The Vintage Summer Wedding Page 17

  ‘You take cards?’ The woman asked, a fraction too quick, taking a step back to glance casually at the bird from a different angle.

  What was it the fortune-teller had said? That she was never too old to learn. Perhaps, more importantly, she was never too old to remember.

  Anna tipped her head to one side and smiled. ‘Of course.’

  As the woman backed out the door clutching the stuffed bird in its case against her chest, the dog trotting beside her, Mrs Beedle wandered in from outside. ‘So she is her father’s daughter after all.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean?’ Anna said, feigning a total lack of comprehension.

  ‘Why knock off fifty when you can add it on straight away? I’ve worked with the old bugger long enough to recognise his tricks anywhere, Anna.’ She laughed.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Razzmatazz got steadily better. She wouldn’t have said they were perfect, not by a long shot, but they were beginning to move in real steps with real timing. Long gone were the bumbling random jumps and wiggles that had made up the performance when she’d first seen them.

  Matt and Mary had started arriving together, heads down, barely looking at one another but giving the occasional murmuring laugh as one of them muttered something while the other might allow a playful nudge.

  ‘Look, Miss, they’re in luurve,’ Billy goaded, making Mary scuttle away in a pretence of changing her shoes.

  Matt blushed and Anna heard Lucy, who was sitting next to her, shout, ‘More than you’ll ever get, Billy. Who’s going to ever fancy you?’

  ‘Don’t need to pretend, Luce, I know you want me.’ Billy swaggered over and Lucy threw her head back in a mocking laugh of disdain.

  ‘Come back to me when you’ve hit puberty, you little runt.’

  As they wound each other up, Anna watched Mary take a couple of steps out of the shadows of the sidelines and nearer to where Matt was standing. She was struck for a second how simple their love triangles were, how sweetly naive. Maybe all she needed to do was sidle up to Seb and offer him a Haribo and all would be well again. Maybe that was where she’d been going wrong.

  Gradually, the others started to arrive, Peter sloped in, Scott loafed about by the piano and Clara appeared, dressed in black-and-white leggings and a ra-ra skirt, cramming half a sandwich in her mouth, and they took their places.

  ‘Two days to go, Miss,’ Peter said as she walked to stand in front of them.

  ‘I know.’ She nodded. ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘Fucking shit-scared,’ Lucy shouted.

  ‘No, you shouldn’t be scared. You should be excited,’ Anna laughed. ‘What are you afraid of?’

  ‘Getting it all wrong.’ Peter bellowed.

  ‘Well, because, Miss, we used to be shit and we knew it. And, well‒’ Lucy looked around at the rest of them who seemed to be in agreement. ‘Now it’s like we know we’re OK, so there’s more to worry about. If we think we’re good and then actually we’re shit, then that’s embarrassing, d’you know what I mean? It’s more serious, isn’t it?’

  Anna watched Mary nodding and felt a mix of pride and frustration. ‘That’s got to be a good thing, surely? Think how good it will feel if it goes well,’ she said, feeling her brow furrow as she looked along the rows of them.

  ‘Maybe, Miss.’ Matt shrugged.

  ‘It’s just we probably want it more now, if you know what I mean? It feels like something we could maybe have, maybe get on the TV in a good way, kind of.’ Lucy shrugged. ‘Or Peter’ll just fall over and we’ll all go home.’ She cracked a smile and the subject was over.

  Peter swore while they sloped off the edge of the stage and took their places to start. Matt led the warm-up while Anna watched in silence, her mind rolling one thought over and over...

  She had given them hope.

  And with hope came the huge possibility of disappointment.

  It was midway through a second run-through, this time to music that was so loud the windows seemed to bow outwards, that the door slammed its now familiar booming thwack and the sound of a number of pairs of stiletto heels seemed to puncture the thumping track.

  Peter stopped mid-move and said, ‘Fuck me, Miss. Your mates are supermodels.’

  Matt stumbled to turn the iPod off while the rest of the group just stood and gawped while Anna swivelled, uncertainly, round in her seat.

  Striding towards them, heels clipping on the wood, wasn’t just Hermione this time, but her ex-assistant and now job-pimp Kim, her slicked-red lips beaming around an electric cigarette and the towering platforms on her shoes wobbling precariously with every step as she waved a vigorous hello.

