2. Octavia
“Faster! Move, you cows!”
My teacher’s creative insults haven’t bothered me in years, but tonight, my heart rattles like the last pill in a bottle.
I jump.
The stagnant air rushes to make space, whipping hair strands into my eyes.
I appreciate the distraction from the nearing ground, which approaches my skull far too fast for my liking.
My eyes twitch. Just when I’m sure the impact will arrive, pressure crushes against my ribcage to stop the fall.
I suck in desperate breaths as a pair of hands clench the sides of my torso, lifting me through the air like a rag doll.
The music prattles on from the CD in the corner of the room, not caring that we’re a beat behind. The small Russian lady in the corner, however…
“Useless! You’re both fucking useless!” Ms. Irina’s shrill cries grind into my ears. I grit my teeth.
I’m lifted higher from the ground. The hands lace my torso like a clawed corset, tightening for a moment of desperation before finally giving in. I slam back down to the steady floor with an uncontrolled thunk that causes my knee to shriek. My head doubles over my knees.
The music cuts out.
“Tomorrow!” The single word shrieks through the air, thickened with her accent. “The Donor Performance is tomorrow! Do you know what happens if our donors are displeased?”
Irina fluffs up her coiffed grey hair, the same sharp color it’s been throughout all twelve years of my time here.
When I first arrived without a single item to my name, I was sure the woman had always been a million years old.
In fact, it took me several years of living in the Manhattan Ballet Company’s training dormitory to realize that the ballerina photographed in intricate poses framed in the hall was my head matron in her prime.
I used to love looking at those theatrical black-and-white prints and imagining myself replacing the gorgeous dancer on the wall. Now I see them for what they are.
Remnants of an illustrious career. One more woman in this line of work who burned bright and fast, only to be forced into an early retirement as her gleam started to rust. I don’t look at the pictures on the wall anymore.
“Millions in donations are at stake, and you two can’t even stay on the beat for one section!”
I hold my tongue. Nothing good can come out of shirking the blame. My partner collapses to the ground behind me, stretching out his legs without a care in the world.
“She jumped late. Couldn’t catch her in time,” he says between gasps, dumping a bottle of accelerant on my waning flames.
“Seriously, Connor?” My spine unfurls. “I jumped on four. I always jump on four!”
“Yelling it doesn’t make it true,” he says. I’ve known him long enough to see the smirk in his eyes, even when it doesn’t meet his lips.
“You were behind from the first lift.” I shove off my knees, straightening with effort.
“Maybe that’s because you’re so damn heavy. Did you fail the weigh-in last week?”
“You little shi—”
“Enough,” Irina snaps, cutting me off. “You’ll take five and run it again.
” She leans on her cane, shuffling forward until she’s stationed between us.
Her scent, cloying and floral, wafts off the elaborate folds of her scarf as she steps forward.
“Either it runs clean by the time the director stops by, or you two will be sent home, and I’ll be spending the rest of the night rehearsing your alternates. ”
The small cluster of bodies in the back of the studio perks up at the threat. My stomach sinks. The director could show up any minute, and we haven’t had a clean run in two days.
Even with last month’s Nutcracker run, I’m still behind on rent.
Tomorrow’s show is supposed to settle last month’s dues, and then I’ll figure out some sort of payment plan for the bright orange eviction notice that appeared on my door last night.
I don’t think I’ve stopped to breathe since I tore that flyer down and checked my sparse bank account.
Mr. Sandavar always lets me pay late during the company’s Winter Season.
In exchange, I don’t mention the broken appliances that need fixing, or the increasingly suspect gambling den that seems to be brewing in apartment 1B.
If we were in the off-season, I’d pick up a few shifts at Callie’s down the street.
The owner always needs extra hands, and lets me serve whenever I have time.
Unfortunately, with the spring lineup, there isn’t a single minute in my schedule unspoken for.
Not if I’m going to keep claiming the roles that pay well.
I have a routine. Five a.m. arrival at the studio.
Technique class doesn’t start until eight, leaving me three hours to carefully warm up my knee and review the combinations from the day before.
Rehearsal usually runs through lunch. Three spoons of honey dissolved in a caffeinated tea keep me going until four, when the afternoon classes begin.
