Strip (8 page)

Big old cars—Cadillacs, Impalas,
Buicks—skid toward a downtown theatre. There I am, peering over the window's ledge into a continuous stream of snowflakes flying by the car. Bored voices from the front seat drop in and out of my little window-world, blankly telling me I am on my way to see something great, that I would probably never see again.

Ballet.

It's
your
father, (she calls him) who said, “I don't know why we had to bring him along, he won't remember.”

Your
mother, (he calls her) said, “It's easier than getting a sitter.”

Bringing me along turned unlucky for him. I could have clung to her but, no, I hung on his jacket sleeves, and the curses he muttered under his breath. The theatre was velvety and everything swirled upward. The seats were soft enough to fart silently, unlike the harsh wood pews at Bellamy Baptist. In that world of gilt and gold and plush fabric, the smells were thick, too. A woman's powdery perfume drifted down her Dippity-do waves of hair, tumbling over the fur collar spread across the seatback, suffocating me, my throat collapsing involuntarily. And as the fur collar inched toward my little flannelled knees, I wondered if I would ever be a grown-up.

“Don't touch,” Father scolded.

“Let him touch it, he's not bothering anybody. Besides,” she whispered loudly, “it's only muskrat.”

They never found out about the sticky mint I glued under that muskrat collar, in the dark, or the giant gumdrop I stuck to the back of some woman's ermine resting on the radiator. But that was when I didn't appreciate the price of fur.

People laugh and whisper, lips touch ears, heads tip toward me with that isn't-he-cute nod and wink, until the sounds fade with the lights and the heavy blood red curtains obey the jab of the conductor's baton and magically fold toward the corners of the proscenium.

And who gave a damn about the dancing back then? Anyone could do it—twirls and twiddles. I was more interested in the ballerinas looking like they had been dipped in icing sugar, and the feathers on their costumes that tickled the men's noses and clung to their sweaty foreheads when they all danced together. I wished, in that silent world, that someone would sneeze. But real swans were much more graceful, I told mother, and they had longer necks, and didn't clomp on tippytoe.

All those cotton candy distractions didn't compare to my fascination with the
danseurs
. I could see myself as one of these princes so much more easily than I could see myself wearing a charcoal suit and tie. These men were strong like I dreamed I would be. They had poise, and shoulders and thighs that looked like they were carved from ivory. They flew, lithe and nimble, through the air. Not like us kids who dropped from trees, twisted our ankles, scraped our shins, or awkwardly leapt across prairie ditches in the spring only to fall short of the opposite bank and have our boots fill with icy water. They only bowed to queens and kings. Their legs were smooth, save for a bulge at the top.

And how could this living statue love a large white bird, when he cared more about his hunting partner? Their big legs bounced them toward each other across the stage, twirled them, too. Then they whispered, touched their hearts and softly stroked each other's shoulders, like I had been taught not to do, one Edmonton summer afternoon on my way to the river. Benjamin Weinstein and I walked toward the water, and it was my father who shouted, “Boys don't put their arms around each other.” So we let go and held hands. “And boys don't hold hands.” We walked shoulder to shoulder, touching, but never again without shame. But the ballet proved me right; the prince and his buddy embraced each other in front of a whole audience, while the other handsome hunters stood like living statues—firm thighs, round butts and bulges—arms draped on one another's shoulders, waiting for their cue to join in the dance. They didn't mind showing their round butts, firm thighs and bulges.

“Why won't they talk?”

“Shhh!”

But how could anyone understand the story if no one talked? Or sang?

At the intermission women tipped their glasses of rye and ginger and carefully stuck their tongues in their glasses to keep their lipstick from caking, as my mother explained.

And people kept saying new-RAYE-ev and Fon-TAIN. The men talked, laughed, whispered and belched out words into their rum and Cokes and Scotches, words like
commie
and
ruskie
,
bohunk
and
fairy
.

“What's a commie? What's a ruskie?” I knew how to be a shit. The women ignored me and stroked my cheeks with the backs of their hands, and I knew, even then, that if I smiled they would say something. “Lovely new teeth—fitting for a dentist's son.”

For better or worse, with no brothers or sisters I was the centre of their attention. Everyone said how fortunate my folks were to have such a handsome—blond-haired, blue-eyed and lovely lipped—and well-behaved young man.

“Your father says you won't remember, but I'm sure you will.”

“Your mother has a thing for ruskie fairies.” His jabs had a distinct tone; I knew what to ignore and when to pretend I didn't understand.

