Imagine a ballerina. Elegant. Tall. Beautiful. In her tulle skirt and her worn out shoes, she dances alone. One, two, three/ one, two, three/one, two three... Everything in her life is a rhythm.
Her heart breaks in a steady rhythm of bad choices. Her mail is filled with rejections in the busty rhythm of bad luck. Her friends uplift her at their weekly dinners in their usual slow rhythms. Everything is musical. Everything has a beat. Everything begs her to dance. Everything stops her from it. She's just going in circles, revolving from aspiration to reality. Until one day, a cold winter evening forces her to stop and look at her only onlooker.
Amidst the dizziness and breathlessness, she sees a man. Short. Clumsy. An average Joe. He doesn't believe it. The girl of his dreams has finally looked at him! He is flustered. He gets up, assuming it's the right thing to do. He rubs his hands on his pants, hoping to clean some imaginary dirt, just in case she decides to shake his hands.
She looks, long and hard at him. She stares at his broad nose and curly hair. She notices his small ears and sad eyes. She sees how he is fidgeting with his hands and shuffling his feet. She is confused: why is he looking at her in that way? She feels violated. She stomps her feet and huffs her way over to him. She is determined to kick this man out of her vicinity. She has thought of the words she will say to him as well. She has a script ready.
Soon, she is face to face with this man. He looks scared. He must have seen her walk with such determination, she thinks. He mutters something slowly, and before she can say anything, he mutters a barely audible "sorry" and turns around swiftly. He is almost running away. And she sees this little reaction of his with mixed feelings.
She doesn't know what happens to her, but she finds herself running after him. She catches his wrist and stops him. He stops. He is immovable. She looks closely at his eyes and notices that they are shy. She runs her fingers over his hands and notices that his wrist has a soft spot. She hesitates, then proceeds to run her hand through his hair. It tickles her hands. There is no rhythm in this man. His hair's curls don't feel like music. His breath is uneven, no pattern to them. He mutters in varying degrees of confidence and conflict. She is drawn. She leads him by his hand to the place they were before.
He is scared. He is unable to understand what she means by her behaviour. But he does know that without the mist and the distance, she looks different. She is tired, and sad. She has the eyes of a voiceless doll. He wants to help her. He knows he can. He knows all about losing oneself to one's art, after all. But before he can say anything, she twirls and performs a recital. She chooses interesting music for her performance: it isn't sad or happy, it is mystifying. He watches her lilt her waist up and bring it down with perfect grace. He sees her feet follow every since melody like they wrote it. He sees her lips: parted in a smile. He sees her exactly like he had seen her before she came near him. So he decides to watch his dream girl exactly how he likes her. He is exhilarated.
As her recital ends, she takes her bow. She stops for a few more seconds than necessary. She recounts the mistakes she made in her recital and wants to correct them. She turns to look at her one and only onlooker and notices him standing exactly the same way as before. She thinks to herself "he has no rhythm". She knows that soon enough, she would leave him. So she decides to stay in the performance area and catch her breath before she dances again.
On and on this story goes, with the ballerina getting her heart broken with wrong choices in her career, her men, her finances. The man keeps coming back to watch her with the same clothes on. He cannot function even a day without watching her. They both acknowledge each other with no words. Years pass, seasons fly away and people change. The ballerina grows scars on her feet and the man gets a cold every day. Yet, they keep this tradition alive."
Should I write more?
Where would it go?
I thought,
"One day, one of the ballerina's old love interests would end up coming here. Watching her dance would make him feel bitter again, and he would just stay there beside the onlooker to spite her. The onlooker wouldn't care, he only wished to see the ballerina dance. But the old lover would want to make it obvious to her that he was bitter. But however much he tried, he wouldn't be able to get near her. Each time, something would come in between. At first, it would become too dark to go near her and he would get lost. Then, he would inexplicably feel freezing cold and have to run home. Another day, it would rain so much that he would have to take shelter nearby. The onlooker and the ballerina would remain, but the ex lover wouldn't be able to express his bitterness. After months of trying, he would get frustrated and start yelling. He would yell day in and day out.
Soon, his yells would reach her. She would stop and think to herself "he yells in such rhythm, they're almost like percussion accompaniments to a very well written piece". She would start devising her newest recital, and soon, dance to his yells.
On and on it would go, his yelling and her dance. The ballerina would keep changing her routine, add new choreography and continue their tradition.
The onlooker would continue coming every day. One day, she would stop and look at the onlooker's face. The bitter ex's yelling didn't affect his tranquility. He was still the same stoic man she had seen all those years ago. She would be pleasantly surprised.
She would try walking to him again. This time, he wouldn't be nervous. He would look at her coming over and stand his ground. She would stop just shy of a few paces of hugging him. Again, she would take his wrist and run her hand through his hair. Nothing had changed. His eyes still had sadness. His breath was still uneven. When he held her hand and caressed it, he had no rhythm. He hadn't developed any rhythm. She would step back. The bitter ex's yelling had come to a halt, she would notice. He was gone. It was just her and the onlooker again.
She would take more steps behind, turn around, and skip her way to her performance area. She would take a bow, choose her music, and start her new routine.
Years would pass, seasons would change and the ballerina would turn older and older. Yet, every single day, the tradition continued. One day, the onlooker would come to his morning routine with a rose in his hand. The ballerina would see it and wonder. She wouldn't stop her performance, she would continue doing her choreography. But her face would show her perplexity. Her mind would be overrun with thoughts. "Is he finally going to talk to me?" "Is he going to take me dancing with him?" "Why did he bring a flower today?"
Her excitement would take over and she would skip her way back to him. Just shy of a few paces of hugging him. He would look at her, tranquil in his silence. She would extend her hand towards the rose, and he would hand it over to her with a smile. She would admire it for a moment, then place it on the edge of her stage. She would go back to her dancing.
The next day, the onlooker wouldn't come. Long forgotten aspirations would come up again, and she would think about them again as she spun like her younger self. She would consider making this day her swansong, but she would easily dismiss this idea. Rhythm is crucial, she would think. How could I ever think of something other than rhythm, she would wonder.
On and on she would go, until the last spring of her last year. As her final performance would end, she would sit on the floor and undo her shoes. Dazed and exhausted, she would realise this moment was her final one as a ballerina. Her strength would give up and she would lie down. She would look around herself for the first time and notice something other than the obvious details.
She was in a garden, fresh leaves and bushes around her. A large tree overlooked her performance area. Beside her, bushes were blooming. Roses. All around. White and red.
He did have rhythm, she would think. Her eyes would close and she would feel her chest relieve pressure."
That's how I thought it would end. What about you?
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