Page 89 of Endless Love

FORTY-TWO

Willow

This was so not Paris. Not the Paris I envisioned with bustling streets, cafés on every corner, and a view of the Eiffel Tower everywhere one walked.

To my surprise, Gustave sequestered us in a remote chateau owned by one of his benefactors in the countryside. I had no idea exactly where we were or how far we were from civilization. Upon our arrival, he made us relinquish all our devices, including laptops, cell phones, tablets, and iPods. He didn’t want us to have any distractions and besides, there was no Internet service where we were staying. Our focus was to be on dance 24/7. He wanted us to live it and breathe it.

Re-entering the world of ballet—Gustave’s world—was a rude awakening I wasn’t prepared for. Maybe I’d shined as The Firebird on stage, but I knew now that my performance had been fueled by pure adrenaline. I’d been away from the reality of what it took to be one of “Gustave’s girls” for almost a year. Along with the others, I was immediately put on a diet of music to nurture us. Meals were sparse, a bit of protein and some vegetables; nothing over a few hundred calories. While Gustave taunted us with the fine wine he drank at dinner every night, we were allowed none. I missed my dad’s delicious sandwiches, blintzes, and matzo ball soup. Within a week, I was definitely “elongating” to use Gustave’s pet word to mean I was getting skinny. My collarbone was protruding as were my ribs. I found myself chilled to the bone, having to layer myself with heavy sweaters, scarves, and leg warmers every minute of the day, including practice. It didn’t help that the massive chateau had poor heating, which Gustave felt kept us sharp and on our toes, no pun intended.

The days were grueling—all work and no play. Breakfast was served at seven o’clock in the dining room, and by eight, we were in class, doing barre exercises and Pilates as well as practicing moves. Lunch was served at noon, and soon afterward, rehearsals began and continued until six or later if there weren’t any emergencies. And there was always something… a dancer coming down sick, straining a muscle, or having a catfight with a fellow ballerina.

The only way I kept track of time was that we were constantly reminded of how many days away we were from the Paris performance. With each passing day, our warm ups and rehearsals became more grueling. On his ruthless quest for perfection, Gustave became more temperamental, more demanding, more intolerant.

And with each passing day, I grew weaker, more depressed. More imperfect. My dancing wasn’t as good as it should be. Constantly, Gustave yelled at me and belittled me, criticizing every move while Mira, who had recovered from her foot injury and was playing my nemesis, the evil Black Swan, looked on with a smirk. My leaps weren’t high enough, my footwork not fast enough, my armwork not fluid enough. I became a body in motion without any meaning because I was losing belief in myself.

As Gustave broke down my spirit, my body broke down in tandem. I felt dreadfully thin, my hipbones now jutting and my tummy concave. Every muscle hurt, and my feet were so sore there were days I almost couldn’t take another step. Not even the ointments, aspirin, or bandages at night could relieve the pain as Gustave worked me harder and harder to the point of exhaustion. My reflection frightened me. Gone was the spirited, determined, healthy girl who had arrived here. In her place, stood a gaunt skeleton of a woman with sunken cheeks, dark circles under her eyes, and veins popping along her emaciated neck.

And I looked sad. Terribly sad. Something more was eating at me. Bringing me down. Destroying all of me. After so many years in this insulated world of dance, I had been seduced by real life. And by one special man, who I couldn’t get out of my mind or my heart. Ryan Madewell. My love for him was far greater than my love for dance. Deeper, more encompassing. I missed him so much and it frustrated me to no end that I couldn’t communicate with him. The way I’d left him with no closure or hope gnawed at me. Oh, God! What had I done? Regret filled every cell, every muscle, every bone of my body as my aching heart sank deeper and deeper, taking with it my joie de vivre, my joie de dance. I had made a terrible, terrible mistake leaving Ryan, the man I loved with all my heart and soul. The man who loved me as much as I loved him. Maybe more, if more was possible. Only the wise and compassionate Madame Kapinski sensed my emotional and physical turmoil, which was compounded by worry for my father, but there was nothing she could do. “Ma chérie,” she told me after one particularly hard rehearsal, “your dance career eez fleeting, but true love never ends.” She was right; it would likely be over by the time I was thirty, maybe sooner. Then what? Would my greatest love be my greatest loss?

Hopelessness consumed me. I felt trapped in this castle, trapped in my own body. Rather than dreaming of curtains rising and standing ovations, I found myself crying myself to sleep every night, and shortly after darkness claimed me, the nightmare that had plagued me throughout my dance career returned to haunt me. It took place in a cemetery, the one my mother was buried in. Except instead of one tombstone, there were two. Hers and mine side by side. Stacked against hers, a bouquet of fragrant Asian lilies; against mine, a bunch of blackened, dead roses. And there I was—dancing on my grave—unable to stop, no matter how exhausted I was. As if I was cursed to dance until I dropped. Night after night, the dream recurred until the sound of my own desperate screams awoke me. Shaking to the bone and drenched in cold sweat, how I wished Ryan was next to me, to hold me, to comfort me, to love me.

Unable to fall back to sleep in a bed that was as empty as my aching heart, my insomnia and depression took a toll on me in practices and rehearsals. I was on the edge of hysteria, the verge of collapsing. And then it happened, two days before we were scheduled to go to Paris, the first stop of our European tour, I did a pirouette in practice and lost my balance. There was no way I could stop myself from falling to the hardwood floor. Crumpled in a pile of tulle, I burst out in tears. Sobs wracked my body.

While a number of my peers hurried over to see if I was okay, I heard Mira cackle.

“Hahaha! You are so pathetic!”

My tears fell harder, faster. Then, another harsh voice, thundered in my ears. Gustave.

“Rehearsal over. Everyone dismissed.” He slammed his cane on the floor, the sound reverberating in my ears. “Get of here. Allez, allez! Now!”

The air filled with the pitter-patter of feet scuttling out the room like frightened mice as I remained huddled on the floor, still sobbing. Then, another sharp bang of Gustave’s cane ripped through my ears.

“Get. Up.”

The two little words swirled around in my head as if they were foreign and I was trying to comprehend them.

“Did you hear me?” Gustave’s voice grew harsher, louder. “GET UP!”

Curling into a fetal position, I hugged my knees and let my sobs rock my body. As tears poured from my eyes, I could feel him looming over me.

“There’s only one letter that separates a mouse from a muse. Which one are you, Willow?”

I couldn’t get my mouth to form words. Not even one syllable ones. As I hugged myself tighter into a ball, he slipped the tip of his cane under a spaghetti strap of my leotard and tugged at it.

“Well, which one?”

I felt like neither. I felt like nothing.

“Answer me!” His voice thundered with a mixture of impatience and anger. Then, with his cane, he snapped the strap, detaching it from the stretchy garment. The fragment crawled along my chest like vermin.

“ANSWER ME!”

My sobs only grew louder in heaving waves as red-hot tears burned my cheeks. And then—WHACK!—I shrieked. Oh the pain! Gustave had hit me with his cane! Rubbing my throbbing thigh with my right hand, I managed to lift myself halfway up onto my other elbow. My watering eyes met his. Madness flickered in his charcoal orbs, and without warning, he struck me again. This time harder. The excruciating pain radiating throughout my body, I cried out again.

“Gustave, why are you doing this?”

His eyes smoldered as a wicked smirk curled his lips. “Don’t you know? You need discipline. Or should I say need to be disciplined.”

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