I Hope You Dance (30 page)

That Wednesday, while alone in the house, the phone rang. The caller display said withheld number. As soon as I picked it up, the line clicked dead. I wrote it down in the logbook the police officer had advised me to keep, then ate a piece of Mum's fudge cake to squish the dread in my stomach. He was gone.

 

The first week in May, baby Hope came home. Due to her vulnerable immune system, she wasn't allowed out of the house yet, or to see too many visitors, but the many well-wishers and quilt-knitters and meal-providers needed to celebrate, so we gave her a Skype party.

On the May Day holiday, over a hundred of us gathered in the sunny back hall at Oak Hill. Afternoon tea was served: an assortment of dainty sandwiches cut into fingers; raisin, coconut or cinnamon scones with cream and locally produced jams, and every type of cake known to man, including pink and blue miniature macaroons, cupcakes decorated with baby booties, and cookies in the shape of
old-fashioned prams. Pink and blue balloons bobbed above our heads, spring flowers decorated every spare surface and on the giant wall-screen in the corner a tired-looking, beaming Rupa and Harry held up their baby girl to show her just how much fuss we thought she was worth.

When she conveniently fell asleep, which premature babies are inclined to do for about twenty-three and a half hours of the day, they handed her over to her enchanted grandma, swapped the Skype for a Hope-themed slide-show and sped around to personally thank everyone for all their support over the past three months. Vanessa Jacobs hovered a little sheepishly at the top of the list. I girded up my loins and made an effort.

“Hi, Vanessa.”

“Ruth.” She flicked her hair over one shoulder. For the first time I detected a whiff of bravado in the gesture. It was amazing what you spotted when looking properly.

“It's a lovely party, isn't it?”

“Not bad. Someone certainly likes bubblegum pink.”

“How's the shop? Busy?”

“Yes, thanks. I've hired a new assistant. A fashion graduate from Nottingham Trent. She practically runs the place; the customers love her.”

“That's great.”

Vanessa frowned. “She's useless at maths, though. The accounts are a mess.”

I let slip a grin, accepting the compliment. “Rupa told us you've been brilliant.”

“Yes, well. You and the sobriety sisters don't have the monopoly on friendship, you know.”

An awkward silence strolled up and inserted itself into the gap between us. It whispered to me out of the corner of its mouth:
go on then. Invite her to the tea dance. What's the worst that can happen?

“So. There's this tea dance Maggie's organizing.”

“Maggie?”

“My daughter.”

“Oh, right.”

“Rupa probably won't be able to make it, but Lois and Ana Luisa are definitely coming. And Emily. If you fancied it. I mean, coming along.”

She tossed her hair again, like a very shiny, irritated horse. “Sounds… interesting. I could drop in I suppose, if I've nothing else on. I'm pretty busy at the moment.”

I took a deep breath. “That would be fantastic. I really hope you can make it.”

Startled, Vanessa shot a look at me, checking for sarcasm.

I put on my best friendly smile.

“Right.” She marched away, swanky heels clicking.

I turned around to see Ana Luisa and Arnold on the far side of the room, heads bent close to one another. Arthur laid his hand on Ana Luisa's arm, and she smiled, brushing the cake crumbs from his jumper. Maybe the Big House would soon be filled with pink or blue balloons.

Having avoided the Big House since David had left for his new job, I wandered over to say hello.

“Ruth! It is so good to see you – your mother tells me you are working all the time, too tired to come and visit. This is no good.”

“What can I say? For the first time ever I like my job. I haven't just been working, though. I'm helping Maggie plan her tea dance, which includes dance lessons once a week. Despite the fact I vowed never to set foot in a ballroom after the last time. It's like being a kid again; I'm being sucked back into this world of streamers and sequins and high heels.”

“You vowed never to dance again? Ruth! What terrible thing could make you do that? Tell me!”

“It's a long story.”

Arnold coughed. “I'll go and fetch some more tea. You take your time. Would you like another scone, Ana?”

“No, thank you, darling. But tea would be lovely.”

Ana Luisa watched Arnold walk across to the refreshments table, her eyes glazing over. She let out a delicate sigh, sinking her chin onto one hand.

“Whew, Ana. You've got it bad.”

Shaking out her long hair, she straightened up again, one side of her mouth curling into a smile. “Oh no, Ruth. I've finally got it good.”

“It's going well?”

