It is dark in the hall. The spotlights are focused on the dance group, his daughter is between the other dancers. She is still so young and yet she has the gaze that reminds him of Valentina.
The spotlights followed each and every of her steps. Her heels clattered, echoing through the hall as she danced. Guitar music resounded, a man and a woman sang, the steps of the dancer followed them in rhythm. Jakob took out his camera, took pictures of her, the whole evening long. He was enchanted by her. His gaze watched all her steps, which grew quicker and quicker and before he realized, the dance had ended. She clapped into her hands and remained in that pose, the arms above her head, looking over her shoulder into the camera.
Hollis takes off her shoes. “How did you like our dance today, Dad?”
“You were great! I’m proud of you.” He smiles at her before going into his office. “I just need to prepare everything for the exhibition tomorrow, then we can celebrate.”
There are many pictures in their frames already. Only some old boxes from the cellar are still standing around. He is searching for one of his landscape pictures as he hears his daughter say: “Is Valentina Varela a dancer?”
Shocked he looks up when he hears her name out of his daughter’s mouth. Hollis is looking through one of the old boxes and hands him a photo.
“You took the picture in Chile? Why did you never tell me about your time there?”
Taking it from her hands, his gaze falls on the caption, Valentina Varela, Chile, 2012. He flips the print to the front side. Valentina’s dark eyes stare at him, her hair open, the lips red.
The next evening as the sun had already set, he stood red roses in his hands, in front of the stage exit and waited for Valentina. He wanted to meet the dancer after the show. He found her dance so expressive, so beautiful. She was brave: the Flamenco was much more popular in Spain than in Chile.
As Valentina stepped outside, he handed her the roses: “I am Jakob Schmied, the photographer. I took pictures of you during the performance yesterday and wanted to ask if you would give me permission to publish them.”
His Spanish was not good, and his German accent thick, but Valentina seemed to understand him just fine. She took the roses and smiled.
“Come in.”
He stepped inside the theatre and followed her to a small room. The paper sign on the door had her name on it. Jakob sat down on the chair in front of hers and handed her his camera.
“I can print them out for you next time if you want.”
She looked at the pictures, the smile returning: “I’d like that. You are good.”
He felt his cheeks flushing and awkwardly scratched his neck.
She pointed at the picture on the camera’s display and showed it to him: “This is my favorite. Can I see more of your work? You are an artist - just like me.”
Surprised he looked at her, then at the picture. She looked straight into the camera while staying in the pose, her hair open, the lips red.
He places the picture into the box with his old camera and other photographs, before stacking the boxes on top of each other.
“I am going to bring these to the cellar real quick, then I can show you the pictures I took of you tonight.”
Once he is back, they go outside, sit on their small balcony and look at the pictures under the stars. It is a clear night, as clear as the night so many years ago.
They walked through an alley, his jacket wrapped around her shoulders, her fingers interlocked with his. He photographed Valentina for some weeks already whenever she danced, and that she did often.
It was a quiet night, the sky was clear, the stars were shining above them. It wasn’t the cold wind that made him get goosebumps but her lips against his.
When they arrived at her front door, Valentina held the door open for him: “Are you coming in?”
Around noon the exhibition opened. More people than expected showed up. He walks around, answering questions from customers about the photographs. Finally, his dream became reality. How he hopes Valentina could fulfil her own.
Valentina wiped away her makeup and took all hairpins out of her tied-up hair. Then she sat next to him, her eyes shining like the star she had become.
“Jakob, I want to go to the next city, through the whole country. I want to get better, so good that everyone knows me. I want my art to touch them-” She laid a hand on his chest, felt his heart beating under her hand: “I want them to love it, like you do, the art that I create with my dance, the art that you catch with your pictures.”
“If you want to go, then I will come with you.”
“Yes” she started, back then he didn’t know why she hesitated: “Maybe.”
A couple on the other side of the room is looking at the photographs in front of them. Jakob sees the wedding bands on their fingers and although they don’t say a word, he can feel all their emotions as they hold hands.
“Valentina” he started one evening as she came home from practicing and got out of her dance dress. On her makeup table was a picture of them, next to a vase with red roses, which he had bought her some days ago. His fingers played with the ring in his pocket. He tried to tell himself that he didn’t need to be nervous, after all their love got stronger every month. He wanted to propose to her after they had dinner in a fancy restaurant, but they didn’t find time for that in the last weeks. Valentina had been so caught up with practicing and performing.
“Yes?” she said as she laid next to him in their bed.
“Do you want to marry me?”
Jakob expected everything but not what she did. She laid her head back and laughed, laughed loud, laughed at him. He waited for her to say that she would of course marry him. But she didn’t say it, she didn’t say anything at all, she just laughed and shook her head, as if it was the most unbelievable thing she ever heard. After she stopped laughing, she kissed him and stroked through his hair. “You love me, and I love you. We are happy this way. That is the only thing that matters to me. So why marry?”
In the evening, he locks the gallery and walks home. As he opens the door, the sound of music welcomes him; music he had heard before. In the living room is his daughter, who is sitting in front of the PC. On the display is a video, in which he can make out Valentina dancing.
His daughter seems to notice his presence and turns to him.
“Are you okay?” she asks.
Sold out night, after sold out night. The theatre was full, everyone was waiting but she didn’t enter the stage. Jakob ran to the theatre toilets; he had seen her there last.
“Valentina?” he called out and knocked on the door.
“I’m here” it came from inside the bathroom which was locked.
“Is everything alright?”
He heard the toilet flush, then the water running. She came out of the bathroom and gave him something. A stick, with two blue stripes. Valentina sank on a chair and sobbed: “Jakob, what am I supposed to do now?”
He never had told Hollis the whole truth: the truth that Valentina had left him, or he had left her, or they had left each other. Both had accomplished to fulfil their dreams, parted, yet together. Because that’s how things always were between them, parted, yet together.
Jakob sighed, looking Hollis in the eyes. The decision whether he really wants to tell her everything was already made.
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