Chapter 8: A Dance Without an Audience

On Sunday the board postponed its decision on the construction arrangement. It approved no closure and asked Caldwell Development Group for a safe staging plan that kept evening access to the ballroom, if one could be made. Clare's course proposal stayed on the agenda for a separate review the following Thursday.

Marisol gave Clare the written minutes after the meeting. “You can tell the students classes continue this week. I can't promise more yet.”

“I won't promise more.”

Clare sent an update to every student on her list. Rosa replied within minutes:

Good. My mother has already asked what she's wearing Thursday.

Another reply was less reassuring. One of the brothers wrote that their mother would stop coming if the class moved too far from the bus line; neither son could drive her every week. Clare asked for her nearest stop and added it to a map of possible backup rooms. The center's small room was less inviting than the ballroom, but at least it shared the same entrance. She marked it for inspection instead of offering a distant studio because it had mirrors.

The reply made Clare smile. She printed a new registration sheet and placed it in her teaching bag. The center had given her five days to show how an adult course would work as a permanent program; she intended to use them.

Henry came by the center that afternoon, carrying the framed photograph of Margaret and the dance card.

“Evelyn says I stepped on her foot,” he told Clare.

“Did you?”

“Only once.”

“And what did she say?”

“That Margaret would have expected at least two.”

He set the photograph down. “I was worried she would think I had forgotten Margaret for three minutes. She brought that picture because she remembered her too. We talked about the dress afterward. I hadn't known Margaret borrowed it from her sister.”

Clare looked at the two young people in the picture. Henry had waited more than fifty years to learn that small detail.

“Are you seeing Evelyn again?”

“We're having lunch. Don't give it a name before we do.”

He pulled out the dance card and showed her the blank line below Margaret's name. “I thought I'd write Saturday there. I couldn't.”

“You don't have to do it today.”

“I asked Evelyn whether it would upset her if I kept the card in my pocket. She said she would have been upset if I'd left it at home.”

Henry looked at the old ink. “Perhaps I'll write the date after lunch. Perhaps I won't. I can decide that without anyone setting a deadline.”

“I wouldn't dare.”

He slipped the card back into his pocket. “You and Ethan spoke after I left?”

“About the center.”

“That's not what I asked.”

“It's what I can answer.”

Henry raised both hands and changed the subject to her class. He volunteered to count attendance at the door on Thursday, provided she didn't call him an assistant. Clare agreed to call him a student with a clipboard.

Ethan arrived after Henry left. He'd asked Marisol whether the studio was in use before coming in, and he stayed near the doorway.

“I spoke with Diane,” he said. “The outside lot might work for storage, but she wants an independent safety review before the center agrees.”

“That's sensible.”

“I told her the review is my company's expense. She said the board will decide what to do with its results.”

“Good.”

His gaze moved to her registration sheet. “You have work to do.”

“A lot.”

“I'll leave you to it.”

Clare had wanted him to stop treating her work as an inconvenience to be cleared from his calendar. Now that he was respecting her time, she found she didn't want him to leave without finishing the conversation they'd avoided Saturday.

“Ethan.”

He turned.

“I appreciated what you said in front of the board. I still need time.”

“I know.”

“Henry thinks I can tell him what's happening between us.”

“Can you?”

She almost laughed. “We haven't even decided what there is to tell.”

Ethan came no closer. “I know I like being here when you're here. I also know I've spent a week giving you reasons to wonder whether I listen.”

“Those are both true.”

“Then I won't ask you for an answer today.”

Clare sat on the edge of the stage. He took the chair nearest the door, leaving space between them.

“When I stopped the music on Friday,” she said, “I was going to help your father. Then he asked me not to. It was uncomfortable to leave a song playing when I could see it hurt him.”

“It helped that you listened.”

“He was the one who told me what he needed.”

Ethan understood. “I didn't give you that chance with the schedule.”

“You can give it to me next time.”

It was the most she could offer honestly. He nodded once, and she returned to the registration forms. After a moment he stood.

“I'll see you Thursday,” he said.

“Maybe. Henry has the clipboard. He may refuse you entry.”

“He has refused me worse.”

After he left, Clare called the instructor who had trained her when she first moved to Richmond. Nora taught mornings at a studio across town and had once covered a class for Clare when she lost her voice.

“Could you take two Thursday evenings in a twelve-week term if I gave you a month's notice?” Clare asked.

“Probably. I'd need to see the syllabus and the floor. Why?”

“I'm putting a permanent class together. The board wants to know what happens when I can't teach.”

“Then budget for my actual rate, not what I charged you as a favor.”

Clare wrote it down. Nora also reminded her that beginners needed a way to catch up after missing a week. Clare added a short review period at the start of each lesson. That meant changing the timetable, but it gave students a reason to return after an interruption.

That evening Marisol forwarded a note from the board chair. The center wanted a twelve-week budget that included a substitute instructor and a plan for cancellations if the ballroom became unavailable for repairs. Clare had calculated ordinary class costs. Now she had to show how the course would survive a disruption without selling students a promise she couldn't keep.

She opened a fresh spreadsheet. Thursday was no longer a deadline someone else had imposed. It was the day she would show what kind of program she was capable of running.

She entered Nora's substitute fee, then calculated the minimum enrollment again. Sixteen students paying in full, or eighteen with monthly installments, would cover the term. She had eighteen expressions of interest; she still needed commitments. She wrote each person a note explaining the schedule, the fee and what would happen if the ballroom closed temporarily. By midnight she had sent the messages. No one had been asked to sign up for a class that existed only in her optimism.