It was until the car pulled up to the address that Zephyr had given her that Ingrid realized why it had sounded familiar. She stared at the tall spires of The Kjat Novelle High House of Fine Arts and once again, she was a sixteen-year-old, arriving at the city for the first time, blown away by its luxurious beauties.
The gallery's golden dome stood tall against the dusk sky like a bright jewel in the crown of its intricate roofing. Whoever had designed it had made it so it looked like its circumference was created by gold-coated wings of some divine creature, folded against each other. The body of the building also shone with the same sleek aurous color, like a staircase leading to the heavens. It was obvious to any observer that the gallery itself had been a work of art.
The memories came back to Ingrid, unbidden. She knew that just two blocks away, the dance academy perched on its cobbled street, a tier of the city's heaven that she had not been good enough to get into. It felt both so long ago but still so fresh in her memory. The judges and their disapproving glances.
She leaned back into the car seat. She couldn't do this.
Through the window, she saw Zephyr standing on the cobbled walk. He was wearing a smart black velvet tuxedo and a flower was pinned to his lapel. There was an expensive-looking watch on his wrist. He stood casually, hands in his pocket as if daring anyone in the world to tell him he didn't belong there.
She almost didn't recognize him. If she didn't know him, she might even have been quite attracted to what she saw.
She felt pity for the women who fell for that trap.
He saw her at the same time, in the car and started over in their direction. When he was close, she noticed that his curls looked softer, like he had touched them with water or something.
Zephyr pulled the door open. He held a gloved hand over his eyes, protecting them from the low sun that shone off the gallery's walls.
"Is everything okay?" he asked.
"Why did you bring me here, Zephyr?"
"I'll tell you if you come out of the car." He held out his hand and she took it, grabbing the end of her dress as she stepped out of the car.
The fabric of the dress moved like water against her legs as she walked.
He led her to the velvet carpeted entrance. A man in uniform nodded with a slight bow and opened one of the gallery's huge doors. Zephyr's hand settled on her waist as the man ushered them inside.
As soon as they were out of sight and earshot, she removed his hand.
They stood in the gallery's large entrance hall.
"I'm only here for my money and my apology," she said turning to face him.
"This is my apology." He pulled out two tickets from his tuxedo pocket. " We're a little early, but 'Death at Midnight' is being performed here this evening."
'Death by Midnight' was a ballet classic in the country, Gogh's tale of a sorcerer who transformed his brides into animals at the strike of midnight.
In its performance, each bride, a prima ballerina, danced out a complicated routine with the male dancer playing the sorcerer at the point of her transformation. There were twelve brides in all and each was named after the animal the sorcerer transformed her into. The Swan was most people's favorite, but Ingrid had loved the Fox the most when she first read about the routine in Nana Ujka's book.
Ingrid was shocked that Zephyr knew anything about the ballet classic. His world, their world, was very far away from the high society of performing arts. Even years after she had decided to become a ballerina in her childhood, her mother had remained clueless about the art.
"So?" Ingrid asked, keeping her face expressionless. "What does that have to do with me."
"Come on, Ingrid. You think I don't know you used to want to be a dancer?"
It must have been goddamn Kafi, going through her portmanteau.
"You don't anything about me, Zephyr."