Ballerina

by Edward Stewart

  Steph stared at the tiny figure trembling with hatred. This was my friend. How did this happen? Half of her wanted to burst into tears. Half of her was relieved: this burden would never again be hers to carry.

  ‘I’m through with you, Chris. Through with your tears and your tantrums and your panics. Go change your own diapers.’

  ‘Now that that’s settled, get the hell out.’

  ‘Gladly.’

  Steph was almost at the lobby door when she realized she still had the medicine bottles and The Little Prince in her tote bag. She went to the desk and plunked them down in front of an astonished clerk.

  ‘Tell Miss Avery she has a package.’

  Steph and Chris did not talk after that. In class they instinctively took different corners of the room, like cats stalking out separate territories. In rehearsal they watched one another for style and form, coldly, but their glances were careful not to meet.

  Before performance there were no more hugs or help with the make-up or merdes in the wings. The other dancers sensed it. The eyes of the company were on the two girls, measuring, comparing—waiting. Whatever it was between Steph and Chris—competition, hatred, instinct to murder—it burst into the open the night of Graduation Ball.

  The ballet was set to music by Johann Strauss. The story was comic and slight: students at a boarding school for young ladies gave a party for cadets from a military academy. The divertisement included a competition where two girls each tried to do more fouettés than the other.

  In fouetté, the dancer went on pointe. One leg whipped out to the side, then in to the knee, and the momentum whirled her in a full circle. Fouettés were single or double—or triple—depending how many turns you made on a single whip of a leg. It was a spectacular step, the triple most spectacular of all. There were no triples in Graduation Ball.

  Until the night that Steph and Chris played the two girls.

  They squared off, as the choreography required, taking up positions on opposite sides of the stage. Chris went first, whipping on four sets of three singles. They were neat, fast, scalpel sharp.

  Steph went second, duplicating Chris exactly.

  When Chris’s turn came again she did three sets of singles. But for her fourth set she whipped out a single, single, double. Which wasn’t in the choreography.

  An appreciative murmur went up in the audience, and the dancers onstage exchanged glances.

  From deep down in Steph came an energized bubble of anger. She wasn’t going to let Chris get away with a trick like that. She whipped out two sets of singles, then two sets of single, single, double.

  And then stepped back to watch Chris try to top it.

  By now the other dancers had come out of character. Usually they mugged their way through the scene with ‘gee whiz’ arched eyebrows. But now the choreography had been flung to the winds and they were actually wondering which girl would top the other. The audience sensed an electric charge onstage and sat forward in their seats. Opera glasses lifted and lips counted silently.

  Chris threw herself straight off into a single, single, double.

  That meant only one thing: there would have to be a triple. The only question was, when? It came in the fourth set: single, single, then a blinding blur of acceleration triple.

  The house broke out in applause that drowned Steph’s music. She didn’t give a damn. She had the last set, which gave her the advantage.

  Chris had forced her up, like a rival bidding at an auction, and Steph had to open single, single, double. She kept to the same pattern for her second set.

  The dancers knew exactly what was coming now. If Steph was going to top Chris she had to do it in the next set.

  And she did: single, single, triple.

  The house began applauding and by the time Steph whipped out the last single, single, triple they were bravoing. She stepped back, caught her breath, shot a ‘Who, me?’ smile into the audience and milked the applause with a little ad-lib curtsy.

  Afterwards, in the jostle to get offstage, Steph and Chris bumped into one another.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Steph, before she saw who it was.

  ‘Nice going,’ Chris said icily.

  ‘It’s your own stupid fault,’ Steph shot back. ‘Don’t start things you can’t finish.’

  Chris’s eyes nailed her. ‘Don’t you worry. I haven’t even begun.’

  Word of the rivalry swept the company. At the next Graduation Ball the dressers and practically everyone who wasn’t dancing crammed into the wings. Word had even leaked to the public, and everyone who had the pull to get walked in used it. There had been a three-quarter house for the first ballet on the programme, Concerto in G. For Graduation Ball it looked like a sellout.