“It is more than I ever dreamt of. Once he got over his nerves!” She laughed. “He is attentive, and patient, and kind. He doesn't only take care of me, and remember all these thoughtful little things like picking me a flower from the garden, or noticing a new dress. He
talks
to me and asks my opinion. Like I am his equal, not a pet or a piece of meat or a thing to be ogled and used and tossed away. He makes me feel I can do anything, like I am treasure. Like he is honoured to be my boyfriend! I never knew this before!”

“Stop. You're making me cry. I am so happy for you. You deserve it. And you are treasure. He should be honoured. I'd kick his butt if he wasn't.”

“Yes, yes. But you are changing the subject. You were telling me why you vowed never to dance the ballroom ever again.”

“Do I have to?”

“Hmm. I suppose I could ask your mother. Or – hang on – didn't I see your sister over there?”

“That's blackmail.”

“Why? What dreadful things will they tell me?”

“Um – the truth?”

“I like the truth.”

Preferring my version of the truth to my mother's – or, please no, my sister's – I took a fortifying bite of smoked salmon sandwich and told Ana Luisa the whole story.

When I was fifteen, my parents entered a team from the dance school into an exclusive, highly prestigious dance competition in Australia. We fundraised for nearly a year to raise the money to take the team of six girls and four boys on the trip. Cake sales, sponsored bike rides, and a plethora of raffles and ticketed shows eventually enabled us to reach our target. One of the girls' dads owned a construction company that agreed to sponsor us, providing the funds we needed for costumes. For a whole year, the Henderson household ate, slept and breathed the Australian Dancesport Open. As the trip drew closer, rehearsal time tripled to every night after school and four hours every Saturday. Lifts were perfected, music chosen and discarded and re-chosen; Mum spent hours embellishing our outfits.

It was my idea of hell.

Years of enforced lessons had moulded me into a competent dancer. I could pick up steps and was fearless when lifted, flung and thrown about by Luke, my dance partner. But I was not Australian Dancesport Open material. And everybody except for my doting dad knew it, said it and – in the case of my sisters – screamed it.

If only I spent my time practising, instead of plotting ways to disappear off into the woods with David Carrington, I might stand a chance, my mother told me. If I only concentrated, put more effort in, got my head out of the clouds, worked harder, ate better, behaved more like my sisters.

They had lost all perspective, all reason, all sensibility. I soon lost the bedraggled remains of my self-confidence, self-respect and any belief that my family actually wanted, loved or liked me.

The month of the trip arrived, and it became apparent nothing was going to make Dad drop me from the team. (I considered jumping off a wall to break my leg, but then someone would have had to stay behind to look after me, and whoever it ended up being might literally have killed me.) I couldn't sleep, my appetite vanished, I couldn't focus at school. And as I boarded the plane along with the excited, hopeful gaggle of fellow dancers, I had never felt so alone.

Lying on my lumpy hotel mattress the night before the show, I stared at the blackness and begged God to give me food poisoning, or send a freak tornado. Unable to sleep, I eventually got up, pulled on my jeans and a jumper, and tiptoed past Lydia in the bed next to mine out into the corridor to see if I could find anyone else awake.

When the unmistakable boom of Mum's voice rose up the hotel staircase, no doubt the rest of her following straight after, I scampered back to a discarded room-service trolley and hid behind it. Her words soon drifted into earshot.

“Well, Gilbert. It's too late now! You should have listened to us months ago.”

I held my breath, trying to catch Dad's mumble.

Mum hissed back, “Of course she's not up to it! She's a girl of many talents, but the Henderson genes just aren't there, Gilbert. She can't dance.”

Now, I knew my mother meant the Henderson
dancing
genes weren't there – the ones including grace, rhythm, style. And I knew I could dance perfectly adequately for most situations. It was the Australian Dancesport Open that reached beyond me.

But, oh boy, at fifteen, stressed out and lonely, those words ripped through me like the claws of a spiny cheek crayfish.

Dad coughed, drawing level with the trolley. I pressed one hand over my mouth to try to quiet my heaving lungs.

“If she tries hard enough, manages to keep it together and lets Luke do the work, it might not be a complete disaster.”

“Well, that's what we were hoping for when we raised thousands of pounds to bring our brightest students halfway round the world on the trip of a lifetime. As long as it's not a complete disaster, it'll all have been worth it!”

I heard them pause outside their room, Mum unzipping her bag.

“She had to be a part of this,” said Dad. “Dancing is what the Hendersons do. Who my girls are.”