  And who was that next to her? Anna wondered. She knew her, she thought, was sure she recognised her. The need to place the face overcame the fact she herself was wearing leggings, a plain white T-shirt and plimsolls, her hair, in need of a wash, was scraped back and her cheeks flushed from shouting instructions at the group.

  ‘Anna Whitehall,’ the stranger drawled. ‘Well, I never thought this is where I’d find you.’

  ‘Anna,’ Kim sidled up next to her. ‘I bumped into Hermione at just the most divine little launch party the other night and I asked where you were, and she told me about this lovely little village and I thought, where better for Lucinda to chat to you than here, in picturesque England. It’s perfect. Hello!’ She waved at Razzmatazz, who just stared back in silence.

  Lucinda.

  Anna thought for a moment.

  ‘So, do you recognise me?’ Curly flame-red hair, skin so white it was like she’d been cast from cream, taller than Anna by one inch exactly, eyes that sloped down at the corners, a mouth that curled up just on one side when it was satisfied it had got what it wanted.

  ‘Lucinda Warren,’ Anna breathed.

  ‘Great to see you again, Anna. I’ve been looking forward to it, what’s it been, ten years?’

  ‘Eleven,’ Anna said.

  ‘Eleven. What’s a year between friends?’ Lucinda laughed.

  What’s a year between enemies, Anna held her mouth taut.

  ‘Miss, we’re running out of time,’ Lucy shouted and all four women turned and looked at her as she flicked her Farah Fawcett hair and then tapped her watch.

  ‘This is what you’re doing now?’ Lucinda drawled, walking forward a couple of steps so she was beside Anna. Anna tried not to look at the group through the eyes of these newcomers. The various shapes and sizes, the ramshackle assortment of clothes, trainers, hairstyles, the hall that smelt of cabbage after the lunchtime Whist-drive, the booming Rihanna track. ‘It’d be awesome to see them dance.’

  Hermione leant round and whispered, ‘I’m not sure it would actually.’

  ‘Oh, Hermione!’ Kim coughed on her electric cigarette. ‘They’re Anna’s. We all know what magic Anna can spin. I bet they’re fabulous.’

  Anna licked her lips.

  ‘You want us to go again, Miss?’ Matt said, quietly.

  ‘He’s my favourite,’ Hermione snorted a laugh.

  No I want you to go home, Matt. Anna thought. I’m embarrassed by you and I hate myself for being embarrassed of you.

  In her last year at the English Ballet Company School it had been announced that the company itself were staging a production of The Nutcracker that would start at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden and then tour some of the greatest venues in the world, including the David H. Koch Theater at the Lincoln Center. The event would mark the fiftieth anniversary of the English Ballet Company and the decision had been made to open one role up to a dancer from the school.

  The opening night would see the industry glitterati nestle into the audience, sip copious flutes of Bollinger, munch on canapés of sour cream and caviar croustades, and narrow their eyes at the performance of this fledgling ballerina, whispering witty criticisms or gasping in delight. It was a giant step towards a ticket to stardom.

  By this time, under the tutelage of Madame LaRoche, Anna had begun to flourish.
The more she grew, the more dedicated she became, the more she avoided her father and the less she went back to Nettleton, the longer she stayed behind so she didn’t have to go back to the flat and her eternally furious mother, and she rose the ranks to the heady, coveted position of unofficial favourite. She wasn’t the best dancer technically, not by miles, but she had what Madame LaRoche would spread her arms wide and call spirit.

  Trampled over, beaten, almost destroyed in her first two years and left hanging by a thread, frayed and terrified, as she went from Nettleton top dog to bottom of the London pack, worn down by the unrelenting competition at the school and constant questioning from her mother every night she came home about who she was better than, who she’d worked harder than, Madame LaRoche had leant over her at the end of one session, knelt down so her eyes were level with Anna’s tired, bloodshot ones and said, To become the top one percent, Anna, you have to look here ‒ she put her hand on her heart ‒ and not here. She spread her arm out across the rest of the room. You focus on this, you go to the devil. Natural talent may have got you here, Anna, but it is not enough to keep you here. Remember that.

