Falling

42

“How was your drive?”

“Long,” my mom says as she hugs me. “It’s good to see you.”

“Come in,” I tell her as I take her bag and set it against the wall. “Max called a little while ago. He said that Traci is feeding Bennett and now would be a good time to come over, so if you still wanted to see the baby, we should head out.”

“Of course I want to see the baby.”

Grabbing my keys, we leave and make the drive over to Max’s place. My mother has gotten to know Max a little over the years, and she never passes up an opportunity to hold a baby, so when we arrive, she melts at the sight of Bennett.

We settle ourselves in the living room, and Mom doesn’t even wait for me to introduce her to Traci. She is already sitting next to her, making her own introductions, and before I know it, they’re chatting away. My mom just has this way about her that can put anyone at ease. Candace loved that about her.

“So, what’s been going on?” Max asks as he flops down on the chair.

“Just covering for you every day,” I tease.

“Ha, nice, man.”

“Got another band booked.”

“Yeah? That’s good. So what’s going on with Mark and the guys?” he asks, and I’m momentarily distracted when I hear my mom talking gibberish to the baby.

Shaking my head and laughing at her, I turn back to Max and tell him, “They’re gonna alternate Saturdays with the new band for the next four weeks, and then their contract is up.”

“Is he staying here in Seattle?”

“Yeah. He and Jase had a few interviews at some firms in the city,” I tell him.

“Nice.”

“How have you been? You look like shit.”

“Dude, this kid wakes up to eat every two hours. When we first brought him home he slept solid for the first few days, but now he’s up around the clock.”

“Sounds great,” I joke when I turn to Traci and ask, “So how’s this guy really holding up?” I laugh as I nod to Max.

She shakes her head and teases, “For such a big guy, you wouldn’t think he’d be so squeamish.”

“Don’t listen to her. I’ve got this completely under control,” he defends with a smile.

“Oh my goodness,” my mother squeals as we all turn to look at Bennett when he lets out a massive fart.

“Holy shit!” I crack up, nearly doubling over at the insane gas that baby just released.

“Ryan!” my mom scolds. “Don’t cuss in front of the baby.”

“Are you serious, Mom? He’s barely a week old. Little dude doesn’t even speak English,” I laugh out as she rolls her eyes at me.

“Speaking of having everything under control,” Traci says to Max as she picks up Bennett and hands him over. “Why don’t you take care of this issue your son has in his pants?”

“You think you’re funny, don’t you?”

She pats him on the back and mocks, “Try to control the gagging this time, huh?”

He plants a kiss on Traci’s nose, and I follow him back to the nursery. I take a front row seat in the rocker as Max lays Bennett on the changing table.

“Dear Jesus!” he says in utter disgust when he peels the diaper off, and it only takes a second for the stench to hit me.

“Ugh! What the hell is that?”

Before Max can say anything, the baby rips out another rancid fart.

“For the love of God!” Max says, and I have to clutch my stomach because I’m laughing so hard at the visual of him being taken down by his own baby, one fart after another.

Max tries holding on to his tiny ankles, when he farts again.

“Dude,” he snaps at me. “He’s shitting everywhere. Traci!”

“Oh my God,” I laugh out. “I’m dying.”

“You’re dying. This shit’s right in front of my face.”

“What is going on in here?” Traci exclaims when she walks in.

“Honey, there’s poop all over me!”

“You boys are ridiculous,” my mom says when she takes Max’s place and starts cleaning Bennett.

“Donna, let me take care of that,” Traci says.

“No worries. You go sit and relax,” she tells her. “And you boys get out of here,” she scolds as if we’re kids and not grown men.

Once Bennett is cleaned up and changed, my mom returns to the living room and lays him on the couch between her and Traci. As she’s rubbing his belly, Traci kicks her feet up on the ottoman and leans back into the couch, laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Max asks when he returns with a clean shirt.

“You.”

“Why is it that every time I change him, it winds up in a fiasco, but when you do it, it’s just a simple pee diaper?”

“Payback for me having to be pregnant.”

We continue to hang out and when Bennett falls asleep, we say goodbye and head out.

I’ve been anxious all day, knowing that tonight is Candace’s production. I feel weird about going, almost like some kind of voyeur, but I couldn’t miss seeing her dance on stage. I have only seen her in a couple of videos she had once shown me.

The whole time we were together, she was preparing for this night, so to finally have it here is bittersweet because I always thought I would be there with her. I should have wrapped her legs up last night in her crazy Saran Wrap. I should have been watching her walk around my loft all day, a neurotic nervous mess, helping her stretch and rub out her calves that had been bothering her, staring at her while she stood in the bathroom as she put her hair up in a bun with all those tiny hair pins.

