The Cranes Dance (17 page)

She’s not there yet, Gia. She’s fabulously gifted, of course, but all the talent is still inside her body. She hasn’t yet learned how to think about this role in her own way. Phrases floated inside my head, things I could say to her. The kinds of things I said to Gwen.

Big Swans. Mara wasn’t my direct opposite, so I couldn’t really see her, but I could feel that we were in unison, and her spacing was perfection. At one point, when we were in a diamond formation, I saw her shoulder blades ahead of me, glistening sweat, every little tendon visible. She’ll never know how extraordinary she looked. How fragile. How noble. How perfect.

Intermission.

Mara was giddy with relief in the dressing room. Everything had gone well, very well, felt good. I hooked her into her Hungarian Princess tutu, fluffed out her skirts like a bridesmaid, took pictures of her with her iPhone. She rubbed Tamara’s lucky bunny and I touched the tape where the mezuzah used to be.

Act III, the birthday ball. Each Princess has a little retinue. I came on last and let myself be led to make my curtsy to Hilel. He took my hand and bowed over it politely, but without interest.

After our “Hey, we’re the Princesses! Check our shit out!” group dance, we all trouped off Stage Left, except for Mara,
because her solo was first. I stood as far into the first wing as I could to get the best view.

The Hungarian Princess solo has a folk dancing flavor to it, and a lot of little hops on pointe. It’s also very fast. Mara was dancing like she got shot out of a cannon, just ripping through things, huge smile. I guess I can see why she’s never been promoted. There’s something withheld, an academic quality to her dancing that’s wonderful for corps work but not necessarily inspiring. Still, she is super strong. And very musical. Maybe if someone had just taken more of an interest? If she had been less willing to be useful? More demanding? There are roles that she’d be right for if she had just been given the opportunity and the right coaching. Phrases began forming in my head, things I could have said to her, long ago, that might have helped.

I was thinking about that when all of a sudden—in preparation for an easy jump—Mara’s supporting leg went out from under her, and she landed flat on her ass, hard. Even from the wings, I could hear the audience gasp. Mara scrambled up so quickly it was almost as if she bounced, and she launched herself right back in.

From the dancer’s point of view, falling isn’t the worst thing that can happen onstage. Falling is either a fluke or the result of going for too much, and as long as there’s no injury involved it’s embarrassing and a little shocking but it’s possible to laugh about it or shrug off later. A splashy fall isn’t as bad as knowing you gave a mediocre performance—that’s really the worst thing.

Except if you don’t get many chances to dance by yourself. Except if you’re just wanting one moment where you know yourself to be really, really good. I could tell from the way Mara
was moving that she hadn’t hurt herself and after a moment she resumed smiling, but her eyes were dead.

Of course she fell. She fell because there was maybe a jewel from a costume that came off, or a stray hairpin, or something, and she stepped right on it and slipped. And because a million, a hundred thousand million pliés and tendus and a life spent sweating and aching and wanting and wanting and wanting could not stop her from falling. She fell because earlier in the evening Gia didn’t, and the stage demanded a blood tribute. She fell because life isn’t fair.

The audience started applauding her before her solo was over, and there were some cheers when she finished. I heard that, the cheer, and I sobbed out loud, a horrible sort of choked honk that scared me a little. I covered my mouth with my hand and watched Mara take her place upstage as the Spanish Princess came on. Mara was still smiling her leaden-eyed smile and breathing through her nose, the tight bodice of her dress holding in her heart so it wouldn’t fall too. And after Spanish Princess, and Neapolitan Princess, I came on and I danced … wonderfully.

I mean, absolutely flawlessly. My neck felt like it was jammed up into my right ear and I hadn’t stayed warm properly and I wasn’t paying any attention to what I was doing, and I have never danced that stupid thing better. I held every balance, and floated every jump. I could see the conductor leaning in to tell the strings to pause for me, but I wasn’t really listening to the music. The solo ends with a series of three slow turns in a diagonal coming downstage. As I prepared for the first one, I thought, “Fall,” because if I fell too, it would be the performance that Mara and I both wiped out in, and we would be
even. But I didn’t fall, I just did an extra pirouette, and for the next one I thought “Fall” again, and I didn’t, and then “Fall” once more, and I whipped through four pirouettes, balanced like I was made of stone, and finished. I made my révérence to the Prince, who will never be mine, and stepped sedately back to the upstage corner. I passed Mara on the way and we looked at each other and I thought, You don’t know what it’s like either.

