Petra headed down to the lobby and asked at the front desk for her package. It was from New York, somewhat large but very light. She received a lot of promotional materials, free shoes and bags and leotards, although they usually came to the theater. She went upstairs and opened the box, pushing aside the packing peanuts. Underneath, she uncovered two fuzzy ears of a gold-colored stuffed bear. Her confusion gave way to goose bumps as she pulled it out.
It was a mess. The eyes were gouged out, threads hanging shorn and bare. The middle was also torn open, with bits of stuffing visible, along with a note. Her first reaction was to drop the thing on the table. It couldn’t be meant for her. She poked inside the stuffing and pulled out the crumpled pieces of paper. The first was a printed-out photo of her and Rubio, the very one of them sharing a laugh at the stage door. The second was a note, written neatly in black pen on lined paper.
Why are you doing this? You’re tearing me apart.
Ugh. Why did freaky, stalky people have to exist in the world? Who in their right mind would send a ripped-up bear like this to another person? Scary Gary, that’s who. The man had developed some weird obsession with her, and with this “gift” he’d shown her that moving an ocean away wasn’t quite far enough.
*** *** ***
One week later, Petra sat in an office at the local precinct. Not an office, actually, but a cubicle, which was the first sign that she was going to get absolutely no help. The second sign was the age of her assigned officer, who appeared to be just out of high school.
“I don’t know what to say, Ms. Hewitt. Gary Paulsen has no criminal record, no known mental illness. Is he behaving badly? Yes, of course he is. Can I do anything to help you stop him?”
His expression said everything. No.
“So what do I do?” she asked, trying not to sound like a whiner. “He’s writing me, bothering me, sending me packages. He’s been doing it for months now. I feel...endangered.”
He gave her a patronizing smile. “I don’t think you’re endangered. He’s not even in this country.”
“How can you be sure?”
“The IP address of his emails, for one.”
“Can’t those be manipulated?”
She could tell his patience was wearing thin. “Aren’t there laws against harassment here?” she asked.
“There are laws against harassment, but they require a degree of menace. Your guy isn’t making overt threats. He’s not in a position to confront you or attack you. You can change your phone number and email and refuse anything he sends through the post. It’s an annoyance, of course, but his actions aren’t significant enough to merit international legal action. Not at this point.”
“So if I was in the US, you could do something. But since he’s an ocean away he can harass me all he wants?”
“Until he presents a credible threat, yes.”
Petra sighed, looking around the shabby police station. Coffee rings stained a pile of reports on the young officer’s desk. His girlfriend, or perhaps his wife, grinned at her from behind a crooked frame.
“So I wait, then,” she said. “Until he says something threatening or scary.”
“There’s always the possibility he’ll move on to some other obsession. Have you considered...” He shuffled his feet under the desk. “Would it be possible to take a break from the stage? Temporarily retire, so to speak?”
“Temporarily retire? Now? At the height of my career?”
“I know it’s not ideal, but if it’s the dancer he’s attracted to—”
She stared at him. “I am the dancer. Ballet is my whole life. I can’t stop, I can’t retire just because some wacko is obsessed with me.”
“It was just a suggestion.”
She shouldn’t be yelling at the kid. None of this was his fault. He was obviously the poor schlub who got all the cases no one else wanted to handle, and she was one more headache in his day. “Could you send him a cease-and-desist letter, on some kind of official police letterhead?” she asked. “Do you think that would accomplish anything?”
“It would only reassure Mr. Paulsen that he’s getting through to you. Ignoring is your best option. Return his packages unopened. If you don’t want to change your email, change your filters so you don’t have to see the things he sends. Whatever you do, don’t engage with him. If you don’t respond to him, eventually he’ll give up.”
“You promise?” she asked, chewing a fingernail.
He gave her a weary smile. “I can’t promise, although I understand your frustration. I know this will sound strange, but try not to get too worked up about the whole thing. Put him out of your mind and perhaps he’ll come to realize there’s no point in continuing to badger you.” He stood and fished a card out of a plastic holder. “And if he shows up here in town, or if his overtures to you become violent in nature, by all means, let us know.”
“Okay,” she said out loud, pocketing his card. Thanks for nothing, she thought to herself. You suck.