  Chris led off with a wild rush of single, single, double. She kept to it for the whole set. There were shrugs in the audience, glances between dancers.

  Steph took her strategy from Chris: three single, single, doubles and a single, single, triple, just to keep ahead.

  So far it wasn’t anything that hadn’t been seen the other night, but there was a spattering of applause.

  Chris’s turn again. Two single, single, doubles and then, pulling up to Steph, a single, single, triple. Applause. Then a single, double, triple, and the house began screaming.

  Steph readied herself. Determination was drumming in her blood. She flung off two single, single, doubles, ripped into a single, double, triple. Applause. Saving herself, she finished with another single, double, triple.

  It was the homestretch now.

  Chris kicked off with a single, single, double, a single, single, triple, a single, double, triple. The sweat was spitting out from her in whipslaps that lashed as far as the faces in the wings. And then, whirling in a dizzying circle up and down and around, leg in, leg out, a double, double, triple.

  There were shrieks of ‘Bravo!’ and even the dancers onstage, under cover of their roles, applauded.

  Steph didn’t have a choice. There was no way she could humanly top Chris’s double, double, triple, so she had to open higher than Chris had. She spun out a smooth single, single, triple. Her body and mind were riveted to one objective: stay equal with Chris. Her next single, single, triple came well, but on her single, double, triple she felt her balance slipping and she wasted momentum correcting it.

  For her final set she did a double, a double, tried for a triple—managed a double and a sloppy fall into fifth.

  Shit!

  Steph was left simmering in a pool of anger. There were no more Graduation Balls that season, but the schedule had her and Chris both dancing the Sylvia pas de deux three nights apart.

  Chris came first.

  Steph watched from the wings, memorizing, determined her Sylvia would be twice whatever Chris could do.

  And what Chris did was to balance in the adagio. Wally, who was partnering, stepped aside, presenting her. She went onto pointe and into arabesque and held it.

  And held it.

  The conductor looked searchingly at her, eyes puzzled.

  She didn’t come down. She didn’t wobble. The audience began applauding. She held the balance till they were bravoing, then with a flick of her eyes she told the conductor he could go on.

  Okay, Steph vowed,I’ll outbalance her.

  Three nights later Steph held the balance till the audience was shouting. The conductor’s eyes inquired and then they beseeched.

  Steph ignored him.

  She held the balance and held it and held it, floating on her bravos. It was like walking motionless in a dream through stretched time. She felt euphoric; victorious. She knew Chris was watching; smarting; hating.

  Sasha was partnering, and his eyes began to plead too. If he moved before Steph he’d disgrace himself. He had to stand statue-still and it was obviously beginning to hurt.

  The applause came like water rushing through a dam. The conductor shook his head. He took out his pocket watch and began winding it.

  The water was rushing through tw
o dams now. Gravity and time nudged. Steph let the balance flow through her and finally, drop by drop, out of her. She began the descent. Never hurrying. Now her heel touched canvas. Now.

  She had won round two.

  Round three was Voluntaries.

  It was an abstract ballet, full of tricky counts and soaring lifts, and it was cunningly dovetailed to the Poulenc organ concerto. It gave the ballerina one of the most dazzling leaps in all contemporary dance: after a shattering organ chord that sounded like a cathedral coming down, there was dead silence. In that instant of shocked nothingness the ballerina had to dash the full length of the diagonal, jump into the male dancer’s arms, and—as he held her—execute a complete split-second turn.

  It happened so fast, and the turn after the catch looked so contrary to physics, that audiences could never believe they’d actually seen it. The reaction was always the same: silence, a ‘Did you see what I saw?’ exchange of glances, and applause that ripped the house apart.

  There were dancers—very few—who could do a double turn after the catch. Natalia Makarova, who starred with American Ballet Theater, was one of them. Stephanie Lang, who wasn’t even a ballerina yet, decided that she was going to be another.

  She was scheduled the night before Chris.

  Sasha was partnering her, and just before performance she told him, ‘I’m going to do a double turn after the catch, so be ready.’