This day should have been completely different; instead, I’ve been walking around with a knot in my stomach. I haven’t seen her in a long time, and I’m not sure how tonight is going to affect me, but I have to see her.

“You ready?” my mom asks when she walks down the hall.

“Why don’t you go on without me?” I suggest. I just think I should be alone tonight when I go. It’s definitely not something I want to do with my mother right next to me.

Without a single question, she walks over and runs her hand down my arm as I stand, leaning up against the windows in the living room. “Of course.”

When she turns to walk out, I stop her and say, “Mom . . .”

“Yes?”

“You look really nice.”

“Thanks, dear. I’ll see you later.”

Leaning back against the windows, I look out at the darkened night sky and decide that after tonight, I have to be done. I can’t keep questioning and wishing things were different. They aren’t, and enough time has passed to know that she isn’t coming back.

When I arrive at Meany Theater, most everyone is already in their seats, quietly holding their personal conversations. The theater is large with seating up in the balcony. The curtain is dropped, and I look at the program to see which numbers she will be in. She’s one of the two featured dancers, so she’ll appear throughout the night. I feel so disconnected even though we are probably closer tonight than we’ve been in a while, knowing she’s in the same building as me.

She’s in the opening number, so I quietly stand in the back of the room when the curtain draws up. The stage is filled with girls who all look the same, hair pinned up, short white tutus. It isn’t until after the music has already started that I see her.

God, she’s beautiful.

She’s the only one wearing purple, standing out from all the others as she dances in front of the other girls. I’ve only ever seen her in leotards and tattered warm-ups. Never like this. She fits the part perfectly. Stoic and polished. Graceful and soft. And even on a stage filled with other dancers, she’s all my eyes can see, captivating me in a way that only she can do. No one else exists in this room right now—it’s only her.

But it isn’t until her solo when it hits me. She stands center stage as the curtain goes up, and chills prick along my arms. She’s perfection, wearing black with a short, full tutu, pale pink tights, and her pink toe shoes. Her skin is a striking contrast to the black, and she looks amazing. She isn’t someone you simply look at; she’s someone you admire.

I know her music by heart from all the times she played it at my place. It’s a dark and intense piece that she struggled with for so long, but watching her work the whole stage, she’s nothing but a natural as she bares her heart up there, making me feel the haunting pain of the piece. She gives it all, up on her toes, gliding through her movements. It almost hurts to look at her because I know this will be the last time I will probably ever see her. I can’t take my eyes off her. I don’t ever want to.

I’d hide back here forever if it meant I wouldn’t have to stop looking at her. As tiny as she is, she made the biggest impact on me. I’ve never loved as hard as I did with her. I don’t know how anyone could ever love her more. With everything we went through to get to the point we were at, knitted so tightly together, I never thought there could be a possibility of us unraveling like we did. But we did.

I don’t blame her though. She hasn’t made a wrong choice yet. I know she left me because it was the best thing for her. I talk to Jase often about her, and knowing how hard she’s working in therapy, I know she wouldn’t be doing that if she were still with me. She needed to be on her own. To do it for herself and not just because it was something I wanted. I’m proud of her, and even though it hurts me, I know she’s doing everything right to try and pull herself out of the darkness that was consuming her.

The crowd is deafening when the music stops, and I finally see it. Her big, gorgeous smile with that cute dimple in her cheek. She soaks up the standing ovation, as she should, because she deserves every second of this. She’s elated. I can see it in her eyes, even from this far away. Her instructor walks out with a huge bouquet of roses and hands them to her as she takes her final curtsey before the curtain drops, taking her away from me.

The pain hits hard as I blink back the tears. I’ll never want to see her any other way than what I just did. That’s the image I want in my mind. My girl, not a tormented thought in her head. Happy, free, and on top of the world. Filled with nothing but joy. She has a couple more numbers to dance, but I take what I just saw because nothing could possibly be better. She gave me perfection, and I decide to leave with that as I walk out, leaving a huge piece of my heart in that theater.

And now I start over because I can’t look back. She’s happy, and I have to be content with that, no matter how much I wish I could be a part of it.

I wake up the following morning to the smell of bacon and eggs. I lie in bed for a while before getting up to see my mom in the kitchen, fixing us omelets.

“There you are. I was starting to wonder when you would drag yourself down here,” she says as she stands over the stove.

“Sorry. I didn’t get much sleep last night,” I respond as I walk over to fix myself a cup of coffee.

