Marcia Talley - Dead Man Dancing

I know a dark secluded place…

Circling, circling they stalked left. Whirling, whirling, they slithered right, their footwork so intricate it was hard for the eye to follow.

A flick of the foot here, a snap of the head there.

I tore my eyes away long enough to glance down the row to Ruth, wondering how she might be taking it, and was surprised (and relieved!) to see her beaming with pride.

You will be free, to gaze at me…

Back on stage, Melanie paused as if her shoes were glued to the floor. When Hutch backed away ever so slowly, Melanie’s feet stayed where they were and she began a gentle slide into his arms. He turned, she bobbed up, they whirled and swiveled and spun until before anyone knew it, Hutch was back in the chair where he’d begun, with Melanie sitting on his lap. On the last olé of the song, Melanie snatched the fedora off Hutch’s head and plopped it down on her own.

The audience sprang to its feet. They screamed, they hooted, they cheered.

I jumped up and down, cupped my hands around my mouth and shouted ‘bravo’ so many times that I made my throat sore. I hadn’t yelled so long and so loud since the Orioles won the World Series back in 1983.

We couldn’t see the judges’ faces, but they must have been smiling, too.

A voice I recognized as Jonathan Job’s said, ‘Wow. I haven’t seen anything so well coordinated since Torvill and Dean electrified the world with Bolero back in the 80s! How long have you two been dancing together?’

Melanie sprang from Hutch’s lap, and the two of them made their way over to the standing microphone where Melanie breathed into it, ‘Three months.’

Samantha gushed, ‘You are just so amazing! Three months! You are blowing my mind. I am speechless!’

Hutch and Melanie’s routine had blown Neville’s mind, too. ‘That, ladies and gentlemen, is what the tango is all about! A walking seduction. What can I say? Judges, this couple goes on to New York City. Am I right?’

‘Oh, yes, definitely,’ Samantha cooed.

‘Too right.’ This from Jonathan.

I was in real danger of choking on the lump in my throat.

As the audience erupted into applause all around us, Chloe squealed, ‘They won? Uncle Hutch won?’

Eva patted her head. ‘Yes, indeed. Your Uncle Hutch won.’

At the end of the row, I noticed Paul fanning Ruth with Chloe’s notebook. She’d slouched in her chair, broken leg half blocking the aisle. I recognized the symptoms; she was hyperventilating, but nothing a few minutes of in-with-the-good-air, out-with-the-bad-air couldn’t cure.

Somehow we managed to sit through the next seven auditions, but the judges could have been watching dancing bears or boxing kangaroos or maypole dancing for all we cared. When Dave Carson came out at the end of the set to help us relax with ‘seated sun salutations’ – apparently the big man was into yoga, too – we half carried, half walked Ruth out of the auditorium, retrieved her wheelchair, and hurried out to the street.

We’d agreed to meet Hutch and Melanie at the Cheesecake Factory for lunch, no matter what, so we walked, rolled (and some of us floated) down to the Pratt Street Pavilion on the waterfront, arriving just as the restaurant opened.

A grilled eggplant sandwich was in my future, I knew, but when Hutch and Melanie showed up, I planned to treat everyone to a round of Godiva chocolate brownie sundaes. We would celebrate their triumph in style.

But Jay was not all right. Far from it.

He’d rallied in the ambulance, but by the time the EMTs rolled him into the Emergency Room, he felt nauseated and was complaining of pains in his abdomen. Before the staff could check him in, he began vomiting.

This report came to me directly from Chance.

Early on Saturday, when nobody answered my repeated calls to the Giannotti home, I’d stopped by J & K to see if anyone had news. It was before business hours, the studio was locked, but I could see Chance through the window, so I pounded on the glass until he looked up from whatever he was doing on the office computer and unlocked the door.

‘Sorry to interrupt your work,’ I apologized as Chance stepped aside to let me in.

‘Not a problem. When it comes to juggling Excel spreadsheets, I actually welcome interruption.’

‘Working on the books?’

‘For my sins. I’ve got an associate’s degree in accounting, so guess who gets tapped to send out the past dues?’ He slipped his hands into the rear pockets of his jeans, the denim stretched so tight over his adorable buns that I was amazed he could get a toothpick into the pockets, let alone his fingers.

‘I’ve got Jay’s gym bag in the car,’ I told Chance. ‘After the EMTs took Jay away, Hutch retrieved it from the dressing room at the Hippodrome. Hutch had a couple of meetings today, so I volunteered to take care of it.’ I waved in the general direction of the parking lot. ‘Should I leave the bag here, do you think, or take it to their home?’

Chance shrugged his muscular shoulders. ‘Your call.’

I shrugged my bony shoulders back. ‘There could be something valuable in the bag, I suppose. Don’t want Kay to worry about it.’

Chance seemed uninterested. ‘Whatever.’

In point of fact, I’d already searched Jay’s gym bag, and found nothing inside that I’d consider valuable, unless you count a pair of black denims, a white T-shirt, several pairs of socks, a can of talcum powder, a comb, and a jar of Dippity-Do hair gel. ‘I guess I’ll just take it up to Kay at the hospital, then. Is Jay still there, do you know?’

‘They kept him overnight for observation,’ Chance informed me. He checked his watch. ‘Kay called this morning to ask me to check Jay’s schedule and let his students know he won’t be coming in this week. She said the doctors would decide by noon whether to release Jay or not. It’s twelve thirty now and I haven’t heard, so I figure they’re still poking and prodding.’

‘Kay must be frantic with worry.’

‘I’d say so. She spent the night on a sofa. She sounded exhausted when we talked.’

‘You have to admire Jay, going on stage in front of all those people when he felt so sick. Their paso doble was stunning, even if it ended a bit prematurely.’

‘Jay’s a showman. It was a really big deal to be asked to perform for the Shall We Dance? audience. No way he’d miss the opportunity. He was nervous about it, for sure. Jay kept telling me he was afraid he’d screw it up, but you probably noticed how Kay kept stroking his ego, pushing him in practice.’

Frankly, I hadn’t, but I didn’t say so. Before their exhibition at the Hippodrome, the only thing I’d seen Kay throw at Jay was drop-dead looks.

‘Kay’s quite the competitor. Always was.’ Chance looked thoughtful. ‘I think Kay and your friend Hutch would have been champions if Hutch hadn’t dropped out of dance to focus on law school. It took Kay three years to find another partner.’

‘Jay?’

‘Not Jay. She met Jay at the Internationals. They were both dancing with someone else. Have you ever seen a competition?’

I shook my head. ‘I was hoping to attend the Sweetheart Ball tomorrow to see how it works, and to watch Tom and Laurie perform, but I already had a commitment to watch my grandkids.’

‘Well, between heats there’s general dancing. Jay asked Kay to tango, and the rest as they say, is history. Ironic that the partners they ditched hooked up and went on to beat Jay and Kay out of the US championships two years in a row. Ha ha ha.’

‘Is Kay bitter about that?’

‘Nah. They’re both too wrapped up in running the studio now to worry about competitions. I think Kay’s accepted the fact that Jay’s much more interested in the business end of things. Recently he’d been saying he plans to hang up his shoes, that he’s too old to compete.’