Chapter Five: Inappropriate
It was opening night of a new season. Not just a new season, but a new era at City Ballet. When he and Petra performed the kiss at the end of the balcony pas de deux, Rubio fell in love with her a little, as Romeo should. The audience broke into gleeful, impromptu applause. He felt her smile against his lips and then compose herself.
As for him, he felt transformed.
Rehearsals were one thing, but this opening performance had raised them both to new heights of inspiration. Petra brought bright, light innocence to the role, the needed balance for his dark Romeo. She was vivacious as young Juliet, and later dramatically mournful. During the death scene he was pretty sure she cried real tears. That scene was one of his favorite places to cop a secret feel, but he didn’t, not this time. Petra was far too invested in the character, so he laid still and stiff while she sobbed over him, keeping his perverted fingers to himself. Instead he focused on her closeness and her sweet scent.
Petra always smelled so pretty. Her hair smelled like sonhos, like vanilla and sugar and good things, even at the end of a long, exhausting day. He liked that about her. He wished she wasn’t such a hard ass bitch. He wished she was a horny, cowering, deeply masochistic submissive, so he could run amok all over her delectable body until she broke down and cried. But no, she wasn’t. Too bad.
At the final curtain call, the audience went wild. Flowers, whistles, yelling and screaming, a tidal wave of appreciation. When he held her hand and led her forward to take their bows, a stagehand trotted out with a massive bouquet of roses. The bright pink roses symbolized welcome and affection for a new partner, and Rubio presented them to Petra with a fleeting kiss. The already-crazed audience exploded into hysteria.
She smiled up at him in the midst of the furor. It was impossible not to grin back. As he gazed into her pretty, almond-shaped eyes, he felt an attachment to her beyond duty and performance. He felt in solidarity with her. We can make perfection together. Afterward, instead of heading off to his own dressing room, he followed her to hers.
Yves joined them, grinning ear to ear. “I have no words. I don’t know what to say, how to express my emotions. I felt like I was watching history being made.”
“Yes, well,” said Rubio, rolling his eyes. “You can watch history made again tomorrow. And the next night. And next week.”
Yves ignored him and turned to Petra. “How did it feel? How was the stage, the production? The sound of the orchestra?”
“It was all wonderful. But the partnering...” She winked at Ruby, her eyes dark with an ebony outline of stage makeup. “Horrible. Can I still get out of my contract?”
Yves feigned distress, which wasn’t too hard since he was almost always stressed out. A stagehand wove past him with two vases of roses and Petra gestured him to the table beside her vanity where the pink ones already lay. One of the vases overflowed with white roses and the other, significantly larger, with red. He knew the white ones were from Liam and Ashleigh.
R
ubio had ordered the red.
He had second guesses now. Was that the expression? Second thoughts? The flowers seemed too garish in her cramped dressing room. Five dozen roses was probably too much. He would have left the room with the stagehand and Yves, but she’d already grabbed the card. Muitos abraços, he’d written. Many hugs, in Portuguese. He had signed it “R.” He had not written I think you’re marvelous, or You smell like vanilla and sugar, or even I wish you were a horny, cowering, deeply masochistic submissive, and he was glad for that now.
She read the two handwritten words aloud with an awful accent. He repeated it to her the right way.
“What does it mean?” she asked. “It’s from you, right? These are from you?”
Before he could answer she buried her face in the bouquet, taking a deep breath. It was the same thing he wanted to do to her hair. “My goodness,” she said. “They’re so beautiful.” She turned and threw her arms around him. They touched all the time but this felt heightened. Different.
“It means many hugs,” he said against her hair. He smelled it furtively. Someday he would ask what shampoo she used. “It’s a usual Portuguese greeting or whatever, to be nice.”
“But you’re only being nice because this was our first time dancing together, huh?”
“Yes,” he said. He thought he might be blushing. It wasn’t good. To his relief, she turned away to read the card on Liam and Ashleigh’s bouquet, which was more reasonably sized. Ruby thought he should leave her goddamn dressing room and go hide, but then the Wilders appeared.
“We came to see the stars of the hour,” said Liam.
Ashleigh didn’t say anything, just enveloped Petra, tutu and all, in a smothering hug. “Oh my God,” Ash cried. “I know we haven’t met before, but oh my God, Petra, you were so good.”
“Petra, this is Ashleigh Keaton,” Ruby said over Ash’s babbling. “And her husband Liam. They are my good friends.”
Petra grinned when Ash let her go. “Thank you for the beautiful flowers.”