Rhapsody (34 page)

"You look beautiful," he said, kissing her on
the cheek.

"And you look better than ever," Vera
replied, inhaling his masculine scent. She ushered him from the
small entry foyer into the living room.

Misha stopped and stood in the large,
gracious room and looked around him. "My God, Vera," he said with
awe in his voice. "This looks fantastic."

"It's a beginning," Vera said modestly.

He turned and looked at her. "You know better
than that," he said. "It's really fantastic. Really special."

"Thanks, Misha," she said.

"I should have known," he said, "especially
after all the help you gave me."

"Have a look around at the rest, if you want
to, and I'll get us something to drink. White wine okay?"

"Yes," he replied. "That'd be great."

Vera went to the kitchen while Misha slowly
toured the living and dining rooms, then the bedroom, examining the
furniture and paintings, the bibelots and photographs, the books
and drawings. He noticed a photograph of himself clustered with
several family pictures on a desk in the bedroom.

"Cheers," Vera said from the bedroom doorway,
holding their wineglasses.

Misha turned around and looked at her. She
looked so ethereally beautiful, like the very first time he had
seen her, all those years ago. He took the wine from her, and they
clinked glasses.

"Cheers," he said, taking a sip.

"Let's sit in the living room," Vera
said.

Misha followed her out, and they both sat on
the big, comfortable couch in front of the fireplace.

"It's strange," Misha said, looking about
him, "how much our tastes are alike. I mean, this place is lighter
and airier than mine, but in many ways it's the same. We both like
Old World art and antiques, worn-out stuff a lot of people laugh
at."

"I know," Vera said, smiling, "but I think
yours is much more dramatic and interesting."

"Maybe more dramatic with all the color,"
Misha conceded, "but not more interesting."

They discussed his upcoming concert dates and
her work at the auction house, his family and hers, their mutual
friends, and finally ate dinner by candlelight in the dining
room.

"I can't believe you did all this yourself,"
Misha declared after finishing the last of his dessert. "It was
really wonderful, Vera. Do you have any idea what a treat this was
after all the fancy, rich stuff that's forced on me?"

"I'm glad you liked it," she said. Her heart
soared, and she felt foolish at being so pleased by his compliment.
"Would you like coffee?" she asked.

"Sure," he said, "if you're going to have
some."

"Why don't we have it in the living room?"
Vera said. "Go get comfortable, and I'll bring it in."

Misha kicked off his shoes and sprawled on
the couch, feeling contented. The apartment was just right, he
thought. And the food. Everything done to just the right turn. So
civilized yet homey.

Vera came through the dining room with their
coffee on a small tray. Misha started to sit up when he saw
her.

"No," she said. "Spread back out and make
yourself comfortable." She put the tray down on the coffee table,
and sat on the floor next to the couch, then handed Misha his cup
of coffee.

"Thanks," he said, taking a sip, then putting
the cup back down. He propped his head up on pillows, and lay there
looking at Vera.

She sipped quietly at her coffee and looked
over at him. "What is it?" she asked.

Misha smiled. "Nothing," he said. "I was just
thinking how wonderful you look, how great this evening's
been."

"I'm glad you've enjoyed it," she said. "I
have. It's not often we can get together these days."

"No," Misha said, "it's not." He looked at
her again, thoughtfully, then asked: "Are you seeing anybody
now?"

Vera put her coffee down. "Not really,
Misha," she said. "I go out a lot, socialize a lot. You know. See
friends. Go to work functions, a few society parties, things like
that. But I'm not really seeing anybody."

"Then who are these guys I see you coupled up
with in the social columns?" he asked lightly.

Vera laughed. "This is like old times," she
said, "when we used to compare notes about who the press reported
we'd been seen with."

"You don't have any secrets anymore, then?"
he asked, teasing her about Simon Hampton.

"No," Vera said emphatically. She shivered
involuntarily and rubbed her hands up and down her arms. "And
that's not funny, Misha," she said.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I shouldn't have been
so flippant about it."

