Chapter Text
Sometimes you don’t survive whole, you just survive in part. But the grandeur of life is that attempt; it’s not about that solution. It’s about being as fearless as one can, under completely impossible circumstances. It’s that, that makes it elegant.
- Toni Morrison
When you finally do move on, there’s a recovery period. And I think the recovery period into the quote-unquote “real world” takes about ten years.
- Wilhelmina Frankfurt, former NYCB dancer
2005: American Ballet Theater Studio Company, New York City, USA
Looking back, Severus thought of it like the Challenger. One tiny failure, overlooked again and again in the weeks leading up to the launch. What would have been their premiere, just seventeen years old.
It wasn’t until days later that they pieced together what had happened. It was the overhead lift at the end of the grand pas—the one he knew he had been inconsistent with in rehearsal—when he had faltered, allowing his burning arms—and all of Lily—to drop incrementally toward his chest. His left leg, meant to be in tendu derrière, had suddenly needed to support their combined weight. But it hadn’t.
Something, which he later learned had been his ACL, had popped, audibly, like a balloon. His left knee had gone sideways, caving in toward the ground, and the stage and everything on it had seemed to roll forward, as if he were the axel of a theater-sized wheel. His arms were wrenched back and Lily’s hips, which just a fraction of a second ago had been balanced between his upraised hands, had vanished over his shoulder.
Then there was nothing at all but the hard, hard ground.
1991: Mrs. Audley’s Dance Academy, Cokeworth, UK
It had been Petunia’s fault in the beginning. Or, rather, it had been Mary Wilcox’s fault, coming to Year 1 already in her tutu and tights, her wispy golden hair twisted up into a tiny, perfect bun. Mary, despite her plain name, was poised and elegant in a way that made Petunia burn with envy. She had begged their mother to let her take ballet—"just like Mary, Mummy!”
Rose Evans brought her girls to Mrs. Audley’s Dance Academy on a Tuesday afternoon. She was counting on Lily being allowed into the Fours class despite being three. The studio’s waiting room thronged with little girls dressed in all shades of pink and white. Mothers sat among them like mountains, tying back hair, dispensing snacks and bobby pins, packing away discarded jackets, reminding of pickup times, scolding, and wiping noses. Laughter and shrill voices bounced from one wall to the other, covering the faint piano music seeping through the door beyond.
Holding her daughters’ hands, Rose began to push her way through. But before she could get more than a few feet, there was a sudden clatter and the studio door burst open.
Out though the crowd of little girls, which parted like the sea, a line of tall girls in black leotards swept through. These girls were something else entirely, another species from the spotty, giggly teenagers that smoked and flirted outside the upper school. Breathing hard and damp with sweat, they nonetheless walked with the knowledge that they ruled this small world. Even Rose stepped back to let the procession pass.
They had come to the ballet school as these snot-nosed toddlers and emerged as this.
“Woah,” said Petunia.
And so it began.
1995: The Royal Opera House, London, UK
“Mum! When is he coming?”
Eileen pulled her jumper out of her son’s grabbing hand. “He’ll be here when he gets here.”
“He said he would.” Severus looked nervously through the sea of adults and bounced on the balls of his feet.
Eileen couldn’t help but share his discomfort. The Opera House lobby glittered with red velvet, chrystal chandeliers, and gold trim. It’s occupants, ballet-goers in suits and cocktail dresses, glanced with confusion at the mother and son stood in a corner of the lobby. She had turned down refreshments at least twice and bristled at an usher who looked as if he were about to ask her to show her ticket (he had offered them a program instead). They clearly didn’t belong here. It was only a matter of time before someone said as much.
“Get your fingers out of your mouth,” she said, pulling her son’s hand down to his side.
A woman in an honest-to-God fur was staring directly at Eileen. She looked up at the ceiling. If that boy doesn’t get here in five minutes…
“Lucius!” Severus vanished into the crowd before she could grab him, but it wasn’t long before she spotted the older boy—well, he was eighteen now—moving through the crowd with her son on his hip. He was still in costume, dressed as a bizarre-looking circus pirate in pale blue tights.
“Hi, Aunt Eileen.” Lucius grinned. “So sorry I’m late, it took ages to get out. The interval’s almost over, so we should head backstage. Do you want to come back with us, or are you all right waiting here?”
Eileen’s stomach dropped at the thought of waiting alone in the lobby for God knows how long. She had no interest in accompanying them backstage, however. “Could you just bring him home when you’re done? I can pick him up from there.”
“Oh, er, all right.” Lucius looked at Severus. “If you’re okay staying after for a bit?” Severus nodded eagerly, and Lucius laughed. “All right then. Say bye to Mummy.”
