Chapter Text
Angel Productions
Prologue, London
The dream woke her as it had done for the last few years. She lay with her eyes closed, trying to hold onto the image of the child’s face before the vision faded completely. Despite her concentration, as always, the image faded away. She looked over at the luminescent clock on the bedside table and saw that, despite the winter darkness, it was almost time to get up. She reached over to shut the alarm and flopped back onto the pillow.
It struck her once again that the child seemed to be trying to tell her something. She laughed at herself now that she was fully awake—it was ridiculous to believe that dreams brought messages. Surely if anyone could manage to send a message from the beyond, it would have been Melvin Porter. Bette smiled at the idea; her father had been long gone. At times she thought that perhaps the dream was of the child they had lost but that didn’t seem to make sense—it had been so many years ago, why would the dream be of him now?
She couldn’t remember exactly when the dreams had begun; only that it had been a few years now. They came infrequently—it seemed that they occurred as soon as she had almost forgotten about them, as if to remind her of something. She wasn’t sure if the child was a boy or girl, just that the features were reminiscent of her own: dark curly hair and mocha skin. The only other memory she could recall was of the child’s laugh. She was a happy, gentle child, somebody’s angel.
She pulled away the covers and sat up. It was just as well that she was up early—she had a lot to do—the opening of the Bacon show at the Tate Modern was only a week away. Halfway to the shower, she stopped and recognized that she had said “she.” Her dream child was a girl.
***
A year later…
The meeting was almost over; she looked across the conference table and motioned to the Managing Chairman of the museum to stay after the meeting.
“Am I being absurdly optimistic in thinking that you want to speak to me in order to tell me that you’ve changed your mind?”
Bette smiled at Colin’s hopeful expression; she had turned down his offer of the directorship both before and after each of the shows she had curated at the Tate Modern. “I have not changed my mind. But I do want to speak with you about a few things before I leave.” “Bette. Why? That’s all I ask. I know you’ve read the reviews of the show, for God’s sake. It’s unimaginable that you should even think about leaving after receiving such notices. God, when I think about what a risk we took allowing a Yank to curate that Bacon retrospective last year. It took all I had to convince the board and now you’re walking away? And this recent show—I’ve never heard such praise. You’ve got them all eating out of your hand!”
Bette waited for him to finish, shaking her head. She was thrilled with the success of the shows. But it had taken two years to get them to fruition and she was exhausted.
“I’m done, Colin. But thank you—thank you for giving me the opportunity to have this success. I really appreciate it.” She strode over to pick up her blackberry, “Let’s have dinner next week and go over things before I leave. My calendar is open—when are you available?”
Chapter One
Dinner, London
“The show was an enormous success thanks to your usual brilliant curatorial skills. Congratulations!”
The blonde woman lifted the champagne glass in a toast and smiled at Bette. “The question of course, is, will you take the position that the Tate Modern is offering?”
Bette smiled at her dinner companion, not surprised that she knew about Colin’s offer, and took a sip of her champagne. They sat at a quiet corner of their usual restaurant and the staff knew not to intrude while they chatted.
“Thank you. You’ve been a great support—you know how much I appreciate it.”
“Oh, I do know…but not as often as I would like.” The blonde’s smile included a raised eyebrow for effect.
“Catherine…”
“Don’t say it. I know.” She waved her hand to dismiss Bette’s tone of voice. “We have what we have…no commitments. I’m fine but I do like to tease you.” She took another sip and changed the subject; she had learned over the past year that any pressure would push Bette further away. “Seriously, will you take the position?”
“Actually, that’s something I wanted to talk to you about tonight. In addition to celebrating of course.” Bette smiled at the elegant woman who had been her lover for most of the time she had been in London.
“I think its time that I went back to the States.”
Catherine’s head jerked up in surprise and she stared at Bette. “What? Why? The Tate is offering you everything you could possibly want!”
“Not really.” Bette’s splayed fingers drummed against the linen tablecloth.
