Story 8, pt 2 | Sort Of
In this week's conclusion, our ballerina returns to the studio to face the critic's review - and her feelings for her partner.
And now for the conclusion of Sort Of! What did you think of splitting this story in two? It was a longer one, so was this helpful?
Here’s the inspiration song by Ingrid Michaelson - see how the meaning of the lyrics changes after you finish reading. And here’s the link to part one, if you’d like a refresher.
Looking forward to your feedback - happy reading!
Sort Of, pt 2
Upon arrival at the studio, I discover that, in my upheaved state, I must have left my cell phone at home. The reaction of every human being at the studio reminds me that I’ve also forgotten about the review.
No one is behaving normally. It is clearly a positive review as dancers and civilians alike react with leaps in the air, the grace of which revealing their allegiance between the two groups. Typically reserved receptionists are cheerily flustered from the babble of talk about the review and incessant ringing of the phone. Everyone has contributed to the production in their own way; we are all responsible for the critical evaluation.
As principal, shouldn’t I be more nervous? The prospect of the review gives me a welcome something else to think about. I’m just through the front doors when my friends rush to me, eager to hear my take.
When I confess my ignorance, everyone in simultaneous mania pulls up the article on their phone or throws about the paper, all while admonishing my irresponsibility in missing this monumental piece.
I take one of the phones thrust before me and begin reading.
My dear readers, a warning. Taking in this production of Romeo and Juliet is akin to ingesting a potent drug. If you do not approach this piece with caution, you run the risk of addiction. I, having been tainted by the purest form of the substance – prime seats on opening night, will now become a dealer. If you have any appreciation of art, you must buy a ticket immediately.
This production of Romeo and Juliet is the most transcendent upper. We all know the fate of these star-crossed lovers, yet as I rose from my seat trying to maintain a reviewer’s cool, I felt as though I had been powerfully drugged.
You see, merely from watching the dance, I was left with the feeling that I was in love. With whom? With what? That mattered not. The company’s principals so powerfully radiated love that the laws of osmosis took over and every audience member left affected, awash in the delicious levity of being in love and being loved. This is a partnering the likes of which I’ve not seen from such young talent. There is more than skill and practice afoot here.
Oh, but how to bottle that feeling and truly sell it to the masses?
In my work, I normally take notes throughout performances, quite accustomed to scrawling observations in the dark. It would appear my notetaking ceased somewhere in the second act. I have little record of the finer points of the performance, other than the scenes which play over and over in my head, all the more precious for their delicate imprint…
The article goes on like this for several hundred more words. Mostly focusing on the two of us as principals. How I gasped at one point when he came up behind me, my little pull of air so soft that the critic has driven himself half mad in deducing whether this is a genius directorial decision or my natural reaction to the moment. He isn’t sure which would be more powerful.
Surely my cover is blown.
I scan the group to gauge reaction. Someone must have made me by now. My own thoughts have not formed, frozen until I can gain more context for whom I am performing. Everyone is still heads-down, rereading the words to ensure it is not a dream, as though the article might evaporate at any moment, and no one would ever believe our story. I look past the group, people are milling up and down the hallways, aimlessly moving in and out of studios, disoriented by the words of our enraptured critic.
Where is he? I brace myself for his appearance at any moment.
Someone walking past us down the hallway reads the review’s closing paragraph aloud, his tone conveying grateful disbelief: “I’m vaguely aware the doting nature of this review may be viewed by some as unprofessional. But I ask you, if you shared the transcendent experience I have detailed above, would it not also be your professional obligation to pass this news on to the masses? Art is designed to imitate life. This performance felt more like life than art.”
I push through the group to find him, playing off embarrassed smiles like I simply can’t handle this level of praise, but how marvelous for the studio. What I really simply can’t is wait for him to happen upon me, as if he could catch me further off-guard.
Of course, I find him in the studio, dressed for rehearsal, though it seems no one else is prepared to start at the assigned hour.
