First-Person Narrative Intro to Creative Nonfiction Writing

Cracked Reflection

       I inch myself up on the velvet seat in the auditorium, gazing over the head of the man seated in front of me. M&M’s melt in my right hand as I try to lick the chocolate off of my fingers. I glance over at my grandpa sitting next to me, his red and white button down matching my red striped dress. He pulls out a handkerchief from his khaki pocket and hands it to me as the light dims. My grandpa comes to The Nutcracker for the live music and the beauty that the orchestra can create with their instruments. Not able to contain my excitement, I swing my feet back and forth over the seat. The curtains open and my pupils widen. Although the violins and cellos and flutes and violas and the harp generate an unseen beauty, the dancers' bodies are the instruments I take notice of, delicately but strongly demanding the audience’s attention. I can’t take my eyes off the ballerinas as they glide across the stage, and for the next two hours, I am immersed in the art of movement. This is the fourth year my grandpa has brought me to The Nutcracker, and next year I’ll finally be old enough to audition.

***

        It’s my first Nutcracker season. I’m 8 years old, playing the role of a baby mouse.       

       I make my way from the dressing room to the rehearsal studio, glancing into the big girl’s studio. The crescendo in the snow scene plays as the dancers take on the role of snowflakes fluttering across the floor. I watch in complete awe as I peer into the room, barely able to see over the tall window. I shuffle timidly into Studio 1, the large panel of windows to my right allowing the sun to direct rays across the Marley floor. The older girls are laughing and running around, and I catch myself grinning at my reflection in the mirror. I’m shorter than most of the girls. I’m wearing my new pink leotard and my hair is pulled back into a bun that my mom attempted. I hear the studio door open and the room drops silent. Sergey, the director, strides into the room and makes his way to the large velvet chair that resides right in the front center of the studio. His presence is the largest in the room, despite only being 5’8. I was always told to look people in the eye when they speak, and at this moment, my eyes are glued onto Sergey.

       “Alright girls, let’s begin,” he says in his thick Russian accent.

       He catches my glance and winks. He smiles in my direction.

***

       It’s my fourth Nutcracker season. I’m 12. 

    I got unanimously chosen for the main role of young Clara, something I had been dreaming of since the first time I sat in that velvet seat in the auditorium with my grandpa. It’s the morning of the in-studio dress rehearsal and I run into Studio 1 to see a long pink tulle skirt hanging up on the barre by the windows with my name on the waistband. While my actual costume is getting altered, I get to wear this skirt to imitate the length of Clara’s long dress for the party scene. I rip it off the hanger and step into it impatiently. My mom laughs, sensing my restlessness, and comes up from behind me and begins to hook me into it.

       “Suck in your stomach Audrey,” she says. “I want to get you on the tightest hooks.”

       I take a deep breath in and try to suck in my stomach to my spine, just how my teacher Zhanna reminds us dancers to do during class. My mom squeezes my hips as she closes the hooks, and I can barely breathe. She hooks them on the second tightest clasp. She sighs. I shrug it off and run over to grab my Nutcracker doll prop. Playfully dancing around the studio before rehearsal, I can't wipe the smile off my face. Sergey strolls into the room and makes his way over to me, his peppery hair gelled to the right side. He looks me up and down and his eyes are drawn to my waist. My smile fades.

       “Tighter,” he says.

       I turn around and he yanks the hooks even tighter. The party scene begins and I emerge from the right side of the room into the lively array of dancers. I already feel a cramp emerging from my stomach, the skirt band digging into my right side. I tell myself to breathe. The scene continues and the pain escalates. I’m heading upstage to the left corner of the room to begin my variation, knowing I will not be able to complete it. I’m silently gasping for air, but no oxygen can satisfy the amount that I’ve lost. Everyone is watching me as I begin the variation, but suddenly feeling lightheaded, I stop mid arabesque.

       It’s the first time I’ve felt a disconnect between my mind and my body. The room is spinning, and I feel like a comic character seeing stars float around the room. Sergey stops the music immediately and runs up to me, yelling at the dancers to find my water bottle. He carefully leads me over to the front of the room, unhooks my skirt, and sits me down adjacent to the mirrors. He smells like cigarette smoke, a smell I had begun to become accustomed to. Kneeling next to me, he reminds me to keep breathing and drinking water. He pats me on the back and tells me to rest. While the dancers wait patiently for the music to resume, Sergey gets up and returns to the remote. He turns back at me and winks.

