Ballerina feet, clad in toil and ribbon, follow Aria's practiced movements. She twirls on her tips, gliding across a sandpaper stage. For her, there is no audience. It is just the dancer and the clown, and there is no comedy, only awe.
She doesn't pantomime a broken move, and Jester doesn't catch her. They don't embark on a joyous, romantic journey through the circus.
It isn't the audience she hears that makes her heart swell and shake from jovial strokes.
Jester smiles and the craters in his cheeks erupt. And, to her, he claps louder than anyone.
And Daphne isn't here to remind him of how Aria is a charlatan, how she is not in control of her own body, but it is Daphne that composes the movements.
Daphne has Aria attached to wire strings, and for tonight, the ballerina becomes a marionette.