  Anna had stared back at her, thinking, please throw me out, please, expel me, let this end. But Madame LaRoche had simply walked away, and Anna had hauled herself up and when the music started once more, for the first time she didn’t see the others around her, she saw only herself, her beating heart, her gaze fixed and unwavering. And it had worked. She had started to get parts that weren’t the starring roles but ones that allowed her to try, to experiment, to show her so-called Spanish spirit ‒ the Mediterranean blood that pumped through her veins and imbued her with the fight, the passion, the determination to succeed against all odds. The same spirit that had turned inwards in her mother and was eating away at her bit by bit.

  By the time The Nutcracker was announced, Anna’s star was shining bright. Graceful and glittering. She would add the perfect amount of shimmer to the Waltz of the Snowflakes. It was there, the opportunity, dangling, ripe from the tree.

  But then, poof, Lucinda Warren walked in. Flame hair slicked back, thick liquid eye-liner flicks, black mesh top over hot-pink leotard and matching leg-warmers. Fresh from a transfer from New York, no mere star, but a boiling, raging, beaming ball of sun.

  ‘Miss, should we go again?’ Billy stepped forward.

  ‘Erm.’ Anna scratched her head. Could she get Lucinda out the room? ‘Did you want to chat about the job? Should we go outside?’

  The job. New York. Her ticket out of here.

  ‘Oh no, honey,’ Lucinda’s mouth curved up, ‘I came for the total experience. I want to see what these kids can do.’

  Anna glanced back at the motley little crew. The pin in the balloon of her New York dream.

  Kim scraped a chair over from the side and sat, legs crossed, puffing on her cigarette, while Hermione made an awkward face of apology at Anna and Lucinda strutted over to the piano where she leant gracefully against the closed lid, legs crossed at her perfectly sculpted ankles, and watched.

  ‘OK.’ Anna sighed and nodded to Matt to hit the music. If it was going to happen, they may as well get it over with. ‘Let’s go,’ she said, her voice sounding tinny and bland. Then she saw Lucy shoot her an odd look and felt an immediate stab of guilt. She was taking their hope and she knew it and she couldn’t help herself.

  The music boomed out, Anna felt herself shudder, Lucinda tapped the lid of the piano, a smile playing on her lips in anticipation, but then Lucy missed the first step which meant her arm was outstretched as Peter turned her way and her fist connected hard with his cheek making him reel back, clutching his face in pain. Matt glanced over his shoulder to see why Peter was swearing, which meant he lost his timing and then tripped over his shoelace which stumbled him back into Clara, who, never one for keeping going, pushed him back and said, ‘Get out my fucking way.’ Mary tried to stay in time but was on her own, as the rest of them clattered about around her. Lucy, flustered, tried to save it with some spontaneous twerking, which made Hermione burst out a laugh. And then, after the whole thing fell apart and Peter had skulked off to the side, Billy slapped out of a handstand cracking down onto his hip. Matt swore, his jaw locked rigid, and Lucy stalked off to sit on the edge of the stage while Mary looked guiltily at Anna from under her fringe.

  ‘I did warn you,’ Hermione sighed.

  Anna couldn’t look at anyone, just stared down at her hands. She could feel both Lucy and Lucinda watching her.

  When Lucinda Warren danced, she blinded people, hypnotised them with energy, grace, confidence and perfection. Anna’s spirit ‒ her passion, her quirk, her style ‒ crumbled next to this girl who danced as if the world had been created just for her. Anna was no stranger to falling from a height, but this was by far her greatest drop. She landed awkwardly, uncomfortably, stripped of her new confidence, like Cinderella at midnight, as the spotlight of favourite refocused on this perfect redhead.

  And Anna, who had got used to the warmth of the limelight, didn’t respond well to finding herself in a shadow. She would watch with fury boiling inside her as Lucinda practised, precision personified. She changed the way she danced to try and be better. She stopped laughing, stopped sleeping, she lived off adrenaline, off jealousy, off determination, wired by a desire to be better. To be the best.

  Anna glanced over at Lucinda, who had walked round to the front of the piano and was engrossing herself in the keys and the sheet music, clearly embarrassed. Hermione and Kim were whispering next to her. She could feel the boring gaze of Lucy straight ahead of her.

