Siren Spell

by Cidney Swanson

  ~ ~ ~

  Saturday passed and Giselle completed her entire week’s homework. This meant that on Sunday, when Ruslana, Ykaterina, and Katya went back to the studio to evaluate costumes, Giselle had nothing at all to do. Even Sasha was no company; she slept all day by the heater vent. Giselle took an extended walk by herself, avoiding the river, just in case. When she returned, Sasha held her leash in her mouth, hopeful, but Giselle was too tired to walk anymore.

  Instead, she went upstairs and began to clear her drawers of dance clothing she would no longer need. Some of it would fit Katya, which was a cheering thought. But when she got to a hand-me-down wrap skirt from her grandmother, she had to blink back the tears that filled her eyes. The ancient black skirt was an indestructible polyester miracle from the days when Ykaterina Chekhov had trained in the Soviet Union.

  Giselle tore her eyes from the skirt, placed it in one of Katya’s drawers, and slammed the drawer shut.

  And then, out of the blue, James called.

  15

  PROMISES

  “Don’t you hate Sunday afternoons?”

  This was James’s opening inquiry.

  Giselle, dabbing at her eyes, stumbled through a reply. “Um, yeah.”

  “I was just sitting here thinking about the auditions and then I thought about you and then I thought I’d call and see what you were doing.”

  “Um, nothing.” Was he asking because he wanted to do something with her? Giselle was inexperienced when it came to talking with boys. Or texting boys. Or flirting with boys. Or pretty much anything involving boys that didn’t also involve tights and ballet slippers.

  “Yeah, me neither. So you and Kinsler had a little one on one, I hear. What was that all about?”

  For a brief moment, Giselle wondered if what Mr. Kinsler had told her was spoken in confidence.

  “I don’t want to pry or anything,” said James.

  His voice was drowsy and warm and hinted at lazy summers spent on blankets under spreading willows.

  “So?” James prompted her to reply, breaking off Giselle’s daydream of his warm lips approaching hers.

  “Oh. He … well … he asked if I would accept a certain role, if he were to cast me in the role.”

  “If he were to cast me,” James repeated, laughing lazily.

  He was mocking her. Her lips pinched together tightly.

  “You’re so formal,” he said.

  “Try growing up in a house where no one spoke English as their first language,” retorted Giselle. “Besides, I’m not formal. I’m … precise.”

  “Precisely,” drawled James. “So, what role?”

  Giselle twisted the hem of her tee around her thumb.

  “Titania?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Hippolyta? Puck?”

  “I’m not sure I’m supposed to tell anyone.”

  “I won’t tell anyone. Promise.”

  She heard other promises in James’s gravelly voice. Promises of warmth in winter. Of heat between palms when hand touched hand.

  “Come on,” he said, wheedling.

  Giselle blurted it out. “Helena.”

  “Helen fair,” murmured James, his voice a sighing warm breeze. “Oh, hey, I gotta go. See you on the flip side, fair Helen.”

  She didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye. Her fingers drifted to her lips, to the remembered kiss. It took a few minutes for her to realize James hadn’t called to ask her to do anything other than spill secrets. Even though he’d said he wasn’t doing anything. Even though he confessed to being bored. She felt unreasonably disappointed that James hadn’t asked her to do something.

  ~ ~ ~

  The following morning, at Katya’s insistence, the girls left for school early to examine the cast list, Giselle with a level of anxiety she knew was entirely unwarranted. She wasn’t a drama student. What did she care if she were cast or not?

  At the school, they weren’t the only ones who had arrived early to check. Several drama students greeted Katya by name. Giselle struggled through the hovering mass of bodies to search the list for her name.

  When she noted it was spelled Gisella, she wanted to shake Rebecca by the shoulders. But when she saw the role “Helena” beside her name, a tiny smile appeared on her face. Some people didn’t think her height was a problem. She was surprised at how happy it made her, seeing her name prominently displayed at the very top of the list, where everyone could see it. She scanned through the other names, pretty sure she wouldn’t recognize any of them but James’s. But she did recognize another name just below hers.

