If- Nina G. Jones Page 0,80
damned secret.”
“Yeah.” I know I had asked more of my brother than anyone should, but I was about to ask him for yet another favor.
BIRD
THIS WAS SUPPOSED to be the best night of my life. The night where I would go on stage, surrounded by color and light, and bare my soul to an audience buzzing with excitement. Instead, all I could see was the empty seat in the second row.
Seat B5.
The seat where the beautiful boy with the light green eyes and auburn hair was supposed to see me like no one else could, with sweeping whirls of color in my wake. He would see the kaleidoscope of complex shapes pulsate in sync with the music. He would feel my dancing on his fingertips. But tonight, even as one of the stars, even with the performance of a lifetime, I was ordinary. Today, it hurt to dance.
Two days ago, I called the hospital to speak with Asher when I hadn’t received his daily phone call. I was told he was no longer a patient. That didn’t make sense. I asked them to check over and over again until I was pretty much dismissed. I called Miller, who asked to see me in person. I demanded an answer from him before I could agree, and all he told me was “he’s gone.” I didn’t believe him. Ash wouldn’t leave. Not again. We had plans. Plans that involved each other. The last words he said to me were that he wasn’t going anywhere.
He wouldn’t lie to me like that. He wouldn’t abandon me.
I met Miller outside of the theatre during a break. I barely heard his words behind a mist of disbelief. Though I couldn’t focus on their meaning, I heard fragments.
Ash left California.
I don’t know where.
I have no control over where he goes once he’s been cleared.
I tried to warn you.
I’m sorry.
Miller shoved something in my hand. I felt a hug, but I don’t think I hugged back. I don’t think I said much to Miller. Well, I did, but I don’t remember much. All I felt was pain, and it flooded my body, so that all I could feel was an interpretation of this hurt throughout. In a weird way, I felt what it might be like to be Asher. I felt emotional pain, but I was dizzy, my vision tunneled, my stomach clenched with nausea, my temperature rose, my throat grew dry, my fingertips numbed. All those physical reactions to one emotion. If this was what it was like to be Ash, I finally understood why he felt things, both good and bad, so deeply. But I didn’t understand why he left me.
I hated Miller, I hated Ash. I hated the whole Thoreau clan at that moment. I didn’t believe Miller. He wouldn’t let Ash leave without knowing where he was going, I don’t care how old Ash was or what laws there were, but it didn’t matter. Miller always said he would put Ash first. I understood it, but I hated it.
Ash once told me that he thought I should float. I think I did, drifting back to my dressing room away from the eyes of cast mates. Once there, I was finally able to relieve all the physical sensations with tears. It was much like a valve being released, and the bottled-up flood of despair flowed.
Now alone, I opened the envelope with trembling hands as I pulled out the folded letter and pin. I scanned over the brief message and fiddled with the item he left me. His parting gift confounded me more.
There was a knock on my dressing room door, and before I could respond the door had opened. I must have forgotten to lock it.
Of all people, Alana walked through. I tried to wipe my tears, but I was in a state and it was pointless.
“Bird? What is wrong?” she asked, closing the door behind her. Alana had become something of an eccentric mother figure to me over the past couple of months. Sort of like the callous, Belgian, dance version of Mary Poppins. “Nerves?”
“No . . . no.” I said, wiping away the tears with my forearms, trying so hard to stifle the flood, but they wouldn’t stop.
“Tell me dear. Did something happen?”
The last thing I wanted to tell the Alana Roché DeMill was that I was crying over a boy. She wanted focus and excitement, and what she saw in front of her was a deflated girl who was crumbling under pressure.
“I’m