New York again. This time he made it very obvious he'd come just to see me. I felt flattered and a little awkward, for he'd already gained success, while I was still only hoping. He had an old ricky-tin car he said had cost him nothing but his time, for all the pieces had come from the junkyard. "Next to dancing, I love to tinker with cars," he explained as he drove me home from dance class. "Someday, when I'm rich, I'm going to have luxury cars, three or four, or maybe seven, one for each day of the week."

  I laughed; it sounded so outrageous and ostentatious. "Does dancing pay that much?"

  "It will when I hit the big-time money," he answered confidentially. I had to turn my head and stare at his handsome profile. If you took his features apart one by one, you could find fault with them, for his nose could have been better, and his skin needed more color, and perhaps his lips were too full and red, and too sensual. But when he was put all together, he was sensational looking. "Cathy," he began, throwing me a long look as his tinny car chugged and choked along, "you'd love New York. There's so much to do, so much to see and experience. That doctor you live with isn't your real father, you shouldn't stick around just to please him. Think about moving to New York as soon as possible." He put his arm about my shoulders to draw me closer to his side. "What a team we'd make, you and I," he said softly, cajolingly, and painted for me bright pictures of what our life would be like in New York. Clearly he made me understand I'd be under his wing, and in his bed.

  "I don't know you," I answered, pulling away to sit as far from him as possible. "I don't know your past, and you don't know mine. We're nothing at all alike, and though you flatter me with your attention you also scare me."

  "Why? I won't rape you."

  I hated him for saying that. It wasn't rape I was afraid of. In fact I didn't know what made me afraid of him, unless I was more afraid of myself when I was with him "Tell me who you are, Julian Marquet. Tell me about your childhood, your parents. Tell me why you think you are God's gift to the dance world and to every woman you meet."

  Casually he lit up a cigarette, which he wasn't supposed to do. "Let me take you out tonight and I'll give you all the answers you want."

  We'd reached the big house on Bellefair Drive. He parked in front, while I stared toward the windows softly lit in the rosy twilight glow. I could barely discern the dark shadow of Henny who peered out to see who was parking in front of her home. I thought of Paul, but more than anyone else I thought of Chris, my better half. Would Chris approve of Julian? I didn't think he would, and still I said yes, I'd date him that night. And what a night it turned out to be.

  My First Date

  . I was hesitant about bringing up the subject of Julian to Paul. It was Saturday night; Chris and Carrie were home, and, truthfully, I'd just as soon have gone to a movie with them and Paul. It was with great reluctance that I brought up the fact I had a date with Julian Marquet. "Tonight, Paul, you don't mind, do you?"

  He flashed me a tired look and a weak smile. "I think it's about time you started dating. He's not too much older, is he?"

  "No," I whispered, feeling a little disappointed that he didn't object.

  Julian showed up promptly at eight. He was slicked up in a new suit, with his shoes shined, his unruly hair tamed, his manners so perfect he didn't seem himself. He shook hands with Paul, leaned to kiss Carrie's cheek. Chris glared at him The two had been bicycling when I'd told Paul about my first date, and even as Julian held my new spring coat I felt Chris's disapproval.

  He drove to a very elegant restaurant where colored lights churned and rock music played. With surprising confidence Julian read the wine list, then tasted what the waiter brought and nodded, saying it was fine. This was all so new to me I felt on edge, afraid of making a mistake. Julian handed me a menu. My hands trembled so much I turned it over to him and asked him to select. I couldn't read French, and it seemed he could from the speedy way he chose our meal. When the salad and main course came it was just as good as he'd promised.

  I was wearing a new dress, cut low in front and much too old for a girl of my age. I wanted to appear sophisticated, even though I wasn't.

  "You're beautiful," he said, while I was thinking the same thing about him. My heart felt funny, as if I were betraying someone. "Much too beautiful to be stuck here in Hicktown for years on end while my mother exploits your talents. I'm not a male lead like I told you before, Cathy; I'm second string in the corps. I wanted to impress you, but I know if I had you with me, as my partner, both of us could make it big. There's a certain magic between us I've never had with another dancer. Of course you'd have to begin in the corps. But soon enough Madame Zolta would see your talent far surpasses your age and experience. She's an old crow, but no dummy. Cathy, I've danced my head off to get where I am--but I could make it easier for you. With me to back you up you'll make it quicker than I did. Together we'd make a sensational team. Your fairness complements my darkness; it's the perfect foil." And on and on he talked, half-convincing me I was great already, when a certain part of me knew deep down I wasn't that sensational, and not nearly good enough for New York. And there was Chris whom I couldn't see if I went to New York, and Carrie who needed me on the weekends. And Paul, he fit in my life somewhere, I knew he fit somewhere. The problem was-- where?

&nbs
p; Julian wined and dined me, then danced me out onto the floor. Soon we were dancing to rock like no one else in the place could. Everyone drew back just to watch, then applaud. I was giddy with the nearness of him and the amount of wine I'd consumed. On the way home Julian drove onto a secluded lane where lovers parked to make out. I'd never made out and wasn't ready for someone as overwhelming as Julian.

  "Cathy, Cathy, Cathy," he murmured, kissing my neck, behind my ears, while his hand sought to stroke my upper thigh.

  "Stop!" I cried. "Don't! I don't know you well enough! You go too fast!"

  "You're acting so childish," he said with annoyance. "I fly all the way from New York just to be with you, and you can't even let me kiss you."

  "Julian!" I stormed, "take me home!"

  "A kid," he muttered angrily and turned on the ignition. "Just a damned beautiful kid who tantalizes but won't come through. Wise up, Cathy. I'm not going to hang around forever."

  He was in my world, my dancing, glamorous world, and suddenly I was afraid of losing him. "Why do you call yourself Marquet when your father's name is Rosencoff?" I asked, reaching to turn off the ignition.

  He smiled and leaned back, then turned to me. "Okay, if you want to talk. I think you and I are a lot alike, even if you won't admit it. Madame and Georges are my mother and father, but they have never seen me as a son, especially my father. My father sees me as an extension of himself. If I become a great dancer, it won't be to my credit; it will be just because I am his son and bear his name. So I put an end to that idea by changing my name. I made it up, just like any performer does when he wants to change his name

  "You know how many baseball games I've played? None! They wouldn't let me. Football was out of the question. Besides, they kept me so busy practicing ballet positions, I was too tired for anything else. Georges never let me call him Father when I was little. After a while I wouldn't call him Father if he got down on his knees and begged. I tried my damndest to please him, and I never could. He'd always find some flaw, some minute mistake I'd made to keep any performance from being perfect. So, when I make it, I'm making it on my own steam, and nobody is going to know he is my father! Or that Marisha is my mother. So don't go shooting off your mouth to the rest of the class. They don't know. Isn't it funny? I throw a tantrum if he even dares to mention he has a son, and I refuse to dance. That kills him, so he let me go on to New York, thinking I wouldn't make it without his name. But I have made it, and without his help I think that kills him Now tell me about you. Why are you living with that doctor and not your own parents?"