  His eyes bulged to twice their normal size. ‘You crazy.’

  She nodded. ‘That’s right. I crazy.’

  By now the whole New York dance world knew about the two competing soloists, and the wings were jammed for Voluntaries. Not just with NBT dancers but with dancers from other companies who’d been able to wangle passes or con their way past guards.

  Steph backed up for her dash—a little farther than she’d rehearsed.

  Sasha was waiting, white-faced and braced.

  Mentally she crossed herself. She muttered, ‘This one’s for you, Chris.’ She waited for the chord. Readiness crept up from her feet, up through her calves and thighs.

  The chord hit her heart with the impact of a starting gun.

  She ran.

  There was a commotion alongside her. The backstage audience rushed like hunting hounds from front wings to back, keeping her in view.

  She jumped.

  Her momentum crashed into Sasha’s immobility. With a sideways twist of his hand he redirected speed into spin.

  One turn.

  Another turn.

  And snap to a stop and screaming, stamping applause.

  ‘Bozhe moi,’ he gasped. ‘Never do that to Sasha again. Bad for heart.’

  The next night was Chris’s turn.

  Six counts before the chord she backed to the very edge of the stage. She would have stepped into the orchestra pit, but the heat of the footlights warned her.

  From somewhere within her, some secret place where body and mind were one, came the spark, the I will. The weakness fell away from her like a dropped cloak. Now there was no headache, no chill, no dizziness.

  Her face was dark. Her pupils had become huge, leaving no irises. Her eyes were hard, black pearls. She stared over the abyss toward Wally. Their gazes met and for one instant he was terrified.

  He knew exactly what she was going to do.

  The chord thundered out.

  A dizzying determination seized Chris by the feet, catapulted her forward.

  Wally saw her coming straight at him, much too fast. He thought he had never seen a girl look so crazed or dangerous or beautiful. He saw her shoot up from the floor and he heard the air sucked screeching into her nostrils.

  Chris saw only the surprise on Wally’s face.

  There was an instant of public disbelief, of denial. And then the explosion. Shouts and applause and bravos poured down from the house and out from the wings and as word raced through the orchestra pit musicians stood up on their chairs and stared.

  The tip of the conductor’s baton hung on air, paralyzed.

  ‘A triple turn!’ The cry ran through the theatre. ‘She did a triple turn!’

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ Wally whispered, ‘You could have warned me.’

  She clung to him, not answering. Her sweat felt like a cold river pouring over his skin.

  The conductor rapped his music stand. ‘Gentlemen—gentlemen!’ He gave the upbeat. The music began again, giant funereal heartbeats of plucked strings and struck timpani.

  Gradually it dawned on Wally what he was holding in his arms.

  ‘Chris,’ he whispered, and then,’ Chris!’

  Her arm slipped off his shoulder, dangling, and then as his own strength gave out she slid to the floor.

  They laid Chris on a blanket just beyond the main swirls of backstage traffic. Someone made a pillow of towels for under her head. Her toe shoes were slipped off, her feet propped up on the seat of an electrician’s chair.

  Steph hung back. A stillness rippled out from the silent body. Dancers watched from a tactful distance, dark and quiet as the shadows of trees.

  The company doctor hunched over Chris. He took her pulse, handed her wrist back to her. A thermometer came gleaming from his bag and went between the two rows of small white teeth. Chris had a dreaming, contented look, like a child sucking on a lollipop.

  The doctor’s every movement was rapid, staccato: the tourniquet, the stethoscope, the listening, the looking, the light flashed in the eyes, the tongue depressed with a wooden stick.

  Steph got her courage up and stepped forward. ‘What’s happened to her?’

  ‘Plenty.’ There was guarded anger in the doctor’s voice. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I was—I’m her roommate.’

  ‘She’s asleep.’

  ‘Asleep?’

  ‘And starved. When did she last eat?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘What is it about you dancers? Can you get her to bed and feed her?’