“Let’s go!” Severus was already twisting to look at the door to the backstage over Lucius’s shoulder.
2001: Heathrow Airport, London, UK
“Are you sure about this?” Eileen asked again, fussing unnecessarily with the straps of Severus’ knapsack and hating herself for it.
“Yes, Mum!”
Charles came over, boarding passes already in hand. “We’re going to keep a very good eye on them, I promise,” he said to Eileen, thumping Severus on the shoulder. Eileen hated how her son looked at this man; Tobias would have hated it even more. “It’s just for the two weeks, then straight back home.”
Lily bounded over. “I just looked—this airplane is way bigger than the one we took to France, Sev. It’s got four engines! You’ll love flying. Anyway, Mum said we can sit together, for the Discman.” She held it up, earbuds swinging. “I have Whoa, Nelly.”
“Cool. Why are you being hyper?” Severus whispered, embarrassed that Lily was acting like a child in front of Eileen. It was hurting his case that thirteen was old enough for independent international travel.
“I’m just excited.”
Severus was excited too. They were really going. New York City. The School of American Ballet. Two perfect weeks.
An announcement blared over the PA system and there was a sudden commotion at the gate doors.
“That’s us,” Charles Evans said. “Ready, you two?”
“Bye, then,” Severus said.
“Be good.”
He nodded. “Say bye to Da for me.”
Then Lily led them down the walkway and into the portal that would take them to another world.
1994: Mrs. Audley’s Dance Academy, Cokeworth, UK
She’d lost her son back at the plate glass windows of Mrs. Audley’s. Permanently, as it would turn out. She returned to find him with his nose pressed against the glass; her Tasmanian devil of a child had never been so still.
“What are they doing?” He wanted to know. “Why are the holding onto that? What are they doing with their feet? Why are they all wearing those? Why is it just girls? What is that lady doing?”
“Ach… Severus, enough,” Eileen said.
The girls in their lavender leotards were making careful scooping movements with their arms. Suddenly their feet shot out in unison, zipping out and back in so fast they blurred. One, two, three, four times. Then, just as suddenly, the girls were back to slow movements, bending their legs and arching their arms forward, moving as if through treacle. Back to quick again, legs shooting out, out out—not just one way now, but every direction, arms moving in opposite directions—up, out, forward, out, up. All in perfect, symmetrical rhythm.
“What is this?” Severus said, transfixed. Eileen was struck, too, though she wouldn’t have admitted it. The girls were young, only a year or two older than her son, but they had such discipline. The littlest one, redheaded, couldn’t have been more than six, yet she was better than any of them. Anyone could see it.
“Well,” she said at last, “they’re dancing. They’re getting lessons.”
Severus looked at her as if she had just told him that other children got birthdays.
And that was the end of it.
2002: American Ballet Theater’s Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School, New York City, USA
I want you to understand,” Kolya began, “that you are here on a provisionary basis.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Your jumps, they are looking good. But nearly everything else needs improvement. The technique, attack, partnering. For example, the sissonne combination today, it was not good.” He paused, swiveling slightly in his chair, back and forth. “And you are too thin, so we need to go to gym more, okay?
“Yes, sir.”
“This is why we have you in Intermediate Men’s. But you work hard this year, we do a review at the end of term, maybe you advance then. But right now… I am not thinking it’s likely.”
Kolya leaned forward, looking at him with his head tilted, his expression softening.
“Your port de bras is very good. Lyudmila says it is very good. But it is…” he sucked his teeth, “how do I put this. It is a little too—” he made a gesture like a floppy arabesque “—it is too like girl. You know?” He laughed, inviting Severus to laugh with him. “So, we work on that, yes?”
“Yes, sir,” Severus said.
2015: Hardware Bar, New York City, USA
CHVRCHES’ Clearest Blue is on the speakers, and he is twenty-seven, and Grindr is still new, and he is going to drown.
He lets his head shake forward, letting the music move through him, ketamine flavored tongue. Lets a sweaty hand slip from his wrist, moves into the crowd, waits for the beat to build, still counting the eights.
Takes another swig, puts his thumb over the mouth of the bottle. When the whole club jumps, he intends to be the highest. And he is. Will you meet me more than halfway up? The beat drops and there’s the thump of a hundred feet landing in unison. He’ll always know that noise.
He is going to vanish underneath the surface of the music—become it—at last. Finally, finally, he is going to disappear.
2000: Mrs. Audley’s Dance Academy, Cokeworth, UK
‘Auld Audley had let Eileen come watch, and there she was, unsmiling. The two women stood together near the studio door as Severus moved through préparation. Coupé jeté en tournant en manège was the order of the day.
