Though countless years have passed, I could probably still remember the ballet moves I was taught in that dusty, diminished hole of a grand theatre. It's muscle memory; it was drilled into my head like screws into a wall, imbedded firmly and hard to remove.
The bright stage lights boiled me alive in my itchy tight pink tutu, frying my slick skin, burning away my small amount of energy. My skin sizzled as perspiration broke out across it, droplets gathering on my hairline and on my lower back. The glare was intense and endless, there was no turning them off or turning them down. I had to continue. All I knew was to continue.
So many of the amazing girls towered over me, and were far more skilled than me and clearly been at it for a long time. They would twirl and swirl like balance wasn't an issue, extend their limbs as if there was no limit to the expanse of their arms and legs. They would float about the stage effortlessly, prancing on their toes, swaying and gliding, like the seeds of dandelions in the wind.
I was hopelessly dwarfed, completely perplexed and utterly terrified, staring up at the tall and beautiful young women surrounding me: unable to move with half as much grace. I stumbled and jumped about the stage frantically, desperately trying to keep up, my feet plodding heavily on the ground without rhythm or fluidity. I was grateful that I couldn't be seen, I was short and could hide behind their billowing bouncy tutus, but it was only so long before someone noticed me like a limp rose in a bouquet... And we all know what happens to the rotten flower in the bunch: it gets cut.
I ran about, trying to stick with the crowd, trying with all my might to remain hidden. I tried to do what looked right, but then I overbalanced.
Smack!
The wooden floor smashed into my rumpled face, my button nose buried in the glossy scented mahogany. My ears began to ring like church bells and my heart rate leapt through the roof, thrumming anxiously in my chest. When I withdrew my head from the floor, everything had stopped. The music had come to an abrupt staggering halt and the girls were all stood in their lines like soldiers, peering at me in horror. It was robotic.
I looked about, and the flaming red hair that had freed itself amidst the duration of the collision fell over my pale horrified face, blocking my view as if my sight wasn't already obscured and fuzzy enough. The world swung around me, like I had been or a merry-go-round and had fallen off. Everything was tilting left and right like a pendulum in a grandfather clock, swinging from side to side.
I pushed myself up on my hands, trying to support myself on my weak battered arms that were scraped by the rusty nails sticking out of the flooring and bruised where I barely caught myself. My forearms were grazed, the skin fleshy and pink where the skin had been scraped away, warm and stinging, buzzing with pain. Bruises were already forming and everything hurt.
Addled and in pain, I started crying. Warm suffering tears leaked out of my eyes and rolled down my rosy embarrassed flushed cheeks. Where was Ivan? I wanted Ivan.
"Natalia!" The hoarse crowing shout of the ballet teacher reached my ears.
She stomped towards me with no grace, her face like thunder and her wrinkled eyes burning with violent fury. The old crone was livid. She snatched me by the arm and hauled me to my feet, nearly tripping me again in the process.
"Fail again and I'll be forced to take you to Karpov."
She warned me and I heed that warning like it was a blessing. If only I had known the horrors that were in store the first time she was going to take me to Vasily.
I nodded frantically, trying my hardest to let her know that her message was received and understood.
"And for god's sake, stop crying girl."
She was like a wolf, that woman; wicked and cruel. She was twisted and always on the hunt for the straggler in the pack - trying to pick them off one by one and have them for dinner.
She brushed the tears from my cheeks mercilessly, not a single sympathetic emotion on her face; manhandling me like some kind of filthy creature off the street, as opposed to a completely horrified and lonely eight year old girl.
"One, two, three."
She clapped her hands in a staccato manner as she made her way back across the room, cutting through the hordes of readied still ballet dancers, trying to strike up a rhythm before the music cut in. And then the ensemble would start playing again: the violinists dragging their bows sharply forth and back over their tight strings, the woodwind blowing hardily into their lengthy hollow instruments and the harp being twanged nimbly as the player raked their slender fingers gently across the fine strings as if she was weaving something on a loom.
The ballet training was intensive, intricate and unrelenting. Day in, day out we would dance. They told us that ballet was good for strengthening the core of the body and enlightening for the soul. I came to love dancing; mostly because it emancipated my mind from the worries and doubts that were constantly saddled with me. They had never told us why they taught us to dance though. I knew from the word go that it was no ordinary troop of twenty-seven dancers with the Bolshoi; there was an undercurrent of corruption.