He’s busy fussing with the stereo, he’s always been terrible with technology. How well I know him. But how does this new perspective change things? What did any knowing look mean, now? Was our dinner last week intended as a date? And all the weeks before? Has he been waiting for me to find my way to feeling this way for him? How many times had we casually thrown about the words, I love you?
He spots me in the mirror. I spy only the beginning of the widest grin before, in three bounds, he is with me, lifting me and spinning me around in joy. He sets me down, but the embrace does not give.
“It’s what we’ve always wanted, except I don’t think I could even dream this big,” he says into my ear, holding tight.
My nerves are batted away by the reminder of the thing that scared me so earlier: he is my best friend. He is where I seek comfort and encouragement and inspiration and fun and that sense of belonging. Of course he is the one person to make me feel better in such a strange moment. I relax into his arms, remembering how good it is here. For the first time, the praise of the review sinks in. An accomplishment I never could have earned alone. Not just for him, but the entire company.
But it’s not the same here in his embrace. His chest is soft and strong, I feel his biceps wrapped around me, his right thumb rubs my back. I breathe him in and try to block out the longing to pull him in closer to him, to never be pulled apart. I try to behave normally, but the new knowledge of my feelings for him colors our interactions and gives them new meaning. His every touch courses through my body, as I consider whether he might feel the same for me. And then I’m nervous all over again. How can I dance with him like this?
He finally pulls away and asks if I’m ready to start. I nod, a bit confused by the quiet studio. He sees me looking for the corps and explains he asked for a private rehearsal time for us today.
“Tonight’s performance has new standards to live up to,” he says.
He’s right. In receiving such a superlative review, we now must prove it was deserved, every night. Those words weren’t the result of a talented publicist or the hallucinations of a critic. They were the accurate reporting and reflection of art delivered by a talented group of dancers who are – on whatever level – tapping into some truth of humanity.
He explains more. The critic so plainly painted our partnership as the focal point of the piece, any scouts called out to the performance as a result will have their eyes sharply trained on us. And it has been made clear by the management that the draw is only for us as a partnership.
I believe I am maintaining a poker face throughout this, but one can never be sure.
He has an idea to prepare us for tonight, which is why he had the studio cleared.
I laugh when he suggests the exercise: running the complicated hands and turns of our most troubled pass – but in complete darkness. We have occasionally stumbled with that series in rehearsal, and tonight and going forward, there can be no flaws.
But he isn’t joking, so I find myself plunged in darkness. Just us, the music and the dark. My eyes search for a reference, but I am met with depth upon depth of black, giving it almost a physical presence. As my eyes adjust, I find the slightest edge to his frame.
We start slowly, the floor no longer a familiar horizon, and no mirrors to ground our movement. Our pace builds as we fall into old rhythms – his hands are right where they are supposed to be. I need not fear.
At some point, I close my eyes. I don’t need to see, I know him. For better or worse, I’ve been trained to trust myself with him. There can be no spectators here, yet anyone could have felt the connection burning ever more, through the sound of breath, the silent turns and the pure heat. He stops as the steps come to a daring lift.
“We can't take those chances,” he whispers.
I am grateful for the dark: he can’t see how much I want him in that moment. I don’t know whether I want him to know it by feel.
And we go again.
—
Backstage that night, the nerves are new. The critic has been won, but the fickle public remains, an entirely new beast to tame, dangerous for its ignorance and expectation. The review provides a surge of confidence, but when news skitters through the dressing room that tonight’s performance – and those of the next two weeks – are entirely sold out, pacing and superstitious rituals break out in renewed fervor. There is no coasting. We have critical approval, but what of the popular vote?
Our director takes the center of the room, orbiting about as he runs through an endless list of notes, scribbled out on disheveled bits of paper, the lilt of his pronunciations projecting his insecurities on us. We are caught between our usual alert quest for perfection and the pull of all the goings-on in our own heads.