“I want you to watch this,” Audley had told his mother. There was no music, only the rhythmic sound of his feet against the floor and Audley calling the count. Nothing could have made him happier than jetés in a circle, flinging his arms and legs out in splits, parallel to the floor. Then down to spin around the ball of one foot before launching again. She sent him ‘round and ‘round until he gasped like a fish, hands on his knees.
“It’s called ballon,” Audley said, leaning conspiratorially toward Eileen. “When dancers hang in the air like that during jumps. The appearance of being weightless. It’s like magic—means ‘balloon,’ you know. He floats.”
“Was that alright, Miss?” Severus approached, and Eileen could hardly help but wince at his earnestness.
“Yes, that was lovely, dear. I was just telling your mum how much you’ve improved.”
“Oh.”
“Severus is one of our best students,” Audley said. “Well, after Lily. She’s our little Étoile, isn’t she?”
Severus grinned. “Yeah.”
“Yes, she’s something of a household name, ‘round ours,” Eileen said, and Severus blushed crimson.
Audley laughed, a big, booming laugh. “They are thick as thieves, those two. I’m not surprised.” She laughed again as Severus blushed deeper.
“It’s about time to start thinking about summer intensives. Perhaps not this year, they’re a little young yet. But next year, maybe. Northern Ballet, Birmingham Royal, even the Royal Ballet in London.”
“Yes, Severus has an older cousin there.”
“Does he now! With the Royal Ballet? Goodness, it must run in the family.” She smiled cheekily at Severus again, who wouldn’t meet her eye.
“Yes, well.”
“Well, anyway, there’s no harm in thinking about applying abroad, as well. There are excellent academies on the continent, and in America.”
“Lily favors The School of American Ballet,” Severus said quietly.
“Does she! Honestly, the ambition of these two, Mrs. Snape! But I’ve always said that girl will have it all. If Lily wants to dance in New York, she surely shall. And you’ll go with her, then, I assume.”
Severus tried not to smile at the Marley floor, and failed.
“My concern, Mrs. Audley, is whether he could actually perform at the level needed to be accepted to any of these schools. Is this something worth pursuing, realistically?”
Audley looked at her, agog. “Why, Mrs. Snape, he’s a boy. He can go where he pleases! On full scholarship, most likely.”
1995: The Royal Opera House, London, UK
Lucius carried him through the stage door, down a flight of stairs, and along a long, dim hallway. Severus would have squirmed and insisted that seven was far too old to be carried, but he was so excited at what lay ahead that he forgot to complain. It helped that Lucius was practically sprinting. All he could do was hold on.
The hallway and the dressing room doors looked like a barracks, the kind of thing he imagined when he played soldier with the neighborhood boys. But they opened into another world, filled with brilliant sequined jackets, glittering gold prop swords, soft boots and ballet shoes that littered the floor, and bags overflowing with neon… things that Severus could only guess the use of. Pop music poured out from a boom box on the counter. And there, bathed in the light of dozens of bulbs, what looked like colored pencils; tiny paintbrushes; flat boxes with grids of circles in a dozen shades of cream, brown and tan; and what was unmistakably powder—makeup powder—the same brand his mother wore.
“What d’you need all this for?” Severus asked.
“It makes our faces look bigger on stage, because we’re so far away from the audience. This way they can see our expressions.”
“It makes your faces bigger?”
Lucius laughed. “Well, visually, yes. Not literally.” He kicked off his trainers and plopped down on the floor to pull on a pair of the soft blue boots. They weren’t like any boots Severus had seen before. Instead of hard tread on the bottom, they had teardrop-shaped pieces of the thinnest suede. The rest was paper-thin leather, molded around Lucius’ feet. Severus loved these boots, inexplicably and utterly. He wanted ones just like them.
“Ready to go up?” Lucius got to his feet and grabbed the gold sword, swishing it through to air so that it whirred. Severus desperately wanted to ask to have a try with it.
“Come on. We’re going to take the elevator.” Lucius ushered him out and further down the hallway. They seemed to be moving toward the center of activity. More dancers appeared through other doors—women in short sequined tops and baggy silk trousers, more men dressed as pirates, and, spectacularly, a woman in a perfectly flat tutu, encircling her waist like Saturn’s rings. Severus had never seen anything like it. Everyone was wearing the same shades of teal, brilliant red, and gold that glittered even in the stark barracks lights. Some of the women waddled a little, toes sticking out to the sides, because they had funny shoes.
They were the most beautiful people Severus had ever seen.
At the end of the hallway, doors to the elevator slid open, and other dancers poured out, already in states of semi-undress, missing jackets and trousers, some in strange puffy slippers and others in bare feet. One woman’s toes were wrapped in masking tape that was beginning to unravel across the floor. Some of these dancers were dressed in purple. Severus had so many questions that as soon as he thought to ask one, it was immediately supplanted by another.
