It was weird, thought Katie, how Jo and I’ve suddenly got something back in common, now we’re both struggling again. Or maybe, she corrected herself, it’s just that I’ve managed to take a step back from my own navel-gazing and seen she needs some support.
‘You’re going to be fine,’ she said, wanting it to be true with a strength that made Jo blink with emotion.
A thunder of small feet in the hall stopped either of them from saying any more, and the sadness vanished from Jo’s face to be replaced by convincing cheerfulness as Molly rushed in, with Hannah close behind.
‘Come and see, Mummy! Come and see!’ Molly ordered. ‘Come and see our magic horse!’
‘It’s a game,’ explained Hannah, pointedly directing her attention to Jo. ‘Jo! You have to play!’
‘Both Mummies have to play,’ said Jo, firmly. ‘Now what does this horse eat?’
‘How about these lovely carrot sticks I’ve brought with me from the supermarket?’ Katie suggested, waving the bag of lunchbox crudités that – fortuitously – was at the top of her supermarket shopping. ‘Horses love carrots.’
‘Remember the ones we saw on our holiday?’ Jo added. ‘Are you going to show us how they munched up the carrots?’
Hannah looked suspiciously at Katie, then grudgingly conceded. ‘All right. You can bring the carrots, Mummy. But be very quiet, he’s sleeping.’
She and Molly crept off, shushing each other loudly.
‘I hope your horse impression is up to scratch,’ sighed Jo.
‘It’s better than you think,’ said Katie.
33
The drizzling dampness of autumn turned into a crisp, cold winter chill as November wore on, and Ross continued to vanish off on his own on Thursdays, and Monday evenings.
He was vague with Katie about where he was going but she noticed, from little things Hannah said, that he was spending lots of time with Jo, and that he’d had another haircut that sharpened up his face, bringing him into a new, fresh focus. He was sparkier round the house, not letting Hannah’s new clinginess set into habit, and reminding her, with scrupulous fairness, how lucky she now was to have Mummy all to herself on Thursday evenings. It made Katie try even harder to show him how much she appreciated what he did, but though he was as kind as ever, the distance between them still echoed.
Jo came along to the ballroom lessons again, and Katie felt a new sympathy for Trina and Chloe, as she and Jo often had to dance together, for lack of male partners. Frank and Baxter had never been so popular. It was nice, though, feeling like two old ballroom ladies. They had a laugh about each other’s bosoms getting in the way, and how Katie still tried to lead even when it was Jo’s turn.
As they were leaving at the end of the evening, Angelica caught Katie putting on her coat.
‘You and Ross, you will dance at the gala night?’ she asked, although it was more of a statement than a question.
‘I don’t think so.’ Katie shook her head. ‘I mean, things are OK, but . . .’ She shrugged. ‘Maybe I could do something with Jo? A jive or something?’
A determined expression set on Angelica’s face. ‘Katie, you’re still coming to our lunchtime session tomorrow, aren’t you?’
‘Yes, but I . . .’ She was going to say, I don’t see what the point is, but the fierce look in Angelica’s eyes stopped her. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I am.’
‘Good,’ she said, and swept off to tell Lauren she would be having her big waltz moment after all.
‘I heard that,’ said Jo. ‘I can’t believe you’re trying to wriggle out of dancing with me.’
‘Well, if it’s just us four girls, maybe Angelica can work up a can-can number for us.’
‘Moulin Rouge!’ said Jo. ‘With Trina and Chloe!’
‘That’s a cha-cha,’ deadpanned Katie, and was pleased to see Jo’s shoulders shake.
Katie was happy to make Jo laugh, because Greg’s solicitors weren’t making it easy for her. Their suspicions about the secret girlfriend turned out not only to be true, but she was both pregnant and a junior employee, and Greg wanted a divorce quickly, but with as much as he could cling on to.
As soon as they were in the car, Jo spilled out the details, and hot tears spilled out at the same time, running angrily down her face.
‘He’s putting a price on what I brought to our marriage,’ Jo sobbed. ‘I can’t believe he’s valuing me, like he’s valuing the house!’