  Marcus Duval.

  As in, the same Marcus whose fault it was she wouldn’t be dancing the role of Giselle.

  Slipping backward, she excused herself from the crowd, no longer interested in the list.

  “Well?” demanded Katya.

  “Oh. Helena.” Giselle tried to look pleased for her sister’s sake.

  “Oh, that’s awesome! Babushka will be so pleased you’re not a fairy.”

  “Why is Marcus’s name on the cast list?” demanded Giselle. “He didn’t even audition. I would have recognized him.” She could hardly have missed part-stealing-boy if he’d been there.

  “He got a special dispensation,” replied Katya. “Mr. Kinsler let him audition on Thursday with a couple of other students who had conflicts Friday.”

  Katya didn’t have to spell out Marcus’s conflict: it would have been something to do with ballet, with Giselle rehearsals.

  “So,” began Katya, a lilt in her voice. Giselle suspected her sister meant to tease her back to good humor. “You get to play opposite James Weinhard….”

  “He’s Lysander,” said Giselle. “Not the character I end up marrying. I end up with Demetrius.”

  With evil Marcus, in fact.

  “He may not be the one you end up with, but I’m pretty sure he has to kiss you somewhere in the second Act.” Katya waggled her eyebrows and giggled.

  Giselle felt a frisson of excitement. She thought she could manage to tolerate a kiss. In ballet, one did not kiss one’s romantic partner. One might be grasped in ways and in places which would shock even the tangled lovers beside the freshman lockers, but kissing? Certainly not.

  A happy fluttering warmed her belly.

  “You’ll have to practice so it looks realistic,” said Katya, a smirk turning up the corners of her mouth. “You know what they say in the studio … practice makes perfect.” She burst into a fit of giggling.

  Giselle leaned in and whispered. “Did you hear about the audition kiss?”

  Katya’s eyes grew wide. “Everyone heard about that.”

  Giselle flushed and looked away. Over by the cast list, Marcus looked as if he might be trying to catch her eye.

  “We’re leaving,” Giselle murmured to her sister.

  Properly, Giselle ought to have been pleased with her triumph in securing a main role. She was only a junior. She was entirely new to drama. Unfortunately, her delight was short lived. Seeing the Midsummer Night’s Dream cast list put her in mind of that other cast list, glimpsed a week earlier. She spent large portions of the day moping over how Kevin, and not Marcus, should have been dancing Prince Albrecht. In the minutes before drama, her final class of the day, began, she made a point of blatantly ignoring Marcus, whom she could only see as the water-spilling, part-stealer of her final ballet audition.

  She frowned and reached for her water bottle, considering the dismal fact that she hadn’t even known, that day, that it was to be her last day in the studio. This realization put her in an even worse mood so that when Rebecca marched Marcus over to meet her, Giselle turned slightly away and pretended to be doing battle with her water bottle.

  Marcus circled to her other side, holding out a hand. Giselle couldn’t think of any good excuse not to take it.

  “I really enjoyed your audition at the studio,” said Marcus. “You’re gifted. I’m sorry you won’t be dancing in Giselle.”

  Well, he
certainly wasn’t shy talking about it.

  She glowered, muttering, “Not as sorry as I am,” leaving Marcus to figure out what else might have been implied in the statement. She was so upset by the forced encounter that she forgot to slouch as she crossed the room to take a seat in the circle of folding chairs and wooden boxes. She corrected her posture once she sat, forcing her shoulders to collapse forward, dropping her chin, taking her feet out of turnout.

  Once she was seated, however, she found her gaze drawn back to Marcus. She had to blink back angry tears. It was so unfair Marcus had come and ruined everything.

  Beside her, a classmate spoke. “Trouble with your contact lenses?” the girl asked. “I’ve got solution. Mom’s always stuffing trial size bottles in here.” The girl rummaged through a bag large enough to hide a level 1 ballet student.

  Giselle bit her lip, wondering what exactly she was doing in drama if her I’m so mad I could cry face was indistinguishable from an I’m having trouble with contact lenses face.