After the solos we all briefly danced with the Prince. I was lifted and promenaded and returned to my place. The Queen demanded that Siegfried make a choice. Hilel took his customary regretful bow over my hand. It’s not that I am not beautiful and worthy. I’m simply not special. I’m not the One.

Then Roger as Von Rothbart entered with Gia as Odile, the Black Swan. I was supposed to join everyone else with some “Who is she? Who is she?” gestures and then move to the far side of the stage, but I just watched everyone else do it. I knew who she was. I let myself be led by my escort to Stage Right, and I watched the betrayal unfold. It looked, as it sometimes can, better than the thing it betrayed.

Second intermission. We end at the lake, of course. Whenever I wasn’t onstage I wedged myself into the wings. I promised Gia I’d watch, and it’s important to see these things through to the bloody end.

You could tell she was almost cashed out, dancing on adrenaline. She looked almost enthusiastic about killing herself, eager to end the ballet and sit down. That might be the right way to do it, actually. Not mournful, or resigned, or pathetic. Excited.

Is that what you would feel?

I was in the wings the first time Gwen danced Odette/Odile. Of course I was. Where else would I be?

Forgiveness. That’s what the last act is about.

What is forgiveness all about?

You shouldn’t ask for forgiveness.

Because if you ask someone to forgive you, and they do, then that’s twice that you’ve taken something from them. First the betrayal, and then the absolution.

God, Odette can’t even die by herself. Siegfried jumps in after her.

Better to be dead than live with forgiveness, maybe.

Curtain call took forever tonight. The audience was kind.

In the dressing room, Mara did not allow me to say anything about her falling. When I asked her if she was okay, she said, “Fine!” as if nothing had happened. Then we talked about Gia and, for some reason, about some new wine store on Twelfth Street. Mara was furiously rubbing off makeup and tearing down her hair like she wanted to get out of the room and away from me fast. Perversely, I kept pace with her. I didn’t want to be in the room by myself. The intercom buzzed to let Mara know that she had a guest waiting for her by the sign-in board.

“Good night!” Mara said, still unpinning her bun. “Thanks for your help tonight!”

“Oh, I’ll go down with you!” I said, shoving my sweater on inside out and grabbing Kleenex.

Mike was waiting with a bunch of roses in his hand. He was wearing his suit, from the office, I guess. He looked like something from another planet, amid all the dancers—half-dressed visitors from yet another planet.

“You were awesome!” he shouted, hugging her. He actually jumped up and down.

“I fell,” she said softly. “Mike, I fell.”

“Wait, what?” he cried. “You did? When?”

“Oh, honey!” Mara gasped, and started to cry.

“Wait, that thing where you sat down on the stage?” Mike pulled her to him and started rubbing her back. “It happened so fast I was sure that it was supposed to be there. It looked like you were doing a fancy trick.”

Mara started laughing and buried her head in Mike’s chest.

“I know you get mad that I think everything you do is incredible,” he said. “But I do. I really do.”

“Tonight I don’t mind,” I heard Mara say.

I left the theater and walked to the subway. There were people on the platform with
Swan Lake
programs in their hands. I moved to the far end, set my bag down on a bench, and my arm suddenly went numb. I remembered that I have an injury. I stood there for a moment, gently rotating my head to assess the damage. I would’ve liked the platform to open up and slowly lower me into another realm, but of course there were no violins and no painted moon and no one to go with me.

It’s been a lot of years now of worshipping in a church where the gods have left, and my neck is broken from praying and my knees are tired. I could have changed my life years ago. I could have been another person and I could have done other things. I did not. I was talented and I didn’t want to give that up. It wasn’t that I always loved dancing so much. But what I always liked, what my poor crooked soul still likes, is being a person who is talented. Talented at one of the most difficult and rare things to be talented in. Almost nobody gets to be a
professional ballet dancer. Those of us who have made it here have watched nearly everyone we knew who was also trying to get here have to drop off at some point. We are the elite, and we have paid for the right to be. How could we possibly walk away from it when it is offered to us? I couldn’t then, and I still can’t now.

Forgiveness.

No, I don’t think so.

Sort of an odd day. I got myself out of bed and to ten a.m. company class and it turned out to be one of those days when Marius was teaching. He doesn’t usually anymore. The temperature in the room goes up about 20 degrees when he does, and everybody turns it on. And there I was looking like total hell again. Like I just shot my dog, as Roger put it. I used to take so much care with how I looked.

