Todd's stomach churned again as confident piano music swirled around him – this was a horse of a different color. He could only imagine what would happen if some famous piano virtuoso caught him in the hall and told the managers of Lincoln Center on him.
But even as he thought this, the piano suddenly hit a sour note, all the more noticeable for the perfection of the bars that had preceded it.
"Man! I can never remember that part." The little girl's lilting voice was comic in its severity as she chastised herself for her musical misstep.
Todd waited for a teacher's voice to correct, criticize or encourage her. When no one else spoke to her, he smiled slightly to himself, and relaxed. There was obviously no one else in the room aside from the mystery pianist.
As she restarted the piece from where she'd messed up, Todd's curiosity got the better of him. He walked slowly to the door, which was slightly ajar. He peered in and squinted into the dim, rosy lamplight of the room before he crept in silently, his shoes soundless on the thick carpet.
The small room was almost completely dominated by the shiny black baby grand piano being played by a girl Todd had never seen before. If she had been in the ballet audience, he hadn't noticed her during the first act.
Todd didn't like classical music, but he couldn't help but admire the skilled way the song spilled from her hands. She was good, and the confidence she'd found after her minor mistake meant she must spend a lot of time practicing.
There was more good news and bad news about the situation as Todd saw the direction the piano faced. The good news - her back was to him, which meant he could watch her for at least another minute, but he couldn't see her face – not yet.
From behind, she looked about two years younger than him. Her long, wavy hair was a whisper's shade of darker blonde than his. He wondered if she knew that the ice-blue headband she wore to match her long, lace-trimmed velvet dress made her look babyish. Or maybe she looked shorter than she really was with her white-stockinged legs dangling below the ebony piano stool and her little fingers flying across its ivory keys. For some reason he couldn't understand, he wanted her to turn around, to notice him, to talk to him.
As if she'd read his mind, she finished her piece and stretched her thin little arms above her head. She showed no sign of starting another song. With nothing of interest to look at in front of her, Todd knew she'd turn around soon, so he figured he'd better speak before she saw him, screamed out loud and got them both in trouble.
"Hi."
She wheeled around on the stool. Todd was impressed when she didn't shriek or fall off, but merely looked at him with wide eyes the color of the desert skies he'd seen in Great Escapes, his favorite book about the Native Americans of New Mexico.
"Hi," she said, looking at him quizzically. "What are you doing here?"
He wasn't about to tell her that he'd gotten lost coming out of the men's room like a little kid, so he just asked her, "Why are you here?"
She sighed quietly. "I've seen the show twice before, and I was bored."
"You've seen this twice? My sympathies," Todd offered.
She smiled thinly. "What's your name?"
"I like to be called Todd."
"Like the fox in Fox and the Hound? Copper's friend?" Her nose wrinkled slightly. "Why do you want to be called Todd if it isn't your name?"
"It's my middle name, and I like it better than my first. When I grow up I'm signing all my papers Todd Manning."
"What's your real name?"
"I told you, Todd IS one of my real names, but my paper name's Thomas."
She raised her eyebrows. "Todd is practically the same as Tom anyway. Why bother calling yourself Todd?"
"You wouldn't understand. What's your name?"
"Marty."
Todd snorted in disbelief. "You're dressed like Alice in Wonderland and you call yourself by a boy's name? How does that work?"
"I do NOT look like Alice in Wonderland," she bristled. "And Marty from Grease is a girl, and she's the coolest of the Pink Ladies."
"I like Rizzo best," Todd shrugged.
"Ugh. That's the name of the head rat from the Muppets, too. I hate rats."
"I bet you next week's allowance your folks didn't name you Marty," Todd continued. "Your parents let you get away with calling yourself a boy's name? Did they name you Martha or something?"
"My real name is Margaret, and my parents are dead."
Todd had been enjoying their conversation up to now, but now he wished he were anywhere else, or that he could rewind the last minute like a tape in his father's fancy new VCR and erase his comment that had hurt her.
"Sorry." Eager to change the subject, he asked her, "Where do you live?"
"In Llanview, outside of Philly."
"Me, too. Do you go to public school?" Whether she did or not, the fact that he went to a private boy's school made it no surprise that he'd never seen her before tonight. And of course, there was the fact that Peter Manning considered the citizens of Llanview – no matter their income – to be paean plebeians and never socialized with them, nor allowed his son to.
"No, I've always gone to St. Catherine's." She swung her legs under the piano stool, and the warm lamplight shone on her patent leather shoes.
"I go to Charlton Prep," Todd told her. "It sucks." He pulled up a red brocade armchair and sat down heavily in it, stretching his legs out in front of him like his father sometimes did after a long business meeting. All he needed was a vodka martini and he'd look just like him. "Who brought you here?"
Her lips turned down at the corners, and Todd mentally kicked himself again. "My Aunt Kiki brought me, but I don't live with her."
"Who do you live with?"
She shrugged. "Sarah's the maid who cleans and cooks, and Richard gardens and drives the car. That's about it."
Todd was flabbergasted, but envious of the quiet and freedom she must have. "Why doesn't your aunt want to live in the house with you?"
"She'd rather travel and drink and have fun. And she doesn't like me."
