A Summer of Kings (25 page)

Sophia curtsied several times before she sat down in the seat I had set out for Pip, and then Stewart got up to perform his ballet. He looked back toward the library at me while Beatrice put the record on, and I could see by the wild look in his eyes that he was petrified. I stuck my hand out the door and showed him that my fingers were crossed for him, and he nodded at me. The music began and he started to move. His first few steps were wobbly, and I thought maybe he shouldn't have started with an arabesque since he had to balance on one foot to do it, which was too hard when you're so nervous, but once Stewart got leaping and turning, he loosened up, and then he held his next arabesque without a single tremor. He was beautiful. His curly hair flopped around and his cheeks got bright red and he looked just like an angel dancing.

I stuck my head out the door a little further to see if Mother and Dad liked Stewart's performance and I saw Mother sitting up ramrod straight with her lips pinched tight and Dad sitting with his hand rapidly tapping his knee, not in rhythm to the music.

"Come on, he's beautiful, can't you see it?" I asked under my breath.

Stewart finished his first dance with a grand tour jeté and landed on his right foot and held it while Beatrice turned down the music to make it sound like it was fading out. Stewart then took a bow and I shouted, "Hooray!" and clapped from inside the library, and everybody else did, too, but I could see that Mother and Dad still didn't look happy. Their claps were more polite than everyone else's.

Sophia stood up in the middle of the applause and said, "There will now be a five-minute intermission while Stewart changes for his next dance. Please enjoy the pound cake and juice we have set up in the solarium."

Before Sophia had finished her announcement, Auntie Pie had jumped up and headed for the solarium so she'd be first at the cake. The others moved more slowly, and before Mother or Dad could say anything to Stewart, he ran off to the library to join me and get changed for his next ballet.

"Did you see their faces?" Stewart said, still breathless and flushed from his performance when he came into the room.

I helped him off with his Robin Hood top. "They're just surprised. They need a bit of time to get used to it, that's all," I said.

"Dad looked like he wanted to yank me off the floor by my ear," Stewart said, pulling his swim trunks on
over his tights. "I'm so nervous. Did you see how shaky I was?"

"You looked beautiful, Stewart."

Stewart scowled. "I don't want to look beautiful. Dad doesn't want to see that. I want to look strong and athletic."

I nodded and handed him the big cardboard surfboard Auntie Pie had made from an old refrigerator carton I had retrieved from our garage. She cut out the shape and Stewart painted it blue with the words
SURFIN
'
USA
in fat red letters running along its length. On the bottom, Auntie Pie had glued a surfboard-shaped piece of felt so that the board could slide across the ballroom floor at the end of Stewart's dance.

"You do look strong, and wait until they see you do that cartwheel without any hands. It's like you're flying, Stewart. They'll love it."

"I hope so." Stewart looked up at me, his worried eyes wide and innocent-looking, and I smiled and crossed my fingers on both hands and held them up.

"Good luck," I said.

Stewart ground some rosin into the bottoms of his ballet slippers so they wouldn't slip too much on the floor and gave me a lopsided smile. "Thanks," he said. He kissed me on the cheek. "You look really pretty, Esther. I'm sorry Pip didn't come."

I shrugged a shoulder and didn't say anything. A few seconds later we heard Sophia ringing the servants' buzzer, a button set in the wall of each room in the
house, and Stewart turned and hurried out of the library with the painted surfboard under his arm.

I stood by the door and watched him take his place in the center of the room with the surfboard held up in front of him, shielding him from the audience. The room was so quiet, I could hear my heart pounding in my ears. Mother and Dad both sat with frozen death expressions on their faces, and I was glad that Stewart couldn't see them.

I said a quick prayer for him.

Then Beatrice started the record and Stewart stayed still and hidden during the short musical introduction, but as soon as the Beach Boys started singing, "If everybody had an ocean," Stewart exploded, first by pressing the surfboard to the floor and cartwheeling over it in one slick movement, and then springing up and leaping and turning and flying. He was just flying. Beatrice had turned the music up loud and it must have really energized Stewart, because I had never seen him leap so high. Beatrice began clapping to the music, and Auntie Pie and King-Roy joined in. Then Monsieur Vichy, Mother, and Dad started clapping, and Stewart really flew. He was wild and yet he was graceful. He was all over the room and yet he was in control; he was in total control. Toward the end he did a series of eight leap-turns in a great circle around the surfboard, and then he picked up the board and ran and slid across the room on it and finished with his arms paddling in the imaginary water as the Beach Boys' song faded.