It was the same most weeks. Katie comforted her the best she could, and then Jo cleaned up her face with a baby wipe and went back to teach Molly how to rumba or cha-cha or whatever Angelica had put them through that week. Molly and Hannah had abandoned ponies in favour of pleas for ballet lessons, but only with Angelica.
Angelica was ‘thinking about it’.
A few weeks later, when Katie arrived for her lunchtime tango lesson, she guessed Angelica was already there, because as she pushed open the front door, loud tango music was soaring through the Hall, the haunting accordion chords gliding against the staccato drumbeats. It made Katie stop for a moment. There was something insistent about the way the melody surged between light and dark, and it raised the hairs on the back of her neck. It isn’t music to tap your feet to, she thought, not like the pretty waltzes; it’s music to strike poses and act out parts.
Slowly, she was beginning to see why Angelica thought it might be good for someone who needed permission to step out of their everyday life; music like this demanded something more than just a series of learned steps.
As she hung her coat up on the hook, Katie glanced through the glass panes into the Hall, and caught a glimpse of Angelica’s lithe body arching like a black cat as the music slowed to a keening crescendo. She was wearing a simple red dress, and had tied her hair in a loose ponytail. It shone like a ripple of black treacle down her back.
Katie had never seen Angelica’s hair down before and she stopped, captivated by how striking it was, as it swished and flicked from side to side, not one thread of grey in it.
You’d never think she was nearly sixty, marvelled Katie, as she watched her syncopate her gestures against the beat, stretching out long arm gestures to double time, and slowly drawing her pointed toe around. She had the sort of natural rhythm that would make her look like the greatest dancer in the room, even when she was eighty and only dancing a quarter of the steps she used to. Each one would count, and you’d see the ones she wasn’t dancing as clearly as if she had.
She was about to go in when she realised Angelica wasn’t on her own; there was a man in there with her, dressed in black. He’d been standing to the side while she did some kind of semi-Flamenco stamping step, and now he took hold of her again, stepping back into the salida as their cheeks touched. The music changed tempo, and he walked around her as Angelica spun on the ball of her foot, her leg flicked back at a perfect right angle.
Katie’s heartbeat quickened as her nerves took hold. Was that Angelica’s own partner, or someone else she was giving private lessons to? Did she expect her to dance with him? They were pretty good together, and when Katie saw what the tango should look like when it was done properly her old despair that she’d ever learn to be that good flooded back.
I don’t really want to dance with anyone but Ross, she thought suddenly. I don’t want to meet new people dancing, I just want him to dance with me like that.
Angelica stopped and demonstrated a new step to the man, darting her foot in and out between his leg, so her red shoe flashed against the black of his trousers. He held her close, his long white hand low on her red dress, as the Argentinian music rattled and yearned in the background.
‘You’ve got it!’ she heard Angelica exclaim, with a delight that she rarely displayed in group class. ‘Perfection!’
Feeling like a voyeur, Katie sank back onto the bench and put on the shoes she danced in. She’d bought a new pair especially, gold leather with good slippy soles – as much glitz as she could manage to change into on her lunchbreak.
&n
bsp; Katie looked at her feet and tried to imagine them doing the same haughty, sexy steps that Angelica had been showing off. It would have helped if she’d had time to give herself a pedicure; tango Argentino was the sort of dance that demanded bright red toenails peeking through fishnets.
For the first time in years, Katie actually wished she’d had time for a pedicure, and she shocked herself by wondering if the salon next to Sainsbury’s did lunchtime appointments. Maybe that was what Angelica meant about rediscovering her inner woman.
‘Come on, feet,’ she said, as she pushed herself off the bench and prepared to go in. ‘Do it for me.’
When she opened the door to the Hall, the music was still playing, but Angelica was on her own, sketching out a shape with her arms, stepping back and forth thoughtfully as she explored a new step in her mind. Her head bounced up when she saw Katie, making her ponytail flick. Up close, she didn’t look quite so young, with feathery lines around the eyes, but the unbounded pleasure in her face and the flush in her cheeks gave her a radiance that was more than beautiful.