“Wait. Before you do that, you should open your birthday gift,” she says with a smile as she nods her head to the dining table where a large box sits, wrapped in gold paper with burgundy ribbon. Tearing the paper, I note the store name on the box and question, “Sur La Table?”

“Just open it,” she says as she fixes our plates.

Opening the box, I pull out the De’Longhi cappuccino machine. “This is perfect, Mom.”

“Yeah? I figured you’d get good use out of it,” she says as she walks past me and sets our plates down on the table.

“It’ll give me something to do today, figuring out how to use the damn thing,” I joke as I sit down.

“Happy twenty-ninth birthday, darling.”

“Thanks.”

As we start eating breakfast, she looks up and says, “So, I never saw you last night.”

“Yeah, I crashed early. Sorry about that.” After I left, I was too upset to even think about seeing my mom, so I spent the evening upstairs.

“Did you go?” she asks.

“I went.”

“Do you want to talk about this?”

“No.”

I get up and walk into the kitchen to fix my coffee, and when I return to the table, I tell her, “It’s done with, Mom. I’m walking away, so there’s no point in ever bringing her up again.”

Nodding her head, she responds, “Of course, dear.”

But I’m not completely walking away because her canvas is still in my closet, and a bottle of her perfume still sits on her side of the sink. It’s pathetic, but even though I know I should, I’m not entirely ready to let her completely go just yet.

Another week passes, and while I’m cleaning up my home office, I come across the sheet of paper where Candace wrote down the information for the woman we met at the gallery showing. It’s funny that I should run across this now because this past week, I started working more on some of the photos that were stored on my camera. Albeit photos of Candace, but the thought of trying to find someone else to photograph turns my stomach.

Needing to step out of the monotonous routine I have going, I pick up the phone and give this lady a call. She once mentioned being interested in seeing more of my pieces, so why not?

“Henry Gallery.”

“Is Stacy Keets available?” I ask.

“One moment.”

The line is picked up after a few seconds. “Stacy here.”

“Stacy, this is Ryan Campbell. We met at Thinkspace a few months back.”

“Yes. I remember. ‘Nubile,’ right?”

“Right.”

“What can I do for you?”

“I have a few pieces that I’ve been working on if you were still interested in taking a look,” I say.

“I’d love to. My time is a bit limited, and I’m about to go on vacation, but I’m free this afternoon, if that isn’t too soon?”

“No, that works for me.”

“Great. How about three o’clock?”

“Sounds good, Stacy. I’ll see you then.”

After running up to the bar for a few hours, I head over to the Henry Gallery.

Sitting down in Stacy’s office, she says, “I’m glad you called. We actually just had two wall openings become available yesterday.”

I hand over my samplings and while she studies them, she keeps her eyes down as she casually says, “Your girlfriend was brilliant last week. You must be so proud of her, huh?”

She says this not having a clue that we’re no longer together, but for the moment, it feels good, so I don’t correct her, saying, “Yeah. She’s amazing.”

“She’s more than amazing. Sergej has always considered her a prodigy,” she says as she flips to the next photo. “Has she gotten many job offers?”

“Umm, I don’t really know,” I answer honestly, and when she looks up, she says, “Well, I have no doubt that she’s gonna have quite a few companies to choose from.”

“I’m sure she will.”

“And these,” she continues as she takes her sleek glasses off and sets them on her desk, “these are really beautiful.”

“Thank you.”

“Are you being displayed anywhere else at the moment?” she questions.

“No. Didn’t really think all too seriously about pursuing anything with these photos until this past week, to be honest.”

“Well, I’d be interested in these two, if you’d like to discuss further,” she tells me as she sets two of the samples aside and stacks the rest. “Are you optioning a sale?”

“No. I won’t sell these,” I respond. All these photos are of Candace, and I don’t want any of them hanging in some random person’s home. They’re mine.

“Well, then. Let me look at something really quick,” she says as she starts clicking away on her laptop. “I can do a six-week spot showing. It’s a good slot because they will be on display during one of our invite-only showings next month. You’ll have a lot of eyes on these that could help jumpstart some work if that’s a direction you’d like to go.”

“That sounds great.”

“Perfect, then. Let me go grab all the necessary paperwork, and we can get everything secured for you right now.”

Feeling like I’ve been needing to do something different, have a little more focus, this couldn’t have come at a better time. Although I would never sell these particular photos, I’d love to have an opportunity to expand this and possibly take on some work. So we spend the next half hour getting everything set up before I head out, feeling good about this new door that could be opening for me.