“You need a signature thing,” I told Gwen when she joined the company. Mine was dark red lipstick, inspired by that photograph of Marguerite Duras on the cover of
The Lover
. She looks deep, there, and also alluring, which is how I wanted to be seen. I parted my hair in the middle and wore it in two braids a lot, and always had a little skirt on for class and rehearsal.

I broke a Vicodin in half and swallowed it with my takeout coffee. Sometimes caffeine will accelerate the effects. I was hoping to stay more or less invisible, but Marius came up to me before barre and squatted down beside me.

“Come see me after class,” he said, patting me on the foot.

I just nodded because I didn’t want to breathe Starbucks on him. Absolutely everyone in the room saw this little exchange. Marius walked away and I stood up and turned to the wall and pretended to stretch. Then I fished out the other half of the Vicodin. I actually felt like I was having a panic attack, because all of a sudden the only reason I could think of as to why Marius wanted to see me was that I was going to be fired. Well, that’s it, I told myself. You’re done. It’s over.

Class started. Marius gives very difficult combinations of steps. Very complicated musically. You have to really pay attention. He always confers with the pianist on what she is going to play. “Let’s have … dum-de-dumdum-dummm-de-dah,” he says to her, humming some piece, and then he claps softly along with the rhythm. Marius counts out the phrases for us, but he never uses any number but one. “And a ONE and a ONE and ONE,” he chants. He says things like “Try to look like you are happy when you do this” and “Don’t be stingy” and “Why is everyone sweating? Ballet is so easy.” Marius himself always looks perfectly composed.

The first part of class passed not so much in a blur as in a glaze. Like there was a shiny hard coating over everything. A stone kept dropping and plunking into my stomach.

Things got worse after barre, because then we move into the center of the room, and I could no longer avoid my reflection in the mirror. I was so distracted that I had trouble following Marius’s adagio combination and had to fake my way through it, a few counts behind.

I looked around the room, but I couldn’t connect myself to the people in it. I felt like I had slipped into some sort of bubble
inside my head, where it was impossible to reach the rest of my body.
Soutenu, soutenu, step, step, arabesque. None of this makes any sense. I’m like fucking Helen Keller in here. I can’t do this. There, it’s done, but who did it? Because it’s not me. This isn’t me
.

I thought I would be okay, kind of hiding in the back of the room, but when it came time to repeat the adagio to the left, Marius stopped class and said, “Kate, come demonstrate.”

“Oh shit,” I said. People laughed and moved off to the sides.

Marius took me by the left wrist and said, “Arabesque,” and I snapped into one like a trained pet. Left leg supporting my weight, toes, knees, and hip all rotated 90 degrees, right leg held up behind me, a good two inches higher than I would go if no one were watching. Still holding on to my wrist, Marius took a step back. “Resist me,” he said, as my torso leaned toward his in order to keep my balance. I did, tightening the muscles in my back. “More,” said Marius, taking another step back. He slid his hand from my wrist and gripped my fingers, pulling me. I pulled back as hard as I could. “Look at me,” said Marius. I looked at him, at his eyes, which are a dark brown. Tiny crow’s-feet surround them now and his hair is turning gray. We are both getting older. I took a breath that was filled with the scent of Marius’s cologne: lemons and something secret and sweat. “There,” said Marius. “There.” He released my fingers and I remained positioned, stretched, flattened, wired, strung. “Rest,” said Marius, and I brought my right leg down, relaxed my arms.

Marius walked away from me, addressing the class.

“There must be tension always, before the release. Otherwise there is no dynamic, everything just bleeds, yah, yah, yah,
no up, no down. And so it’s boring. Your audience sits back in their seats and wonders what the babysitter is doing. Always tension, then release. I say tension, but I do not mean this”—Marius screwed himself up like a scalded cat—“I mean like the bow of an arrow.” Marius turned back to me and held me in front of him, encircling me with his arms. He moved me into an archer’s stance, pulling back an imaginary string. The knuckles of his left hand pressed against my heart. My right shoulder blade slotted into the ridge of his sternum. “Aim,” said Marius. I pressed back into him and swiveled us a half turn to face the mirrors. I closed one eye and found my reflection’s heart in the mirror, lowered the imaginary arrow, and pointed it directly at myself. There was some chuckling and applause from the class. Marius let go of me and stood back. “All right, then,” he said. “Fire when ready.”