‘Ah, hello!’ she said. ‘I’ve got a surprise for you!’
‘I saw,’ said Katie.
Angelica looked caught off-guard. ‘Did you?’
‘Yes, I saw through the glass – you were dancing with someone.’
‘That’s part of the surprise,’ she said, recovering quickly and wagging her finger. ‘The first bit is this.’ She stepped lightly over to the chairs and picked up a yellow Selfridges bag. ‘I think it’s time to take your tango lessons on a stage, now you know the basics, so first of all, I want you to pop into the loos and put this on.’
‘Another dress?’ said Katie, thinking of the amazing red encrusted number still hanging in her wardrobe, a kidnapped butterfly amidst her drab office suits. ‘But you’ve been far too generous already. I thought . . .’
Angelica shook her head. ‘No, that’s a ballroom tango dress. Far too stagey for what we’re doing here. This is a real milonga dress, for the tango Argentino. Much sexier, easier to dance in. Go on, put it on.’
‘But that man,’ Katie said, taking the bag nervously. ‘Do I have to dance with him, because I’m not sure that . . .’
‘You’re not my only student,’ said Angelica, sternly. ‘Now, off you go.’ She tapped her watch.
Reluctantly, Katie went into the chilly loos.
If the worst comes to the worst I could get the council to hire this place out to film crews, she thought, looking round at the cobwebby pipes coiling round the walls. Even the plumbing had been done with an eye to elegance, and the institutional blue-grey paint didn’t spoil its neatness.
The dress didn’t look very big in the bag, just a little puddle of black jersey, but when Katie pulled it over her head, it fell over her body and hung perfectly where it hit her shoulders and hips, flattering her white throat and the curve of her shoulders with the deep v shape in the front.
She looked at herself in the mirror, half amazed and half horrified at how sensuously it clung to her body, highlighting every inch of what little shape she had. The fabric was heavy and swung as she turned to see her back exposed in a matching v.
It swung so sexily that Katie found herself swinging back the other way, just to see how it would feel. It felt fabulous, rippling against her knees, so she swung back again, this time turning her head over her shoulder to peep coyly at herself in the mirror.
A sultrier Katie peeped back, and she nearly laughed in surprise.
There was a big silky red rose on a comb in the bag too, which Katie pushed into her hair, holding her fringe up at one side. The music had started up again in the Hall, and with a final check in the mirror (where had all those curves come from?) she stalked back out, already holding herself differently, so her post-Jack tummy bulge wouldn’t draw more focus than her shoulders.
Angelica clapped her hands when she saw her, although Katie detected something else in her face too – a shadow of something that she tried not to let Katie see, but it must have been quite a strong emotion because it showed in her eyes, even though her red lips were smiling generously.
‘You look stunning!’ she said. ‘Stunning! From now on, that’s your tango outfit.’
‘But I can’t possibly . . .’
Angelica waved her hands. ‘I’m getting rid of a lot of my old gowns. I’ve got a whole box for Lauren to dress up in. Now then, as I said before, you can only learn so much dancing with me. You need some tension to play with, so you can find that inner vamp we talked about.’ She patted Katie’s hand to temper the words with kindness.
‘So I’ve found you a partner.’
Katie’s heart began to beat more quickly. This was it. This was taking it a bit further, and she wasn’t sure she even wanted to practise moves like that with someone other than Ross.
‘He looked pretty good to me,’ Katie started to say, ‘I hope you’ve warned him that I’m a total beginner . . .’
‘He’s a beginner himself,’ said Angelica, and pulled the door to the ante room open. ‘We’re ready for you now.’
The man in black stepped into the Hall, running a familiar hand through his dark hair, and in that instant, Katie realised it was Ross.
It took her a second to match her Ross with Angelica’s self-assured partner from a moment ago. Ross, dancing with that sort of assertiveness? Really?
Angelica was smiling as if her face would split, and turned her back very deliberately while she went over to the CD player, leaving them staring at each other, as if they’d only just met.
‘Katie?’ he said, lifting an eyebrow.