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve been there before, Catherine. Being the director of a museum is filled with political battles and financial accounting—two things I abhor. Curating shows on a project-by-project basis has a little bit of that but it’s short-term and then it’s over; you can hold onto the sheer enjoyment and satisfaction of a job well-done without dealing with all the politics. I really don’t want to be in the same place that I was in at the CAC. I’ve learned better.”
“I think you are making a terrible mistake, Bette. There is tremendous power in this position—you would come to it with some enormous successes behind you as well as the backing of my family. We are huge supporters of the Tate Modern, as you well know.”
“And I truly appreciate that, Catherine. But I doubt your husband would once he found out about us.” Bette’s smile was joined by her own raised eyebrow.
Catherine’s hand waved away the comment. “You are hardly my first woman lover, Bette. He knows what he knows and he doesn’t care as long as I am discreet. I promise you that. It would have not the slightest effect on things.”
Bette leaned forward and covered Catherine’s hand with her own, “It’s time for me to go home, Catherine. I came here bleeding to death and I’ve healed on so many levels. But it’s time.”
Catherine withdrew her hand. “You’re breaking up with me, aren’t you?”
“There’s nothing to break up, Catherine…you know that. Neither of us had any expectations beyond where we are now.”
“Are you going back to LaLa land? God, I can’t imagine you spending your life in a car, Bette. You are so much more than that.”
Bette laughed, “No, I have no intention of going back to Los Angeles except to see friends. Actually, I’m contemplating an offer that would probably keep me in New York.”
Her dinner companion, somewhat miffed at being kept in the dark, asked, “What offer?”
“I’ve been speaking with Peggy Peabody. She called after we met at the Bacon opening to tell me that both MoMa and the Whitney have been frantically wooing her for her contemporary art collection and asked my advice about it. The problem is that Peggy has been collecting contemporary art for years, but she really has no idea of what she has in her collection—most of her pieces are in storage in New York and nothing has ever been properly cataloged. Her conversation with me was all over the place; she’s thinking about selling some pieces or possibly making some serious donations. She needs someone to evaluate, confirm provenances and catalog her collection. And then be her agent and negotiate with whichever museum ends up with the significant portion of her collection. And it’s huge: she started collecting back in the fifties when no one was touching contemporary art. It would probably be a two, possibly even a three-year commitment.”
“Why hadn’t you told me?”
“Because I knew you’d be unhappy and try to talk me out of it. And I know that Peggy’s daughter Helena is a friend—Peggy asked me to keep it all secret until we came to an agreement.”
“So you’ve decided, I gather.” Her tone was facetious as she leaned back against the banquette.
“Yes, I have.” Bette leaned forward again, her voice low and sultry, “But it’s not that long a flight between London and New York.”
Catherine looked up from her drink and smiled at her, “I see. Well, if that’s what you have in mind, then I’m not quite as disappointed as I thought I would be. I adore shopping in New York—the exchange rate is quite helpful.”
“As if you need to worry about that, Catherine.”
“When does this all occur?”
“I’m flying to New York in a few days to meet with Peggy and start looking for workspace as well as someplace to live. She’s had a real estate broker put together some listings for me. Then I’m going to try to fly out to LA to surprise Alice at her website launch party. I’ll be back here the week after to start packing up my things.”
“Do I have you all to myself until you leave?”
“Well, if you really want to help me pack…”
Catherine slapped lightly at her arm, “Darling, you know that is not what I had in mind at all. Besides, you’ve been living in that sublease since you got to London—all you need to pack are your clothes. Not that that isn’t going to take a substantial amount of time. I never thought I’d meet a woman who was as big a clothes horse as me.”
“I do have other things to ship, but they’ll stay in storage until I find a place.”
“So I can tell Helena to take care of you and make sure she protects you from all those mad New York lesbians. I’ll want you for myself when I come to New York.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that Catherine. At all.”
