The Last Dance

This work of adult fiction, loosely based on characters portrayed by Russell Crowe, includes adult language and experiences; you have been warned. No copyright infringement on the original work is intended. Copyright Reagan Kavanagh 2007.

Author's Note: There are several versions of “Save the Last Dance for Me,” (Dolly Parton, Favorites, 1984) but the one by Dolly Parton is the one Reagan's mother would have favoured. Clicking the link above or the one in context will start the song.

MAXIMUS
She is inordinately fond of music from the days of her late mother’s adolescence; I speak specifically of that popular during the 1960s. She has the player used by her mother whilst at university and all the old vinyl records that had been played so many times. The old player – a record player, with spindles of two sizes to accommodate the vinyl platters of different sizes – is large and cumbersome in comparison to the playback units of this day. The records themselves are bulky, prone to warping in extremes of heat and shattering in very cold weather, and best stored on their edge to preclude those occurrences. Once warped, the platters are useless as they will no longer properly reproduce the original sound; the result of a platter breaking from cold is obvious.

Shortly before our move to the farm, I fashioned a cabinet for Cassandra that would accommodate not only her mother’s player, but all the records my wife holds dear. It is necessarily large, though nicely fashioned. It was one of the few pieces of furniture my wife demanded be brought inside the old farmhouse on the day we moved. She would not consider storing the player or the treasured platters in the barn with the remainder of the furniture that awaited completion of our new home and subsequent movement into that edifice. The cabinet sits in our lounge room; it will be placed in the media room on completion of the new house.

I can tell when she is melancholy, for she pulls out old records favoured by her mother and plays them for hours. When I arrived home this night, she was sitting in the darkened lounge with one recording playing repeatedly. She looked up when I entered the room; I could see the tracks of tears on her face in the light reflected from the kitchen. I put down my briefcase and removed my coat before going to her, pulling her to her feet and taking her in my arms to hold her close to my body.

“What troubles you, Cara?” Her voice was choked with tears as she tried to answer.

“I miss her, Max. I miss her so much!” There was no doubt in my mind as to the point of reference for 'her;' it could only be Cassandra's late mother. The dam within my wife burst, and she sobbed into my shirt front. Emily was born a month past. My research of breeding women has informed me that women become more emotional immediately prior and for a time after giving birth; I trust that is the reason for her now missing her mother so acutely. I sat on the couch, taking her onto my lap, and continued holding her close. In time, she ceased her weeping and looked at me. I put her on her feet and went to check on our daughter; she was sleeping soundly, and I returned to my wife.

“I fed Emily and put her down shortly before you got home. I’m sorry, Caro. I’m such a mess just now, but I miss my mother so. I’d give almost anything if she could have lived long enough to hold Emily in her arms. She wanted this for me – for both of us – for so long.” The song was still playing in the background, and I sought to deflect her attention from the loss of her mother.

“What particular significance did this song hold for your mother?” She dabbed at her eyes and took a deep breath.

“She loved that song. I think it represented a wish she always wanted but was never fulfilled …at least I never saw it fulfilled.”

“In what respect was it unfilled?” She settled again and I could almost see her travel back in her memories.

“When I was little, my father’s company gave him a membership at the country club. He played golf; golf is a good way to do business outside of office hours.” That was true enough in certain professions.

“With the club membership came the golf course, access to the swimming pool and tennis courts, and an open invitation to all the social functions that gave my father access to making good business contacts and subsequent deals. There was a dinner buffet every Saturday night, and everyone who was ‘anyone’ in town was always there. There was either a live band, or the juke box from the kids’ rec centre was moved into the ballroom so the adults could dance. Mother always wanted my father to have the last dance of the evening with her; I don’t recall his ever doing so. That dance was always with some other woman.” I was puzzled in the extreme. Her mother’s wishing to have the last dance of the evening with her husband seemed appropriate and a simple request to gratify.

“Did he offer a reason for his refusal?”

“He said it was ‘good business’ to have that dance with the wife of a man he was doing business with at the time. He’d leave mother and me at the table and take someone else to the dance floor. After that, we’d go home. I’d get ready for bed; he’d come in and kiss me goodnight, and leave.” I nodded as I spoke.

“That last seems reasonable. You were young, and the hour was late. It was time for him to bid you goodnight and leave you to your slumber.” She shook her head at me.

