by Anna Maxted
Normally I wouldn’t be seen in a body bag at Poncho—it makes Taco Bell look like the Met Bar—but I didn’t want Chris to think I had nowhere to go on a Friday night. The party is a welcome back party, organized for Andy by his pal Robbie. Andy invited me—a sympathy invite—when I was captive in the Astra. I didn’t have the nerve to refuse. (I didn’t have the nerve to refresh his memory either.) I’m going because Babs is going. Presumably Simon will be there too, so at least Chris will know someone. I didn’t tell Chris it was karaoke, but I did say that my brother Tony—vice president of marketing at Black Moon Records—might turn up, and Chris said it sounded “boss.”
The only monster blot on the landscape, I think, as I slink into the studio to meet Mel as arranged, is this scab on my face. I feel the urge to hack off my chin with a knife. I wish it was fancy dress, I could go in a yashmak. I sit on a chair by the pianist, and gaze at the dancers. I want to leap up and shout, Oh my god, you’re so clever! I will never get over the beauty of classical ballet. I’ve seen Swan Lake—technically known as a “grind”—fifty times and at the first flutter of a feathered tutu I dissolve. When I first joined the company, I watched class and asked Matt to identify the god in the head scarf. He replied, “I have a rule: ‘Don’t shag the payroll.’ ” Like I have a choice. Dancers aren’t generally keen on civilian bodies. As Julietta reportedly said, “Once you’ve driven a Benz you don’t want to drive anything else.” I watch Oskar now, fiddling with his head scarf in the mirror. This week, the company is rehearsing for spring. Mel is sitting on the floor in what looks like a baby “onesie,” cutting up plasters and sticking them on her callused toes. Her feet are ugly. It fascinates me, the mess and tears and pain behind the cool serenity of this purist art. Dancers are the only athletes who can’t show the viewers how much it hurts, and I’m in awe of their power and poise.
Then the artistic director swishes in and orders everyone to “Get your junk off.” The AD is slightly more feared than a vengeful god and the dancers scurry to remove their layers. You can always tell if they’re feeling fat by what they wear to class. Some days it’s like walking into ski school. The répétiteur—whose job it is to breathe life into a production and betray people to the artistic director—is already taking the principal couples through their paces.
Today, the répétiteur has the Herculean task of translating into English the instructions of Anastasia Kossoff—former star of the Kirov—who is “staging” our presentation of Romeo and Juliet. Anastasia is sixty-seven with a body like a wasp, and will never be able to infuse these British pears with even a breath of her genius. The problem is, she literally scares them stiff. Mel scampers into place—“Sorry, sorry!” The AD watches like a bird of prey.
The pianist plays, the dancers dance themselves dizzy, and Anastasia starts shouting: “It looks like you working! Here”—gracefully executing the step herself—“is dignity, here”—mimicking the dancers like a stiff wooden puppet—“is not dignity! Use grace! Not jerky! Urgency! I not see the shape of your arcs! Can we do the écarté step again! Control!”—the sweating, panting principals stare dejected as she demonstrates—“Softly, soft…come up! Come up! Control yourself! Squeeze, squeeze, now carry yourself! Carry, carry, little ronde de jambe, small, huh? On the top of the ground! As this goes forward, this goes out but not too much! Yah! Okay, lez go, don’t drop that! How”—she turns to the répétiteur—“do you explain this in technique?”
Forty excruciating minutes later, the class is dismissed. Mel looks crushed, and I ache for her. Ballet is all about correction. And all ballet dancers are perfectionists. It’s not what you call a horse-and-carriage partnership, and it’s no mystery that most dancers are a mash of desperate vanity and low self-confidence. As Mel passes the AD, he murmurs, “Nice try, darling.”
She is wan as we walk to the corner café. I hate to say it, but her dancing today was less than wonderful. She did not—as they say in ballet—“move big,” and she stumbled twice. And although she has the frame of a spring onion, her thighs looked pappy. Suddenly she blurts, “Oskar is holding me back! He’s just not there on the lifts! He’s dancing like a plank with rigor mortis!”
I am not about to skewer my baby friendship with a principal dancer by disagreeing. I present a consolation prize.
