The morning after Nina's debut is not a good one. Lily has news for the company, and she hates making announcements like this. Morale always nosedives, but she can't keep something of this magnitude a secret, not when the papers will be reporting it. So she calls the company together to tell them Beth is in the hospital after being struck by a car.
Nina's the quickest, realizing that Beth must've done it while Nina was at Lily's apartment. It's partly guilt that moves her to ask, "Is she going to be okay?"
Lily sighs. "They don't know yet. She's expected to recover, but…" No more needs to be said. Beth has ended her career as dramatically as possible; typical of her. She'd rather go out with a bang than a whimper. Fortunately scandal is just another kind of publicity, and Lily manages to sound appropriately concerned and sad when she talks about Beth. She has to maintain that familial image with her dancers as well as the investors and the public.
Still, it's more stress than she needs, something Beth has been from the beginning. But she was so very good, brilliant onstage, far more cunning than Lily expected offstage. Without her Lily might not have been able to turn the company profitable in her first year as director. Hell, without her she might not have gained control of the company at all for another five years. Fortunately Beth knew all of Thomas Leroy's secrets; she'd been sleeping with him, too.
When Lily took the choreographer's job, she'd seduced the director's pet mostly out of revenge for Thomas' attempts to woo her. Beth had been surprisingly easy to seduce, at that. Once the two women decided to dethrone Thomas, his days as director were numbered. Lily even managed to give a very quotable speech to some reporter about how so many directors were like Thomas, objectifying and exploiting their charges, and it was time for a different style of management, a woman's hand on the steering wheel to guide the New York City Ballet into the twenty-first century.
Such bullshit. Darwin was right, only the fittest survived in this world, and they did so by taking advantage of those weaker than themselves. And Lily was anything but weak. In the beginning Beth thought she was the one in charge of their partnership, and Lily let her believe so for a while, but eventually she taught Beth who was really running the show. And ever since then Beth had been extravagantly needy. She'd even professed, once or twice, to love Lily.
What a fool. There's no room for love in a business partnership like this. Lily will do anything for the sake of the company, true, but there are limits. Especially now that Beth's becoming a liability as well as an annoyance. Maybe it's for the best, what she did. It's at least the fifth time Lily's told herself that.
After the meeting, when the rest of the girls leave, Nina lingers. Lily tips her head in the direction of her office, and Nina follows her. Interesting, her attempts to increase the connection and intimacy between them must be working. Once the door closes, Nina asks, "Are you all right?"
"I will be," Lily replies, and unlocks her desk drawer. Several pill bottles lie next to a bottle of spring water and a flask of emergency vodka; she chooses Xanax this time, and washes it down with water rather than let Nina see her drinking at work. "You know, Nina, the hell of it is, I'm almost certain she did it on purpose."
"She was very drunk," Nina demurs.
"Not drunk enough to fall in front of a car," Lily sighs, leaning back in her chair. "Nina, I know you've always admired Beth, but … she's never been the most stable person. Many artists aren't. It seems like part of what makes us great also leaves us vulnerable to such things."
For a long moment Nina doesn't reply, and then she looks seriously at Lily. "If you need anything … if I can help … just let me know."
Lily grins. It would be too easy to tell her to lock the door and get over here. Instead she simply replies, "Be magnificent for me, Nina. Be the Swan Queen I know you can be. That's all I want."
Nina nods gracefully, and with one last look she leaves. Only then does Lily take a sip of the vodka. Damn Beth. Why couldn't she accept fate? Why did she always have to fight against the way things are and have always been? And why, when it finally became clear to her that nothing she did could turn back time, why did she have to destroy herself?
There's an ache in her chest at that, the idea that Beth might not pull through. Lily quickly drowns it with vodka. The director of the best-known ballet company in the country simply cannot afford to be sentimental.