Mine can’t sort out which problem to fret over first, so my thoughts flurry and furiously ping from the silent black maw of a new audience – to a torn lace on my good pointe shoes - to the impossible task of leveling out the right amount of character-driven love for my Romeo, how to channel the right motivations from the right person, without some unanticipated movement from him causing me to switch lanes and baring something more personal, but is that not the source of successful art – to making a mental note to remember the quick-change midway in act three, I forgot it briefly last night and stopped to catch my breath instead of finding my dressing partner, almost a costly mistake – to what if I get lost in that swell of strings in the finale, the last thing I want is for the vulnerabilities of my character to cause me, the real me, to come undone – but where does my character end and I begin? All this before a foreign audience, as though our guests of last night were any different. I know myself well enough to recognize the gnashing machinations of my thoughts are veering down a dangerous path. It’s all too much.
At last, we have stretched and touched up. Our excuses are exhausted, our fears sit beside us, and there is nothing more to do but dance. We assemble backstage, hands knitting us tight as we pray and come together, banishing our invisible friends through our sheer numbers.
As the corps disperses, shaky but prepared, he steals a moment and draws me to him. I resist the urge to bury my face in his chest and instead tilt my chin up so as not to disturb the expertly drawn mask of makeup.
“Don’t be nervous. It’s you and me,” he murmurs. I feel him nod, and I know someone on headset has cued the conductor. We are ready.
The music rolls, signaling us forward, in the give and take of music and movement.
Something happens when I step on stage for a performance. One could look at it as a sea of distractions: the blinding lights, the costumes, the backstage running about, the in and out of character, the dancers everywhere, the million steps and poses and motions to remember exactly so. The music should be deafening, provoking movement, setting our rhythm. Yet that’s not what happens for me.
In performing, I ease into a higher version of myself. I am both present, singularly focused and doing work, while also lost, recessed into imagination and suspended in the world of the show. When I emerge from it, I know both that I was conscious of exactly where I was but that I was also gone. It is the finding of a transcendental groove, whereby tuning in to my gifts, the works loses all effort.
This feeling has grown and deepened along my career. But before I danced with him, I didn’t know another person could exist in this half-world with me.
So, we step onto the blinding stage, and the music plays with us, spinning out the story we share. But in a way, though the music controls us, it also falls away, like the edges of sight blurring but seeing perfectly.
And so it is that I hear the imperceptible footfalls of our shoes, I hear the breath of his exertion, I hear his body touching mine, whether the slap of hands clasping, the soft sandpaper sound of his hand snaking down my arm. I hear when he speaks to me, just a word here or there, translatable only to me, sounds of encouragement or correction for me, or even little audible reminders and notes to himself. These are not even whispers, just wisps of words I’m not even sure he knows he’s saying aloud. Steps fade here, leaving us with just this story that we know but also discover anew each night. We are charged to communicate it, to one another directly, but ever aware of where the audience sits.
This world we created on stage was always a safe one. Tonight, as we dance, our precious home feels somewhat artificial to me, as though by being conscious of it and self-conscious in it, I take away the magic. I try to simply lose myself in the dance and trust my muscles, my training and my partner. It works for a time, especially apart, but then there is a close dance, our noses practically touching, and there is nowhere else to look, and so I indulge myself ever so slightly and allow hope to creep in. How glorious to be held by the one that you love. How glorious it is to be drawn close in love by your best friend, the person that understands you best in the world, the human you want to hide nothing from. To smile unabashedly. To throw away all fear. To open your self and dump everything out in his favor. To give all but be filled and feel boundless and all capability and beauty and love.
We dance. And it is glorious.
In act four, I solo a long series of fouettés, with my ladies behind. I spin and spin and spin, and something spins loose, with permission. The movement taps my adrenaline, reminds me of my power as a woman, so I give up the reining of the heart and loosen something deep within.
He returns to me on stage, and I feel full and beaming, happy with him. He senses the change and responds to it. I know the dance has never been better. It streaks on through the next act, the outside world dimming, the music a singular note binding us together and bidding us on.
The finale. I feel nothing and everything. We die to ourselves and return to each other. We are panting and hot, exhausted and elated, triumphing in our bodies and emotion. I hold nothing back, it is true. He echoes and reciprocates, I know it. The dance makes it obvious.
Then, the rolling waves of applause, cresting and crashing. The audience on their feet.