"That's okay," she said.

"Still," he said, "I find it hard to believe
that you're not seeing somebody at least half seriously."

Vera looked at him and shrugged. "Well, I'm
not."

"How's that possible, Vera?" he asked. "I
mean, you have everything in the world to offer some guy."

She looked away, feeling very uncomfortable.
How could she tell him that no other man on earth interested her?
How could she tell him that she had no desire to become involved
with those men who had been genuinely interested in her over the
years?

"I just haven't met the right person, Misha,"
she finally said.

He reached out a hand and stroked her hair
gently. "You will, Vera," he said. "I'm sure of it." Then he leaned
over and kissed her forehead.

Vera looked into his eyes, and Misha saw the
sadness and the desire there in their pale watery blueness.
Inexplicably, he would afterward think, he pulled her to him,
caressing her, tenderly peppering her face and neck and ears with
kisses, inhaling her sweet fragrance.

Vera held onto him as if for dear life,
before abruptly pulling back. "No, Misha," she whispered. "Please,
I don't want your pity."

He drew her to him with a much more
considerable force, kissing her more passionately, his tongue
darting between her lips hungrily, his hands stroking her hair, her
back, her shoulders, then, inevitably, her breasts.

Vera gasped and began to shake her head from
side to side.

"Shhh," he whispered, moving his lips to her
ear. "This has nothing to do with pity, Vera. Nothing at all. It's
me, Misha. Remember? Just let yourself enjoy it. Let us both enjoy
it."

He began again, gently, tenderly, lovingly,
until they were both swept up in a tide of passion, of need, of
urgency, that ultimately led them to her bedroom and sweet, sweet
release.

Jesus! he later thought, getting dressed. I
wanted to tell her about Serena, and look at what's happened. He
experienced a strange sensation, unlike guilt, unlike shame, but
unfamiliar and worrisome. He didn't feel that what he'd done with
Vera was wrong. How could it be? he asked himself. It had somehow
felt so right. It was a coupling, he thought, of familiarity,
between friends.

Vera was like a safe harbor, a very loving
one, and very exciting in her own way. What then was Serena? And
why was he so drawn to her? Could he love them both, in different
ways? He didn't know, and was genuinely confused. Only a short time
ago he had been convinced that Serena was the only woman in the
world who mattered to him. And now?

What's wrong with me? he wondered. What am I
going to do?

Vera let him out, then returned to her
bedroom. The evening couldn't have worked out more perfectly, she
thought, even if she hadn't planned it that way. She was glad that
she hadn't tried to seduce Misha, for she knew with dead certainty
that that would be the worst mistake she could possibly make.

She shut her eyes and hugged her arms around
herself tightly. Maybe ...just maybe, she thought, he'll finally
realize that no one else can possibly love him like I do. And maybe
someday, he'll come to love me, too.

Misha rolled over in bed and put his hands
behind his head. He sighed with postcoital contentment and stared
up at the bedroom's white ceiling and the ugly exposed pipes. Even
in the bedroom's dim lighting, he could see them crisscrossing
above him. When he'd first seen Serena's loft in SoHo, he'd been
enthralled with its vast proportions, its high ceilings and huge
windows, the drama of its cutting-edge modernity and minimal
decoration. Over the last few weeks he had spent many nights
here—every night when they'd both been in New York City—yet by now
he found that his initial enthusiasm had changed to a kind of
boredom, if not active dislike.

The loft's vast whiteness now seemed sterile
and somehow inhuman, its modernity uncomfortable, institutional
even. Serena was too much on the go, he reflected, to do anything
to make it more livable.

The furniture was all horrendously expensive
and beautifully designed but hard-edged and cold. On the walls hung
a few pieces of contemporary art, most of it in varying shades of
black and by artists he was unfamiliar with. None of it inspired
him. A few of Serena's photographs hung in the only bedroom and a
hallway— all high-fashion shots, very well done, but like the rest
of the loft, cold and unfriendly. There were very few bibelots,
almost nothing to indicate that she had traveled the world over in
her work. Most peculiar of all, he thought, was that there was not
a single photograph of family or friends.

