The Four Temperaments Read online

  At home, Rita studied Ginny's toes, with their flayed, peeled-off skin. She had Ginny immerse her feet in all different sorts of solutions, and fed her aspirin and ibuprofen tablets as if they were candy. Ginny's toes still burned and stung, keeping her awake most of the night. And they hurt the next day too, but she went to class anyway, and when Wes said it was time for pointe work again, Ginny was the first one to have her shoes on. That day, the relevés and échappés hurt so much that she really did see stars, but she didn't care, she kept doing them anyway. If pain was what it took to leave the ground and be up there like that, then pain was what she'd have to accept.

  Of course, it didn't always hurt so much. Ginny learned that pain, at least physical pain, was something she got used to, something she could control. But the kind of pain that starts inside, where it can't be seen or found, that was another thing entirely. And that was the sort of pain Ginny felt in those days and weeks after Thanksgiving, when Gabriel first kissed her.

  She kept the note he had given her tucked inside her dance bag so she could take it out and reread it whenever she wanted, which was often. At first, she was expectant and giddy, waiting for this phone call, this message to arrive. But, after a while, when it didn't, she felt deflated, like a bicycle tire that had just gone over a piece of a broken beer bottle. She called the telephone company to make sure her phone was working. Still nothing. She began to feel sick from all the waiting and wondering. But Ginny couldn't call him, though she supposed finding him would have been easy enough. She didn't want to risk talking to his wife and she didn't know the name of the place where he worked. She considered writing to him, but what if Penelope was the sort to steam open a letter and read it? Better not take any chances.

  It used to be that Ginny would listen to the other girls talk about men when they were all in the dressing room, getting ready for class or rehearsal. How she had looked down on them. As if any of that mattered when you were a dancer. And now here she was, in the same boat, only she had no one to tell about it, since she had no friends here in New York. The person Ginny really wanted to talk to was Oscar, and that was clearly not going to be possible. They both took great care to avoid each other during this period. If they met in one of the backstage elevators or hallways, he quickly looked down at the floor, or turned his head away. But not so quickly that she couldn't see that hurt look in his eyes. She even felt sorry for him. But what could she do? Gabriel was looming between them, making it impossible for them even to say hello, let alone have one of those long, soulful talks she had come to like so much. So she went to class and rehearsals, and performed onstage all the while thinking of Gabriel, willing him to call her. And then he did.

  He told her when he would be in New York and where she was to meet him. When they hung up, she kissed the receiver. He was coming to see her. Soon.

  Now the pain vanished, as if by magic, and in its place was the most wonderful kind of anticipation. Gabriel was coming, and Ginny was getting ready for a solo in The Nutcracker. She danced especially well during that time; when Erik taught company class, as he did sometimes, he would pay her compliments, the sort that made the others, even the principals and soloists, look at her again. After all, when the artistic director of the company told a member of the corps de ballet that the line of her arabesque was perfect, everyone else in the room took a second look.

  Christmas came and went. Mama called her in the morning, to see if she had opened the packages she sent. Ginny thanked her profusely for everything: the cans of chicory roast coffee from the Café du Monde in New Orleans. The two pairs of leg warmers and the black lamb's wool cardigan to wear to class on winter mornings. And the Barbie doll; she couldn't forget to say thank you for that.

  Every year, since Ginny was about eight, Rita had given her an elaborate Barbie at Christmas. Though Ginny despised most dolls—babies with fat cheeks, toddlers with dimpled knees—she did have a weakness for Barbie. More than the body, Ginny was in love with the doll's face. She loved the serene expression, the angelic smile. No matter what you did to her—turned her upside down, attempted to deflate her protruding breasts with a hammer and nail—she retained her beatific and imperturbable calm. Although Ginny probed the secret of that calm, she was never able to uncover it. Nor was she, despite her ardent prayers at church on Sunday mornings, able to emulate it.