“Poor you,” I say, “but guess what?” I cross my fingers. “I’ve spoken to The Sun and they want to do a feature on you!”
Mel does a bunny hop of joy. “When?” she gasps, squeezing a lifetime of hope into one short word.
Even as I smile, my heart flips uneasily. But I ignore it. That’s what you get for selling your professional soul to the devil. Anyhow, it’s worth it to see the look of gratitude on Mel’s face. In her world right now I am number one. I tell her it will be this Sunday, and it’s for their Health and Beauty section. “They’re going to compare your fitness with a rugby player’s. So that should be a laugh, and they’ll take gorgeous pictures of you in a tutu, with the hunk, and there’ll be a shoot, with a hair stylist and a makeup artist, and The Sun has so many readers you’ll be even more famous than you already are!”
Mel’s toothy grin lights up her face. We sit in the café and she buys a Mars Bar and a Coke.
“This is the first thing I’ve had to eat in two days,” she announces.
“Oh!” I say. “How do you feel?”
Mel smiles again. “High as a kite.”
I think of when a visiting nutritionist told a junior soloist to eat more or reap the whirlwind aged forty. “Forty!” she scoffed. “Who cares about forty? I’m not going to live that long!”
I smile tightly and try not to wonder if my Sun story is actually a good idea. I should have okayed it with the AD, but I haven’t and I know that Matt assumes I have.
“You know,” I say softly, “you should eat.”
Mel frowns. “Natalie, my thighs are enormous. And my legs are short, and I’ve got no neck—I can’t afford to eat like a horse!”
I didn’t say, “eat like a horse,” I said “eat.”
“I want to see bone!” she adds, quoting a late revered choreographer who married four of his ballerinas. (In this industry there’s a quick turnover.) I sigh. Mel’s insecurity is exhaustive. Last year, one of the GL Ballet guest artists was a twenty-three-year-old Serb, a wonderful lyrical dancer, though a tad stocky compared to, say, a bamboo stick. Mel watched her dance Odile in Swan Lake in a black tutu and scoffed, “I bet she thinks black is slimming. You might as well ink in the white bits on a killer whale.” I know that makes her sound mean, but she isn’t—just scared. Mel reminds me of a dog that’s been ill-treated—everyone is a threat until they prove they can be trusted, and then she becomes sweetly, irrevocably fond. I see the café owner glance at us, and foolishly, I feel proud to be seen with her. When I was small I confused ballerinas with fairies—beautiful, mystical creatures in pink and white and able to fly—the breathless sum of my little girl dreams. I’ve never outgrown that awe.
Mel grips my hand. Her mood has bounced from stormy to sunny. As we chat she darts from this to that like a tiny tropical fish, confiding that she is bored with Oskar and wants to have a fling with a civilian, that the new ballet mistress is a total bitch and once made a senior soloist dance with a broom tied to her back so she’d stand up straight, and that—dramatic pause here and hoarse whisper to maximize impact—while Anastasia seemed pleased with Julietta today, yesterday she was overheard saying, “There’s nothing wrong with your dancing, have you tried not eating?”
“Really?” I gasp. Julietta has a Formula One metabolism. Her “problem”—if you can call winning the body lottery a problem—is keeping her weight up. While Mel chain-smokes and chews gum, Julietta carboloads and remains sculpted. Matt says she doesn’t yak it up either. I can’t believe Anastasia would say such a thing.
“Well, that’s what I heard,” purrs Mel.
Three hours later, snug in a cozy purple room and allergic to silence, I repeat this piece of go
ssip to a charming stranger at Andy’s party. He says he’s called Jonti and feigns an interest in ballet. He asks a brisk stream of astute questions, then wanders off. It was something I said. I look around, and see Andy talking to a short, muscular guy encased in an FBI jacket. He must be a detective. I swirl my wine and peruse the karaoke brochure. Entertaining though this is (“Goldfinger” and “Footloose” are two of my favorite songs, I’m afraid), I wish I hadn’t been so prompt. No matter how long I loiter in the street fiddling with my mobile phone, I am always the first to arrive at parties. I think I caught it off Saul.
“Natalie.”