Then he sprung up from the board and did a low bow while everyone, even Mother and Dad, stood up and cheered. Everyone, that is, except Sophia. She sat in her seat with her arms crossed and a worried pout on her face. But that didn't matter, Stewart was a rip-roaring success!

I let Stewart enjoy the limelight for a while longer but once the applause had died down and everyone had taken their seats, I signaled to King-Roy to announce me, which he had reluctantly agreed to do. But when he stood up and made his announcement, he did it right—with lots of excitement and pizzazz.

He said, "Announcing ... the one and only ... the greatest ... the most talented tap dancer of them all—live from Westchester County, New York—Miss Esther Young!"

I heard the applause and I made my entrance just the way King-Roy had taught me, with shuffle steps out from the library to the center of the room. I looked at everyone smiling at me, and I smiled so wide back at them, I thought my mouth might rip apart.

"Why, Esther Josephine Young, look at you!" Mother said. "You're beautiful!" I looked at Dad and he whistled, and then I saw Monsieur Vichy's cigar drop right out of his mouth into his lap, and Auntie Pie clapped and nodded, and Stewart just glowed, and King-Roy's eyes looked wide in his head and he was nodding
like Auntie Pie, and Sophia's eyes had turned to mean little slits, but I ignored her. This was my turn to shine.

I gave a little curtsy, and then when everyone had quieted down, I began with my time step. I made sure that I kept my upper body relaxed and my arms light and moving with the steps, and I saw King-Roy nodding his approval out of the corner of my eye. I finished with a twirl and another curtsy and everyone applauded and I signaled for Beatrice to start up "Stomping at the Savoy" for my Shim Sham. While I danced I could see that Mother and Dad and everyone were impressed. I was even so impressed with myself that I added some extra flourishes with my arms and my hips, and as King-Roy would say, I "really got down into it."

When I finished the Shim Sham, everyone cheered for me, and I just couldn't stand it, I felt so proud. I couldn't wait to show them the Shoop Shoop dance. It had a number of difficult rhythms and steps that I knew would surprise everybody when they saw that I could do them so well.

Before Beatrice put on the music, I said, "I would now like Mr. King-Roy Johnson to please join me in performing his very own Shoop Shoop dance."

Everyone cheered and so even though it wasn't in the plans, King-Roy stood up and walked over to me and whispered, "I'll get you for this," but I saw the light in his eyes, so I knew he was pleased I had asked him.

I signaled for Beatrice to start the music, and we waited eight counts while Sophia climbed into Mother's
lap and got settled, and then we were off, kicking and tapping and swinging and shooping, and it was so much fun, I laughed out loud and so did King-Roy, but then in the middle of our "double wing" steps, I heard an ear-piercing scream.

I looked over at the audience, and I heard it again. Sophia screamed, "No! Stop it! Mother, make them stop! She's better than I am! Esther's better than I am!" She hopped off of Mother's lap and ran at me. "Stop it. You just stop it! You're ugly and stupid and a no-talent dumbo."

King-Roy and I had both stopped dancing and Beatrice had turned off the record player, and while Sophia ran at me, screaming, Mother jumped up and ran after her and grabbed her just before she rammed into me with her fists.

Mother picked Sophia up and said, "Shush, now, Sophia. It's all right. She's not better than you."

"She is. She's better. I don't know how to do that. I don't know how to do that dance," she wailed, and kicked in Mother's arms.

Mother spoke to Sophia as she carried her back to her seat. "Sophia, it doesn't matter. It's just a silly little tap dance. Anybody could learn it if they wanted to. It's nothing. It's nothing, Sophia, dear."

Everyone else had stood up by this time, and they gathered around Sophia to soothe her while she sobbed and choked and stole the show right out from under us. I looked over at King-Roy and he looked so angry, I
thought he might march over to Sophia and Mother and strangle one of them, but he didn't. He marched right past them, through the solarium and the living room to the foyer, and then I heard his
tap-tap
feet marching all the way up the steps.