A metallic clunk, and the door creaked open. I caught my mother's last words as she stepped inside. “You can't make her something she's not, Gilbert. And she is not a dancer.”

So I was not a dancer. And not a Henderson, apparently. Not one of Dad's girls. Fine. I would dance in the stupid competition tomorrow, because poor Luke had been forced to practise with me forever and I owed it to him. And that would be it. Stuff the dance school, the ridiculous costumes and the echoey floors and shows and tedious old music and applause. Stuff the Hendersons. After tomorrow night, I wasn't going to dance another choreographed step. And if that meant I was no longer a Henderson girl, so be it.

Bluff and bluster is easy enough when sneaking back to a darkened room in the middle of the night. About to walk out in front of five thousand strangers, your family and teammates staring anxiously at you, knowing you are going to humiliate yourself and let everyone down, is another matter. Jet-lagged, seriously sleep-deprived, the apple juice I forced down for breakfast sloshing in my stomach, I stood there in the wings of the Australian Dancesport Open stage. Sweat dripped down my forehead as I waited for the judge to call my name. Head spinning, paralysed with fear, all I could hear was my father's words from the night before.

I felt a push from behind. Mum hissed at me, “Get out there, Ruth! Everybody's waiting.”

She pushed again, and the momentum carried my shaking legs out onto the stage and up towards Luke, who took one look at
me and turned green beneath his fake tan. I bumped into him, allowing him to grab my hands in his, ready for the opening bars of music. As the first beats pumped into the auditorium, he frowned at me. “Pull yourself together, Ruth. You're a Henderson girl. You can do this.”

No. No. No no no no no no no.

Something in me snapped. I wrenched my hands out of Luke's grasp, and shoved my way past him, clattering to the far side of the stage where nobody stood except for one of the technical guys. Stumbling, careening off scaffolding and old scenery, ducking my way underneath a clothes rail full of costumes, I slammed into the emergency exit, and fell, tumbling, into the back alley beyond. As I dragged myself back up and began sprinting for the far corner of the building, I heard my mother's voice behind me, pleading with me to calm down, get back inside, it wasn't too late.

But it was. It was far too late. As I reached the main street, full of noisy traffic, I glanced back and saw the confused, distressed figures of Mum and Luke. But what made me pause, for the tiniest of moments, was Dad's face. A mixture of thunderous rage and disgust. I turned and ran.

For the rest of the evening I wandered the streets, ignoring my dance-shoe blisters, eventually ending up at a bus station. Huddling in one corner of a bench I attracted curious glances from the few travellers boarding or leaving buses, and as the night wore on I grew frightened of the groups of men who slowed down to stare at me or make bawdy comments about my outfit. I went into the furthest ladies' toilet I could find, locked myself in a cubicle, kicked off my stupid shoes and curled up on the sticky, stinking floor until I drifted off to sleep.

A woman with two small children came in to use the facilities that morning, waking me up. Uncurling stiff limbs, I climbed up and squatted on the toilet lid until they left. I washed myself and tidied up my hair as best I could, then marched out into the station as if I had no care in the world.

It was just two minutes before a bus driver, having been informed to keep an eye out for a fifteen-year-old girl in a ballroom dancing outfit, clamped one hand on my shoulder and solved my problem of how to find our hotel.

Needless to say, I spent the rest of the trip in bed hoping I might die while the Henderson family proper enjoyed the sights, along with their adopted dance troupe. Miriam in particular enjoyed the sight of the policeman who had taken the missing girl report, already hatching plans to get herself back to Australia as soon as possible and stay there. My other sisters, without the distraction of a holiday romance, were spitting lava. Mum clucked, patted my head through the bed-sheet and told me to pull myself together.

Not a single word passed between Dad and me until we returned home. The following week, when he asked me to get changed ready for dance class, I told him exactly what I thought about his precious dance school, the Henderson family I considered myself no longer part of, and him.

It did not go down well.

He accepted my unofficial resignation from the family, if not in words, then in action. Years of misunderstandings, rebellion and disappointment reached a crashing crescendo. Dad didn't know what to do with me, so did nothing. I pretended I hated him, buried the pain of my failure and rejection under slamming doors, scowls and spending every spare moment out of the house. What a pathetic mess.

Ana Luisa, no stranger to family struggles, pursed her lips at me. “Well, it is no surprise you ran off to a strange city and jumped into the arms of the first man who was nice to you.”