The elevator crowd had noticed him, however, and immediately a half dozen women in baggy trousers had surrounded him and Lucius.
“Who’s this? Are you our new apprentice?” They giggled. “Are you going to be good in the wings? You’ll need to be very quiet, you know.”
They stuffed forward into the elevator—Severus had only ridden in one once before, at the doctors, and it hadn’t been nearly so big—and together they shot up one, two, three floors.
“Right.” Lucius leaned down to speak directly into Severus’ ear, suddenly all business. “When we get out, it’s going to be very dark. Once we get to the wings, there will be big black curtains in rows. Whatever you do, you must not go past the curtains. Do you understand? If you do, you’ll be on the stage and everyone in the audience will be able to see you.”
“If you go onstage, you’ll turn into a pumpkin,” the tutu lady said, winking at Severus. She had tucked the sides of the tutu up under her armpits, making her look like a teal taco.
“Why’re her shoes like that?” Severus asked Lucius, hoping she wouldn’t overhear.
Both Lucius and the tutu lady laughed. “Well, you’ll see. You’re about to see.”
The elevator doors opened, and orchestral music flooded in, sudden and vivid and thrilling.
“Very quietly!” Lucius hissed in his ear, and he pushed him forward into the yawning black space ahead.
2003: American Ballet Theater’s Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School, New York City, USA
When she was good, she was very, very good. And even when she was tired, she kept her magic. There was no one quite like her.
The School of American Ballet had wanted to keep Lily on a permanent basis, and, as Avril Lavigne sang, she wanted them as well. But the JKO had wanted her and Severus both, and they weren’t going anywhere without each other—not on a permanent basis, anyway.
She chalked it up to JKO having more taste. And it was true: when they danced together they were magic, more than the sum of their parts.
They wanted her, eventually, for the Studio Company. In student productions she played Giselle, Aurora, Juliet, Chloe, and Kitri. She was Sylvia in Sylvia, Manon in Manon. She performed roles called only “the woman in blue,” “the novice,” “the red gem,” “the third fairy,” and “hail.”
She danced with him only rarely. They had too much fun. (“You are having too much fun!” ancient Lyudmila had shouted. “We put you in West Side Story Suite, you keep acting like that!” As if they weren’t both half-desperate to be cast in West Side Story Suite.)
But they had too much magic to ignore, Lily Balanchine-quick, Severus Vaganova-lyrical. So different, yet they moved together as if they shared the same brain. They were two halves of the same whole, anyone could see it. Kolya said they were like Plato’s complete people, two trunks, four legs, and four arms bound together, humanity before it was cleaved in two.
But Kolya also said Lily could stand to lose five pounds, especially around the hips and thighs. So there was that.
In the end, she danced with him only rarely, because she was talented in a way he would never be. But it didn’t matter to her. It was enough, for a while, to share the same space. To come back to the dormitory at the end of another crushingly long, utterly exhausting day, and stick her feet in the same ice bucket as her best friend.
Why do you have to go and make things so complicated? Avril Lavigne sang, but it wasn’t. For a little while, it wasn’t complicated at all.
2012: ABT’s Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School’s Collegiate Summer Intensive, New York City, USA
Minerva paced the front of the room as the dancers traveled across the floor in a particularly taxing petite allegro.
They moved through the brisé, the jeté—“higher, gentlemen!”—and into the final assemblé-to-changement. Minerva had reached the end of her patience with these young dancers; they tended to collapse at the end of every combination, almost before the music ended. She intended to nip this tendency in the bud.
“Now hold it! I want complete stillness, Michael, no collapsing. Are you dancers or footballers?” She stared out at them as the music ended, watching for breaks in the stillness, the poise she desired. And sure enough, out of the corner of her eye, the faintest rippling near the back of the room.
Ah, but it was Severus. He stayed at the back of the group, as courtesy dictated. He knew he was no longer there to be scouted.
As Minerva looked, however, something seemed unusual. Every one of the faces before her shone with sweat, but this was something different—the young man’s face was wet with tears.
“Come here, Severus,” she said.
He stayed resolutely where he was, stock-still as she had requested. As if she might forget that she had noticed him. As if the lorry might not notice the deer frozen in its path. The poor, foolish boy.
“Come here,” she said again, quietly.
A beat, then he unwound from fifth position, and it became clear that he could put hardly any weight on the leg. He hobbled toward the front of the room, mouth twisting in fury.
“I finished the combination,” he spat, “I finished it!’
“You are being ridiculous. Go and wait for me in my office while we finish the grand allegro.”
He stood there, wavering, as if he might argue. The studio was utterly silent; the other boys hadn’t moved but watched, agape.
“My office,” she said. “Immediately.”
