The Dancer and The Doll

~Trapped In The Past~ (1)

The wind howled, making whistling sounds as it crept through open doors and hollow windows. Houses with caved in roofs and broken fences were now filled with the nests of crows and rats.

The old dirt trail, that had once been a road, wound its way through the battered buildings like a weary snake. Its head finally met with and ended at the foot of a towering stone mansion.

Pieces of the mansion were missing; this and that had crumbled away to leave jagged marks behind. Its black and open windows gave away no secrets, the once great front gates stood crooked and rusted on their hinges. They creaked and groaned from the pressure of the wind, and if you were to look up its slowly crumbling walls, and if you were careful... you might see him. Standing stock still, his black hair out of control, and dark eyes unblinking.

He stared down out of the windows at the abandoned ghost town with mixed feelings of contempt and loneliness. His outfit was made up of the traditional tight vest to the high collared cape to the light leather boots.

Once he had been a Dancer, the best, and most fluent, most popular dancer around. Now he was forgotten, his many posters trodden by hastily leaving footfalls as they had fled.

The Dancer turned gracefully away from the window, his eyes held such an intense glare that they seemed to slice through solid rock and see what was beyond.

He stalked through the huge attic room; weaving past half finished and abandoned projects, old photos, dusty costumes and sheet covered piles and furniture. The Dancer came to a stop in front of a rotting panel of wood, it had numerous photographs nailed or pinned to it.

It was a collection of the Dancer's most treasured newspaper clippings and pictures. His eyes took the images in, moments of dancing on stage for hundreds captured in black and white. The Dancer reached out with long fingers and brushed them across his favourite... a portrait of his dancing partner.

Her face was perfect, framed by wavy locks of hair, a charming smile tugging at her lips.

However he could not recall her name. He remembered her laugh, and her fluid movements as she danced. But even those memories were limited, fragments missing, edges jagged and difficult to recall and piece together. It had been too many years. Some days her face only angered him... These memories made him long for what once was. His eyes scanned the newspaper articles. 'Alcedo', that is what they used to call him. But now he had no name, he was not known or remembered. Now... he is simply the Dancer.

He stepped away and began to pace about the mansion's room, like a cat that had been forgotten and left to haunt dark nights and long for the golden years. The Dancer stopped alongside his old record player. Cobwebs dangled from its once beautiful bronze speaker; a spider scuttled along the box of it and vanished.

It had been many months since he had last danced. At first he had danced to keep his spirits high, but over the years empty loneliness had crept in, dampening his inspiration and hope. Without a partner it seemed pointless, without an audience it was only appreciated by the spiders and mice.

The Dancer tenderly brushed his fingers along the record players smooth shape.

He ripped part of a sheet from the covering of a nearby chair. The tearing sound echoed eerily through the empty mansion, bouncing off the walls to carry on and fade. The Dancer began to work; with nothing else to do he wiped the music player free of its dust and grime.

He blew the soot and dirt from the records themselves, memory again struck as his eyes took in familiar song names. Songs he had been proud to dance, some for show, others for private dances with his long gone partner.

"Midnight Ballet," He murmured, his voice scratchy from lack of use. The Dancer was momentarily mesmerized as he stared down at the record that he held.

Gently, he slid the record from its sleeve and into the player. The Dancer hesitated to start the melody. It would be his first dance in weeks, his heart prodded him to do it, to let his feet find the familiar footsteps and carry him along with the music's gentle flow. But his head rejected, he had no partner to dance with... the thought made his fleeting happy moment fade, he was alone.

Sadly he put the record back in and set it down, dragging his eyes from it to travel the room, to see if there was anything that could give him a purpose for more than an hour.

His gaze landed upon the piles of gears, springs, joints and metal scraps he had abandoned. The Dancer considered rekindling one of his old hobbies again and tinker with the odds and ends. In years past one of the Dancer had created puppets and dancing dolls for his shows and other performances.

His greatest creation had been Rose. She had been constructed of the finest metals and she had bronze, well-oiled joints. She had long silver fingers and two pure diamonds for eyes. The Dancer had tailored her dress himself from the best imported silk and had treasured Rose as much as his love of dance. Her hair – he remembered – had been a long wig of the softest fox fur. The Dancer looked slowly towards odd lump in the far corner of the room, it was covered in a dusty sheet and was covered in numerous cobwebs.