Even the kitchen, usually the coziest
gathering place in these expensive downtown aeries, was a temple to
the industrial. The industrial stoves and refrigerators, the
cabinetry and counters—nearly everything glass and steel and
granite—gave Misha more the impression of a surgery than a
welcoming hearth where friends cooked and ate and drank together,
talking and laughing. It looked as if it had never been used, and
indeed Serena said that she almost never had.

At first Misha thought that she was surely
exaggerating, but he had come to believe her. Every night he'd come
down after his daily piano practice, they'd ordered food in:
Chinese, Japanese, Burmese, Thai, Vietnamese. The few times they'd
gone out, Serena had insisted they go to chic, overpriced
restaurants, the sort of fashionable and trendy restaurants where
one went not for the food, but to see and be seen.

Mornings at the loft were always the same:
coffee. Period. Gulped down quickly as Serena geared up for the
day's business, usually placing and receiving telephone calls as
she made and drank the coffee, often on more than one line at a
time. Stylists, models, publishers, photo editors, art directors,
fashion designers, advertisers, ad agencies, assistants, and her
agent—the telephone never seemed to stop. And his being there never
stopped her from answering it.

He smiled, thinking how adept Serena was amid
this beehive of activity. How she handled a million details with
such orderliness and aplomb. He would be half- crazed, he thought,
if he lived in the incessant whirlwind she did. His own life was so
different, so much more isolated, revolving as it did around the
piano and the music in front of him.

He realized that in some ways they hardly
knew each other at all, despite their many nights of intimacy
together. We both work such long, hard hours, he thought, and the
work and travel make it very difficult to have a relationship
that's more than sexual. Sometimes he felt they weren't a couple at
all, but strangers repeating an erotically charged one-night stand
over and over.

Even sojourns, like their few hours in
Copenhagen together a few weeks ago, as much fun as they had been,
had begun to lose their luster. Perhaps, he thought, the novelty
had simply worn off, but he suspected it was more than that.

He heard Serena shut off the shower in the
adjoining bathroom and waited for her to appear in the doorway as
he knew she would, a towel wrapped around her head like a turban,
her resplendent body blushed pink by the hot shower. When she did,
surrounded by a halo of light, he looked at her intently, wondering
who she really was, what lay beneath the beautiful, polished
exterior.

She saw the expression on his face and looked
at him questioningly. "What is it?" she asked.

He smiled. "I was just wondering about some
things," he said.

"What things?" she asked, walking over to the
bed and sitting down on the side next to him.

He reached a hand up and ran a finger down
her spine. "Oh, about you. Who you are. Where you're from. Things
like that."

Serena expelled a sigh and turned to face
him. "I'm Serena Gibbons," she said wearily. "I grew up in Florida.
Can't that be enough for you?"

Misha shook his head. "I can't help but be
curious," he said. "You know everything about me, Serena, and I
want to know everything there is to know about you."

"I've told you before, Misha," Serena
replied, a note of irritation in her voice. "I don't like to talk
about the past. There's nothing to know." She began drying her hair
with the towel, rubbing it slowly.

"I find that hard to believe," Misha
replied.

"Try," she said, toweling her hair with more
vigor.

"I have," Misha said. "For several weeks. I
think it's pretty amazing that so far I've found out more about you
from an article in Vanity Fair magazine than you've ever told
me."

Serena put the towel down and slumped. She
turned to look at him again. "What is it you want to know?" she
asked in an exasperated voice.

"Come on, Serena. You know," he said. "The
things lovers tell each other." He gently pushed strands of wet
hair from out of her eyes. "About your family, about growing up,
your friends and dreams and ambitions. All those things that tell
me about you."

She looked into his eyes, her own glinting
bright and hard in the dim light. "If I tell you once and for all,
will you promise not to ask me anything about the past again?
Ever?"