1994: 31 Spinner’s End, Cokeworth, UK
Neither of them knew what to do with Severus.
He’d asked about lessons often enough to get smacked, and then he had taken matters into his own hands. First Tobias had dragged him out (“if you’re going to jump around enough to give us all a bleedin’ headache, you can do it outside”), and then he had dragged him back in (“what the ‘ell are you thinking, spinning ‘round like a mental case for all the world to see?”).
As of Sunday afternoon, Severus was out. He stood in the yard, kicking vaguely at something—smacking his toes against the brick? He’d better not be ruining his only good pair of shoes. Eileen hurriedly dried her hands and went to drag him back in.
Tobias had taken him to Mass that morning, perhaps hoping for some divine intervention, more likely to get time alone with his son.
On the walk back from the church, he’d tried to get a sense of how serious this all was.
“How about footie? Yer like football, yeah? Could be quite good at that, I reckon. There’s a club for boys just a bit older than yerself.”
“If I do football, can I dance too?” came Severus’ return volley.
“No chance, lad. It’s too expensive.”
“Not even one lesson? Just the one?”
Tobias sighed. “What good’ll that do yer? An’ do yer really want to dance ‘round with a bunch o’ girls in frilly pink what’s-its?”
Severus squirmed away. “No.”
“It’s just girls that do that all, yer know,” Tobias said, wanting to reinforce this point—or something like it—but feeling wrong-footed about it. There was a precocious primness about his son that raised his blood pressure. Let it last, and he’d be torn apart.
“That’s not true,” Severus said at last, “You and mummy dance. You dance together in the sitting room.”
“Tha’s different.”
“Why?”
“Well, it’s—It’s different when yer dancing wi’ a girl.”
Severus nearly shrieked and clutched his hair in frustration. “But you just said that I shouldn’ dance wi’ girls! That’s what you just said!"
Tobias had raised a finger, on the edge of a full-throated lecture, but the boy had already turned and run, leaving Tobias to watch helplessly as he disappeared around the final corner toward home.
They’d only coaxed him to dinner under the threat of a beating, and he sat sullenly, bouncing his heels off the chair legs, not eating.
“Yer going to make a nuisance of yourself until yer get what yer want, aren’t yer,” Tobias said at last.
Severus glowered at his plate, but his heels stopped bouncing. Waiting.
“Are yer sure yer want this? Do yer even know what it’s about?”
“Yes! I read a book about it in the library, and—” he cut himself off. “I’ll just die if I can’t do ballet. I know I will.”
Tobias snorted, and it set off a chain reaction in Eileen, who tried to stifle her laugher behind her napkin. Severus looked between them in childlike outrage at his parents’ betrayal of his destiny.
“It’s not funny!”
Tobias had to bite both his lips.
Eventually Eileen lowered her napkin, forcing her face into seriousness.
“I have a cousin,” she said, “whose son in involved in some way with the Royal Ballet in London. Perhaps he might be able to arrange a lesson or two.”
2004: American Ballet Theater’s Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School, New York City, USA
He kissed her outside the bodega between the studio and their dormitory, and he kissed her outside their favorite Lebanese place, in a seven spices-scented snowfall.
Lyudmila and Minerva let them learn the Cinderella bedroom pas for the spring showcase, and all through their stumbling first rehearsals, their love was a star they held between their chests.
They rode from 23rd street to Times Square and walked around, eyes up, holding hands. Severus would do the whole opening bit to the Scissor Sisters’ “Let’s Have A Kiki,” and they would both lose it by the time he got to “and you know the emmmTA should stand for motherfuckers touching my ass.” Eventually all he had to do was say “MTA” with a slight, sly grin to get Lily to giggle.
On the weekends they took the 7-line train out to Charles and Rose’s new place in Jackson Heights, bursting into light at Hunter’s Point Avenue. She’d doze off against his shoulder some early mornings, letting him watch the stops, trusting him to get them there.
2005: American Ballet Theater Studio Company, New York City, USA
The rule was, you got up as quickly as you could.
Everyone fell on stage occasionally, and most of the time, the shock was the worst part. The illusion broke. The music galloped on without you. No one was going to wait.
You stood up gracefully, if you could manage it. You listened for the music, found a good time to leap back into the dance. You soothed the audience’s shock and disillusionment with a benevolent smile, spreading your arms as if to say, doesn’t that happen to the best of us sometimes? At the end, the applause was especially loud for you, because you had fixed what you broke. You had recast the magic spell over the stage and all its occupants.
But the truth was that the ground was hard, and the music discordant, refusing to admit you back into that other world. The shock of falling was disorienting. Here is the floor, now, under your hands: black, lined with gaffer’s tape, marked with scuffed white X’s, and you realize the floor is quite dirty, perhaps even sandy, a shocking amount of gravel now digging into your palms. The audience has already gasped for you—they watch only you now. They will hold their breath until you get up.