***

       It’s my sixth season. I am 14, cast in the snow and waltz corps, along with the Columbine doll. My mom backstage can sense the excitement I have to be dancing in these parts… they’re usually roles for the older girls. I get to leap across the stage and throw fake snow in the closing piece of the first act during the crescendo of the music, something I’ve been looking forward to since I was 7 years old. I get to wear a pink tutu in the second act while I lightly waltz, feeling like the stereotypical feminine ballerina. I also get to be the Columbine doll, the soloist dancer that is brought to life in the first act and looked up to by all the younger dancers.

       The whole company stands in a circle underneath the lights embracing each other, feeling the energy passed around from squeezing each other’s hands. My bobby pins dig into my scalp from my bun, but no amount of pain can surpass the anticipation I feel before going on the stage. There’s a large unsaid bond between the dancers, especially before we go on stage. Every challenge we’ve faced, high school dance we’ve missed, family vacation we’ve skipped…

       At this moment, it’s all worth it.

       Sergey recently got a knee replacement, so when he enters the stage to join the circle, he’s hobbling on a pair of crutches. There’s no life behind his eyes and his hair is graying. Even though his chuckles in the past were infrequent, they were still present.

       Now they’re gone completely.

       He doesn’t laugh anymore, only snarls. The previous compliments he would give to us consisted of the singular word “good” or just silence. Never anything more. Now, even those little affirmations were absent. I need a reason to stay. I need a reason to keep sacrificing my life to ballet. Being on stage was that reason. 

        The music to the Act 1 Pas De Deux is finishing up and the snowflakes, including myself, are warming up backstage, preparing for our entrance. There are buckets of shaved up paper backstage that we throw as we leap in a diagonal later in the music. I sigh in sympathy to my seven-year-old self, who believed it was actual snow that the dancers threw.

***

       It’s my seventh season. I’m 15, and I’m playing the roles of snow crystal, waltz couple, columbine doll, and mirliton. Zhanna calls us over from backstage onto the main stage after our last dress rehearsal. It’s two days before opening night, and Thanksgiving is tomorrow. The older girls look at each other knowing what’s about to come out of her mouth. I overhear them whispering about the annual “Thanksgiving speech.” I stand in the crowd of girls anticipating nothing more than a feedback session before our first show. I’m hoping for an encouraging speech, something to validate the hard work and dedication of time we’ve put in over the course of the season.

       “Girls, listen up,” Zhanna says in her thick Russian accent.

       “Thanksgiving is tomorrow but you must fit into costume for Friday. You can chew the food to get taste, but then spit it out. You don’t want puffy stomach,” she says as she pats her stomach.

       Nobody takes it personally. This is normal.

       It’s Thanksgiving Day. We always go to my grandma’s house for the feast she prepares during the preceding three days. I tell my parents that my stomach hurts too much to join the celebration. I stay home. My brother texts me and offers to bring me home leftovers.

       I refuse.

***

       It’s my 8th season. I’m 16. I’m cast in the same roles as last year.

       I’m rehearsing in the studio tonight, my toes and feet swelling as I finish the diagonal of pirouettes I’ve been practicing for a solid 45 minutes. I’m out of breath as my legs give out on me. I’ve been on my toes for a collective five hours so today, a collective 30 hours this week so far. My left foot is pounding and my body is telling me that I’ve outdone myself. My mind, on the other hand, is trained to know never to stop. Ever. I’m panting as sweat falls down my forehead to my chest, creating a puddle right above my leotard as I’m gasping for air. I let out a moan from the sharp pain that just hit my achilles. The eyes of Sergey are stuck on me, glaring, as he stays completely silent and shakes his head slowly as he sits in his red director chair, one hand holding the music remote towards the stereo and the other holding a cigarette. The smell doesn’t faze me anymore.

       The room is dead quiet, but his face says enough. His lip twitches, his nose scrunches up, and his small beady eyes stare at me as I crawl in pain to the side of the room next to the piano.

       “Again.” He demands.

       He raises his right hand to his mouth to smoke his cigarette, his eyes not moving off me. It’s a known notion to never talk back to a Russian ballet master, ever. You just don’t. You obey. You push through.

       This time, I couldn’t.

       “I really can’t Sergey, can I rest for a couple minutes and roll out my foot?”