  Even though Ginny had long ago stopped playing with the dolls, she still liked to own them and Rita was happy to comply. In her room back at home in Louisiana, Ginny had a blond Barbie dressed as Sleeping Beauty and an auburn-haired Barbie dressed as Glinda, the Good Witch from The Wizard of Oz. She also owned Barbie as a cheerleader, bobby-soxer, mermaid and, of course, ballerina.

  This year, Rita sent a trio consisting of Barbie and her two younger sisters, Stacie and Kelly. All three dolls were dressed in coordinating silver-and-green metallic dresses; all wore silver shoes. They came equipped with a black plastic stairway on which they could be posed; a button on its side played a syrupy version of “Deck the Halls” meant to suggest the dolls themselves were singing. Ginny loved it. She carefully took the dolls out of the box (which she saved) and arranged them next to the potted ten-dollar tree she bought at the fruit stand.

  Ginny lied and told her mother that she was spending Christmas with Oscar's family, the way she had on Thanksgiving. “Why, what friendly people,” Rita said, evidently not realizing that they were Jewish. “I really should write and thank them for taking you under their wing. What's their address?”

  “Oh, that's all right, Mama,” Ginny said. “Just send a note to me and I'll pass it along.”

  After they hung up, she spent the rest of the day doing laundry—the machines in the basement were all empty, which was like a gift all by itself—and later watched It's a Wonderful Life and Miracle on Thirty-fourth Street on television. The second one made her kind of weepy, as it was about a little girl without a father and she and Rita had always watched it together. But Barbie and her sisters smiled consolingly from their plastic perch and Ginny took solace from their benign expressions. Later, she took herself out to a restaurant and ordered Christmas dinner—roast goose, candied yams and all the trimmings—and felt much better. She went to bed early and slept for what felt like days.

  The next night, she was going to dance her solo in The Nutcracker and meet Gabriel after the performance. Ginny thought that the coupling of those two events was significant, as if each would cast an auspicious light on the other. There it was, her name on the schedule and in the Stagebill. Gabriel wasn't sure if he was going to see her dance or not; he said that he felt uncomfortable about being in the theater when Oscar would be there. Ginny told him to make up his own mind. She would understand either way.

  Getting ready for the performance actually forced him from her thoughts for a while anyway: applying the makeup a bit more dramatically than usual, adjusting the new costume. Tonight she wasn't going to dance in the corps at all. She had the Coffee solo and that was all. She saw the other corps members putting on their makeup and getting into their costumes. Ginny was all ready, the wardrobe mistress having brought the costume up some time earlier. It was gorgeous, all slinky red and gold, and Ginny was sorry she hadn't thought to bring a camera. If she had, she would have asked someone to snap her picture so she could have sent it home to Rita.

  Ginny sat very still while the noise and buzz went on around her. People were making last-minute repairs to pointe shoe ribbons that had popped, putting on antiperspirant, slicking back their hair with a tiny daub of gel or a mist of hair spray. She had the feeling that tonight was a turning point; if it went well, she might not be in this shared dressing room much longer. She might instead have one of her own.

  Then the dancers took their places backstage, the curtain went up and the ballet began. As the artificial snowflakes fluttered down onstage, one settled very near where Ginny was standing. She quickly reached to get it, and slipped it down the front of her costume. When the cue came, she imagined she
could feel it there, warm, glowing and white, sending her the energy and the poise to dazzle the hushed, expectant audience. And she did. The variation went by so quickly, so very quickly. That sensation of space and expanse, of dancing alone, without all those other bodies around her, now that was intoxicating. She could feel the audience like a single live creature, a creature with one heart, and one mind, but a thousand eyes and hands. They were there with her, every second of the way, and then it was over. Applause showered her and she could have soaked it up forever. During the curtain call, she glanced at the orchestra for a second, and there was the top of Oscar's head. He wasn't looking in her direction, though. Instead, he was staring straight off, into space. There was no way she could have reached him, even if she had wanted to.

