There was no answer at Sam’s door when Michelle knocked.  No rustling.  No giggles or hushed lover-voices.  Not even the sound of Lily running over the floor.  She stood for a moment in the stale-smelling hallway listening to the silence, then she walked to work.

That Monday the girls couldn’t fill all the dance requests.  Around Princess in a swarm sat and stood admirers.  The dancer wore dark pants and a black t-shirt as she spoke.  The crowd nodded at intervals, holding their drinks in limp fingers.

Michelle walked past them, past all of them, and barely glanced.

Then he was there, sitting as always alone, sipping a glass of liquor and glancing around in a stream of interconnected gestures.  Her regular.

His skin seemed even more tired, and his eyes darted around the club.  She knew he was looking for her.  Suddenly she felt tears gathering in the corners of her eyes.

When he saw her, he smiled.  The nervous energy surrounding him slowed, for a moment at least, to a comfortable hum.  As Michelle sat down beside him, background noise faded away, the strange buzz of his movements the only vibration approaching sound.

“Hi there, young lady.”  He was folding his hands over each other again and again.

“Hi,” she said.  “I haven’t seen you around here for a while.”

“Well, I’ve been busy.  You know, not everyone can be young and carefree.”  A sigh, drawn and deep.  “Once you get old like me, responsibilities, they just keep piling up.”

“So I’ve heard.”

The man stared into his glass for a moment, then sighed.  “How ‘bout you, little lady.  How old are you, twenty-one?  What do you plan on doing with the rest of your life?”

Michelle hesitated.  “Actually.  What I always wanted to be was a ballerina.”

The man nodded.  “That’s lovely.  Are you still planning on becoming one?”

“No, not really.”  The words, coming from her own mouth, should have shocked her, but they did not.  They settled comfortably, and she continued.  “I never really had a chance in that world.”

“I’ve seen you dance.  You’re phenomenal.”

“Thanks.  That’s really nice of you to say.  But I have a new goal now.”

“Which is?”

“To love as many people as possible.  And to grow.”

The man coughed, disguising a blush.  “That’s an ambitious desire.”

“It’s about time I grew some ambition,” she said.  “I don’t think I ever got your name?”

“Morris.”

“Morris, I’m Michelle.”  She put out her hand.  “That’s my real name, not my dancing name.  Would you like to go somewhere with me?”

“Where would that be?”

“I –” she stopped.  Hesitated.  “I don’t know.”

Morris coughed and began to fidget.  “Oh, Michelle.  You’re young enough to be my daughter.”

Michelle’s eyes dropped and she started wringing her own hands.  She looked from side to side, then up.  “I—I’m sorry,” she said.  “That’s not what I meant.  Really.  I just wanted to talk.  And we can even stay here if you want.  I—I just thought it might make you feel better.”

She reached out, hesitated, and touched his arm.  The man shivered, turning a visible shade of pink.

“…Michelle.”

From the touch, Michelle garnered a feeling.  An old, cold desire that lay within Morris.  She tried to concentrate.

“Morris,” she said.  “You’ve been alone since your wife died.”

“That’s right,” he said, breathing slowly.

“You say you’ve never looked at another woman.  That’s true, isn’t it?  But just because you’ve never been with anyone physically, doesn’t mean you want to be lonely.  But you’ve completely shut yourself off for years.”

Morris nodded, took a deep breath and adjusted his tie.  He looked at her and said, “You are beautiful, Michelle.  You truly are.  And a thing of beauty is a joy forever.”  He sighed and cast away his eyes.

“Isn’t that a quote?”

“Keats,” he said.  “My first true love.”

There was a beat during which the interaction could have gone a number of ways.  Morris might have walked out, they might have moved on to safer conversation, they might have taken each other to bed, but instead, Michelle followed a strange, foreign instinct and grasped his hand.  She held it and noticed with detached interest that he grasped back, passionately.  She felt a warm rush flow through her body from the contact point.

She looked at Morris with new eyes; he was suddenly beautiful.  All the pain and sadness in him – sadness stemming at its core from hope and love – came to the surface, and was visible on his face and body.  She saw the relationship between his physical appearance and the sum of his life experience.  The deep crease between his eyebrows from worry during his wife’s illness.  The bags under his eyes from loneliness.  Strong lines around his mouth from long forgotten joy.  Every breath, every movement was an expression of his experience, and never had she seen that connection so clearly.  She saw him, really him, and when you see all of someone, you almost can’t help but love them.

She gained an entire life’s worth of experience in moments.  She felt his pain, his sorrow, his happiness, his failings.  She smiled at his wedding, and cried at the funeral of his wife.  Lines and pages of poetry flowed into her brain.  Keats, Milton, Byron, Blake.  Words flashed through her mind and fixed themselves in her memory.

Morris seemed to grow younger as she watched him.  Lines firmed, his eyes reflected the smoky lights of the club with iridescent clarity, and a ruddy glow found his cheeks.  She knew he was seeing her the same way as she saw him.  She had never felt closer to another human being in her life.

They each let go in the same instant and took deep, exasperated breaths.  Michelle looked at him.

Morris, glowing with new vitality, let a single tear drop down his burning cheek.

“Excess of sorrow brings laughter,” Michelle said.  “Excess of joy brings tears.”

Morris blew his nose, his eyes still red.  “Very true.  You know Blake?”

“I do now.”

Filed under: Michelle by Jade