When the day drew to a close we were guided into barracks behind the theatre and packed into a dusty make-shift dormitory that was actually the prop and costume room. We were made to sleep in coarse sleeping bags like potato sacks, harsh and biting on the skin, itchy and cold. The snowy winters were the worst, when ice froze in the corner of the windows and the floors became as temperate as the snow outside, when the warmth of the candles were taken from us as they were extinguished and we all slept close together, trying to survive off each other's bodily heat; the sacks never did any good when it came to warmth or comfort. Lying on the hard wooden floorboards in a pile, all trying to find room for our small bodies in the cramped space. We tried to seek comfort in one another, and those who spoke formed secretive friendships - but I just kept quiet.
I used to cry at night; and wonder where Ivan was. I missed him every day until I couldn't remember him anymore. I used to try and convince myself that he was coming back, that he wouldn't leave me, and that I would see him again, but then I grew up. I would always wonder why he gave me away if he knew what it was going to like it there. I had dreamed of the ballet; but never like this. I wondered what kind of affluent bargain was stroke so they might take me; Ivan wasn't rich and money was a valuable commodity. I always supposed he sold me off. Ivan was the closest thing I had to a father; being that my actual father died in a fire when I was a baby along with my mother. I missed family more than anything. It wouldn't have mattered where I was if I had Ivan; but I was completely alone with no one to support me and there was nothing I could do to escape.
A guard used to sit in the room in the 'dormitory', with his filthy tobacco pipe alight in his hand and make sure that all of us "got a good rest", but in reality he was just making sure none of us left. One of the girls tried to leave once; Alyona, I think she was called. He had grabbed her by the ear and taken her straight to Vasily - and even through the thick walls of the theatre we could hear her sobbing agonised cries as she was struck over and over with the cane. Sometimes I think they wanted us to hear, to try and persuade us not to do the same.
Stage work was terrifying, and the first time I stepped on stage I nearly passed out. I remember looking right from the front of the audience to the back, expectation sitting heavy upon my shoulders, to impress and look pretty. We were the face of the motherland, the epitome of grace and beauty, we were known across the nation and we had to be perfect. Every hair had been tugged violently into place, every face had been plastered with slap and painted up like a china doll, and every last body had been shaped by the training: skinny and broad in all the right places. It was almost beautiful; but the sinister truth somehow took that beauty away. If only the audience had known about the canings, about the shouting and the solitary confinement for those who failed.
We all stood there in first position, our heads tilted towards the ground, staring down in inactivity, waiting for the first upbeat chorus of music. I could hear my heart drumming in my ears and I was still as a statue with fear. This was the moment.
As the music stroke up, we all began to move in perfect harmony, leaping and twirling, splitting off into groups and performing together. We danced and pranced along to the music faultlessly: faults were something we couldn't afford.
There were so many idealistic pleasant smiles, including the one on my own petrified face; but that barely disguised the haunted and terrorised fear in the eyes in so many of the young girls.
The focus showed on their frozen faces, their eyes locked straight ahead as they recalled their training and tried not to mess up. Eager to impress, they all pulled it off, and by the end of the evening, when the curtain fell, a sigh of relief went up, and the smiles were gone in an instant.
No one was happy, and after that performance, I realised that I wasn't the only one.
As the weeks passed we were whisked off to different stunning venues. We were packed into the back of a cramped icy truck in silence and the car would chug along the poor roads for hours as he all sat there in silence, swaying on the bench seats in the back as the wheels negotiated bumps and lumps in the road. No one even made eye contact. I was confused most of the time and remained silent; I would only speak when spoken to: and that was when Vasily turned up to speak to us about our training.
It came to my attention at the age of ten that people in the troop were slowly disappearing. One by one they were plucked off like petals off a daisy, never to be seen again. No one ever seemed to speak about it or even acknowledge it. No one really dared speak. Even in the changing rooms, when everyone did up their ballet shoes in the changing room, winding their laces up and around their slender legs and nattering amongst themselves. The talking would always stop when our instructor entered the room.
The girls would go without saying goodbye, without so much as a word or a warning. I feared every day that they might do the same to me. Horrible notions stuck in my mind about where they might be going: tossed out onto the street for being inadequate, or worse; executed. They never returned and slowly the group thinned out; the amount of people got to only ten, and the shows stopped, and then one day we were taken away too. Then we realised that the ballet was a facade for something so much worse.
A/N - I'd been wanting to update this for a while, and I'm glad I did. Dedication goes to IvyAfterShock.