Katie couldn’t think what to say, but she could feel herself blushing, though she didn’t know why. Ross looked masculine and unfamiliar, in a black polo neck and tight trousers. Another man’s clothes. He’d done something to his hair too, because it was gleaming and pushed off his face, showing off his eyes, and he walked with a confidence that bordered – she couldn’t quite believe this – on a swagger.
The effect made her skin prickle with excitement.
I really fancy him, thought Katie, as shock and attraction and delight ran through her like a massive jolting shot of espresso. He is a gorgeous man.
Ross narrowed his eyes, and said, ‘Bailamos?’ as he held out his hand.
He didn’t say it entirely seriously, but there was no trace of his usual self-deprecating humour, and it only added to the delicious strangeness of the situation.
‘Si!’ said Katie, in the same pretend Spanish accent, and without warning, he swept her into the closest possible hold: his arm tight around her back, his hand clasping hers right up by her cheek. She felt her whole body melt into his as he tipped her slightly off balance, but his leg was strong against hers, bearing her up, and she let him feel the weight of her against him, so their bodies touched the whole length of her thigh.
Their noses were almost brushing and his breath was warm on her face. They were so close to each other that she had no choice but to look deeply in his face, and for a moment the rest of the room blurred into nothing as the shock of being so intimately connected after months and months of physical detachment swept through every nerve ending in her skin.
Ross gazed into her eyes with a passion that made the colour flood into her cheeks; his eyes were nearly black and it was obvious that he was seeing a different Katie, just as she was seeing a different Ross.
She stared back, not letting herself smile and spoil the drama of the moment. So this is what those magazines mean when they tell you to dress up as different people and meet in a bar, she thought, dazed. It’s Ross, but not Ross. Tango Ross. I know he’s going to be seductive and masculine and everything else the dance tells him to be, and he knows I know. He knows I’m going to be sensual and defiant, and he can’t wait.
Their lips were still inches apart, and neither of them could look away, for fear of breaking the electric tension crackling between them. Katie knew she couldn’t hide anything from him, and a kind of fearlessn
ess spread through her at the dare in his eyes.
Yes, sure, it was pantomime, but Katie couldn’t remember ever feeling so attracted to Ross, and because she could tell he felt the same way, an old sexiness crept over her. The same tingle she’d felt when they first met, and she couldn’t believe he fancied her as much as she fancied him. I want him to feel that again too, she thought, desperately. And if he won’t listen to me at home, he’s going to listen to me now.
The music started, and without speaking, he led her into the basic salida. Their hips brushed as he stepped around her backwards step with a deft confidence that made her trail her left foot with more vampishness than she’d summoned up with Angelica. They did it again, neither varying the steps as they measured each other up, like two cats prowling in a circle.
Just when Katie thought they were going to get through another basic – with a touch of disappointment – Ross suddenly led her into the figure-of-eight spin that made her swivel first one way, then the other, up on her toes, as he stood back, watching motionless apart from his eyes, which followed her as her hips turned to push into the spin.
‘You dance this step to tease your partner,’ Angelica had told her, demonstrating with a provocative flick of the knee that Katie had thought she’d never master. ‘You’re flirting with him, making him wait to carry on the dance. You decide how many ochos are enough.’
Her skirt began to flare the first time she turned, and Katie knew it was rising up around her knees, showing off her slim calves. She spun once, twice, then as Ross started to lead her back into the basic, she flashed a stern look at him from under her eyelashes and did another spin, then a fourth.
Then, and only then, she let him step around her to finish the salida, and without thinking, her head arched back proudly, just like Angelica’s had in the lesson.
She met Ross’s gaze, and a thrill of excitement shivered through her as he let a small approving smile tug at the corner of his mouth. Not the puppyish, eager grin he usually gave her, but something much more sexy, more difficult to please. She’d pulled off that move perfectly, and he was impressed, she could see in his face. And in his eyes, and his hands which stroked her back, and his breath, which was quick on her neck, much quicker than their slow pace required. Katie slid her feet languorously along the floor as they stepped round once more in the basic pattern, and Ross led them off at an angle, into the centre of the room.