THE GOD'S WIFE Read Free

asked, when Randy handed her the cast list for their next major production. Her name stood at the top.
    “You’re due, my dear,” Randy said, showing his over-bleached white teeth. “Helen had her chance with ‘Danse Macabre.’ No star power there. Looks like you and Ricky Ramon will be rehearsing quite a bit.”
    This was everything she’d been working for since she stood in that makeshift room with wobbly mirrors in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. There were recitals and pulled muscles and fights with her mother for new tights and leotards, arguments over the tuition for dance lessons, a trip to the emergency room for a twisted ankle and the giddy day she first stood on pointe and realized how much it hurt. There was the high school play, which no one from her family had bothered to see, little dance jobs in Iowa City (also ignored by friends and family), now corps work with Waterfront, all in anticipation of landing a leading role. In the end, despite all the naysaying from her relatives, she won the big reward.
    She wanted to embrace Randy, but no one ventured that close to him. Reclusive and a bit shy, Randy seldom ever allowed his partner Artie to pat his hand in public. Still, Rebecca wanted to kiss his immaculate cheek, at the risk of mussing his stylish appearance.
    He tilted his head to one side as if assessing her looks and smiled.
    “Get yourself a tan and I think you’ll be perfect as an Egyptian. Long, black hair, sleek body with legs that don’t stop. Yes, you’ll look stunning in a white linen costume.”
    “But isn’t Aïda, well, you know, Nubian?” Rebecca blurted out.
    Randy’s expression went blank as a television screen tuned to a channel of static.
    “They were black,” she added, in case he wasn’t catching her drift.
    “Oh, some people think all the Egyptians were black, and it’s all wrong,” he said, tapping his desk with a pencil. “They were a mixed race. They had genetic heritage from all over the place. Mediterraneans, Semites, Africans above the Sahara ... Anyway, we are a color-blind company. We don’t discriminate. That’s so twentieth century. White, black, blue … who cares?” He threw up his hands.
    Rebecca twirled a strand of her hair as she considered the change from tradition. “I guess. Why not?”
    “Go on, now, enjoy your freedom for now. Because once the rehearsals start, you belong to us.” Randy’s eyes, usually so piercing, radiated warmth, and Rebecca thanked him about twenty times before she slipped out the door.
    She looked at the clock, realizing the work day was over. Full of adrenaline, Rebecca ran straight from her locker to the street. Her insides, her skin, her very soul sent out sparks of delirium. If she were a balloon, it would be bright yellow and would skip over the streetlights and dance on the rooftops before sailing into the clear Chicago sky. She ran across the narrow street, beating out a red light and an angry man in an SUV, and whirled around Jonas, her boyfriend, who had been waiting on the sidewalk. He stared in apparent wonder.
    “I got it! I got it!” she said, her words bursting out of her as she continued to spin on the sidewalk.
    “What? What did you get?” Jonas said, trying to hold her steady.
    “The lead. They picked me for the leading role in the new dance production.” She stopped spinning and held her boyfriend by his shoulders. “Jonas, they cast me as the featured dancer in ‘Aïda.’”
    Rebecca bounced in place. The lead. All her career she had been waiting for this. Waterfront Dance Company, known for its cutting-edge modern and jazz dance repertoire, planned a full-length production, much like a ballet but without the pointe shoes. The choice was an odd one: “Aïda,” an old opera. A “Romeo and Juliet” would be more to Rebecca’s liking. But any lead would do.
    She continued to fidget like a teenager, ignoring the middle-aged men in proper suits who shuffled by, eyes cast to the distance, trying to pretend