“You don’t get it, Max. He would leave, as in kiss me goodnight, and then leave the house to meet some other woman, usually the woman he’d had that last dance with an hour earlier at the country club. I didn’t realise what was happening until I was about ten, and I heard my mother crying one night as she begged him to stay with her. I crept out of bed and down the hall in time to see him toss her hands away and walk out the door. I went back to my room and stood at the window …I watched him drive away. From that point forward, I watched the scenario play out every Saturday night until I left home for university. By the time I was 12, I realised he stayed home long enough to shave before leaving the house and why he was doing it.

“That’s what I was referring to on the occasion I told you my father screwed around with every woman in the county. I’m only surprised he wasn’t shot by one of their husbands. As if what he did wasn’t bad enough, he’d drag mother and me to Church every Sunday morning and sit there feigning piety and familial duty. He forced my mother to endure the whispers about him and whoever he was fucking at any given point in time. In truth, I don’t think he ever wanted to marry her, but marriage was expected in that day, so he got married. An unmarried man wasn’t considered responsible enough to advance professionally, so my mother was the window-dressing for his career. He never wanted children, but when I came along, I added to his so-called respectability. He had a beautiful wife, a charming, well-mannered daughter, and for all outward appearances, we were the perfect family. It was a sham, Max, all of it was for show. All he ever cared about was what people saw, and he gave them what they wanted to see. He showed them what was good for him professionally.”

I pondered her thoughts for a time before speaking once more. I now understood her question of me regarding herself and the child she carried when I had challenged Terry for leadership of our firm; she asked if I had married her as ‘window dressing’ for my profession. Given the experiences of her childhood and youth, she had good reason to ask.

“Cara, I have told you of my family and the experiences I knew as a child. I have told you of my relationships with women in my past …first Lucilla, then my wife and Ethelinde; you know that which I had with you in the first life. You have never told me of your childhood other than the drunken episode in which you and Ellen participated that lead to your incarceration whilst yet a girl. Will you speak of it to me now? Perhaps in the telling you will enlighten yourself.”

REAGAN
Wow. The tables had turned, and my husband was now in the position of therapist. I’d never even considered telling Max about my family of origin or my admittedly dysfunctional childhood and wasn’t at all sure I wanted to go there; however, things are different now. We’re parents and talking about my own screwed up childhood might be one of the keys to making me a better parent to our daughter as well as any future children we may have. I truly didn’t want to think back on those years, but if I didn’t do so now, I could very well be risking re-enacting some of the dynamics at work in the house in which I was raised. I took a deep breath, got off his lap, and sat in my own chair before beginning my journey back in time.

“The earliest memory I have is when I was three-years-old. I was peeking round the refrigerator and looking down the length of the kitchen toward the lounge. Mother was making dinner, and my father was sitting in his chair reading the paper. I’d probably been there for several minutes when my mother turned to my father and told him I was trying to get his attention; she said she’d appreciate it if he would reciprocate.

“He lowered the newspaper and looked at me. He asked if I know how old I was. I recall nodding; I held up three fingers and said I was three. He nodded and looked at my mother. I’ll never forget his comment …‘At least she knows how to count.’ That may have been the moment my awareness that I’d never be able to please him began.” Max reached over and took my hand in his, rubbing the back of it with his thumb as he watched me closely and listened.

“I honestly don’t remember a great deal of interaction with my father. When I was six or seven, it snowed, and he helped Ellie and me build a snowman. He said even girls should know how to build something. When I was eight, I was accused by a classmate of stealing one of her pencils. The teacher didn’t think I’d done it, and I certainly didn’t have the bloody thing because I hadn't taken it, but all such accusations were reported to parents. The pencil had red and white stripes on it …I think the girl had got it at the fair …and I liked it. What child wouldn’t? I’d told my mother about it the day I saw it, and she said perhaps we could find one like it for me. That was that; we couldn’t find one, and I didn’t take the one belonging to the other child.

“The principal called my father at his office; he left work and was waiting for me when I got home. He interrogated me in much the same manner I’ve interrogated the accused over the years. I tried to explain that although I liked the pencil, I hadn’t taken it. The child had left it on her desk when we went outdoors for recess; perhaps someone else had taken it, or perhaps she’d put it in her book bag and forgotten about doing so. My father stopped me at that point and said I was lying. I said I wasn’t and hadn’t done anything wrong. His response was that any time someone started ‘explaining’ their actions – and he managed to make that a dirty word – he knew they were lying. That was the last time I ever attempted to justify anything to him.”