We step off-stage, relaxing from the postures of character and working to catch our breath. We’ve learned to stay tucked away in the curtains during bows, what with ceaseless torrents of the cast leaping from the wings. To stay out of the way, we huddle close, facing each other, our hands clasped low.
The dance must have stirred up my courage, for I see the moment. I push up on his hands, flex to pointe and lean into him. I don’t know if I hesitate or he understands my intention, but before I know it, his mouth is over mine. I’ve kissed him a million times on stage, in rehearsals – but never as me. It is hesitant at first, softly testing, but then with mounting urgency, his hands pull from mine so as to wrap me to him.
The music changes, our cue, hauling us apart. I have new reason to catch my breath. He grins wickedly at me, grabs my hand, and we skip out on the stage again. I swear my feet are not hitting the ground, with his hand in mine. We might normally linger a moment, ostensibly to give the audience that cathartic release, but also to bask in our earned praise. I might fawn over roses thrown to our feet as he salutes the orchestra, but tonight we are efficient, briskly running through the motions as inertia calls us elsewhere.
The curtain finally moves to drop, and he whispers in my ear, “my car, your place. Meet me in the parking lot.”
I pretend not to run to the dressing room. There’s never been a change this quick. From elaborate costume to jeans and a loose t-shirt. A far cry from the elegance of last night, but my body is so expectant that nothing could feel sexier right now. Just as the night before, I undo my taut bun for an easier flow, my long hair returning to a femininity I can work with. I throw my things in my bag, ignore everyone and head for the parking lot.
He is, of course, the only ballet boy I’ve ever known to drive a pick-up truck. There he is, leaning against the tailgate, waiting for me, his old bomber jacket cleaning up his tailored sweats. He gives me that grin again, with a little shake of his head. How could he be mine? Could he be mine? I stay to my side of the truck, not trusting myself, tossing my bag in the back and clambering in the cab. I’ve climbed in this truck how many times? It’s all new now.
Most nights, after a performance, I am exhausted, taking time only for a long bath before an even longer night’s rest. But I cannot feel more alert now, as we drive toward my apartment. A song plays on the radio, filling the nervous silence between us. I’m oblivious to lyrics or sentiment; I’m simply grateful for the music to provide a backing track for our nerves and excitement.
The tension is practically physical, a third entity vibrating between us. I’m jabbering on about the production that night, the size of the crowd, the moment the lights flickered oddly in the act three, anything to pretend this is normal and that I’m not completely exploding inside. My mind keeps projecting flashes of what might be ahead. His hands ripping me apart, in the best way. My heart, my stomach, my entire internal core is just humming, alive.
We stop at one red light, then a second. The third, just blocks from my house, proves to be too much.
“Come here,” he says with finality, unexpectedly reaching for me across the bench seat, his fingers lace through my hair, and he gently pulls me toward him, kissing me again. We are lost in it, fumbling in the dark around seatbelts until I notice the greenish cast on the dashboard as the lights change. I pull away and slink down in the seat, hiding my face behind my hands and giggling to myself, fully embarrassed and delighted at once. Can this really be happening?
For all the tension in the car, we walk chastely to my door. I get ahead of myself and think how in the future, as our relationship wears in, this commute will not be so charged. This is not a moment, but I will remember this walk from the car forever, how the air is still and soft, the trees brushing at a sky of stars overhead, the cheerful potted daises along the walk. The echoes of his footsteps and his presence just behind me. I will remember how electric freedom pulses through me. He makes me feel possible. This man lifts me.
As I unlock the door, his hands come to rest on my hips, warm and comforting and leading. Inside, it is not a rush of bodies and a wild tearing at clothes, as accustomed as we may be to a quick change. There is a hesitation, as we try to work out the twisted familiarity and newness. I slip into dining room with promises of drinks from my makeshift bar, but really, I need a moment to breathe. I run a breathing exercise, a more silent version of my yoga meditations. I get back to pouring a steadying whiskey into tumblers, when he meanders into the dark room. I have not bothered with the lights, favoring my practiced paths in the cast of the moonlight.