I’m used to the showpony stakes. I’ve danced for my rent since I was a child, when they pulled me out of foster care on a scholarship and made very clear, in the gentle, condescending way adults have of making things clear to children, that the scholarship was conditional.
That I had to be worth it.
And that if I stopped being worth it at any point in time, they’d send me back.
“I don’t need five.” My voice scratches on its way out. “Let’s run it again.”
Ms. Irina’s brow quirks up in surprise, but she strolls back to the CD player with her long, gold cane and clicks the tape.
The music starts up. Through the violin’s trills, I can hear the low rustle of our alternates warming up behind us.
Thankfully, the threat seems to spur Connor’s pride as he steps up to me, sliding his hand around my waist for the opening position.
We don’t speak as we wait for our cue. I can’t tell if it’s his palm that’s coated in sweat, or the thin fabric of my leotard, but his digits slide across the slickness, searching for purchase.
The opening eighth plays all over again. I step into the first turn, and soaked curls whip into my face, slipping further from the twist I pinned in nine hours earlier.
My knee burns.
Every relevé sends a blaze of pain shooting from my ankle straight up through my thigh, white-hot and electric. The crashing waves absorb before agony has a chance to reach my face.
I keep turning. My head whips back around to my reflection in the mirror. It doesn’t take long before a deep-seated hollowness infects my blood.
Maybe because I haven’t eaten in eighteen hours. Or it could be that I can’t afford to buy a meal tonight either, because it’s going to take every last cent I have to make my payment tomorrow.
But as the hollow feeling spreads further, consuming even the tips of my fingers, I decide it’s because, just like during the last run, we’re falling a beat behind. I jump into a lift that takes too long to reach the air, and my alternate rises from the ground in the corner of my eye.
“Faster,” I breathe, sliding down Connor’s ribs. Sweat gleams across his brow, dripping onto my arm as I pull away. I fly through the turn section and return to his side.
He stumbles. I note the misstep, the way a sailor tracks the sinking ship below his boots. I will not get thrown out of my apartment for such a trivial reason as this. Irina will see my effort to reconcile his screwups. She must. But that ultimatum hangs above my neck with every beat.
Adrenaline warps into desperation. Each jump lands harder. My left leg is shaking by the fifth eighth of music, deep in the muscle where no one can see. Puffs of air escape my lips as I run across the room.
Through the gleam of the mirror, I notice three things in rapid succession.
Irina, shaking her head in silent disappointment and turning back to the CD player.
My alternate, already warmed up in the back and moving through the same choreography with the eager grin of someone about to get their big break.
And the finger-fouetté section, which is rapidly approaching despite the missed counts in the choreography. Before Irina can click off the tape, I step into the fouettés, grabbing Connor’s tired grip above my head.
My final stand.
But his hold collapses, loosening from my waist. He gazes into the mirror, watching Irina shut off the music. He’s already given up.
I need this.
I fucking need this. It doesn’t matter that he doesn’t.
The grip dissolves around my fingers. He steps back, determination already dissipating from his eyes. I feel the exact moment I snap. My arms extend in slow motion, winding up for the turn he’s not prepared to assist with. My leg whips just a touch too slow. I twist.
The collision is deafening.
My knee cracks into his nutsack with a satisfying clap, and he falls to his knees in a chorus of groans. Gasps echo through the room, and the music cuts out.
Eyes burn the back of my neck as the whole room waits for an apology that never leaves my lips.
I’m not sorry. None of this is my fault.
He’s still rolling on the ground in a pitiful heap, and I have the strangest impulse to kick him harder.
I practiced my side of this duet already, and even at six in the morning, I hit every single beat. My lip pulls up, baring a snarl.
“You bitch,” he groans, settling on his back. His expression shifts from agony to accusation.
I glare back, consuming his pain. It satiates me better than any meal could.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he snarls. “Aside from the obvious, of course.”
I squat down, letting him meet my crazed eyes. “You’re weak and stupid. Pick one, get the fuck up, and run it again.”
His jaw falls open. “How dare you speak to me tha—”
I blink, trying to figure out what cut off the vitriol pouring from his lips. He scrambles to his feet so fast that I have to step back to avoid the near collision. The hairs on my neck rise. My righteous smile falters before I even turn to meet the pair of soulless eyes in the doorway.