“Just before my ninth birthday, I screwed up my courage and asked my father why he didn’t like me. Rather than trying to reassure me that he did like me, he actually told me the truth. He said it wasn’t that he actually disliked me specifically, but that he’d never wanted children at all. He fathered me because children were necessary as a part of his place in the community. A responsible man was married and had children, and that was why he allowed my mother to have me.

“He went on to say that even though he hadn’t wanted me, I was a reasonably good child, and he would certainly do his best to ‘do right’ by me. I asked what that meant. His response was that he would make sure I always had a roof over my head and enough food and decent clothes to wear. He didn’t plan on sending me to college, as girls just grew up and got married and pregnant, and he wasn’t wasting his money when I’d never use my education anyway. That was the day I determined to make him eat those words.

“By the time I was 14, I was taller than most of my peers, boys included. I was slender and didn’t have the adolescent acne that plagued so many of my friends. Mother and I made a trip to Dallas during the Christmas holidays to shop and went to Neiman Marcus. We were browsing through blouses, hoping to find one for a cousin when a woman walked up to my mother and introduced herself. Her name was Susan Calvert; she was the fashion coordinator for the store. She put together all their fashion shows, selected the clothing and accessories, and basically set the tone for what the Dallas elite would be wearing each season. As a former fashion model herself, she also chose and trained all of Neiman’s runway models for both the Dallas and Houston stores. She asked my mother if I’d ever done any modelling. I had, but only as a child, and had done nothing since I was eight-years-old. Susan said she would take care of that, and before we left Dallas, she’d had me with a photographer, and I had my first adult portfolio.

“Susan made arrangements to put me with a modelling coach in Tyler and enrolled me in diction lessons because as she said, ‘Sooner or later, someone is going to ask you a question, and I don't want you to sound like an Irish Mick who's been living in the East Texas Piney Woods. You reflect Nieman-Marcus stores; you need to sound the part.’ She never minced words. Susan originally wanted me to model clothes for teens, but within six months, she realised she had a true clothes horse on her hands. She also discovered that when I was in full make-up, I looked 25. I modelled teen clothing for less than a year, and then went into haute couture. I was wearing clothes by Dior, Givenchy, and de la Renta before I was 16. I was making good money and socking it away for college because I knew damned well that going to university would be on my nickel.

“Susan brought me to Dallas for every show they had here, and sent me to Houston for most of the shows there. She also sent me to New York and Boston and to London a couple of times. The store paid my trips and my mother’s expenses as well; I was far too young and inexperienced to be globe-trotting by myself. A couple of the big name designers on the North American continent picked me up, and I modelled for Carolina Herrera at her New York salon, as well as for Calvin Klein and Ralph Lauren.

“Thinking back on it, my last three years in high school may have been the best of my father’s life. I was making money and investing it for my education; that meant he wouldn’t have to listen to me whine – his word, not mine – about not being able to afford to attend university. I spent half my time on the road even though I was still in school, and mother went with me; her degree was in secondary education, and she tutored me. Our frequent absence from home meant my father was free to cat around on mother as much as he liked; I’m surprised someone’s jealous husband didn't kill him during that time frame.”

I stopped talking, becoming aware that my husband’s usually impassive face had lapsed into melancholy. I should have known my retrospective would upset him. It’s just this side of inconceivable to Max that anyone could – much less would – speak so scathingly of a parent.

“Max, the reality is that though I loved my father and respected him, I didn’t like him; I know he didn’t like me. I have no idea as to whether or not my love was returned. I know the respect wasn’t. To him I was a financial burden he undertook to make himself more professionally acceptable. Men of his generation were expected to marry and have children. That’s how the ‘game’ was played, and he played by the rules, at least on the surface …the screwing round on my mother wasn't in the 'rule book,' but he got away with it. It took me years to realise and accept it, but the simple fact is that parents and children don’t always love each other, and they don’t always like each other. My father and I fit very neatly into that descriptor.”

He was silent for a few moments before speaking.

“And what of your mother? What was the relationship between the two of you?” I finally felt the smile break through my still unresolved anger at my father.

“She was the most incredible woman I’ve ever known. She was born to be a mother, and I can’t imagine any woman having a better and more loving mother than I did.”

“Tell me of her.”

How do you tell your husband of the person you loved most in the world until you met him?