  Steph’s mind raced. She knew Chris would not accept help from someone she now regarded as her enemy. And she certainly wouldn’t feed herself.

  ‘I can put her in the hospital,’ the doctor said, ‘but the company won’t like it because it raises the insurance premium.’

  Steph said, ‘I’ll be right back.’

  ‘Stephanie.’ It was Sasha, one hand on the edge of a prop bin, stretching and warming up for his entrance in Harlequinade. He had leashed Merde to a light pole and the poodle was snoring softly. ‘Something wrong with Christine?’ He grasped Steph’s shoulder, used her as a support to exercise the other leg.

  ‘She’s very sick.’

  A shadow crossed his face. For an instant, shame outweighed arrogance and his eyes dropped, borne down, ‘Is something I can do?’

  The old impulse stirred in her. How lovely it would have been to muffle her face against his chest, to feel his strength holding her up.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Anything.’

  He was ugly-handsome, boy-man, gazing at her, flirting with her, even now.

  ‘I need a dime for the phone.’

  ‘You want to use the phone in my dressing room?’

  ‘No.’

  He shrugged, charming in defeat, and then he called to a stagehand and borrowed a dime and closed Steph’s hand over it.

  She went to the pay phone in the corridor. It was just a phone on the wall, smack in the middle of traffic and hurry, no booth, no privacy. She dropped the dime in the slot and placed the collect call.

  People didn’t exactly stop and stare but they slowed down and shot the quick glances of dancers running for a cue who’ve heard a rumour of disaster.

  Steph’s feet fidgeted. Three rings: four rings. She swallowed. God, let someone be home! The sweat was turning cold on her skin and she hadn’t the faintest idea what she was going to say.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Mrs Avery?’

  Two conversations battled for the same line. The operator was trying to straighten out the collect call
and Steph was trying to shout over the operator, over the orchestra.

  ‘Something’s happened to Christine?’ Mrs Avery sounded frightened.

  Steph felt herself drowning in an ocean of bustle and fortissimo. ‘She passed out during performance.’

  ‘I can’t hear you, she what?’

  Steph waited for a lull in the music. She told Mrs Avery what had happened. Mrs Avery spoke in a strangely controlled voice.

  ‘Is there someone to take care of her till I get there?’

  ‘I don’t think she’d let me.’

  ‘Can you get her to the hospital? I’ll fly to New York first thing tomorrow morning. And, Stephanie—thank you.’

  More dancers had gathered, blocking the wing. Steph pried her way through them. There were stares and headshakes. There was fear and mute acceptance, the knowledge that what had happened to the girl on the blanket could happen to any of them, would sooner or later happen to some of them. There was the guilt of survivors and with it whispered offers of help.

  Wally was crouched beside Chris, holding her hand, telling her it would be all right, telling her desperately. Steph stared down at the face, whited-out beneath the make-up. It seemed to her Chris was calling silently for help: Save me, don’t let me die here!

  Steph shook off the thought. No one’s going to die. No one’s even going to be sick.

  Not if we move fast.

  ‘Wally, she’s got to go to the hospital.’

  A rustle went through the dancers as they strained their collective ear.

  ‘I’ll get a taxi,’ Wally said.

  His eyes met Chris’s and it dawned on them both at the same time: they were still in costume, still in make-up. They looked like Halloween drag freaks.

  ‘We’d better put on raincoats,’ Wally said. ‘And one on her, too.’

  forty-six

  It was twelve-thirty in the morning by the time Wally let himself into the apartment.

  ‘Anyone home?’

  No answer.

  Funny, he thought, Ellis ought to be home by now. His eyes roved the clothing and old newspapers strewn about the room. Nothing seemed changed since he’d dashed out that morning.

  The coffee cup, half full, was where he’d left it, on the mantelpiece of the so-called wood-burning fireplace that didn’t burn wood or paper or anything else. Ellis had wanted a fireplace—‘Makes it homey,’ he’d pleaded—and so they were paying a hundred dollars more than they could afford for the run-down, badly heated, leaky walk-up.