Screw Your Courage by Alexandra Caluen

Author:Alexandra Caluen [Caluen, Alexandra]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-10-01T04:00:00+00:00

Being forewarned about the parking situation, Casimir took an Uber to the dance studio for the showcase. A friendly person stationed at a lectern by the front door sold him a ticket, handed him a single-fold program, and pointed him at the staggered rows of folding chairs. Casimir chose one at the end of the second row; the front row was nearly full. The person in the last chair turned around with a smile, asking who he was there to see.

“One of the instructors, actually, we’re dating. He’s dancing with,” Casimir paused, finding the number on the program, “Dawn Woodbine. How about you?”

“Closing number.” They pointed at the program; it was the Waltz of the Flowers from ‘The Nutcracker.’ “My BFF is dancing the lead.”

“Oh, how cool.” Another quick glance at the program, because Misha hinted that the casting was nontraditional, and Casimir didn’t want to use the wrong pronoun. “Have you seen her dance before?”

“Last winter. It was her first year en pointe and she was so nervous she didn’t tell anybody else. She’s forty-two,” in a murmur, so nobody else would hear.

“Wow,” Casimir said, equally soft. “I didn’t know you could begin pointe as an adult.”

“Hardly anybody tries it.”

“That’s so brave!”

The friend smiled. “That’s what I told her. She was like, is this total ridiculous self-indulgence, and I said so what if it is? Why shouldn’t you give yourself something you’ve dreamed of all your life?”

“Damn right.” They smiled at each other. Then a new arrival indicated he wanted to move past Casimir to a vacant chair. A minute later, they were talking about the Macbeth number.

Five minutes before the scheduled start time, all the seats were taken. The greeter did something with a switch before locking the door. “Okay everybody, you know the drill. Feel free to take video of your friends, but please silence your alerts and refrain from talking during the performances. Thank you for your support, from all of us at Set The Barre.” A smattering of applause from the audience as she flipped some more switches. The main lights, except those directly over the stage area, went off. String lights hung vertically – Casimir knew they were taped to metal window framing – came on, along with lights on the fake weeping willow tree, making a surprisingly effective frame for the stage. An LED rope across the bottom of the mirrored wall behind the spectators also lit up. Then there was a flourish of music, a hilarious mashup of the Twentieth-Century Fox fanfare and ‘Vive le Capitaine Spaulding,’ and the first performers came out from some inside room.

The opening jazz number was set to a Christmas rap song Casimir knew from the movie ‘Die Hard,’ which struck him as a great ice-breaker. Not that anyone here needed to be convinced. Everyone was so excited. Casimir hadn’t been in a room so full of delighted expectation since his high-school senior awards night.

The next number was a version of the Adam and Eve ballet from ‘Can-Can.

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