Granny Dan

“You are a whore now, like the others, the little cheap ones who dance and play, and to whom it means nothing. You should be dancing on the streets in Paris, not here at the Maryinsky. You don't belong here. I always told you, you cannot be like them if you truly want this. You must choose, Danina.”

“I can't give up my whole life forever, Madame, no matter how much I love dancing. I want to do the right thing, I want to be great, I want to be fair to you … but I also love him.”

“Then you should leave now. Don't waste my time, or that of your teachers. No one wants you here unless you are what you were before. Nothing less is worth it. You must choose, Danina. And if you choose him, you will be making the wrong decision. I guarantee it. He will never give you what we do. You will never feel about yourself as you do on the stage, knowing you have given a performance that no one will ever forget. That's who you were when you left here. Now you're nothing more than a little dancer.”

She couldn't believe what she was hearing, except that the words were familiar. She had heard Madame Markova's point of view before. To her it was a sacred religion one sacrificed one's life for. She had, and she expected everyone else to do it. And Danina always had, but now she couldn't. She wanted her life to be more than just the perfect performance.

“Who is this man?” she asked finally. “Does it even matter?”

“It matters to me, Madame,” Danina said respectfully, still believing she could do both, finish well and honorably here, and go to Nikolai when he was ready for her.

“What does he want to do with you?”

“Marry me,” Danina said in a whisper, as Madame Markova looked disgusted.

“Then why are you here?” It was too complicated to explain and she really didn't want to.

“I wanted to finish properly with you, maybe even for the next year, if you want me, if I work hard enough and improve again.”

“Why bother?” And then her eyes narrowed suspiciously, and she proved once again to Danina that she was as all-knowing as Danina had always thought her. “Is he already married?”

Again, another long silence between them as Danina did not answer.

“You're a bigger fool than I ever thought you. Worse than one of those little whores. Most of them get husbands at least, and fat, and babies. They are worth nothing. You are wasting your talent on a man who already has a wife. It makes me sick to think of what you are doing, and I don't want to know anything more about it. I want you to work now, Danina, as you used to, as you're capable of, as you owe me, and in two months, I want you to tell me that it is over, and you know that this is your life, and always will be. You must sacrifice everything for it, Danina … everything … and only then is it worth it, only then will you know true love. This is your love, your only love. This man is nonsense. He means nothing to you. He will only hurt you. I want to hear nothing more about this. Go back to work now,” she said, with a wave of dismissal that was so direct and so uncompromising that Danina immediately left her office and went back to class, trembling from what Madame Markova had said to her.

That was the kind of sacrifice she expected, she wanted her to give up everything, even Nikolai, and Danina couldn't. She didn't want to. She didn't owe them that. They had no right to expect it of her. She didn't want to be one of the insane zealots who had no life other than the ballet. She could see that now. She didn't want to be Madame Markova when she was sixty, and have no other life, no children, no husband, no memories, except performances that strung out over the years, and eventually meant nothing.

She had tried to explain it to Nikolai, to tell him what they expected of her, and he hadn't believed her. This was what they wanted. Her soul, and her promise that she would end it with him. But she would not do that now, no matter what it cost her. And her anger over it made her work even harder, in class, and at the barre. She began warming up at four o'clock every morning, and stayed until ten o'clock at night, working after classes. She never ate, never stopped, never slept, never did anything but drive her body beyond its utmost limits. It was what they wanted of her, and she looked thin and drawn and exhausted two weeks later when Madame Markova called her into her office once again.