“You,” he whispers behind me, his words pulling me around to face him. Our performance is about to begin, and I am hit with the realization that I don’t know who to be with him. Which character am I to play tonight? “We have a pass to practice. In the dark,” he adds, with a laugh. With a whoop and a giggle, I am scooped into his arms, distinctly not a ballet lift, and he carries me to my bedroom.
There is no time to decide who to be, or which character to summon, so I fall on the old standard, my true self, strong and free under his gaze.
—
Come the morning, he is still there. I wake slowly, the scene coming into focus, revealing little clues of the night before. I run my hand along the long stretch of my bare skin, an unusual luxury in this context. The sun peeks through the blinds, indicating an approximation of the time. No one will begrudge us coming in a little late today.
He is absent-mindedly getting dressed, hopping into his pants. I am in such a state where even that insignificant act melts my heart.
“We move pretty well in the dark, don't we?” I pose, wrapped in sheets and assuming my best morning-after stance.
The look he returns stops time.
We are partners. I have simply to see his eyes to know how he will move next.
His back turned to me, the mirror above my dresser catches his reaction to my vocalization, my announcement that I was now awake. His wariness and calculations, I see them.
Our eyes find each other through the mirror. I can’t breathe as he gazes at me, his eyes silently pleading with me not to love him, that he will never return the sentiment. It is a warning, cruel for the promise that he will deliver on hurting me when it comes time, despite my most vulnerable position.
I try to smile, perhaps unsuccessfully, and try to push it from my mind until I can think. Turning away, my thoughts spin as I search for my clothes. Oh no.
He will see me later at the studio, the mumbled offering trailing over his shoulder as he flees the apartment. The very thought reeks of the wrongness of everything. What have we done?
Lost, I move through the house, trying to make sense of how to get to work, and I find myself standing before a massacre of flowers in the kitchen sink. My bouquets from opening night, I had placed them all in the sink with the intention of properly arranging them – or at the least putting them in water. Roses, yes, but also cunning winks of anemones, soft pops from ranunculus, generous peonies. My stuttering thoughts stumble to how lisianthuses are underappreciated and how tulips always feel weak to me. Except, these flowers are all dead.
In all the commotion over these last days, I had forgotten them, and now they are not quite brown but hanging on to the last drabs of color, just beyond wilted, on a fast path to shriveled. There will be no reviving them.
I try not to take the sight as a metaphor for my own situation.
They land in the trash indelicately. I hope their expiration does not linger in the air for long.
—
Here we go again. The show tonight is different. He assumes the character, and I play a new one. I can’t tell if the audience notices. I fight the nausea of love lost when our eyes meet, his still bearing a well-rehearsed spark, or when we nail that difficult passage once again. With each moment of now-manufactured chemistry, the memory of his pitying eyes declaring the impossibility of my love this morning flashes in my mind. He has not uttered a breath to convince me otherwise; it was clear and crushing. This connection that lifted me before, now flattens me.
Could it actually be that I am in the arms of the man I love and still I will never reach him?
This would be my nightly sentence, dancing with him. Six performances a week, I could touch him, I could hold him, but I could never reach him. I would never leave. It was love, so I would suffer either way. I didn’t want to dance the steps without the partner. If I was always going to dance the steps, I at least wanted a partner.
But your eyes are warning me this early morning
That my love's too big for you my love
- “Sort Of” by Ingrid Michaelson
Thank you so much for reading! Your feedback is welcome: rate the story with one click in this poll, or get a discussion going in the comments.
Next Week’s Plot Twist…
This new story was inspired by my recent getaway to the Dordogne region of France. Think of it as a mini French version of “Under the Tuscan Sun” or “Eat, Pray, Love.”
Last week’s story:
🩵 If you enjoyed this post, please click the like button below.
💌 Or, I’d love for you to share this story with others! Use the share button below, or screenshot a favorite passage to post on Instagram. Tag me at @lisedelman - or follow me for more goodies.
Thank you for helping me get these stories in front of new readers!
Finally catching up on all your stories- so fun! I appreciate the split story, it was done on a cliffhanger too