“She was loving and warm and funny, and everyone but my father adored her; I don't think he actually disliked her, but she was an appendage, an accoutrement to his success. She embraced life and all it had to offer, even when what it offered wasn’t pleasant; she accepted the less than wonderful things and made the best of them. I’d like to think she taught me to do the same; most of the time I think she succeeded.

“She was amazingly intelligent and not only in the academic sense. She had native intelligence. I suspect you would have found her a match for Lucilla in the brains department.”

“I find you to exceed Lucilla in that area. It does not surprise me to learn that your mother was very intelligent.”

“She was more than just intelligent, Max …she was wise. She had the ability for discernment and discretion, she wasn’t judgemental, and she was fair in every sense of the word. She raised me to understand that life wouldn’t always be fair, but that I could still make the most of it and be reasonably happy as a result. She was a lady, Max, and that isn’t something I’m willing to say about many women. She was gracious and charming; she was without doubt the best professional asset my father had, and he was too foolish to realise it.” I fell silent for a moment, and he spoke again.

“Have you photographs of them? I have heard Ellen say you greatly resemble your mother, but I should like to see for myself.”

“Yes, I have photos; they’re in the album in my cedar chest.” I walked to the bedroom, stopping to check on Emily who was sound asleep in her crib, collected the album and returned to the lounge and sat beside my husband.

“I think my mother was a beautiful woman, but I’ll also admit to being biased. You may judge for yourself. After all I’ve said regarding my father, you likely expect him to look like an ogre; he didn’t. Although I disliked him intensely, even I could see that he was a very handsome man, for all the sternness of his appearance.” He took the album from where it sat in my lap.

“Are there photos of you in this book?”

“No …this album only has photos of my mother and father. The ones of me are in the barn. I know what I looked like as a child and adolescent, so I’ve never bothered to keep them out and accessible.” The smile on his face told me we’d be in the barn soon and digging for those old albums. He opened the book and stopped at the first page. It was blank but for a photo in each corner of the page. I’d positioned the photos so that my parents were facing away from each other. I’m not sure that had been a conscious act on my part when I put the album together, but it certainly struck me now. They didn’t communicate in life, so why should they be facing each other in death? The implication – for lack of a better term – wasn’t lost on Max.

“They are facing away from each other. Was that intentional on your part?”

“I truly don’t know. I do know that in life they were always at opposite ends of whatever continuum they happened to be on at any given moment, so it was probably intentional though beneath conscious awareness on my part.” He returned his attention to the photos for a few moments before speaking again.

“It is not difficult to see from whence your beauty derives. I have never seen a more handsome couple.” I smiled.

“They were a good looking pair; there’s no doubt about that.”

“From what you tell me, they were completely opposite in demeanour. How did they come to marry?” My laugh was bitter.

“That’s the easy part. My father was his company's regional manager in East Texas; his firm was headquartered in Houston. At one of the managers’ meetings, the company president took my father aside and indicated that he was slated for bigger things, i.e., a potential move into headquarters, but he needed a wife to make the corporate photo complete. Basically, the president did to my father what Caesar did to you …he ordered him to marry.

“My father started scouting women in Palestine – it never hurts to marry a home-town girl – and my mother came home from college on Christmas Holiday shortly thereafter. They met at a party; she had a ring on her finger when she went back to school. They married when she came home on spring break. I suspect that was the only precipitous decision my mother ever made. God knows, she paid dearly for it.” His smile was there, but it was sad.

“Making that decision resulted in your conception. I doubt she regretted your birth.” God, I hope she didn’t.

“Well, there is that. I don’t think she ever regretted having me, but I do know she regretted marrying my father.”

“Why did she not divorce him?”

“Are you kidding? Palestine, Texas in the 1960s? Add to that the fact that she was Roman Catholic, and she would have been the social outcast if she’d done that. Her family was still alive, and she’d have died before she’d have left him and embarrassed her parents by being divorced and excommunicated.” He thought on that for a bit before speaking again.

“You have shown me her grave, but your father is not at her side. Is he still alive?” I knew he’d eventually get round to that question, and I knew I had to answer.

“I don’t know. He left town on a business trip whilst I was away at university. He never came home. He didn’t call on his arrival at his destination, which he always did for some perverse reason, and when Mother checked with the hotel he was supposed to stay at, he’d never checked in. She called the police in Palestine, then in Shreveport where he was supposed to be. The police in Palestine contacted the Highway Patrol to look for his car …nothing between home and the state line. Texas DPS contacted the Louisiana State Police, and they checked the roads from the Texas border to Shreveport …nothing there either. Nothing was ever found …not his car, his suitcase, no wallet or chequebook ever surfaced, and there were no charges to his credit cards. He just drove off one day, and no one who knew him locally or professionally ever saw or heard from him again.

