Old Friends

Resting her chin on the back of a beige half-glove, Dolores gazed at the stage with a wistful look in her eyes.

An orchestra, adorning the restrained darkness, was opening the sweet doors of autumn.

On stage, a ballerina was in the full tide of her performance. Between the symphony that gathered and scattered at the conductor's commands—rising and falling, quickening and slowing—drifted the faint tip-taps of pointe shoes.

En pointe, en pointe, en pointe.

The thin romantic tutu that fluttered with her graceful steps carried love in every pleat; the reaching arms, the bright smiles, the whirling turns were all silent confessions.

The ballerina turned, and turned again, and at last came to a stop in the spotlight.

When the curtain finally fell to the sound of a low cello, like the sigh of a giant, the story that had lived and breathed sank back into slumber. Only after the lights went out did her story truly begin.

Before the dancers had even finished taking their bows, Dolores made her way toward the dressing rooms backstage.

In a crowd, her cane was worse than useless. Between the clatter of footsteps, voices slipped in off the beat.

"Miss Dolores. It's been a while."

Now and then, the staff of the La Potské Theater recognized her and offered their greetings—as though the woman who had once performed on this very stage and the woman who leaned on a cane now were two entirely different people.

"Yes, hello."

Receiving their greetings without warmth but without rudeness, Dolores walked quickly toward the dressing rooms. The nimble-footed dancers and the hall's staff were already trickling in.

The moment she opened the door bearing that sign, the dull ache at her temples eased a little. Dolores let out a sigh before she even knew she was breathing one.

Inside, Claudia—the heroine of tonight's final performance—was untying the ribbons of her pointe shoes. Perched on a long-legged stool, she looked even more willowy than usual.

"You have to think of the patrons who've traveled a long way to get here. This hall does, too. Not every audience member is as light on their feet as a ballerina, you know."

Claudia stopped halfway out of her shoes and lifted her head. Her eyes went round as if she'd seen a ghost—then flushed with color in an instant.

"Good heavens."

Abandoning her half-undone ribbons, she closed the distance at nearly a run and pulled Dolores into a fierce embrace.

"Dolores! You came without even replying? Were you trying to give me a fright?"

"Ana let Father catch sight of the invitation while I was away. He confiscated it. I only heard about it this morning."

"That girl has a real problem with her hands, I swear."

"She's my sister. Mind your tongue."

"Well, regardless. Your father really is—how shall I put it—stubborn as ever. I'm glad, I suppose, that he's at least consistent."

The last words carried a faint sarcasm, but Dolores pretended not to notice. The joy of this reunion was already more than enough to fill the moment.

"Your Madame Fortdaille was extraordinary tonight. The staging, the direction—all of it magnificent. Who else could have carried it if not you?"

"You say the most obvious things so earnestly. Come here, come sit."

Claudia guided Dolores toward the inner part of the dressing room, where a sofa had been set out for the company. Dolores quietly propped her cane against its arm, and Claudia watched her for a moment before speaking.

"You looked better last time."

"Mm."

Dolores sat down with an unconcerned face. "It must be the change of season. Anyway—is it true? You're really retiring?"

Claudia nodded with an expression impossible to read, something subtle and strange. "So you've truly made up your mind."

"The stiff-necked people of Hennessy don't seem to care much for ballet."

Dolores gave a soft breath of a laugh. "Now I'm curious who it is... to make you love it enough to do all that."

"It's the love of my life, as I've always told you. Of course, it would have been better to keep dancing... but well, I mean to try."

There was a trace of regret in Claudia's voice. Then she drew in a sharp breath and pressed straight on.

"I wish you could have met him by now, but we've hardly seen each other at all these past months, which is a shame."

Claudia was one of Dolores's fellow ballerinas from the conservatory—the same age, twenty-two this year, with her wedding barely two months away. Her fiancé was a lawyer from Hennessy she'd happened to meet while traveling, a love she had won only after pursuing him relentlessly. The one who falls first, they say, is the weaker one. And so she had decided to go to his hometown of Hennessy.

"...So today was your farewell performance. It was truly beautiful."

"You may cry if you like."

"It's not quite that bad."

"Oh, come on."

"It will be sad not to watch you fly across the stage like a bird anymore... but I'm sure the younger dancers will bring their own joys."

Dolores smiled with only the corners of her mouth and changed the subject. "By the way—no fiancé on a day as important as this?"

"Unfortunately, he says the weather in Pomeroy has been foul, and the ships are tied up in port."

"Your fiancé had better spend the rest of his life cursing bad weather, missing performances like this one."

"You little witch."

Claudia covered her reddening cheeks and pursed her lips in a pout—then, as if struck by a sudden thought, spoke up. "Oh, right, right! What are you doing this weekend?"

"Nothing in particular. Why?"

"There's supposed to be a party at the Thomas estate. Were you thinking of going?"

Dolores considered for a moment before asking back. "Thomas... Pierre?"

"Yes. I hear he's opening up Azaria Villa."

Lange, where they lived, was not quite a great metropolis, so once you'd lived there long enough, everyone became a friend of a friend. Pierre was the son of the baron Thomas family, one of the acquaintances Claudia shared with her crowd.

When Dolores hesitated to answer, Claudia quickly added, "Pierre wants to know how you've been, of course—but it's also my farewell party."

"...If it's your farewell party, then of course I want to come."

"The Thomases are old money through and through—you know how they cling to their pedigree. Surely your father won't object?"

Dolores's father's rigid class consciousness and fossilized way of thinking were famous among the young people of her generation. She couldn't help but laugh outright.

"If his sensitivities could be soothed by something that simple, our friendship would have been a far prettier thing all these years."

"What age does he think he's living in, sorting people into piles like that? Why not ask your uncle instead? Sir Rudolf is far more broad-minded than your father, isn't he? Hasn't your uncle been by lately?"

"I couldn't say. It is about time for his visit, though..."

Dolores had decided to let the matter drift, and was just about to turn the conversation elsewhere when firm knuckles rapped on the wooden door.

Knock, knock, knock.

"I heard it was Miss Claudia Lefort's farewell performance, so I came. Am I late?"

Standing at the door was a brown-haired man holding a bouquet of roses. Tall and lean-lined, he was large enough to make the doorway look small.

Another flush of color bloomed across Claudia's face. "Xavier?"

Xavier Bransen was the second son of the Bransen family—a name no one in Lange failed to recognize. The family ran Durand de Morton, a massive textile conglomerate, and stood as pillars of the region, drawing their own lines through the world of the arts as well.

And he—how long had it truly been?

For Dolores, too.

"Haven't you grown even taller?"

To Claudia's artless question, Xavier drew the flat of his hand across the air above his head. "Just a little. I intend to stop growing around here."

Setting aside his family's wealth, he had always been the brilliant one. His brown hair, swept back with careless elegance, threw into relief his jutting brow and sculpted nose; the long, thin-lidded eyes that boasted of their deep set were green.

He wore a black single-breasted coat that fell to his knees, and each time the dressing room light caught it, the fabric gleamed. There was a provincial jest that ran, 'A woman from Freud, a man from Lange—there's nothing finer,' and even in Lange, a city overflowing with handsome men, his presence stood apart, unmistakably singular.

But seeing him again after so long, Dolores's heart was anything but light.

He was the one person she had hoped never to meet.

A shattered yearning. A scattered friendship. A first love she wished to forget.

For every one of those phrases pointed, inexorably, to the name Xavier Bransen.

Our beginning—

what did it look like, once?