Colours in Her Hands by Alice Zorn

Author:Alice Zorn
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Freehand Books
Published: 2024-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

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Opening night. In the tech booth Bruno sat focussed, hands on the lighting and sound controls, attention alert for each cue. Even so, at the farthest edge of his galaxy of attention, he knew Mina was in the front row. She always wanted to sit as close to the dance as possible. She wouldn’t listen when he said she would see better farther back.

On stage the dance was building to its climax. Mathieu, spurred on by the clamour of the cello, smashed the doll on the table. Tandi hovered, hands clenching and unclenching. The doll had been her only treasure, her only connection to home. When he swatted it to the floor and stomped on it, she swung at him. He made to whirl away, but she hooked him by the waist and threw him on the table.

The sawing of the cello was a tortured beast. Mathieu had twisted off the table and rolled across the floor, but Tandi leapt on him. He bucked and struggled but was unable to shake her off. Abruptly the cello stopped. Mathieu no longer moved. In the silence, Tandi crept around Mathieu’s inert body. She squatted to peer at him, her face puzzled. Then ever more frenzied, she shoved and batted at his ragdoll limbs and sprang around him, desperate to dance him back to life.

Boogie gave an occasional hard slap with the flat of his hand on the cello. It sounded like a question. What now? What have you done?

She swung her head, scanning the stage, took in how truly alone she was now. Her body softening, she bent to Mathieu and began stroking his arms, his torso, his legs. Boogie plucked a low C string, signaling the change in mood. A new perception. She sat on the floor to gather Mathieu close and cradled him. As she held him, he slowly stirred awake. Stretched a foot, lifted his head. She curved his arm over her shoulders to help him upright and guide him to take a step. One, then another and another.

Bruno could feel how the audience was rapt. This was the rise from the ashes Val had envisioned. Still homeless, but they had each other — and wasn’t that a deeper sense of home? At first unsteady and tentative, they began to dance together in a way that they hadn’t yet, one bracing the other to kick legs high, leaping, stretching, tipping. Tandi rotated Mathieu across her shoulders, him on his back, legs straddled wide. This time, when she flipped him, she linked her arms through his, keeping him by her.

When Bruno lowered the lights, people clapped and rose to their feet. Tandi and Mathieu bowed and held their arms out to Val who strode on stage. The dance critic for Le Devoir, who Bruno had spotted before the show, was still clapping. A good review in Le Devoir would mean a full house for the rest of the run, an invitation to Quebec City and Ottawa.

With everyone standing, Bruno could no longer spot Iris and Mina.

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