  Afterward, people congratulated her, including a principal dancer whom Ginny admired a lot. She took off the costume carefully; in her mind, she could hear Madame Dubrovska's voice: “Not on the floor, don't let it touch the floor!” She hung it up carefully so that it could be brought back to wardrobe. She didn't bother with the makeup, though; she was that eager to see Gabriel. So she got dressed quickly and was lucky enough to get a cab right away. When she reached the hotel and asked for Gabriel's room, the clerk at the desk looked at her, struggling to hide his disdain.

  “He's not here, miss,” he replied to her inquiry.

  “He will be,” Ginny told him. “I'll wait.” She pulled a Stagebill out of her bag, and opened it to the page where the cast was listed. She handed it to the clerk, pointing out her name. “By the way, that's me. I danced at New York State Theater tonight,” Ginny said before she sat down.

  “Charming, I'm sure,” he said and looked back at his computer screen.

  Who cared what he thought, anyway? Especially when a few minutes later, Gabriel appeared in the hotel lobby. She stood up and walked toward him. When he took her hands in his, Ginny felt as if she had come home at last.

  The next morning, Gabriel ordered breakfast brought up to the room. Never having stayed in the sort of hotel where they had room service, Ginny was unprepared for how quickly the food appeared. Since she had neither robe nor nightgown, she wrapped herself in a sheet when she heard the knock, and stood there while Gabriel thanked the man and tipped him. It was only after he left that Gabriel went into the bathroom and brought out another white terry cloth robe identical to the one he was wearing. Ginny looked at the robe, and at him, and then burst out laughing. “Did you see his face?” she said, hardly able to talk. Gabriel laughed too. Then he stopped and reached for the sheet, gently tugging it away. She let it drop and moved toward him. Later, he fed her breakfast—berries, one at a time, bits of croissant with jam—while they were nestled together in bed.

  “You know we won't be able to see each other very often,” he said, face pressed against her neck. “I have a wife. And a daughter.”

  “I don't care about them. I just care about you.”

  He pulled his face away, then, and turned her around so they were looking at each other. He was quiet for what seemed like a long time.

  “You're such a strange girl,” he said finally.

  “How am I strange?”

  “I thought women couldn't stand the idea of sharing. Another woman would want me to get a divorce. Get married to her. Give her a baby.”

  “I don't want to be married,” Ginny said. “And I certainly don't want to have a baby.” Then she told Gabriel about her own mother, the scholarship she had, and how it all went down the drain. How instead of college, a degree and awards, she got eighteen years of raising Ginny, by herself, with no help from anyone. He was quiet again. Ginny wanted to tell him that there had never been anyone like him for her, that she had no convenient slot into which he could fit. She knew he was not going to be a boyfriend or a lover in the usual sense and she didn't care—she just wanted what they had last night and this morning to go on and on. But she didn't know how to say that. So instead she said, “What about your mother? When she saw us that day?”

  “That's okay now,” he said. “I told her that I wouldn't see you again. That there was nothing to worry about.”

  “Does she believe you?”

  “People believe what they want to believe.” He shrugged. “What they can stand to believe.”

  “How about your father? What does he believe?” Ginny was not sure if Gabriel knew about what happened with Oscar before she met him.

  “We haven't spoken since Thanksgiving.” Gabriel looked down and fiddled with the blanket binding as if it were the most interesting thing he had ever seen.

  “You know about us, then? About Oscar and me?”

  “Not really. He didn't tell me anything. I put it together.” He lifted his eyes.

  “Does it bother you?”

  “It did.”

  “And now?”

  “What do you think?” he asked, kissing her. “I'll give you my cell phone number and my number at work. You can call me there, only not too often. And I'll call you. Whenever I can.”

  “The company will be in California,” Ginny says.

  “When?”

  “After we go to Saratoga—that's in July. So some time in August, I guess.”

  “You let me know where and when. I'll be there.”