No one asked if I'd ever be the next New-RAYE-ev.

At home my mother tucked me into a grown-up bed in my big room, far away from theirs. Indian rugs covered the cold oak floors. They probably still do. You'd never know it was well below zero outside the walls of that big warm bungalow in Strathcona, Edmonton.

In my bedroom in the basement, I lay in the dark and wondered what it was they liked about going out. Was it the intermission? Seeing their friends? The same reasons they went to church? Or was it a chance to drink cocktails? I figured the husbands went to make the wives happy, and the wives went to dream of princes. As I dozed, I wished I lived in that world where no one spoke and everyone was beautiful. I slept and dreamt of feathers stuck to women, and closed lips miming secrets, while dancers with rock-hard thighs flew through the sky, their tights full of sticky mints.

 

Intermissions, for dancers who
happen to be sitting in the audience, are the side-shows of life, where egos bow and grovel to be noticed. Since they aren't up onstage, they make sure everyone around knows they should be; the females wear their buns twice as tight, with enough makeup to ice a wedding cake, while the men wear corduroy pants just as tight, stretched over their butts, belts snug, and walk bolt upright, waddling with toes pointing in opposite directions like ducks. Then they'll voice their opinions, refer to the stars by nickname—Misha, Rudi—and hope someone notices.

At intermission, Bertrand's much-spoken-about Madame, Madame Talegdi, reclined on a bench in the foyer, stretching like a Siamese cat and inhaling cigarette smoke to her toes. If there was attention to be had, it would have to find its way to her, as far as she was concerned. She looked me over like she was about to eat a big steak and didn't know where to begin. She was strong, lean and dark. With her dyed-black hair pulled tight to a knot, and her even, capped teeth, you could squint and believe she was a twenty-year-old señorita. Up close, she was an aging Hungarian woman, maybe with a dash of gypsy blood. But her presence filled the foyer. People pointed and whispered; whether they recognized her or not, she was alluring. Blowing that smoke everywhere, she made sure she was noticed. The attention was justified. When I saw her dance in Quebec City I understood. Her legs were rock hard, her ankles were a little thick from two infants and a newborn she hauled around. But she could stay on pointe forever. One afternoon the girls in her small company ran from the room, in tears, because she had shamed them by doing thirty-two fouettés without moving, not travelling so much as the diameter of a dime along the floor.

Louise and the girls sat at her feet and Bertrand and Jean-Marc, Bertrand's nemesis, sat beside her. Louise strained to maintain a graceful seated posture, despite her full chest. If she leaned forward she was just way too luscious—a no-no for dancers though no doubt pleasing for any civilian straight males in the theatre. Other, thinner dancers in the lobby would look down on her, but she would smirk because in the end she had the best of both worlds. The Company would have called her “heavy” until she showed signs of anorexia. Someday, in the real world, her body, and all the other shapely ballerina's bodies I had known, would be appreciated. Until then, they'd have to settle for some crazed taskmaster's petrified idea of beauty.

Next to Louise, the other girls appeared to be corpses. Maryse, a buck-toothed and anorexic stick, ignored me outright. Bertrand admitted she could dance but then mimicked her overbite when she turned her back to him. She was all knees, elbows, shoulder blades and grey skin. She snacked on raw celery out of a baggie.

The other female, Chantal, came across as stern. She looked in my direction, but her eye-line just managed to graze the top of my head. When I phoned Rachelle to fill her in on the Company, and described Chantal—legs crossed tight, back bolt upright—Rachelle predictably said Chantal needed to be fucked. This was her solution to most women's attitudes. Chantal had the perfect dancer's body and profile. She stretched her feet in her shoes, and showed off her perfect arches.

Jean-Marc, the one who had brought Bertrand and Louise head to head, sat beside Madame, and presented a huge, toothy, open smile when we were introduced. Bertrand's jealousy of Madame's attention to Jean-Marc showed up as disdain, and Louise's jealousy of Betrand's jealousy registered as fury. Jean-Marc was lean and muscular with veins splitting his biceps. Madame referred to them as his telephone cords. He had a big jaw, and a perfect space between his two front teeth. He looked around the room with eyebrows raised in a
Je suis innocent
way. With a body like that, I'm sure he's had no trouble making his way to the top. That didn't occur to me those few months ago. I still believed it was about talent.

Did Madame sense I would jump her protegé in a second? It turns women on, to think their man is attractive to boys like me. It can also be a big fat insult that no one, including their boyfriend, is noticing them.