“I suppose he could have run off one of the roads in Louisiana and into a bayou …the ‘gators might have eaten him, or he could have been bitten by a cottonmouth and died. I don’t know, and frankly, I don’t care. Physically dead or not, he’s dead to me and has been for more than 20 years. What I do know is that the last years of my mother’s life were happy without him, and that’s all I care about.”

MAXIMUS
I knew my wife could be controlled when called upon. I had seen that in Cairo and had been told of her strength whilst I was missing. This was the first time I had witnessed her anger at her father. I had long known she bore him no true affection but was caught off guard at the depth of her antipathy for him.

I held my tongue and continued looking through the photo album, coming upon a collage of photos Cassandra had compiled of her parents.

I tapped the top left of the collage as I looked at her.

“Who is the boy?” She shrugged her shoulders before speaking.

“You tell me. Mother found it in a box of photos when we were cleaning out my father's effects a year after he disappeared …she hadn't even known he had any photos stored anywhere. He never showed me any affection – I always knew he wished I’d been a boy – but his affection for that child is certainly apparent, isn’t it?”

It was indeed. I did not ask the question, but she answered it.

“I suspect it was his son, though who the mother was, Mother and I had no idea. You can tell it wasn’t done with a good camera or quality of film. I suspect the child’s mother took it and had a print made for my father. There’s a date on the back; it was made when I was six-years-old. The boy looks to be about seven or eight, which would have made him born after my parents married. My guess is that I have a brother out there somewhere. In truth, I’d like to know who he is and meet him …and I pray he’s nothing like our father.”

Adultery takes on far greater significance in this day than in mine. Roman men were expected to have sexual relations outside of marriage; it was accepted, and no one thought the less of a man for having his share of bastards. This time is different, and a male child lacking the presence and love of his father feels that loss keenly. For my wife to see an example of her father’s care expressed to another child – whether that child was his or not – must have been painful for her in the extreme.

“Why did you include this photo in the collage?” She shrugged and shook her head.

“Every photo included shows a different aspect of my parents. It seemed appropriate to have one of my father in which he actually looked happy, even if that happiness wasn't directed toward me or my mother.” Perhaps I had best change the subject.

“Who is the man your mother is embracing?” She smiled at last.

“That was the man she should have married and didn’t. They dated through high school and put the relationship on hold when she went off to university. He went to the Texas A&M University, and Mother went to Vassar. Gabriel Forrest Hallowell …Gabe. He wasn’t at home when she met my father. He was an oceanography major and on a cruise in the Gulf that year. By the time he came home, my parents were less than a month from their wedding. That photo was taken at my grandmother's funeral. My father had disappeared several years earlier, and Gabe was my mother's mainstay when Grandmum died; my mother and her mum were as close as my mother I were.”

“And what of Gabe? Has he children now? They must be close to your age.”

She shook her head in the negative.

“Gabe never married, though I suspect he's come close a couple of times. He lives in Galveston. He's a professor of Oceanography with the Texas A&M program there. I think my mother was the love of his life, and if he couldn't have her, he just decided not to marry. He's a wonderful man, Max …you'd like him, and I know he'd like you.”

“I should like to meet him one day.”

“I think that can be arranged. He comes home each Christmas and Easter to spend time with his parents – they're both alive and still live in the house where Gabe grew up – and we could go to Palestine for Easter. I should contact him and let him know we'll be there and like to see him. He does know I've remarried …I invited him to our wedding, but he sent his regrets.” He declined to attend the wedding of the daughter of the woman he loved; most curious.

“Do you know his reasons for not attending?” She smiled sadly before answering.

“Yes …he called me two weeks before we married and apologised in advance for not being there. He said it would be too painful to watch me walk down the aisle and marry, that it would be too much like the night he watched my mother marry my father. Gabe was at their wedding, and he said it almost killed him to lose her. He said that if I could forgive him for not attending our wedding, he'd really like to meet you at some point in time. I promised him that would happen.” I pulled her into my arms, burying my face in her hair as she nestled into my chest.

“And so it shall.” The music was still playing and she she straightened, I stood and pulled her to her feet.

“Dance with me, Cara. I promise you, my last dance will always be with you.”

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