       He slowly stands up and gives me a look of utter disgust.

       “Your foot hurts because you need to lose weight,” he sneers.

       Emotionless and cold, he throws his used cigarette next to me on the floor underneath the barre and exits the rooms, closing the door behind himself, leaving me and the cigarette alone together next to the piano. I lay there, still trying to catch my breath as tears rolled down my cheeks onto my lips. I can taste the saltiness of my tears, the humiliation flowing from within. I manage to stand up, and I can barely turn to look at myself in the mirror. I make eye contact with myself and I see a girl who has been beaten down. The high, slicked back bun I used to spend at least a half hour on was now a lazy low bun I threw together in the dressing room five minutes before class. Two bobby pins were falling out and the pieces of hair by my ears were falling in front of my face and sticking to the sweat that was stained on my skin.

       I turn away from the mirror and lean down to untie my pointe shoes. I see my mom peering through the small glass square window on the door. A look of disappointment washes over her face while I stare directly onto the Marley floor. I can’t make eye contact with her. Not realizing she was watching the rehearsal, embarrassment rushes over me as I grab my water bottle and force myself to walk down the hall to the dressing room. I don’t interact with her. I have nine missed calls from “Mama Bear” but the thought of telling her what happened makes me nauseous. I lock myself in the bathroom.

***

       It would have been my ninth season. I’m 17. Instead of holding hands in a circle backstage, I’m on the other side of the curtain. There’s a pit in my stomach as I cowardly slide into the velvet chair that I haven’t sat in for ten years. The overture begins and the roles are reversed as I watch my younger cousin dance the role of Clara, while I’m glued to my seat. My legs don’t hang over the edge this time and my feet are able to touch the floor. I ground my shoes into the ground and remind myself to breathe while the music is playing.

       My grandpa passed away a few years ago, so there’s nobody to hand me a handkerchief to wipe my tears.

        My face starts to go pale as I watch my cousin Caroline perform the same steps I did five years ago. She’s the oldest child; her bulging innocence of the ballet world has consumed her. Her smile and performance presence reminds me of myself up there on that same stage, the lights on the Christmas tree prop shining just as bright as when I left a year ago. I hear one of the company’s board members in front of me whisper to the other that she “has the perfect ballet body.” Her long lean lines and prepubescent body are praised by the board members around me as I sit in the audience directly behind them. The anger is boiling up inside of me, seeing her dance on stage so freely, no idea what is being said about her 11-year-old physique. My mom notices the conversation occurring in front of us and the tears that are reforming in my eyes, and mouths to me that it’s not a big deal. I glare at her.

       After the show, my mom begs me to go backstage to congratulate Caroline. My breathing starts to increase and my brain is racing with invasive flashbacks. This is yet another panic attack I’ve had from ballet, but this one seems different because the presence of Sergey is looming over me. I slowly make my way out of the auditorium seat into the aisle, keeping my gaze fixated on the dirt residing on the velvet carpeted ground below me. My mom holds my hand as I’m bombarded by the moms and board members surrounding us asking why I’ve quit. I keep my head down and my mouth shut.

       Making it out to the hallway, I can finally take a deep breath. I make my way to Caroline with a large bouquet of red and pink roses which used to be my favorite bouquet to receive after I finished a show. I force myself to flash a smile as I hug her, an unconscious guilt overwhelming me from my selfishness. I sheepishly congratulate and hug her one last time and turn to my mom, gesturing to leave the auditorium. I take a sigh of relief that I hadn’t run into Sergey when I hear a familiar thick Russian accent from behind. I ignore the voice, but I know it’s going to be hard to hide with my unique blonde hair flowing down my back. I distract myself by talking to my dad, but when I hear Sergey’s voice fade out, my breathing returns to normal and I turn around to exit the auditorium. Sergey is a few feet away from me. He’s off crutches now, but he looks like he’s shrunk, and his hair is even grayer. He’s wearing the same faded paisley sweater he wore when I had my first rehearsal with him nine years ago. I’m on my way out the door when we catch each other’s glances, and I freeze. He stands there for a couple seconds staring at me, perplexed. My heart is racing a hundred beats per minute and I’m standing there, arms frozen down to my sides. A parent comes up to him to praise congratulations for the direction of the show, but his eyes don’t leave mine. I break eye contact with him and turn to leave the auditorium. I look back once more before walking down the stairs.

       He flashes me a wink.