The Flowers in the Attic Series: The Dollangangers: Flowers in the Attic, Petals on the Wind, If There Be Thorns, Seeds of Yesterday, and a New Excerpt! (77 page)

I called Paul long distance to tell him my great news. “Paul, I’m going to appear on TV in
The Nutcracker
, I’ll be Clara!” He laughed and congratulated me. “I guess that means you won’t be coming home this summer,” he said rather sadly. “Carrie misses you an awful lot, Cathy. You’ve only paid us one short visit since you went away.”

“I’m sorry, I want to come but I need this chance to star, Paul. Please explain to Carrie so her feelings won’t be hurt. Is she there?”

“No, she’s finally made a friend and is ‘sleeping-over.’ But call again tomorrow night and reverse the charges, and tell her yourself.”

“And Chris, how is he?” I asked.

“Fine, fine. He gets nothing but A’s, and if he can manage to keep that up, he’ll be accepted for an accelerated program and can finish out his fourth year of college while starting his first year in medical school.”

“Simultaneously?” I asked, marveling that anyone, even Chris, could be that smart and accomplish so much.

“Sure, it can be done.”

“Paul, what about you? Are you well? Are you working too much, too many long hours?”

“I’m healthy and yes, I do work long hours, as every doctor does. And since you can’t come to visit us, I think it would be nice for Carrie if we came to visit you.”

Oh, that was the best idea I’d heard in months and months. “And bring Chris,” I said. “He’ll love to meet all the pretty ballerinas I can introduce him to. But you, Paul, you’d better not look at anyone but me.”

He made a strange sound in his throat before he chuckled. “Don’t worry, Catherine, there’s not a day that passes that I don’t see your face before me.”

In early August the television production of
The Nutcracker
was taped for Christmastime release. Julian and I sat close together and watched the rushes, and when it was over he turned to take me in his arms, and for the first time he told me with the kind of sincerity I could believe, “I love you, Cathy. Please stop taking me so lightly!”

Hardly had we rested up from
The Nutcracker
when Yolly fell and sprained her ankle, and April was visiting her parents, so I had the chance to be Sleeping Beauty! Since Julian had played two roles in the TV production, both Alexis and Michael thought it should be their turn to partner me. Madame Zolta frowned and looked at Julian, then at me. “Alexis, Michael, I promise you the very next lead roles, but let Julian dance with Catherine. They have a rare magic between them that is spellbinding. I want to see how they do in a really lavish production like
The Sleeping Beauty.”

Oh, the thoughts I had on stage as I lay so still on the purple velvet couch, waiting for my lover to come and put on my lips an arousing, come-alive kiss. The glorious music made me feel more real on that couch than when I was just me with no royal blood at all. I felt enchanted, surrounded by an aura of beauty as I quietly, gracefully lay with my arms folded on
my breasts and my heart pulsated in rhythm with the glorious music. Out in the dark audience, Paul, Chris and Carrie and Henny were watching for the first time a New York performance. Truly, I felt in my bones I was that mystical medieval princess.

I saw him dreamily from beneath almost closed eyes, my prince. He danced about me, then down on one knee he knelt to tenderly gaze upon my face before he dared to put a hesitant kiss upon my closed lips. I awakened, shy, disoriented, fluttering my eyelids. I feigned love on sight, but was so frightened, so maidenly virtuous, he had to woo me with more dancing and coax me to dance too, and in the most passionate
pas de deux
I soon succumbed to his charms and in conquest he lifted me high and up on the flat of his palm that knew well the exact spot to balance my weight just right, and I was carried offstage.

The last act ended; the applause thundered and resounded as time and again the curtain rose and came down. Julian and I took eight curtain calls of our very own! Red roses were thrust again and again into my arms, and flowers were tossed onto the stage. I looked down to see one single yellow buttercup weighted down by a folded slip of paper. I bent to pick it up and knew it was from Chris even before I had the chance to read his note. Daddy’s four yellow buttercups—and here was one put in a freezer to keep it fresh until it could be thrown to me as a tribute to what we used to be.

