Living Out Loud (Austen, #3)(62)
Annie forked another bite of my Stroganoff, watching me eat with cheerful pleasure. “I know.”
As I helped myself to another piece of her chicken, her eyes wandered from my face to our surroundings. We were secluded in a wraparound booth in the back corner of the Russian Tea Room. I’d been here a couple of times before, and when Cam had suggested it, I had known Annie would understand the magic and mood of the place and not only embrace it but amplify it.
The room was brilliant and rich and a little over the top—from the gold-leaf ceiling to the deep emeralds and blood reds of the walls and booths and carpet. Antique samovars shone from perches all over the restaurant—from the walls to the ledges between booths, their curved spouts proud and beautiful, their wide bellies waiting for tea. The walls were adorned with an eclectic mix of paintings in gilded frames; the one above our booth couldn’t have been more appropriate.
I’d noticed it the second we walked up, inspecting it while Annie shrugged out of her coat and slipped into the booth. It was quirky and imperfect; a dark man in a dark suit stood in the foreground, patchwork hills stretching off behind him, and his hand held that of a lady who floated up and away, her face turned to him and her feet closer to the sun than the earth, her red dress caught in the wind.
It was Annie, light and floating away, and I was hanging on to her with blind devotion.
“So,” she said with a secretive smile on her face, “I have something to tell you.”
I smiled, ignoring a jolt of wishful thinking that her admission could be the words I longed to hear. “Oh?”
She nodded. “I sent my audition to Juilliard today.”
“Oh my God, did you?”
“Mmhmm!” she hummed proudly, her back straight as an arrow and smile sweet and pretty. “Thank God I knew so much of the material already. All I’ve done the last few days is practice and do trial recordings, but I finally got it all put together, and man, I only hope I’ve got a real shot.”
“Well, you did your best, right?”
“I did,” she answered.
“Do you think it’s good enough?”
“I do,” she said with her shining eyes on mine.
“Then you did what you came to do. And now, you wait.”
She groaned, the brief seriousness broken. “I hate waiting.”
I chuckled and scooped a bite of Stroganoff up with my fork. “No…you? Impatient? I never would have guessed.”
“I know; I’m the picture of restraint.”
We both laughed, and Annie picked up her fork and knife again, her eyes on her hands as she spoke.
“I told you about how my parents scrimped and saved to put me through lessons, making deals with Mrs. Schlitzer, although I think she was glad to teach me. Maybe because we both loved it so much, more than anyone else we knew. Don’t get me wrong. People tried to understand, but I don’t know that anyone without a passion could understand true passion. It’s easier to describe obsession, which is, I guess, almost the same thing. Like saying you’re particular instead of picky.”
I took another bite, content to listen to her talk as she was content to speak.
“But what a wonderful way to repay them all for what they’ve done for me. Juilliard,” she said with a wondrous shake of her head. “I wonder what Daddy would have thought.”
“Well, I didn’t know him, but I can’t imagine he wouldn’t have been proud.”
“I wish…” She shook her head. “You already know what I wish for. I’m sure you’d wish the same.”
“Yes, I would.”
“Wish in one hand, shit in the other. See which fills up first.”
A brief, unexpected laugh burst out of me.
She shrugged, but she was smiling. “Something my pops used to say. A little nugget of grandfatherly wisdom he left me with.”
“Do you have any other family? Besides your mom and sisters?”
“Daddy’s parents died before I started junior high, and my dad was an only child. My mom’s parents are alive, but I’ve never met them.”
“Where do they live?”
“Here in New York.”
I must have looked surprised because she explained, “They didn’t approve of Daddy, wanted her to marry someone they knew, someone with breeding and a family name, not a woodworker from Nowhere, Texas, who hadn’t even gone to college. When she made her choice, they cut her off.”
“Jesus,” I breathed. “I will never understand what would bring someone to put that much of their own expectations on their child.”
“Me either. We didn’t talk about them at all, growing up. My uncle—the one we’re staying with—wanted to help, but Mama’s as proud and stubborn as her own parents. My parents tried to make things work, even with all my medical bills and lessons and…well, with everything. It was why they didn’t have much when Daddy died.”
I nodded, swallowing hard. “When my mom died, the medical bills were—are a small fortune. With Dad unable to work, there was nothing we could do but move in with him and help him pay the debt down. There was no money saved. Everything had gone to keeping her alive after her diagnosis.”
“It’s so crazy to me that we have insurance for exactly these reasons, but what we’re left with after insurance pays is enough to rob a family of everything they have. My first open-heart surgery was at three weeks old. Can you imagine? To have a baby so sick that you have to rely on science to save them and then have to pay for their life for the duration of yours?” Her hands moved into her lap, and she met my eyes with her entire heart shining in hers. “My parents sacrificed so much for me. I wish they’d accepted help from my uncle, so they wouldn’t have had to suffer like they did. So they could have enjoyed their lives before…before…”