Page 247 of Swallow Your Sorries

“Elle. Forget about your mother. Forget about Jarett. Even forget about me. Just for the play. Those scouts are out there. Make it so that they’ve come for you and only you. That’s all that matters right now. Everything else can wait.”

I lick my dry lips and reach for a Q-tip to swab on more lipstick before he pulls me to my feet and kisses it straight back off as we head to the line-up.

Yes, it could wait. But for how long?

Elle

Spotlights are like damn infernos, but as I dance beneath them, a fire from an internal heat source ignites within my veins.

This is my moment.

I may not deserve it, but I am Cinderella.

I’m Cinderella, sweeping the already clean floors and dusting the already tidy shelves just like at the deli.

I’m Cinderella with a deceased mother because while mine isn’t dead yet, she’s slowly dying all over again.

I’m Cinderella whose horrible circumstances don’t entitle her to anything but sheer luck from a fairy godmother and a chance encounter with the prince changes her life forever.

Gant’s both my fairy godmother and my prince. From hell. But does it negate the fact that he shows up for me?

In the hundreds of seats that ascend damn near up to the vaulted ceilings, there’s not a single person there for me. Perhaps the scouts, if I manage to catch even one of their attention, but there’s no one that cares about me, about Elle, in any capacity. The only person that does isn’t going to appear in a cushy seat. He’s going to dance on stage with me.

Because good or bad, he’s always there and it feels good to have someone there.

It feels good to fall into someone’s arms and as the minutes tick on with each petite allegro sequence as I make my way around Cinderella’s home, I’m dying to do just that.

I’d always thought I needed to think about the next move a second before it was time to execute it. But as the music continues on, and my heart and breathing seem to hum in perfect beat to the music’s timing, I’m too swept up inbeingCinderella to think about the choreo. It just flows through me naturally.

It’s like driving along your daily route. One minute I’m fastening my seatbelt at the old apartment, the next I’m pulling into the deli’s car park. Sometimes there are glitches along the way, like when I notice the massive billboard of flying pigs advertising an unbelievable mortgage rate with a local bank.

Or when I’m tossed, albeit aesthetically, to the floor by my wicked stepmother flanked on either side by my stepsisters, Kesia and another one of Rin’s lackeys.

Mistress couldn’t have picked a better casting of spiteful women if she tried. The hatred all three girls have for me is channelled with sheer perfection into their roles. When Rin swipes the mop bucket across the floor towards my elbow, I know her despisal as she glares down her nose at me is one hundred per cent real.

She doesn’t need to tell me how angry she is that our Beaussip plan backfired. How jealous she is of Gant, even when he’s in the wrong. Even when he’s abdicated and is still liked by everyone, maybe even me included. She doesn’t have to tell me that in some twisted way; she thought, because we shared a common goal, a bond of sorts, that I broke our alliance by not playing by her rules.

I hadn’t played by her rules or Gant’s and I won’t. I’ll do what I feel is right and learn the hard way if I lose or gloat in bliss if I don’t and she hates it. She despises me because I’m the opposite manifestation of what she swore I was. Of what she swore I would be if I didn’t play it her way. Of what she’s afraid of allowing herself to become.

Yes, the bitter stepmother role is so fitting. She thinks she’s helping her daughters and her sisters, but all she’s doing is hindering them with spite and bitterness.

As a stunning brunette swoops in as my fairy godmother and the music picks up pace, so does the choreography. In the wings, Gant’s hovering face in his prince costume keeps me grounded. With every passé, pirouette and sauté, he’s there. There’s no malice in his stare like he wants to put a bullet in my head. Or lust like he wants to devour me. I like that look. I’d thought it was the best look of recognition he ever gave me, but no, it’s this. It’s appreciation. It’s pride. It’s…love?

And I feel that love surge when the ballroom scene begins, and it’s my turn to admire him pass off Rin and Kesia dismissively as he breezes through their dances, eager to leave the ball altogether.

Until I arrive.

The chorus fades away and once again, there’s just him and I.

He always said it’s best just him and I and I couldn’t agree more.

I’m genuinely sad when the clock strikes midnight versus simply pretending to be. I want nothing more than to feel his touch again as I watch him from the wings. I’m purposefully keeping my eyes glued to him and not the crowd. It’s not like I can see the scouts anyway beneath the lights, but still. I don’t want to think about them. I don’t want to extract myself from Cinderella’s thought process because in this moment they are my own as I watch Gant go through a chorus of dancers trying on the baby blue pointe shoe that’s either too big or too small. When it’s finally my turn to emerge from hiding, it fits me perfectly and as Gant fastens the ribbons around my ankle, the lights dim and for one second more, it’s just him and I.

Until chaos breaks out. We’re both pulled and tucked this way and that as the costume department swarms us. My tutu is exchanged for a longer one that doesn’t resemble rags. Its sheer layers glimmer beautifully beneath the lights, a pretty silvery, pale blue that’s nearly white. Cinderella’s wedding dress. The big finale.

Once again, I’m plunged into this feeling of surrealness.

I’d gotten through the play. Dozens of acts, dances, and costume changes, and I’d gotten through it without feeling like I was acting at all. Like I was trying my damnedest to get through the choreo with as much grace as I could muster. It just felt like I was being me. It’s the finale that finally makes me realise that I am acting as I eye the sparkling ring that Gant’s slipped onto my gloved finger.

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