Mother kept telling Sophia that my dance was nothing, a silly little tap dance. She had called King-Roy's dance a silly nothing. She had called my efforts a silly nothing. I stood in the middle of the ballroom stunned and unable to move while Mother kept trying to soothe Sophia.

"It doesn't matter one whit," she said while Sophia kicked and cried some more. "You're our star. You'll always be our star, Sophia, honey."

Then Dad suggested Mother take Sophia up to her room while the rest of us cleaned up. The show was over. Because of Sophia, the show was over, and I didn't get to finish my fancy footwork tap dance.

I slapped over to the row of chairs and with all the noise and fury I could muster, I slammed the seats shut and hauled a couple of them off to the closet in the foyer. When I returned to the ballroom, I saw that Stewart and Dad were gone and I asked, "Where's Stewart and Dad?" and Monsieur Vichy pointed toward the library with his cigar. "In there. Your papa wanted to have a leetle talk with Stewart."

"Oh yeah?" I said, feeling more anger building up in me. I imagined my father telling Stewart that he couldn't dance ballet after all, and I felt like barging into the
library and yelling my head off, but I decided to march on up to Sophia's room instead and yell my head off at Mother.

Beatrice had collected the record player and the records, and Auntie Pie had gathered up all the silly typed-up programs and was taking care of the food table, and Monsieur Vichy was hauling the rest of the chairs to the closet, so I decided to do just that, march into Sophia's room and give Mother and her both a piece of my mind. I headed toward the solarium, and Beatrice called after me, "You did a really nice job with everything, Esther."

Auntie Pie mumbled around the pound cake she had stuffed into her mouth, "Very impressive, dear."

"Well, you didn't get to even see the impressive part," I said, stopping to glare at Auntie Pie. "Nobody did because Sophia had to act the brat and spoil everything!"

I stormed off and charged up the stairs and down the hallway to Sophia's room, and there I found Mother cooing over the dear little precious Sophia, who lay on her side in the bed, choking on her leftover sobs.

"Mother!" I said.

Mother looked up at me. She put her finger to her mouth and shook her head. "Shh," she said. "Not now."

"But I want to talk to you, Mother."

Mother patted Sophia's back. "Not now, Esther. I just told you. Now is
not
a good time."

I put my hands on my hips and I felt my face just burning with rage. "It's not a good time? Not a good time!
When would be a good time, Mother, in the middle of someone's performance? In the middle of Sophia's play, maybe? Should I jump up
then
to have a talk with you?"

Sophia yelled over her shoulder. "Go away, Esther. I hate you."

"Oh yeah, spoiled baby brat."

"Esther, that's enough!" Mother stood up. "I do not need one of your scenes right now."

"One of my scenes? One of
my
scenes? Boy oh boy!" I stamped my foot. "That just takes the cake.
Why,
Mother,
why,
do you
always
tell me I'm making a scene, but when Sophia throws a tantrum, it's poor little precious Sophia? Why is that? I'd just really like to know, 'cause it looks to me like you've created a little monster over there." I pointed at Sophia's back, and Sophia rolled over and stuck her tongue out at me.

Looking at her lying on her frilly little princess bed with a gleam in her eyes, I just wanted to reach out and yank her up and shake her so hard all her little baby teeth would fall out.

Mother moved toward me, blocking my view of Sophia, and said, "Esther, I will not tell you again. Now is not a good time to talk; we'll have this conversation in private later." Mother took hold of the door as if she was going to close it in my face, but I stepped inside the room so that she couldn't do it.

"No, Mother. Now is just the right time to talk. I don't care that I'm making a scene. Who cares? I'll make a scene if I want. I want some answers."

Mother grabbed me by my arm and said through gritted teeth, "Sophia, I'll be back in a little while. Why don't you read a book? Will you do that, sweetheart?"

Then Mother, still with her hand around my arm, pulled me out of the room and led me down the hall to her bedroom saying, "Esther, I don't know when I've been so upset with you."

"It was about a week ago," I said. "You're always upset with me. How is it I'm in trouble when Sophia was the one who ruined the show? Why don't you ever say to Sophia that you don't know when you've ever been so upset with her? I'm upset with her every day. She's a monster, Mother. Everyone down at the theater thinks so, you know. How can you let her call me stupid all the time? Why do you let her?"