  ‘That was shit, Miss, wasn’t it?’ Lucy whispered.

  Matt skulked over to stand next to Mary, who looked like she might be about to cry.

  ‘Probably quite a good thing though, Miss, isn’t it?’ Lucy carried on. ‘To know we go to pieces in front of an audience. Takes the edge of the nerves.’

  Anna looked up and met Lucy’s narrowed eyes, her brow raised in challenge, her heels banging on the stage.

  Anna’s mum had said, This is what it’s all been for, Anna. This is it. Don’t waste this. There’s nobody better than you, do you hear me. If you believe that, you’ll get what you want. No ‒ I don’t want to hear it, it’s just excuses. Anna, I mean it, I don’t want to hear it. Anna! Fine, if you don’t get it, don’t come back. How’s that for an incentive?

  ‘I just have to‒’ Anna pointed out to the back of the hall. ‘Just take a minute, everyone. I’ll be one minute.’ She could feel her brow sweating as she turned and jogged to the doors at the back of the hall. Pushing through them she stood outside in the warm, sun-drenched air and leant her head back on the brickwork, closing her eyes and remembering the feeling of standing on the edge of that Nutcracker audition. They had all waited in the corridor to audition in front of a panel of Madame LaRoche, Mr Hadley, director of the EBC, and the resident choreographer, Barnaby Adams.

  Anna’s diet had consisted of protein and Prozac for that last pre-audition month, her hands shook so she sat on them as she waited, her skin was sallow, her muscles trembling like a bull wound up ready to fight, her cheeks hollow, her hair thin, her tired eyes sore, but her audition so perfect, so practised, so focused that she could have danced anywhere, slice her feet off and they would have kept on dancing. She had sat staring at a spot on the floor, a black dot of dirt on the white linoleum, looking at no one, nothing, just fixed, doing all her breathing techniques for calm, for focus, for confidence. Her body straining at the bit, ready. Her mind was visualising walking through the flat door that night, seeing her mum, waiting, trembling, apprehensive, and Anna would smile and her mum would leap up and hug her and she could finally exhale.

  Leaning against the wall, she tried to search her mind for those relaxation techniques now. To lean forward and turn the dial in her mind that would release her endorphins and adrenaline, that would focus her and cut out the chatter.

  But instead she saw her face making its biggest mistake. Saw it peering t
hrough the round window in the door just before she was called in for her audition. Saw it watch Lucinda glide across the space like she was made only of air, saw the muscles in her back ripple as they arched, saw the slick of red across her lips as she smiled, saw that this was hers. That whatever Anna did, she couldn’t compete, she had lost before she had begun. And, as she watched, her adrenaline seemed to trickle out of her, her muscles held so tight just loosened and gave up, the exhaustion that was hidden by determination threaded through her and left her limbs like lead. So, when she walked into the room, she was already defeated. She had never felt so tired in all her life.

  Across the square, Anna could see Mrs Beedle outside the shop taking in the chairs and other bits and pieces that had been arranged out the front. She saw her look up, shade her eyes and glance over in the direction of someone walking across the square. Anna’s father. He took off his sunglasses and the two of them stood chatting, laughing. She watched him pick up a side-table and help carry it inside.

  Before The Nutcracker audition, he had told her a story over the phone of a girl he’d seen on TV. A violinist. She’d picked up the instrument at four years old and been announced a prodigy. But, at twelve, when she’d started moaning about practising, her father had made her give it up. Made her put the violin away and told her that if she picked it up again, she picked it up for her. For no one else. No more moaning at him. And, four months later, she had opened the case and played and never stopped. Her father had told her the story and then paused and Anna had said sarcastically, ‘I take it you’re trying to tell me something.’ ‘No.’ He had said, ‘I was just making conversation.’

  ‘Miss?’ Mary pushed open the door next to her, ‘Are you coming back in? It’s just no one’s quite sure what to do.’

  Anna turned her head to look at the mousy-haired girl, unable to look up from the floor mere weeks ago. She looked at her baggy T-shirt, leggings and the Converse hastily pulled onto her bare feet. ‘Why do you do this, Mary?’ she asked.