I look up. Andy is waving me over. I can hardly disobey, although I imagine mouthing Me? and legging it. He looks all right with a tan but does himself no favors with a shirt apparently made from scraps of curtain.
“What did you say to Jonti to make him disappear like that?”
“I have a knack,” I say.
Andy doesn’t get it. He grins, and asks if I want a drink. “Natalie, meet Robbie.”
FBI man grips my hand and squeezes.
“Natalie is a big friend of my sister,” explains Andy, as the blood makes a slow return to my fingers. “And Robbie is a small friend of mine.”
Robbie rolls his eyes at Andy and says, “Gimp Boy is jealous of my superior muscle tone.”
Andy snorts. “Jealous? You’ve got arms like my nan!”
I try not to smile until Andy walks off to greet some guests.
“So will you be singing for us tonight?” says Robbie.
“I’d love to,” I reply. “I really would. But I wouldn’t be so cruel. I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket!”
Robbie laughs. “We could sing together if you like. My voice is so bad it would divert attention from yours. We could do something easy. ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’?”
I laugh. I am a foot taller than Robbie and can see that the crown of his head has one hair per five follicles. But while he is no oil painting—or finger painting even—there’s something about him I like.
“What do you reckon,” he says, rummaging in a pocket and producing a small pale green object. “It’s for Andy to put on his dashboard.”
I admire it. Robbie grins. “You’re joking. It’s a fluorescent Virgin Mary, it’s rank!”
It emerges that Andy and Robbie compete to buy each other disgusting presents. Andy now has four china shepherdesses, a commemorative plate, an alien baby in a jar, and a cut-glass vase adorned with gold leaf. And Robbie is the proud owner of the Windsor Gentleman’s watch, a pine woodpecker door knocker, a fake rabbit head on a plaque, a large green plastic iguana, and a life-size metal Doberman pinscher. I am laughing, when a voice like nails down a blackboard inquires, “Natalie, who’s your friend?”
I hang on grimly to my smile. Frannie at a party. Weedkiller on a lawn. Then I recall that Frannie half extended the hand of friendship this week and that I turned her down. I smile properly. “Frannie! Great to see you! This is Robbie, a small friend of Andy’s. Frannie is—”
“A close friend of Andy’s sister,” says Frannie. Robbie stretches out a hand. He doesn’t know that Frannie sees the handshake as “a literal male stronghold” and has perfected a squeeze that would crush rocks. I watch, terrified. Someone could get hurt. Then Robbie squawks, “I surrender!” and Frannie giggles.
“Drink, anyone?” I ask, relieved.
“I’ll have a pint of bitter, please,” says Frannie.
“White wine and lemonade for me.” Robbie grins. I leave them to it and head for the bar.
“Natalie,” says Andy, blocking my path.
“Andy,” I reply, as politely as I can.
He takes my hand and leads me into the corridor.
“Now,” he murmurs, “you’re not going anywhere until you’ve told me what’s wrong. I haven’t seen you for, what, years, and you seem to have developed a grudge against me. What have I done? Is it what I said in the car? Is it to do with Big Tone?”
He treats me to a smile that I’m sure works wonders on his mother and secretary but makes me want to smack him.
“No,” I say stiffly. “Nothing to do with Tony. No.”
“Natalie,” he says in a cooler voice, “whatever it is, I can take it.”
I’m not sparing your feelings, I shout in my head, I’m sparing my own. My insides churn and I blurt, “It’s nothing, okay? Happy birthday. I mean, welcome back. It’s nice to see you again.”
“But no welcome-back kiss?” he says cheekily.
“I’d love to only I have a large festering scab on my chin,” I retort. “I wouldn’t want to transfer it.”
“Shame.” Andy sighs. I step daintily over his foot and scurry to the bar.
When I return to my original party position, the first words I hear are “The pointe shoe is merely a phallus.” I tense. Ballet is another crime Frannie holds against me.
“I didn’t realize,” says Robbie. “Is that why me mum’s so keen?”
I hold my breath. Frannie peals with laughter.
“You’re the expert, I’m told, what do you reckon?” says Robbie to me.
I say carefully, “I see Frannie’s point—classical ballet is sensuous, but it’s sexless too. Upright and prim. The center of gravity is in the upper chest. Modern dance is more focused on the, er, pelvis.”
