On the other side of the heavy doors the night is chilly and starry, a night painted by Van Gogh. Propelled by a force beyond my control, I run. I run down Meeting toward Broad Street. I run over blue-slate sidewalks and beneath rattling palmettos. I run past the storefronts, law firms, antiques shops, and art galleries, my path illumined by old-fashioned street lanterns.
I keep running down the oyster-shell driveway and make it to the entrance of the formal garden, where I stop. My plan was to retrieve the spare house key I nailed in Laudie’s potting shed, but the kitchen light is on. I walk up the back staircase. The door is unlocked. Tito sits at the kitchen table. An electric space heater is positioned at his slippered feet. He doesn’t sit at the head—his usual spot. Instead, he sits in Laudie’s chair. He’s in his pajamas, wrapped in a plaid bathrobe, wearing his reading glasses. He holds a piece of paper.
“Tito?” I fold my coat, lay it on the counter, and join him at the table.
He turns to me, surprised but not startled. “Why are you all dressed up?”
“I was at Caroline’s debutante ball.”
His rheumy eyes search my face. “I’d forgotten it was tonight. That’s some hairdo.”
“Thanks.”
“Your mother said this was meant for you. I imagine you don’t blame me for peeking.”
The piece of paper, faded and obviously folded and refolded many times, has the look of a cherished heirloom, a beloved artifact.
On this day, the 14th of November, 1953
Miss Claudia Parks Pringle, in accordance with the faculty of the Atlanta Civic Ballet, has been accepted to dance for the troupe in the year of 1954.
Laudie was good enough. She made the cut. She turned the opportunity down.
“I lived with her for sixty-six years and she never told me.”
I examine the document. I can see my fingers through the nearly transparent paper. “Maybe she kept it a secret because she wanted a part of her life that was just hers. For her, alone.”
Tito considers the thought. “How about a glass of sherry?”
I find the sherry in an old crystal decanter on the dining room bar cart, select two glasses, wipe off the dust. I pour sparingly. Tito hardly drinks anymore.
“What was Laudie like back then? Before Atlanta.”
“Those were our courting days,” he begins. “She always wanted to go dancing, so I took her—mostly to the Folly Beach Pier.” Tito’s wet eyes gleam. “She was determined to dance every song, and I just didn’t want to. And she particularly didn’t like waiting to be asked to dance. She would just tap a boy on the shoulder, and he would do as she said.”
“But she was so pretty. Wouldn’t the boys line up to dance with her?”
Tito laughs. “They were scared of her, I think. Didn’t quite know how to handle her.” He chuckles. “And my mother didn’t approve of Claudia. She said she was too hot-blooded.”
“Why? What did she do?”
“Oh, she was stubborn.”
“But how?”
“She had her opinions. Didn’t stay quiet like the other girls. But she got quiet after Atlanta.” He takes a small sip. “She learned.”
I search his face for signs of remorse or insight, but his expression remains neutral. Tito will almost certainly never understand his immense privilege as a white male raised in a cradle of wealth and power. He reached that pinnacle when he was elected president of Battery Hall. He’ll likely die oblivious of the struggles of others.
Images from Laudie’s stories flash into my mind: the simple freedom of going to the theater whenever she wanted. Of walking into a club, arm in arm with her lover and dance partner, all eyes on them. Of practicing her ballet at her windowsill, her dream very much within her reach.
“Maybe she didn’t want you to know what she gave up to be with you. That she could have been a prima ballerina instead of a housewife.”
“I hadn’t thought of it that way.” It’s hard to tell if it’s emotion or old age causing a tear to roll from his eye. We sit in the kitchen’s stillness. My grandfather, the widower, stares at his knotted hands, as scaly and blotchy as the trunk of a crepe myrtle. “I fussed at her. I shouldn’t have fussed at her so much.”
I stand and place my hands on his bony, coat-hanger shoulders. I kiss his bald, speckled head. “It was a different time.”
He makes a little steeple of his index fingers. “I could have been less critical.”
“She forgives you. I’m sure she does.”