Madame finally diverted her attention from her audience in the foyer of Place des Arts. She seemed content that she had been seen by all. “Bertrand tells me you would like to contribute your talents to our little company. He says you can dance.”

Bertrand frowned, but I was growing used to having to prove myself.

“At last we can remount
Rimbaud
,” Louise said. “Madame has created a ballet after the French poet.”

“It's a masterpiece,” Chantal added, toward the space above my head.

Madame pretended to have caught someone's eye. She drew on her cigarette, waved, and shook her head at Chantal's flattery. Like any faded ballerina, she would have killed to be back onstage at Place des Arts. You could almost taste the desire.

“We are taking
Rimbaud
to New York,” said Madame. “Harlem. Three nights. It needs at least six strong dancers.” Her exhaled smoke settled around our little group. “As usual Bertrand will partner Louise. He will be our Rimbaud. Jean-Marc will work with Maryse. They make an ideal match.” Jean-Marc puffed up. “I think you might be a good partner for our Chantal,” proclaimed Madame. “You would make a perfect Verlaine: jealous, in love and always in Rimbaud's shadow.” Chantal tightened her knees, sat even straighter, and curled her lip as though the one person who could turn her into the next Alicia Alonso, and make her dreams come true with the snap of her fingers, had just cut an extremely foul
fromage
.

My time had finally come. This is what I had needed. Not a ballet factory like Montreal, but a small company where I had time to focus on being brilliant. Montreal was short-lived, perhaps another stepping stone along the way—the way to New York.

 

 

Three

The arms extended just
enough, relaxed never, are open to cradle the most precious air, like an angel holding the earth, or releasing what has entered the body—by way of the trunk and the back—through the arms and out the hands toward the heavens. To feel a mere fraction of this, for yourself, slowly push the air away with the back of your hand.

 

Bertrand called their little
group
un equipe
. Every time we met in Montreal, he never stopped his crazy chatter until he returned to Quebec. I didn't need convincing; I wanted to prove I could overcome anything. I tried not to think of Daniel over me, big hands on my back, soaking me with sweat on our second-last night. If he just got cold feet and planned to return, then the break would make our reunion that much better. And ignoring him would make him want me even more; he'd see what a hit our little company was—New York—and how I was not a threat to him, and how serious I really was about my dancing, then he'd want me. I wasn't going to mope around Montreal and envy the ones he danced with, choreographed for, had cigarettes with, disappeared for—or to—his fucks and tricks and protegés. I had my own life to live. I tried so hard not to think of Daniel.

Empty pockets, empty bank account, and stuffed on another bus with all my crap, I'd show him. Dry heater in my face. Frosty late September morning air, a prelude to winter, raced down from the
Les Laurentides
in the north and across the highway to Quebec City. On that ride I must have dozed. I saw the boy, me, walking through the ravine in a yellow raincoat, matching yellow hat, black galoshes, my tight pink fists holding a crumpled painting of dancers, the colours running and fading in the rain. My mother told me to show the class what a wonderful artist I was. How proud I should be. The cold autumn sleet rushed me along, the wind splashed me into puddle after puddle. Coat, hat, boots filling with icy October water. Paint washed away. Up and rush. Hands red with blood and paint and chill and pebbles in the flesh. Up and rush. Up and rush. Hot and damp in yellow. The yard was empty. Everyone was dry in the warm brick building. The heavy door gave quickly and I tumbled into my seated teacher and class, gathered for their rainy day story. Bloody nose, snot and tears ran over my upside-down smile. My gasps were drowned by snorts and giggles, chortles of childish laughter from slouched kids as the plump teacher's ass sagged over the tiny seat of the wooden chair. I strangled the art.

 

In Quebec City I
stayed at Madame “Smoke-cough-ska's” house. I will never understand the link between the physical demands and stamina a dancer must have, and the ability to smoke in spite of it. Madame met my bus in her rusting crayon-orange Volvo station wagon that smelled a nauseating combination of fresh and stale cigarette smoke and rotting apple juice mingling with kiddy poop. Madame had dropped the posturing, let her hair down, but was in full makeup. Regardless of the filth, she had a pristine allure as if she had just stepped out of a
Blackglama
magazine ad. All she spoke of was Jean-Marc: “He's finally coming into his own.”