“Upright!” Frannie nods. “Exactement! The female ballet dancer is merely an erect phallus being manipulated by the male for his own pleasure!”
I look about for deliverance and to my relief see that Babs and Simon have arrived. Babs looks luminous, as if she is lit up from the inside. Her curls gleam in the green and blue disco lights. As I wave at her, a waitress digs me in the ribs with a tray of pizza.
I shake my head. Frannie takes a slice and says, “What is it, Nat—scared your belly button might detach itself from your spine for five minutes?”
I squirm. “I don’t like garlic.”
Nor do I wish to greet Chris with breath so potent it could power a jet plane.
“So you’re a midwife?” says Robbie politely to Frannie. “I admire people what do that job.”
Her face softens. “Do you?” she says. “Well, I appreciate that. It can be so thankless. People scream at you when you’re only doing your best—I’m always relieved when the husband faints because then he’s out of the way and you can step over him—the trouble is we’re constantly short staffed and what with the heat and the mess and the smell, it’s all too easy to lose your sense of amazement but, oh hello!” Andy looks through me, and drags Frannie off to join him and Babs in a rendition of “Wives and Lovers.” As this is a song warning women not to let themselves go after marriage, I can only conclude that Frannie has a sense of humor, even if she doesn’t waste it on me. To me Frannie is like a thistle, prickly and dour, and has been ever since we vied for Babs’s friendship at school. (When I was twelve, classrooms were full of double desks. Those double desks caused a lot of grief.) To Babs, Frannie is gruff but loyal. A serious person who you do things with, visit exhibitions, attend talks, a friend who is low on frills but stands by you.
Frannie admires Babs for her strength and courage. But Frannie and I are like two magnets repelling each other. We try to get on but I find her brash and intimidating. I am the kind of woman she disapproves of. The day I got my degree results I donned black stilettos and a short tight skirt, drank most of a bottle of Warnink’s Advocaat, and reeled round the college bars with Kathy, a companion pisshead (she was swigging Lambrusco), snogging whichever men fell into my path. I’ve since modified my drinking and dress sense but, like most people who know you from your teens, Frannie judges me on my past. Occasionally she’ll attempt to educate me—recommending books by Susie Orbach, Erica Jong, and “your kind of feminist, Natalie,” Naomi Wolf—and I’ll glimpse a flash of her kindness. But generally she regards me as beyond help.
“So how do you know Andy?” I ask Robbie.
“We met at college,” he says, grinning. “I suppose you
know him through Babs?”
“Not really,” I say. “He was a friend of my brother’s, but they didn’t really associate with their sisters. They’d rather have played with nuclear waste. And then, when we were older, he went to university, then he worked in the City, and didn’t he work in Aldershot for a bit? Anyway, I haven’t really seen him for years. I know he lived with his girlfriend, and then he went traveling, after Sasha, er…”
“Left him,” says Robbie. “Yeah, Sasha, mixed-up kid.”
“Really? I never met her. I know Babs was fond of her. It’s funny, isn’t it? A person can be part of a family, and then a couple split, and the family never sees that person again.”
Robbie nods. “I think I saw her the other day,” he says.
“Sasha?”
“I was on me moped,” he replies. “She was crossing the road. Kensington way.”
“That’s near where I work,” I cry. (This is a bad habit of mine—grabbing at things that are blatantly not coincidence. It’s a sad reflection of my desperate need to bond with the whole world. I’ll see a guy on the tube with a regulation black umbrella and want to tap him on the arm and exclaim, “Incredible!—I’ve got that umbrella!”)
“Oh, right,” says Robbie. “So would you’ve liked to be a ballerina yourself?”
I giggle. “Do I look like I could be? It was a fantasy, when I was four. They wear such pretty dresses.”
We are laughing about this when I’m tapped on the shoulder by Babs. So, she came over.
“Hello, Nat,” she says. “Hi, Robbie.” Then, to me, “I take it all back. Your prince has come. Or should I say, Charlie’s turned up.”
I twist round fast enough to crick my neck. Charlie? Chris! A vision in a sheepskin jacket, raggy jeans, and Van trainers. He is talking to Simon. I beam at Babs, and speed over.