Noella woke to the sound of her phone ringing. For a moment, she didn’t know where she was – didn’t recognise the faded lilac wallpaper, the bouncy mattress beneath her. And then she recalled that she was in a guest house just a few streets away from the Royal Hospital.
Her head throbbed with the recollection of everything from the day before – of Jemima’s accident, of the quiet looks of accusation on the Lees’ faces last night.
She looked about for her bag and saw that she had left it on the pillow beside her, like an inert husband whose face was creased and leathery. She hadn’t wanted to let the bag out of her sight since the accident, even though she had dropped the hip flask in a bin in Guildford outside a kebab shop.
She pulled her phone from her bag with trembling hands and took the call.
It was Mikhail. He wanted to meet her at the academy. She didn’t have transport, she told him – was reliant on the Lees.
He would come to her then, he said. They could go for coffee in Guildford instead.
Noella rose and went through to the bathroom. As she cleaned her teeth, she stared out of the window that overlooked a gravel forecourt. There were flutters of snow in the air, delicate and pale like tulle. She thought of Jemima falling; light, like snow.
She tapped her toothbrush and packed it away.
She would not stay here another night. She would visit the Lees later today to offer her services in some meagre way. And then if they didn’t mind, she would go home by train.
Better to be there than here, which felt like nowhere.
Poor Jemima, she thought. She hoped and prayed she would pull through. She had to, for all their sakes.
‘Ma petite chérie,’ she said, tears brimming her eyes.
An hour later, she left the guest house, her feet crunching on gravel, her breath outrunning her. She was meeting Alexandrov at a café several streets away.
As she hurried, she wondered what he wanted with her.
He would be worried about the impact of the accident on his career – was going to ingratiate himself with her and Lees.
Well, she would be having none of it. He hadn’t wanted to know her before now – had been blunt, dismissive. She certainly wasn’t going to suck up to him now that there was absolutely nothing to gain from doing so.
He was waiting for her outside the café, leaning back on a fancy car. She didn’t know cars very well, but maybe it was a Porsche. He was wearing a blue blazer and his collar was turned up against the snowfall, his arms folded high on his chest.
On seeing her, he jumped up and reached out his hand. ‘Noella,’ he said, smiling.
She couldn’t help but be a little frosty in response. She nodded hello.
‘Shall we?’ he said, gesturing to the café door.
They both ordered espressos. It was part habit – a quick knock-back drink with a morning cigarette in Paris – and part an indication of the amount of time they were intending to expend on each other.
‘Have you seen Jemima?’ Mikhail asked, the moment they were seated. The café was busy. It was arty, she supposed. Perhaps he had chosen it because of that. The walls were purple and gold, the photography minimalist: a black-and-white tree, a stark flower.
She shook her head. ‘No.’
‘Oh. I was hoping you might have news for me.’
‘No news,’ she said.
‘Oh,’ he said again. He sipped his espresso. ‘This is a very sorry business indeed.’
‘Indeed,’ she said.
Without looking down, Noella edged her bag closer towards her so that it lay between her feet. The hip flask was no longer there, but it might as well have still been hidden in the lining. It was haunting her – the suspicion that she had been responsible for the fall.
How much had Jemima drunk exactly? She tried to think back – had barely thought of anything else – but could not say for sure.
‘I would like to do something for the parents,’ Mikhail was saying. ‘I would like to visit them, to pay my respects, but don’t wish to barge in at such a private time.’ He gazed at her. ‘I was hoping you might go with me – to smooth my way.’
So it was exactly as she had thought: he wanted to use her.
‘I see,’ she said.
She wanted to tell him no, that she wouldn’t be doing any smoothing – not for him, or anyone. But he was looking so earnest.
‘Please, Noella,’ he said. ‘I know we didn’t know each other intimately in Paris …’
Not intimate? How much more intimate could one be? They had had sex, many times!
Ah, she thought. He was talking about love, indirectly.
He had not loved her.
Even though she had already known this, she still felt stung. She drank her espresso with a shudder. It was bitter.
‘… but I always knew you to be kind – to do the right thing,’ he was saying.
She looked at him in surprise, wanting to laugh out loud – a guttural, guilty laugh. For she was good at many things – sometimes was even capable of kindness – but a tendency to do the right thing wasn’t something that she counted in her skill set. ‘So perhaps you could just do this one thing, for old times’ sake.’
For your career’s sake, she thought.
‘Please,’ he added.
He set his eyes on her then, and she found herself drawn in to them, unable to look away. She had never noticed before that his eyes were not fully brown, but contained flecks of bronze and gold, reminiscent of Van Gogh’s sunflowers, and of the cornfields of her childhood.
She suddenly felt immeasurably sad, alone.
‘You were always good to Delphine,’ he said. ‘She was so fragile, and you … were so … robust.’
His mention of Delphine broke the spell. She blinked in apprehension, picked up her coffee cup by way of distraction, but did not drink for fear of melting. Her heart was racing, her forehead tingling with perspiration.
‘Do you ever hear from her?’ he asked. ‘You were such close friends.’
She stared at him.
How could he possibly have been so ignorant to the situation, to the truth: to her love for him at the time, to her sense of guilt?
Because – like most of them – he had been too preoccupied with his career.
Just like now. They were both here for their careers. He was trying to preserve his reputation. And she was trying to assuage her mounting sense of culpability regarding Jemima’s accident. For if she hadn’t forced the hip flask on Jemima, hadn’t pushed her to audition in the first place, none of this would have taken place.