Todd found this hard to believe. He'd known her for five minutes and he liked her already – especially the way she told the truth straight out. He'd never known a girl like her – scratch that. He'd never known anyone like her.
"Why doesn't she like you?"
"She was my dad's only family, and she's ticked that Mother and Dad left the house and money to me, not her. But she still spends plenty of it. When I'm old enough I'm gonna make her pay it back."
Todd decided to speak his thoughts frankly, since polite pussyfooting had just hurt her feelings twice.
"You'll need a good lawyer. It's too bad your dad couldn't have made a better backup plan for you after you lost your mom – or did he pass away first?"
"I don't think they ever thought they'd have to have Kiki be my guardian," she said, seeming a little needled at any criticism of parents she'd obviously loved. "They went at the same time, and there was no one else."
Todd's blue eyes went round, and the skin around them paled a little. "They died together?"
She nodded. Despite the defiant, so-what set of her chin, he could tell she was more upset than she was letting on.
"How?" He realized immediately that he probably shouldn't have asked, but he was taken in by her frankness.
"They went sailing to have a second honeymoon and make me a brother or sister. Their boat crashed into an ocean liner and the engine exploded. They drowned."
"That's awful," Todd mumbled, and scrambled yet again for a change of subject. "Why did your aunt take you to the ballet if she doesn't like you?"
Marty rolled her eyes. "She wanted to make a tax-deductible donation, and she thought that giving it to the Children's Hospital would impress people with what a good guardian she is to me. And I'm in and out of the hospital, so she promised my doctor she'd buy tickets."
"Are you sick?" Todd asked her. She certainly seemed more vibrant than anyone he could ever remember meeting. Her face was pale, but he'd thought that was just her regular skin tone.
"I have lupus."
"What's that?"
She shrugged. "It's just a disease. It can look like other stuff, so it took them a while to figure out what it was. Sometimes it flares up and I get a rash on my skin and I get tired. I'll have to watch it or my heart or liver or kidneys could get sick, but if I'm careful I'll probably grow up and live through it."
"Your doctor told it to you that way?" Todd asked, taken aback by the blunt explanation.
"No, I heard Kiki talking about it on the phone with her friend Rachelle. I wanted to stay home tonight, but she wouldn't let me."
"I thought all little girls loved ballet," Todd said.
"I'm not a little girl. And I'd rather have gone to the symphony, but I do like ballet. I just don't want to be here."
"Why not?"
She looked down at her lap and clutched a fistful of her velvet skirt, crushing the delicate fabric.
"My parents took me the last two years, and this is the first Christmas they've been gone. I want to be here with them, not her."
Todd nodded slowly – he could certainly understand that. He still felt sick when he saw one of his father's girlfriends coming out of what had been his mother's bedroom, or sitting in a negligee at the breakfast table.
"I don't want to be here at all, with anyone, but my dad made me come."
"Your mom couldn't have gotten you out if it?"
Todd shook his head. "My mom left us a long time ago."
"A long time ago?" Marty echoed. A wan, sad smile rose to her lips. "You sound about a hundred when you say that, and you can't be more then twelve. What grade are you in, sixth?"
At this, Todd smiled at her for the first time. He wasn't tall for his age, and no one had ever guessed him to be older than he was. In a swift double impulse he couldn't understand or contain, he decided to both own up to his real age and pay back her unwitting compliment.
"I'm not twelve – I'm almost eleven. How old are you, ten?"
"No, I'm eight," she said glumly.
"Oh," Todd said clumsily, wishing he hadn't mentioned her age. According to his father, girls and women of any age were very sensitive about the subject. He was sure racking up a lot of feet in his mouth tonight. "Sorry."
She shrugged. "Don't worry about it. Who cares? Besides, I look about six in this dumb kiddish dress Aunt Kiki made me wear."
Todd's brow furrowed wryly. So she did know how the dress made her look.
"It's not that bad," he told her, not quite sure why he was trying to make her feel better.
"Please. You were right - I look like Alice in Wonderland."
"What do you want for Christmas?" Todd asked.
Marty picked up a sheaf of sheet music from the piano in front of her and flipped idly through it.
"Some books and videos. Some clothes, a bracelet, I guess."
"No pony? No Barbie doll?"
She gave him a withering glance. "I shaved my Barbie's heads last year, and I have a pony. His name is Claude."
"What does your aunt usually get you?"
"Nothing. She gives Richard a credit card to MY bank account and has him take me to the mall to pick out some stuff, same as on my birthday."
"My dad does the same thing." Todd was sorry that she too had such a cold, boring gift routine, but strangely comforted that he wasn't the only one.
"You mean your chauffeur is named Richard too?" she asked. Todd snorted in appreciation of her wisecrack.
"What do you want for Christmas?" she repeated his question at him.
He was much more forthcoming than she was. "I want my own house for just me and my mom to live in, a fire-engine red Porsche 911, a staff of three, a private jet and a license to fly it."
"You don't want much, do you?" she asked.
"Hey, you asked what I wanted, not what I was going to get."
Suddenly, they both jumped at the voices coming swiftly in their direction from down the deserted hallway.