  “I don’t wear contacts,” she murmured, rubbing her eyes.

  Mr. Kinsler called the class to order, asking Rebecca to pass out copies of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Just as the tardy bell rang, James slipped through the door looking like he should be modeling in an ad for tight jeans instead of acting in a high school Shakespeare play. He winked at Caitlyn, the Juliet who had slapped him on Friday, but when he chose a seat, he chose the one directly behind Giselle.

  She could hear his breathing, rapid from having run to class. She smelled the heady scent clinging to his clothes, coffee and dark chocolate and that spice she couldn’t name. The aroma made her dizzy. Her eyes were on her new copy of Shakespeare’s Dream, but in her imagination, she was kissing James again. She had to be nudged to read Helena’s first line.

  For the next two hours, the second of which occurred after school, the class read through A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Giselle was surprised by how much she understood, a point Mr. Kinsler addressed at the end of the rehearsal.

  “Good work, everyone. I hope you now appreciate why you must never, ever read Shakespeare silently. To be understood, the Bard’s words must be experienced ALOUD!”

  He uttered the final word with such gusto that several students, Giselle among them, startled in their seats. Mr. Kinsler made no apology, instead handing Rebecca another stack of papers.

  “Rebecca is distributing your rehearsal schedules. Look these over and sign your initials by each date to indicate you understand when you are to be here after school hours. Please have a parent initial the final sheet, indicating they know what days you are to be here. Lastly, you will find a brief homework assignment I’ve tailored to each of you individually. Beginning tomorrow, I will select one of you each day to do a three minute presentation on the indicated topic, so please come to class tomorrow ready to go. Dismissed.”

  Giselle rose, exhausted from having remained sitting in one position for so long. She had been working hard to copy the various slouching postures she observed with furtive glances around the room, and she had a horrific ache between her shoulder blades to prove it.

  Feeling a light touch resting on that shoulder for a moment, she turned and saw James withdrawing his hand. She smiled.

  “It’s gonna suck seeing Demetrius end up with you, my fair Helena,” he said, sighing deeply. His smile held a hint of melancholic dismay, which Giselle thought might be manufactured rather than genuine, but it was such a lovely smile that she didn’t really care. Before Giselle could think of anything witty to say in response, James made a brief bow and departed.

  Her toes curled inside her shoes, and for a moment she forgot to breathe.

  James raced for the door, calling out, “Cait, Cat, Catrina the fair,” to the Juliet of the audition, now cast as Hermia, Helena’s best friend. Giselle remembered to breathe again, shoving her copy of the Dream into her bag. As she uncurled her toes, she saw Rebecca approaching with Marcus and the student playing Puck.

  “Gisella,” said Rebecca, still mispronouncing Giselle’s name in blissful ignorance, “Some of the students are going for coffee to run lines. Are you free?”

  Giselle’s eyes flickered briefly to the hateful Marcus. She muttered something about homework and turned to walk home alone.

  She was home for a long, quiet hour before Katya, their mother, and Babushka returned from the studio. Ruslana entered the house talking on her cell, discussing with Miss Ellen the possibility of permanently taking over the classes Giselle used to teach.

  A small part of Giselle crumpled like wadded paper as she observed how swiftly her mother could replace her.

  “I’m covering your office hour,” Katya murmured to Giselle. “It’s no problem. I’m there anyway.”

  “Fine by me,” replied Giselle, little bits of herself continuing to origami themselves to the size of shriveled peas.

  She went to bed unhappy, falling asleep to the murmuring of the fountain in the backyard, which her mother must have turned back on. She dreamed about the fountain.

  In her dream, she stood outside, locking the chicken coop for the night. A full moon glowed from behind thin cloud cover, casting light into the otherwise darkened yard. As she left the hen-house, Giselle recalled her grandmother’s admonition to keep the fountain turned off. She cut around the side of the house to flip the switch, but when she did so, she saw them, the long-haired girls combing their wet tresses beside the fountain, pale bare feet swish-swishing through the pooled water.