We chugged into Sainte-Foy. “He's got charisma and energy like the dancers I knew in Hungary.” We coasted up to her peeling bungalow, surrounded by yellow grass and no trees. I was starting to feel defeated and inadequate and I hadn't even so much as
sautéed
for Madame. I wondered if she had already started with the head games or if she was simply oblivious to my presence. “He's lean, handsome and hungry for it. I remember what that was like.” The last sentence was another silent mantra that aging dancers lived by, usually followed by a wistful sigh, as they swallowed their bitterness back into their core and secretly prayed those nearby would whisper about their greatness in the past, saying things like, “She had amazing technique,” or, “His was the definitive Albrecht.” I followed along the cracked walkway, to the front door, as she shoved children's toys aside with her foot and cursed under her breath before announcing, “He will make our name in New York.”

Was I surrounding myself with people obsessed with anyone but me? Everyone loves to talk about how much they are in love, or attracted to so-and-so. But I had been around enough male dancers who had impressed the pants off someone, and even been described as the next Godunov or Baryshnikov, and they wisely rode that wave of enthusiasm. Those were the ones who knew they had an ace in their pocket. Others had no faith in that allure and had slept with Kharkov, perish the thought, or his wife—which made Kharkov even happier—or with anyone who could help them along the way. And there were tons of Jean-Marcs to be obsessed about, which led inevitably to someone's heartache or break, while they forged their own route to the top.

Madame led me into the house, took off her coat, revealing her walking-anatomy-lesson taut torso and medium-sized breasts with no bra, amazing for a woman her age. She knew it. She dropped her coat, almost on a chair, and then rifled through her bag to finally find a cigarette, which she lit and took a drag on. She led me to the kitchen. The house itself looked like it had been ransacked and I was waiting for her reaction, but none was forthcoming. This mess was
de riguer
. In the kitchen, she leaned over the cluttered counter. “When I first saw you I wasn't sure. You have blankness in your eyes. Are you sad or just hesitant? And there is something very uneven about your face. Your nose.” She grimaced as she choke-talked, “But now I see you again and I think maybe you are handsome.”

“I banged it on the bottom of the pool.”

“Playing pool? Hmmm.”

“Not playing…”

“You could get it fixed.”

“It hasn't affected my dancing.”

She tapped her ashes effortlessly into the sink.

The studio was situated on a road that led toward the walled part of town. It was simply a sad fluorescent-lit, linoleum classroom on the top floor of a 1950s beige brick high school that had been converted to a clinic for mental patients. When the wind blew up the slope, the windows howled. No sprung wood floor. No showers; we changed in the bathroom across the hall. After class the girls used talcum. We used cologne; Jean-Marc shared his collection of Drakkar, Pierre Cardin and Christian Dior for our stinking armpits. Bells went off at weird times, people in white coveralls, lab coats, pyjamas or nothing at all ran down halls. Hortense, the pianist, arms like water balloons, hammered everything from Chopin to Delibes to Tchaikovsky with the same heavy hand.

I wanted to believe that Madame's classes were the best I had ever taken. I told myself that this was it. Yes, it was gruelling; my thighs screamed every moment with every plié. Madam had an incredible imagination when it came to putting together a class—the barre was intricate and rigorous, although she seemed to have a habit of forgetting what she had showed us. Regardless, it was hard: from a full plié in first position she would have us
développé
so that we were being supported by one fully bent leg. She seemed to do whatever she could to make our thighs scream and our calves seize up. I might have been starting to get my form back, feeling my legs stretch, feeling my arches once again, and starting to feel like everything was finding its former place within my body, but it seemed too ambitious, and I was too physically worn to sleep well. But I told myself—in the glow of the newness of the experience, and of Madame Talegdi's allure and charisma—that it would make me great.

The days were full. At nine in the morning the six of us had company class, with Hortense at the piano and Madame stomping out the beat for two hours. We extended our tired muscles and followed her commands through a series of pliés,
tendus
,
battements
, with the aid of a barre. “Don't hold the damn thing like you are trying to strangle a cat,” she'd shout. I was developing bad habits all over again; I used to rest my hand lightly, if at all, on the barre, but now I needed it for most of my support. The second half of the class there was
adage
floor work, where we danced and danced and danced—worked on our jumps, turns and everything you could do from one corner to the other. Although there was an air of competition, I doubt they would have acknowledged it. Dancers watch not only themselves, but others, to measure their progress. Following this, Madame would alternate later mornings with a follow-up men's class—more thigh-bursting held pliés, Ukrainian kicks, Russian splits, endless leaps,
tours en l'air
,
grand jeté en tournante
, exercises that focused on male capabilities, designed to exploit the major muscle groups, all interspersed with endless sets of one-armed push-ups with the heal of her Capezio digging into our backs. (She knew how to work a man.) People say that a male dancer's role is to support the woman. Balanchine said ballet is purely a female thing. And I say it's not fair: go to any classical ballet and tell me the man doesn't fly or spin or become airborne for supernatural lengths of time, and I'll know you slept through it.