‘No,’ she said, finally answering his question. ‘We lost touch … After what happened.’
‘Ah,’ he said. ‘That is understandable.’
She wondered bleakly where Delphine was now.
In a mental institution; homeless; selling Bibles door to door?
Wherever it was, it would be a sharp downturn from life in the Parisian ballet school.
They didn’t speak again in the café, finished their drinks. Somehow it was agreed without words that she would accompany him to the hospital.
Outside, the snow was falling more rapidly, swarming. ‘I can leave my car here for three hours,’ he told her.
She nodded in response, thinking that she couldn’t have cared less.
And they walked to the hospital in silence, heads bent against the tumbling snow.
It was some time that morning before Steffie looked out of the window and noticed the snow. They were in the family room, waiting for Jemima to get back from the latest series of tests.
‘Look,’ she said, pointing.
Greg joined her at the window. ‘Snow,’ he said flatly.
‘Jemima loves snow,’ she said.
She knew he was thinking it too: wondering whether Jemima would regain consciousness in time to see it.
They watched the snow. It was coming down harder, pitching on the paving stones and potted plants of the atrium below.
There was a noise behind them and Steffie turned, expecting it to be a member of staff coming to find them. But it was Noella and Mr Alexandrov.
Steffie pulled her jumper straight, pushed her hair from her eyes. She felt self-conscious all of a sudden. She hadn’t slept, hadn’t combed her hair or even looked in a mirror.
Mr Alexandrov was the first to speak. ‘I’m sorry to intrude,’ he said, shaking her hand and then Greg’s. ‘But I just wanted to enquire after Jemima.’
‘Thank you,’ Steffie said, lowering her shoulders. She had been holding herself taut. ‘We don’t know very much at the moment. But she’s stable for now.’
‘Well, that’s good,’ Mr Alexandrov said, nodding, glancing around him, taking in the shabbiness of the room.
It was slightly awkward, this meeting, for all sorts of reasons – none of which Steffie could identify. She was too tired, too preoccupied.
Noella looked even thinner than usual, and chronically tired too. She was clasping her bag with white knuckles, mouth knitted, frown lines pronounced. Had she always looked so old, so fierce?
Nothing could be judged correctly now – not until they were home, settled, out of trouble. Only then would anything look right. Until then, it was like looking at life through the side of a fish tank – trying to gauge space and depth and form through the distorting effects of moving water.
‘Perhaps I could buy Jemima some books?’ Mr Alexandrov said.
‘Books?’ said Steffie.
‘Isn’t reading aloud supposed to help?’
‘Oh,’ said Steffie. ‘Yes. Perhaps. It’s hard to …’ She was going to say that it was hard to know what to do for the best, or for anything at all. Everything was so uncertain.
‘Does she have a favourite?’ Mr Alexandrov asked.
‘A favourite?’ Steffie said.
‘Book,’ he said.
‘Ballet Shoes,’ Greg said quietly.
‘Ah,’ said Mr Alexandrov, ‘of course. Then allow me to get you a copy.’
‘Please don’t go to any trouble,’ Steffie said.
‘It’s no trouble.’
Mr Alexandrov looked tall in here, in this room, with the low ceilings and slouchy sofas. He wasn’t as tall as Greg, however, who loomed over him – made him look slight. Still, there was something majestic about the man, Steffie thought. Perhaps merely because he had held in his hand the very thing that Jemima had wanted more than anything else: a place as an étoile.
She turned away to the window to watch the snow again.
‘Steffie …’ Noella had joined her but stood at a distance. There was a barrier between them that had not existed before. Maybe it was the awkwardness of not knowing what to say to someone whose child was in a coma, and of Steffie having little to say in response. ‘I think I’m going home this afternoon, if that’s all right with you.’
Steffie didn’t reply.
‘Steffie …’ Noella touched Steffie’s arm.
‘That’s fine,’ Steffie said. ‘Go home, where it’s comfortable.’
Noella was staring at her in dismay.
Had that sounded rude?
Steffie hadn’t meant to sound dismissive, yet in order to explain that – to apologise, soften her tone, appease – she would have to speak more. And that meant burning more energy – energy that she was eking out slowly, like a frugal car owner monitoring petrol. A test result, a police visit, a sudden change in Jemima’s vitals would swallow energy in a greedy guzzle, leaving her on empty.
So she shrugged internally and didn’t look at Noella.
‘And what about some music?’ Mr Alexandrov was saying.
Steffie wanted to tell him that she didn’t care about music or books. She just wanted Jemima back again, whole, well.
But instead she nodded politely, vaguely.
‘She likes Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev …’ Noella offered.
‘Then I’ll purchase you some CDs and bring them here tomorrow, if I may,’ Mr Alexandrov said.
‘Thank you,’ Greg said.
‘Well, we’ll leave you in peace,’ said Mr Alexandrov.
‘Goodbye,’ Noella said hesitantly.
What was she waiting for? Steffie had nothing to say to her. Nor did Greg, by the look of things. He was approaching Steffie, turning away from their guests.
It wasn’t ill-mannered. It was intensive-care behaviour.
So Steffie didn’t wave goodbye to them, or see them out; she hadn’t taken their coats, or made them tea, or offered them a seat; she hadn’t thanked them profusely for their visit, enquired as to the traffic, the weather or their parking arrangements.
She turned back to the window, to the snow, to Greg who was gazing outside, looking as disorientated and lost as she was.