So, the rule was, you got up as quickly as you could.
2012: ABT’s Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School’s Collegiate Summer Intensive, New York City, USA
“You are asking your body to do something that it cannot do.”
“David Hallberg—” he began.
“David Hallberg is a principal dancer with this company, and has numerous responsibilities to us, to the Bolshoi, and to other companies across the globe. Of course he is able to seek out the best rehabilitation program in the world! But you must understand that that kind of funding simply does not exist for you.”
He was quiet then, looking at the floor. At last, he nodded.
Minerva sat back, unsure of how he would take what she was about to say. “There is an excellent teacher training program here at ABT—”
“No."
“I really think you ought to consider it. Severus, the reality is, next year you will be twenty-four; you are rapidly ageing out of this program. It’s time to think about what comes next for you. Meanwhile, you have an excellent eye for technique—and for artistry, for that matter. Teaching might be the most fitting next step—”
“No.” But weaker this time.
“Or you could go back to England and see what’s available for you there! A smaller contemporary or jazz company might—”
“I won’t leave the ballet for anything. There’d be no point in living.”
“Mr. Snape, that is not the kind of thing we joke about in this office.”
“Oh, are we joking now? Tell me another one!” He twisted away from her, pressing the back of his hand over his closer eye.
“Severus, I—” but he was already imploding, hand cupped over his mouth, eyes squeezed shut.
1991: Mrs. Audley’s Dance Academy, Cokeworth, UK
In the beginning, it was all joy.
The class was called Creative Movement, and Lily loved it. She loved her pink skirt, pink leotard, and pink slippers. When the sun shone in on the swirling girls, the whole room glowed peach-pink.
On the days when Mrs. Audley taught the class herself, Lily loved it even more. Mrs. Audley adored her girls, it was clear to see. She greeted them with a big wave, and sent them away with hugs and curtsies. And in between they played.
They sat in a circle and wiggled their toes, in gales of laughter at the three little piggies who went wee wee wee all the way home. They stomped around the studio like toy soldiers, feet pounding the floor along with the marching music. They galloped around like ponies, then chased each other like zombies, staggering with their arms outstretched and their toes turned in. They held hands and skipped-to-my-Lou in a big circle, first one way, then back.
On Lily’s favorite days of all, Mrs. Audley brought down a basket full of beautiful silk scarves and rainbow-colored ribbons on sticks. The girls would each grab a scarf or a ribbon and twirl in the long afternoon light, the studio exploding in dozens of shifting colors.
Mrs. Audley would put on songs she loved when she was young, and together they would leap into the music, colors and patterns emerging from the paths of their moving bodies. The magic’s in the music, and the music’s in me. And it was.
During all the long later years—the years of diva personalities, 9:00pm rehearsals, stress fractures, and single-serve packets of ibuprofen offstage—Lily never forgot. When she needed it most, she could reach down into her heart and turn the old joy like a snow globe, shaking her love back into motion again. Magic, music; first the right foot, then the left.
1995: The Royal Opera House, London, UK
The wings were barely controlled chaos. Lucius kept his hand on Severus’ shoulder and guided him past a flock of tutued corps dancers warming up at a backstage barre, a soloist couple arguing over bottles of shoe paint, and a lighting specialist holding a barking Walkie-Talkie.
In the time they had been downstairs in the dressing rooms, the curtain had come up again, and insistent music poured in from the front of the stage. Severus kept trying to worm his way forward to see where it was coming from. Lucius caught him around the middle and held him there.
“Be patient. We’ll get closer in a minute.”
What exactly they were waiting for wasn’t clear, but there was enough to look at to hold Severus’ attention right where they were. If he looked directly upward, black metal bars and lattices crisscrossed the distant black ceiling, racing out toward the stage. Dozens of lights lined these structures, a few illuminated but most dark, covered with thin plastic film, each a different color. A great ba-dumm! came from the orchestra, and the lights changed, sliding from pale blue to pink and white.
Suddenly, a burst of commotion, and a line of dancers breezed through from the stage toward the elevator, still gasping for breath. Lucius pulled Severus back and they waited in quiet respect as they passed.
“Right, we can go up in the wings for a bit. But remember, the closer we get to the stage, the more careful we must be.”
Severus nodded.
They slipped up into second wing, and slowly the stage revealed itself. Dozens of ballerinas in long, flowing skirts ringed the whole stage, some standing, some kneeling, all with their arms raised gracefully. They were utterly frozen, as if they might not even be real. In the middle of the circle, two women in white, flat tutus danced.
