"A small step for a man, but a great leap for mankind." Those words resounded on the walls of the empty practice room. The woman rejoiced, and a smile illuminated her face, but as her teacher had instructed her, she could not allow insignificant distractions to distract her. So, she ignored that transcendental news, as if it were nothing at all, and disconnected the old radio. Then she approached the modern radio cassette and introduced the tape that said Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake.
The melodic composition went deep into her body and moved her muscles in perfectly matched steps, like a clockwork. She placed herself in fourth position, preparing to make that turn she feared, the pirouette in dedans. And she turned with great dexterity; one turn, two turns, three turns. The passage of time became diffuse and her thoughts moved away from reality. Suddenly, her foot, the base that held her, lost its strength, which caused a painful fall and loss of consciousness.
Her eyes opened slowly, overwhelmed by the white light that embraced her. She tried to focus her vision and glimpsed, beneath her feet, a crystalline lake that perfectly reflected the beauty of a full moon. Confused, she analyzed the landscape. A lush forest surrounded that infinite lake, it did not allow you to see beyond its interior, something that produced an uncomfortable feeling of restlessness and discomfort. She stroked his hair and managed to feel a strange sharp accessory attached to it. A light bulb lit on her head, it was the crown of the Queen of Swans that rested on her skull.
The melody that used to fill the walls of the room, played again in this melancholic landscape. She moved around in search of answers, as she was tormented by not knowing the origin of the music she had heard so much in the past. A slender figure approached from the shadows, someone she recognized, the prince. She had read that story so many times, that she could identify the scene instantly, she was in the second act of Swan Lake. Now, as the play indicated, the prince would approach her and both would dance until the sun rose and she was a swan again. So, being faithful to the script, she did the same.
And she danced, she danced until her muscles weakened, these looked like fabrics about to tear that would end up being hundreds of unusable threads. The prince took a step back and she understood, on the spot, what her next step would be. Again, she regained the fourth position and turned; one turn, two turns, three turns. She focused on the splendour of the moon, that light, so powerful, frost with indigo subtones, that light, that light... that light was the light of a great focus.
The public applauded euphorically and flowers fell at her feet. The sweat that ran down his complexion shone like tiny stars, while his breath, choppy, followed the beat of the chant of the crowd. She smiled, she could finally smile. A lone tear escaped from his glass cage, leaving a fine wet trace in his path, and an accumulation of emotions seized him, pride, faintness, joy, satisfaction, all too overwhelming for the situation.
Suddenly, the sounds became distant and her whole body became numb. A loud bang was heard in the auditorium, and all present ended their talks to pay attention to what they had just witnessed. The woman, lying on the floor in the middle of the stage, did not move, nor did she breathe, she had died like the swan in the play. "I have to stick to the script, I can't change the story," she thought hours ago. And she would never know, but maybe, just maybe, her teacher would be pleased, at last, to know that her performance had simply been perfect.