  Ginny took a shower. Last night's stage makeup felt as if it were embedded into her skin; it took her a long time to get it off. Then there was her hair, which was stiff and matted with styling gel and spray. When she finally emerged, she put on the terry robe, and then started hunting for her clothes, which had been tossed Lord knows where last night. It was only when Gabriel moved the breakfast cart out of the way that she noticed the rolled-up newspaper on the breakfast tray.

  “Is that today's New York Times?” Ginny asked.

  “I guess so. They must send one up with room service. Why?”

  “There may be a review in there. Of the performance.” She reached over, and quickly started looking through the paper.

  “I saw you dance, you know,” Gabriel said quietly.

  “You did?” She stopped pawing the pages. “You didn't tell me.”

  “I know. But I had other things on my mind last night.” He smiled with such charm that Ginny wished they could get right back into bed. “Still, I was going to mention it.” He put his hand under her chin, tilting it up ever so slightly. “I'm hardly a connoisseur, but I thought you were extraordinary.”

  “You did?” Ginny knew her voice was squeaky, the way it got when she was happy or embarrassed, both of which she was right then.

  “I did. And other people did too. I heard the applause when you finished. I could tell.”

  She stood there, foolishly beaming at him.

  “Go ahead,” he said, gesturing to the newspaper. “Find the review. You can read it to me if you like.” After a few seconds, she found it. There were some remarks about the staging of the performance, which she skimmed, and some things about the principals who danced last night. Then she saw her own name and read silently, though she could feel her lips moving, sounding out the words, seeing how they would feel when she read them aloud.

  Newcomer Virginia Valentine dazzled the audience in her all too brief role as Coffee, a variation she imbued with her own grace and sensuality. Ms. Valentine, who has been with the corps de ballet for just over a year, danced like a demon child. Her extensions were lofty, her pointe work both crisp and cutting. She performed the short variation with such passion, such grace, such attack, that one would swear her pointe shoes were on fire as she danced. This reviewer knows she is not alone when she says she hopes to see more of her in the not too distant future.

  “Well?” said Gabriel. “Aren't you going to read it to me?” But Ginny found that she couldn't. Instead, she handed him the paper and let him read it for himself. He did and then put it down to stare at her again, in a kind of wonder this time.

  “Congratulations,” he said tenderly. “It seems that you have arrived.”

  When Ginny kisse
d Gabriel good-bye, she cried, but only a little. She felt as if she were in mild shock, what with the lack of sleep last night, and what she and Gabriel had done while they weren't sleeping. Then waking up to all those glorious things written about her in the New York Times of all places. Wait until Mama and Wes saw that. She took a taxi home to her apartment. Once there, she went straight to bed and, even though she was all keyed up, still managed to sleep, at least for a little while.

  When she woke, Ginny found fresh practice clothes and headed for the theater. She had missed company class this morning and hoped she wouldn't hear too much about that. But when she got there, no one said anything about class, and instead she was treated like a minor movie star. Almost everyone had something to say about the performance, the review or both. Even Erik made a point of congratulating her.

  Ginny felt no pressure from the review at all. She did feel a bit stiff from missing class, but she gave herself a short, brisk barre and felt fine after that. Of course she had to shower all over again before she got back into the glamorous costume and the makeup that changed her ordinary-looking face into one that held mystery, fire and romance. She heard the orchestra warming up, and took her place backstage. When the time came to dance again, she was ready, sweet Jesus, was she ready.

  It went even better than the night before. After all the applause and the curtain calls, there was still the steady hum of excitement she could feel from the other dancers in the company. The one that said, “Now here's someone to reckon with.” Ginny was even asked out to dinner with a group of dancers for the first time since she joined the New York City Ballet, and for the first time she went. She even had fun. So much fun, in fact, that she didn't get back to her apartment building until late, and when she entered the lobby and saw the time, she cursed because she had missed company class once this week already and she couldn't afford to miss it again.