Say Goodnight Before You Leave

39. Son of Autumn

Past. Copenhagen, Denmark.

Irene shakes her head and uncrosses her arms. Her curly hair is in a tall ponytail and her outfit in baby blue. "Nej, nej, you're prolonging. Tip and pirouette at once."

"Like this?" I say doing the movement again.

"Like that."

We're at her house, where we pushed some of the furniture to the sides so we could have more space and a large mirror on the wall served as a reference. Baby Elinor stood on the side in her pink playpen playing with ocean balls.

Irene didn't have my telephone or anything, but a couple of weeks after her birthday, through Marceline, she gave me the message that she wanted to see me again.

And today, after training, I came straight here.

We had lunch together and the sight of my leotard under my coat made her crazy to dance, and despite feeling exhausted, I guessed it wouldn't hurt to show her some of my training and indulge her in something she loves so much.

"Yes... place the arm higher... perfect."

She rewinds the tape and I repeat the whole part again.

"Amazing. Now, let me get some rest."

I sit down on the corner on the soft carpet to rest my numb muscles, insecure to sit my sweaty self on their fancy sofa. She comes from the kitchen with two glass filled to the brim with lemonade, a smile from ear to ear.

"May, I gotta say," she begins, sitting beside me, "you're better than I imagined. The girls didn't describe the way you dance as you really do."

I chuckle. "I can only imagine how they described me."

"Don't be hard on them. I would get nervous as well if I saw a novice dancer doing as you did. Julio called after you auditioned and I only heard the highest compliments."

"I'm not a novice you know that. And from day one people say how marvelously you dance. I'm the one eager to see you in action."

"Well, dancing is my life, so I expect that I'm somewhat good at it. But with my hiatus, I'll be pretty rusty when I come back, you can be sure."

"We'll see."

"But it doesn't make you less of a great dancer. I have great stability, my elasticity is enviable, and a strong stomach muscle control. But you... you're energetic, your endurance is impeccable, you dance with emotion!"

I turn my eyes down to my glass. "I don't convey the emotion I used to."

"One day, stop to watch yourself dance and you'll see. Goddamn, May! Giselle is the one play to be dramatic and over the top. Even as a Willi."

"But my wish to leave has drained the drama out of dancing to my writing." And sex, but that's my issue.

"I digress. And so what? You're still talented."

I smile, readjusting my position. "And you wanna know something? You'd give a great instructor."

Her eyes widen. "You think so? I adore this, worriless moving, taking this rough clinical technic and ending up with such gracious result. I consider dancing ballet a tier above everything else. But instructing, I don't think I could."

"Maybe not currently, but in some plentiful years, it could be a possibility. If you love dancing that much, you'd love that as well the day your body gives out."

She furrows her brow. "Don't you think they get bitter? Seeing others doing the thing they love?"

I shrug. "They don't seem like it. To stop dancing professionally doesn't mean to drop dancing entirely."