Blindly I stared out into an audience of blurred faces, searching to see those I loved. All I could see was the attic, the gloomy, awesomely huge attic with its paper flowers, and over there, near the stairwell, was Chris standing in the shadows, near the shrouded sofa and the big trunk and his yearning desire was on his face as he watched me dance on and on.

I was crying, and the audience loved it. They gave me a standing ovation. I turned to hand a red rose to Julian, and again they thundered their applause. And he kissed me! Right
in front of thousands—he dared to kiss me—and it wasn’t respectful, it was possessive. “Damn you for doing that!” I hissed, feeling humiliated.

“Damn you for not wanting me!” he hissed back.

“I’m not yours!”

“You will be!”

*  *  *

My family came backstage to lavish me with praise. Chris had grown taller but Carrie was very much the same—maybe a bit taller, not much. I kissed Henny’s firm, round cheek. Only then could I look at Paul. Our eyes locked and held. Did he still love me, want me, need me? He hadn’t answered my last letter. Easily hurt, I’d written only to Carrie to tell her of the upcoming performances, and only then did Paul call to say he was bringing my family to New York.

After the performance came the buffet party given for us by the rich patrons Madame Z. cultivated. “Wear the costumes you have on,” she instructed. “The aficionados get a big thrill seeing dancers up close in costumes—but take off the stage makeup, use what you wear every day to look stunning. Never for one second give the public the idea you are less than glamorous!”

Music was playing and Chris took me into his arms for a waltz, the dance I had taught him so many years ago. “This is still the way you dance?” I chided.

He grinned in a self-effacing way. “Can’t help it if you got all the dancing talent and I got all the brains.”

“Remarks like that could easily make me think you have no brains.”

He laughed again and I was drawn closer. “Besides, I don’t have to dance and posture to win over the girls. Just take a look at your friend Yolanda. She’s quite a beauty, and she’s been giving me the eye all evening.”

“She gives every good-looking guy the eye, so don’t feel so flattered. She’ll sleep with you tonight if you want that, and tomorrow night with someone else.”

“Are you like her too?” he shot back, narrowing his eyes.

I smiled at him wickedly, thinking, no, I was like Momma, sweet and cool and able to handle men—at least, I was learning. To prove this I winked at Paul, seeing if he’d come over and cut in. Swiftly Paul was on his feet, moving gracefully across the dance floor to take me from Chris. My brother’s lips tightened, then he strolled straight from me to Yolanda. In a minute or two they disappeared.

“I guess you think I’m all hands and clumsy feet, after dancing with Julian,” said Paul, who could dance better than Chris. Even when the music changed into a faster rhythm with a jungle beat he followed along, surprising me that he could let go of his dignity and jiggle around almost as abandoned as a college kid. “Paul, you’re wonderful!” He laughed and said I made him feel young again. It was so much fun to see him like this, relaxed, that I went a bit wild with my dancing.

Carrie and Henny looked tired and ill-at-ease. “I’m sleepy,” complained Carrie, rubbing her eyes. “Can’t we go to bed now?” It was twelve o’clock when we dropped Henny and Carrie off at their hotel, then Paul and I sat in a quiet Italian café and looked at one another. He still wore the mustache—not a neat, dandy one, but a thick brush above his sensual lips. He’d gained a few pounds, but it didn’t detract from his looks or his appeal. He reached across the table to gather both my hands in his, then lifted them to his face so he could rub his cheek against them. And all the while he did this, his eyes asked a burning question, forcing a question from me. “Paul, have you found someone else?”

“Have you?”

“I asked first.”

“I’m not looking for anyone else.”

It was an answer to make my heartbeats quicken, for it had been so long and I loved him too much. I watched him pay the check, pick up my coat and hold it, and then his own
for me to hold. Our eyes met—and then we almost ran from the restaurant to the nearest hotel where he registered us as Mr. and Mrs. Paul Sheffield. In a room painted dark red, he took off my clothes with such seductive slowness I was ready even before he went down on his knees to kiss me everywhere. Then he held me close, caressed and cherished me, kissed and pleasured until we were again made one.