Severus could only get brief glimpses of these dancers, as one of the frozen women was standing right in front of him, but what he could see left him in awe. He felt as he had when he’d first seen a heron take off from the river near home—he’d never imagined a bird could be so beautiful, or so otherworldly. These dancers were just the same, only human. Yet they were also something else—their movement had a beauty beyond human movement, a quality he couldn’t understand.
Who were these people? They seemed a different species from the dancers backstage, who clomped around and slouched, watching the stage with their hands on their knees. The people on the stage looked unbound by gravity, and something possessed them all so that they became part of an alien world—a world that seemed unreachable to anyone else.
Suddenly, a ripple spread through the frozen women ringing the stage. One after the other they swirled, arms spreading, a wave of movement rushing through them until each posed exactly like the others.
And then they ran.
The whole stage seemed to whirl with their movement, and Severus leaned back, dizzy, in awe. Somehow the women had formed lines—how they had got there he wasn’t sure—and they swayed like trees, bobbing and swaying as if pushed by wind. Perhaps, he thought, they weren’t people at all, but some kind of magical beings with special powers, able to turn their bodies into other things, into music itself.
“Look—look at their feet,” Lucius said softly, pointing. He did.
The dancing had changed; the ballerinas’ feet flashed in tiny steps that made them seem to float. And, stunningly, they were on the absolute tips of their toes—the real tips—and he understood, at last, was what those funny shoes were for. They didn’t look funny now; they looked beautiful.
“What do you think?” Lucius whispered, grinning. But Severus couldn’t speak.
“Oh! We’d better get out of the way.” Lucius pulled him back just as four of the ballerinas came tiny-stepping backward through the wing.
One by one, as dancers crossed the invisible boundary between the stage and the wing, their magic drained out of them. Gravity took them again, and they became human. Nothing he’s seen had stunned Severus like this. These dancers weren’t a different species at all! They were humans who transformed into something else the moment they crossed over into the world of the stage. The stage had the magic, and the dancers only reacted to it, stepping out into zero gravity like men on the moon.
“Hullo,” said one of the ballerinas who’d just transformed back into a human. She was smiling at Severus. “Who’s this?”
He gaped at her.
“Hi, Meg,” Lucius said in his talking-to-grown-ups voice. “You looked great out there.”
“Cheers.”
“This is my little cousin. Listen, I’m on in a minute. Do you think you could watch him?”
Severus whipped around to stare at him. Surely Lucius couldn’t turn into one of these magical being, could he? Was he about to transform?
“Sure, for a minute.” She looked down at Severus again. “Enjoying yourself? Is this your first ballet?”
He had no idea what to say.
They were both laughing at him. “I think he’s a bit starstruck at the moment.” Lucius was bouncing the way Severus did sometimes. Nothing made sense.
Three other men had gathered near the wing, all pirates. Lucius turned to him, leaning down to look him in a face. “I have to dance this next scene, so you’ll wait here with Meg, all right? Do not go on stage, understand? Whatever you do, don’t follow me out.”
Severus nodded. Maybe he would turn into a pumpkin after all. Anything was possible here.
Meg took his hand and he let her lead him to a spot where they could see down the whole length of the second wing and out onto the stage. Lucius and the other pirates jockeyed into line along the wing, whispering to each other, rocking, and bouncing a little. Their gold swords became dark slashes across the wing’s bright window to the stage.
The music changed and the men grew serious, waiting, listening for some invisible summons. Suddenly, as one, they burst out, leaping through the magical dividing line and bursting onto the stage.
The second Lucius passed the end of the wing, the stage lights caught him. He lit up, brilliant white to Severus’ unadjusted eyes, illuminated like the sun.
2005: American Ballet Theater Studio Company, New York City, USA
He had already tried to get up twice, intending to take Lily’s hand, give her a graceful way to reenter the pas. For some reason, the getting up wasn’t working. Lily was still spread-eagled on the ground, watching him almost casually, as if they were leisurely stretching, down here on purpose.
The music raced on, an incomprehensible tangle of strings. Had they been meant to dance to this? It did not seem like a sound Severus had ever heard before. He could not imagine what steps might go with it.
“Sev,” Lily gasped at last, “I can’t get up.”
He abandoned trying to stand up for the moment, instead scootching closer. “What?”
The audience was murmuring.
“I can’t move.” She inhaled like there was no oxygen in the theater. And just like that, shock gave way to terror.
He looked up, past Lily, into the wings, where a crowd had already gathered. Costumed dancers stared out at them, eyes huge and frightened in the dark. In the dark space beyond, the faint shapes of stage managers and techs moved. He could hear the crackle and screech of Walkie-Talkies echoing from both sides of the stage, already calling down the gods from upstairs—PT, medical consultants, the artistic director, a whole squadron of techs.