  At first, she thought the girls couldn’t see her. But with a quiver along her spine, she realized they knew she was there; they recognized her presence. One of the pale maidens murmured to the others in their strange sibilant language. As in her other dreams, Giselle could understand their speech.

  “The new name sounds silly,” hissed one of the creatures. “I liked it better when they called us veelis.”

  “I liked it better when they were afraid of us,” whispered another.

  “This one is afraid,” hissed the first. “But is she afraid of us? Or of what she will become?”

  As the siren spoke, she turned, gazing over her shoulder at Giselle. The creature pulled back her lips as if to smile, but Giselle saw only disdain in the row of sharp, white teeth. The maiden raised her proud face just as the moon broke free of the clouds, exposing the milky whites of eyes with no pupils, horrible and terrifying.

  Giselle awoke gasping for breath.

  It was a dream, Giselle told herself again and again, but merely repeating the statement did nothing to remove her dread of looking outside her window, which would give her a direct view of the fountain, still plashing outside. She thought again of her grandmother’s warning.

  Not for any amount of wealth would she have gone outside to turn off the fountain. She pulled her duvet up and around her shoulders and shivered until Katya’s alarm got them both out of bed.

  16

  CRIMES OF PASSION

  The Sirens of Foulweather had made the morning news again, due to a new attack in the Multnomah Channel, this time on the borders of Foulweather itself, but the students of All Arts had apparently become inured to the idea of the creatures haunting the riverbanks, and anyway, the victim had lived, hadn’t he?

  In Spanish and English classes, students whispered to one another about the sirens, but quickly switched to discussing who might ask who to the homecoming dance. In PE and Science, murmuring was not tolerated. In drama, muttering was accepted as a matter of course because students were always running lines, but in the corner where Giselle had seated herself, the thespians, eschewers of school dances, discussed the sirens.

  Giselle needed no reminders of the pale creatures populating her nightmares. She moved to another part of the classroom where students were running lines from A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

  Before she’d been cast in the play, the constant muttering of lines by drama students had struck Giselle as … pretentious. Now, she understood it was driven by necessity; th
ere was no pretense about it whatsoever. Lines couldn’t be learned without constant repetition. It reminded her of how she and her dance friends had been called “stuck up” in middle school because they walked with their heads held high. Dancers had to walk with their heads held high; drama students had to mutter lines. Perhaps they weren’t so different after all.

  The line-whisperers were suddenly drowned out by a pair of students who appeared to be engaged in a sort of Shakespearian … insult duel.

  “Thou toad!” cried one student.

  “Thou creature of small brain!”

  “I am sick when I do look on thee!”

  The last phrase, Giselle recalled from yesterday’s read through of the play. It was something Demetrius said to Helena, her character, when she tried to lead him into the woods to search for Hermia and Lysander. Today’s rehearsal would place her with James as Lysander, in the scene where Lysander would fall madly in love with her character, Helena. There might well be kissing. Repeated kissing. Giselle felt her cheeks heating and checked her bag for breath mints. Finding one, she popped it in her mouth.

  One of Katya’s drama-geek friends seated herself beside Giselle. Giselle knew the girl only as “Cobweb,” one of the fairies in the play.

  After listening to a few more insults, “Cobweb” leaned over and introduced herself.

  “You’re Katya’s sister, right?” She didn’t wait for a response. “I’m Ophelia. Yes, it’s my real name. No, I didn’t pick it myself.”

  “Giselle,” said Giselle, smiling at Ophelia’s contagious enthusiasm.

  “My parents are the world’s biggest Bard-o-philes,” murmured Ophelia. “Although why any parents would see fit to name their child after a girl who runs mad and drowns herself in a river—well, I have no good explanation for that.”

  This was so nearly identical to what Giselle had thought hundreds of times about her own christening that she giggled. She sounded just like Katya when Katya was amused by something. Giselle couldn’t remember the last time she’d laughed. It was refreshing, as though she were softening and expanding inside. She was about to tell Ophelia about the origins of her own name when Mr. Kinsler called the class to order.