After we were spent, he traced his finger along my lips, looking at me so tenderly. “Catherine, what I wrote on that hotel register I meant,” he said, kissing me softly.

I stared at him, disbelieving. “Paul, don’t tease me.”

“I’m not teasing, Catherine. I’ve missed you so much since you’ve been away. I realized what a fool I’ve been to deny you and myself the chance to find happiness. Life is too short to have so many doubts. Now you’re finding success in New York; I want to share it with you. I don’t want us to have to sneak around behind Chris’s back, I don’t want to have to worry about the small-town gossips. I want to be with you, I want you forever, I want you to be my wife.”

“Oh Paul,” I cried, throwing my arms about his neck, “I’ll love you forever, I promise!” My eyes filled with tears, I was so relieved he’d asked me to marry him at last. “I’ll make you the best wife any man has ever known.” I meant it too.

We didn’t sleep that night. We stayed awake, planning how it would be when we were married. I would stay with the company, somehow we’d work it out. The only shadow that darkened our joy was Chris. How would we tell Chris? We decided to wait until Christmas, when I would be in Clairmont. Until then I had to keep my happiness a secret, hide it from the world, so no one would guess I was about to become Mrs. Paul Scott Sheffield.

T
hat was the autumn of my happiness, of my burgeoning success, of my love for Paul. I thought I had fate fully under my control; I dared it to stop me, for I was free and running true on my course. Almost on top now. I had nothing to fear now, nothing at all. I couldn’t wait to tell the world about my engagement to Paul. But stealthily I protected my secret. I told no one, not Julian, nor Madame Zolta, for there was much at stake, and I had to bide my time, to make sure everything would continue to go my way. Right now I still needed Julian to partner me, just as much as he needed me. And I needed Madame Zolta to have complete confidence in me. If she knew I was going to be married, something she did not highly approve of, she might not give me all the lead roles, she might think I was a lost cause and not worth her time. And I still had to be famous. I still had to show Momma how much better I was than she.

Now that Julian and I were achieving a little recognition, Madame Zolta began to pay us more money. Julian came running to me one Saturday morning, terribly excited as he
grabbed me up and swung me off my feet in a circle. “Guess what? The old witch said I could buy her Cadillac on a time payment plan! It’s only two and a half years old, Cathy.” He looked wistful. “Of course, I always hoped my first Cadillac would be a brand new one, but when a certain ballet mistress is scared to death a certain sensational
danseur
might join another ballet company and take along with him her best ballerina—how can that certain someone refuse to almost give away her Cadillac?”

“Blackmail!” I cried. He laughed and grabbed my hand, and we dashed to look at his new car parked outside our apartment building. My breath pulled in, it looked so new! “Oh, Julian, I love it! You couldn’t blackmail her if she didn’t want you to have one of her pets—she knows you will pamper it—and don’t ever, ever sell it.”

“Oh, Cathy,” his eyes shone brilliantly with unused tears. “Can’t you see why I love you so? We’re alike—why can’t you love me, just a little?” Proudly he swung open the door to give me the rare privilege of being the first girl to ride in his first Cadillac.

We had a wild and crazy kind of day from there on. We drove through Central Park and all the way up through Harlem, to the George Washington Bridge and back. It was raining but I didn’t mind. It was warm and cozy in the car.

Then Julian started in again. “Cathy . . . you’re never going to love me, are you?” It was a question he put to me at least once or twice a day, in one form or another. I longed to tell him of my engagement to Paul, to put an end to his questions once and for all. But I steadfastly kept my secret.

“It’s because you’re still a virgin, isn’t it? I’ll be so gentle, so tender, Cathy . . . give me a chance, please.”

“Good God, Julian, is that all you ever have on your mind?”

“Yeah!” he snarled. “You’re damned right it is! And I’m sick and tired of the game you play with me!” He guided the car out
into a heavy stream of traffic. “You’re a cockteaser. You lead me on while we dance, then kick me in the groin when we’re not!”