The orchestra had gone silent. Someone had given them the word.
Suddenly Minerva was there in the wing, so close she was almost onstage. On impulse he rose again, trying to flee to her. But the instant he stepped onto his left leg, it gave way and he collapsed, nearly landing on Lily’s arm. She was still down, still gasping.
The audience clamored, were gibbering unfamiliar animals in the dark.
Minerva looked directly at him, holding his gaze steadily. “Curtain,” she said.
He nodded frantically. She nodded once back.
“Lils.” He tried to scoot closer to her, find her hand. Surely between them he could find one functioning limb. “Curtain.”
“Oh no. No.”
“It’s s’okay.” He was starting to shake, as if he’d fallen into icy water. The very first prickles of what would eventually be excruciating pain had begun to creep into his consciousness.
They were close to the front of the stage, where Severus had been meant to carry Lily out through the first wing. The stage lights blinded them, and beyond the theater house was a pitch-black cavern that swelled and towered, threatening to swallow them.
Suddenly a mechanical chunk and whirr came from overhead, and the curtain began its long, slow descent. He looked up and watched as a thousand pounds of deep red velvet slid down from the distant ceiling.
“No, no, no, no,” Lily gasped, pleading with the curtain.
“It’s okay,” he pleaded back, still thinking, somehow, that this might be fixed. Minerva would pull them to their feet and they would go on, would do what they were meant to.
Someone had found the God mic, an authoritative male voice announcing an unexpected intermission through every speaker. The gabbing of the audience, more foreign than any human sound he’d ever heard, rose and fell in dizzying waves.
Suddenly the house lights came up, and he could see them at last.
Every eye in the audience was on the two of them, some people even standing, craning their necks to get a better view.
He understood in a single blow that they had not come to see them perform, but instead to see them fail. This was the most entertained they would ever be.
He stared back at them, into every gaping mouth and beady, inhuman eye, until the velvet curtain sliced down between stage and house, cutting them off forever. It sent a gust of air over them both, fabric pleating on the floor with the utmost finality.
Only then did Lily begin to cry.
2023: Castles School of Ballet, Connecticut suburbs of New York City, USA
He heard it on a Wednesday afternoon, ensconced in the back office, ostensibly doing the school’s taxes. He liked the back office as well as anywhere. He could crack the small window that opened into the side lot, put on NPR or the local arts radio, and almost imagine himself somewhere else.
He was just beginning tax form 1040-SR when the radio’s voice leapt from the background and straight into the pit of his stomach.
“—Lily Evans announced her retirement from the American Ballet Theater this afternoon, saying that she will remain with the company until the end of the summer season.
“Originally from the small urban town of Cokeworth, England, Lily Evans began her dance training as a prodigy at an obscure mixed dance school. On the advice of her teacher, she attended summer intensives at the Northern Ballet, the English National Ballet, New York City Ballet, and the American Ballet Theater, where she received a Princess Grace Foundation Scholarship in Dance.
“Evans has had a long career with ABT, ever since that summer intensive in 2002. She joined ABT’s Kennedy school full-time in the fall of 2002, and was selected for ABT Studio Company in 2005. After a year off to recover and retrain after a nearly disastrous spinal injury she received during an early performance, Evans rejoined the Studio Company for their 2007 repertory season.
“Evans became an apprentice with ABT in 2008 and joined the corps de ballet in June 2009. She was promoted to Soloist in 2012 and to Principal Dancer in 2015, dancing across the United States and in Hong Kong, Manilla, Sydney, London, Paris, St. Petersburg, and Athens.
“She will be 35 when she retires this fall, and says she has no set plans for her career after dance. She intends to remain in New York City, where her parents also live in Queens, and to continue soaking up the Big Apple’s culture and arts.
“After nearly losing her career to an early injury, Evans says, ‘I’m tremendously lucky to be able to choose when I retire—’”
He clicked his laptop shut, cutting NPR off. What more could there possibly be to hear? She had made it; he had not. Now she was released in the real world, just as he had been. Only she had all the time in world to sort out her post-dance career plans, yet seemingly had not.
Something didn’t add up. Ballerinas retired young, certainly, like any extreme athletes. But they rarely chose to do so for no reason. Dancers retired in their thirties because they were either injured or wanted to spend time with their mewling infants. As far as he was aware, Lily didn’t have any of the latter. Something must have happened, regardless of her claim to be retiring on her own power.
She must be—or still be—injured in some way.
He was set to teach the Level 4s in ten minutes, so he put those thoughts back where they belonged. He’d spent years dragging his broken body after her, like a rabid dog caught in a bear trap. Somehow, she had managed to escape him.
He had ruined her life once already; he would not do so again.