Madame had the good sense to alternate our men's class with women's pointe class every other day. Jean-Marc, Bertrand and I would watch the women's class closely, but during our class, Maryse, Chantal and Louise would talk in the lunchroom to the extent that Madame would have to shout for them to shut up. After lunch we would all have a short warm-up at the barre, then a
pas de deux
class. It was odd and good to have such a small group; the good being that we danced so much more than one would in a large group, the odd being that I knew my body was undergoing some fundamental changes and I wasn't really sure what my condition would be when I came out the other end.

To finish up the day, we rehearsed sections of repertoire, including Madame's ballets. I rest my case: if it looks like dancers work longer hours than athletes, that's because it's the truth—which is to a dancer's disadvantage. The body needs a sufficient amount of rest and recovery as well as nutrition when it is this active. The ballet world, built on obsession, competition and starvation will never figure this out. It is cemented into a tradition that involves an outdated work ethic. The dancer's fitness regimen involves hours of physically demanding repetition (why else would it look so easy onstage?), optional cigarettes, mixed with coffee and no food. The law of diminishing returns has never been read to the dance world.

Maryse and Chantal kept their noses turned up at me when I was partnering them, when I was beside them at the barre, when I was dancing next to them and when I was anywhere near them for that matter—fortunately it was perfect ballet posture. I had no qualms about staring at their chests, it made them horribly self-conscious—they needed to get out in the bigger world and see how far being a little league bitch would get them. And I noticed everything: when Maryse got thinner, Chantal seemed to put on weight, as if no stray pounds would leave our little company. But Maryse looked like death in this condition, which, paradoxically, made her perfect for the children's roles that called for waif-like fairies, sylphs, fireflies or something equally translucent. Chantal did her best to disguise her expanding thighs with a variety of sheer rehearsal skirts, and I had the misfortune of being her
pas de deux
partner while Jean-Marc partnered only the skeletal Maryse, making him look even more capable.

Sometimes Bertrand shared Louise with me. She was the only one who responded like a real performer. She had instinct, trust, generosity and perhaps even a crush on me; she always looked at me with a grin and a twinkle in her eye as though we were sharing a private joke. On this particular day we danced together rehearsing the
pas de deux
from Minkus's
Paquita
. Both of us knew the choreography more or less, although we had never danced it together. As Hortense crucified the music as if she were nailing Jesus to the cross and making damn sure he wouldn't get away, Louise and I flew beyond the staleness of that crummy little studio. Madame stood silent and the other two couples finally stopped their cumbersome, indulgent and weighty movements to watch as well. If Louise hadn't been Bertrand's woman, I would have made her my dance partner for life. There was a natural sensitivity in every move we made; every lift, every turn, we became one, and far more than one when we danced.

Later that week, we were to rehearse one of Madame's creations set to Debussy's “La Mer,” and based on Grimm's
Little Mermaid
. Jean-Marc, her Neptune, was late and had not called in. Madame was visibly shaken by this lack of etiquette, so I stepped in. I took my place and watched Madame slide across the classroom, arms carving the air, her footwork an intricate swirl of triplets. She swam me from an imaginary giant clam, to Louise,
bourréeing
as Les Algues, an overgrown piece of seaweed. I followed slowly. We call it marking; in the whole ballet theatre world we call it marking. You rarely, if ever, dance full out when initially learning the choreography.

“You're not going to move like that!” she shouted after I traced the steps, head down, arms grasping the air, counting out the beats. “Of course not, Madame.”

“Go and sit down.” Madame choked, turned red, leaned on the barre.

Louise rat-a-tatted something to her and then muttered to me under her breath, “Madame hates marking. She'd rather see you get it wrong full-out, than have you mark it.”

But Madame shouted back short and quick at Louise, “Mes nerfs!” She stood by the window and lit a cigarette.

Louise rolled her eyes then whispered, “Make her choreography look difficult. Does that make sense?”

It didn't matter. Even if I did pirouettes on my ear, Jean-Marc had stood her up.

Madame continued to make things more difficult. She altered the choreography, put in extra lifts, made them last longer. My repertoire became rife with adagios with laboriously slow lifts from Albinoni to Telemann. To my credit, Chantal and Louise appreciated a male who didn't gasp in a
presage
or a
cambré
.