Maybe not. Maybe it was no surprise that I stayed with him, clinging to our shambles of a partnership, finding neither the courage to fix it nor the confidence to walk away either.

 

Harry grabbed me before he left the party. He had managed a whole fifty minutes away from Hope, an impressive forty minutes longer than Rupa.

“Hey, Ruth. How are you doing?” Brimming with emotional energy, he clasped me in a bear hug.

“I'm good, Harry. How are you?”

“Brilliant! Knackered, but brilliant. So, I wanted to thank you again for looking after Rupa that night.”

“It's okay, Harry. I think the first six thank yous covered it. I didn't do anything really, apart from not throw her out in the snowstorm.”

He frowned at me. “Rupa mentioned about that doctor pestering you. You asking him to help means a lot.”

We hadn't told Rupa the discoveries since that night. She had enough to deal with.

“No, it's fine. Please stop thanking me. It's getting awkward.” I smiled at him, rolling my eyes a little bit, wondering how grateful he would be when he found out I placed his wife in the hands of a struck-off, disgraced doctor.

“Okay, but I need to tell you something. I didn't think much of it at the time, with everything going on, but when the guy was examining Rupa, he opened his bag. He had binoculars in there. High tech ones – like night vision goggles.”

I quickly sat down in the nearest chair before I fell down. “Are you sure?” I managed to croak.

“I'm sorry, Ruth. Do you need some of us to pay this guy a visit?”

I shook my head feebly. “No. It's okay. I've spoken to the police. He's disappeared, anyway. No one's seen him for months. Thanks for telling me.”

The party came to an end early evening, with one last ogle at Hope via the big screen. I had taken six more orders for pictures: three for new babies, two for wedding presents and one for a woman who simply liked animal pictures. I stayed to help clear up along with a bunch of other people, Lois and Matt included. Bumping into Lois by the outside bin, I hurriedly relayed what Harry had told me.

“Eew. That's horrible.”

“I feel so bad for letting him near Rupa. What if the ambulance hadn't got there so quickly? Who knows what he might have done to her.”

“Woah, Ruth. Calm down. Carl was struck off for an inappropriate relationship, not incompetence. And the ambulance did get there. Let it go.”

“Binoculars. Night vision goggles!” I yanked at my hair in frustration.

“I know.”

“He was watching me! I knew he was – the whole Christmas present thing and how he kept turning up all the time. He watched me. In my own house. It makes me want to throw up.”

“Me too. And it didn't even happen to me. But he's gone, Ruth. You calling on him to help Rupa turned out to be a good thing. You scared him off.”

Maybe. But I had an ugly feeling Carl Barker could not be scared off so easily. There were five cars remaining in the car-park when I left. None of them black. I ducked my head and marched the twenty-minute journey home, eyes down, heart pounding, fear nipping at my heels.

 

Later on that week, another withheld number. I disconnected without answering, got up and closed every blind and curtain in the house despite the fact the sun blazed outside.

On a drizzly morning near the end of the month, I picked up Lois in the car and set off towards the motorway. She had armoured up in a pair of elegant brown trousers and white top trimmed with lace. Her hair freshly styled, nails brown to match her trousers, Lois hid behind her classy exterior.

“Okay?” I flicked down the radio a notch, glancing over at her chewing on a nail.

“I'll do. It means a lot to me, you doing this.”

“No problem. I have to use my holidays up sometime. I told Martine we were having a day out.”

Lois grimaced. “That's one way of putting it.”

“So how are you really feeling about this?”

She stared out of the passenger window for a moment, hands knotting and unknotting in her lap. “Apprehensive. Guilty. Sort of numb. It beats how I used to feel.”

“Scared?”

“Terrified. And filthy. Worthless and broken beyond repair. Resentful. And the anger? It ate at me like I was knocking back battery acid,” Lois said.

“You don't feel angry any more?”

“Not about him. Virtually never. I have more important things to channel my anger into. You know – justice, fighting the flaws in our social care system, people who insist on making bad choices on behalf of my kids… evil drug lords, the slave trade, the poverty crises, my continuing lack of a romantic life. I'm not sure quite when or how it happened, but I forgave my dad. Not for his benefit, if I'm honest, but for mine. And Matt's. I just needed to be done with it.”

“And this is the final step,” I added.

“More like the beginning of the end. You know how messy the aftermath can get.”

“Well, if it's any help, I'm pretty good at sorting through all that complicated stuff.”