Siren Spell

by Cidney Swanson

  Giselle’s throat tightened and she wasn’t sure if it was from missing her father or from missing ballet or from evil dreams or from doubting her own sanity. She felt hollow. Empty. Like a bird nest vacated in winter, gradually losing bits of straw and twig until nothing remained but the vague impression that once, there had been birdsong.

  Sasha shifted from her position by the front door, offering to Giselle the comfort of a wet nose and gentle snuffles. From upstairs, Giselle could hear her sister’s computer playing Dvořák. The music matched her mood in bitter perfection, slow and heartrending; it made her body ache to dance.

  For ten long counts of eight, Giselle listened, resisting the need to move. But as the music swelled, she found herself standing, rising on a perfectly turned out leg and extending one perfectly pointed foot along the ground in a gentle tendu. At her side, her hand and arm moved into position, soft and elongated, thumb hidden just beneath her fingers.

  She sank into the movement, trying to find calming breaths, a way not to care, not to feel. Outside, the Mercedes growled its way up the single-car drive.

  Babushka and her mother were home.

  In an instant, Giselle’s response to the Dvořák turned from longing to resentment. Anger flared inside her, expanding and forming itself into a singular, concentrated fury at her mother’s decision to give away the role of Giselle. Just as her mother and babushka entered the house, Giselle shoved the chair with enough force to send it out of the kitchen to the front room where it shivered on its side, a back slat falling from place and striking the wood floor with a noise like a slap.

  The returning women stared at the chair and then at Giselle.

  “What?” she demanded. “What?” The words fell from her mouth as harsh and irrevocable as the tumbled chair.

  Babushka, already muttering in Russian, hung her stole on the coat rack and walked to the kitchen, inspecting the pelmeni.

  “What’s this about?” asked Ruslana, pointing to the chair. The click of her heels as she approached seemed magnified by the silence between mother and daughter.

  Giselle didn’t explain. She didn’t apologize. She didn’t straighten the broken chair. She walked to the front door, taking Sasha’s leash from where it hung and attaching it to the dog’s collar. Without a word, she left the house.

  Outside, the air was heavy with moisture. It ought to have been raining, Giselle thought. At her side, Sasha shuffled slowly forward as if each step from their home increased the arthritis that had set up camp in her hips. Soon Giselle was tugging at the lead after each road crossing.

  The thick cloud cover made the evening sky appear more like a midnight sky, and when Sasha cast her sorrowful eyes back at Giselle a third time, Giselle relented and turned back home. It had begun to rain.

  This was no gentle Foulweather drizzle; it was something borrowed from a Midwestern sky. The rain fell so rapidly that it became difficult to see. Windshield wipers on passing cars were useless and traffic slowed to a crawl on the streets.

  The pair hurried, girl and dog, back along sidewalks now slick with wet moss. When they arrived home, Giselle rested, dripping, under the shelter of the front porch alcove. Rain was sheeting off the edges of the overhang. Sasha shook out her coat and the drops spattered Giselle. She was soaked. Everything was soaked. Everything except Giselle’s eyes.

  The hollowness inside seemed to swell again, and she hesitated at the front door, uncertain if she would open it or not. Perhaps she would spend the night outside, a dripping statue of a girl. Perhaps by morning, her skin would transform to bronze, like the Little Mermaid at the river. Perhaps, if her heart hardened to a lump of bronze, it would cease hurting.

  Sasha sidled closer to the house and whined to go inside and the spell holding Giselle was broken.

  “Okay, girl,” said Giselle. Her voice was low and tired. It sounded like her mother’s voice after rehearsal. The thought needled her.

  Entering the house, she bent to remove Sasha’s leash.

  “That chair didn’t throw itself on the ground, young woman,” said her mother, her dark eyes flashing in anger.

  Girl and dog stood dripping on the floor, bringing a patter of rain indoors.

  “No shake!” Ruslana ordered.

  Dutifully, Sasha headed through the kitchen and out the dog door to an area of the deck where she was allowed to shake.

  “Well?” demanded her mother. “Do you have something to say for yourself?”

  “No,” replied Giselle.

  Katya, downstairs again, stared at Giselle, eyes wide.

  Giselle turned for the stairs. The bottoms of her jeans were wet up to her calves. She wanted a hot shower. A very long, very hot shower.

  “What is wrong with you?” asked her mother.

  Giselle paused at the foot of the stairs. “Wrong? With me?” She released a bitter laugh. “I wonder what could be wrong. Maybe … everything?” She turned back from the stairs. If her mother wanted to have this conversation right now, then fine. They would have it out once and for all.

  Ruslana’s eyes closed. She pinched her fingers across the bridge of her nose and exhaled slowly, saying nothing.

  “Why, Mom? Why didn’t you cast me as Giselle?” She shouted at her mother, barely containing her rage.

  How could her own mother have taken away the one thing she needed more than food or shelter or water or even oxygen—the one thing Giselle didn’t know how to live without?

  Ruslana sat heavily on the family’s brick colored sofa. The ancient coils squealed.

  “I know how you feel, Giselle,” she said at last.

  It was too much, the quiet manner in which her mother spoke: the patent untruth of it. Giselle exploded.

  “You have no idea what I feel!” The words rasped along her throat, sharp as cut glass. “You have ruined my life!”

  “You’re not the first dancer to lose a coveted role,” her mother replied.

  “Well I’m for damned sure the first one to have that role taken from her by her own mother!”

  Ruslana’s face paled and she clenched her hands at either side. When she spoke again, her voice was soft. “You have no idea. You don’t begin to understand—”

  Giselle threw the words back in her mother’s face. “No! You don’t begin to understand. And I don’t have to listen to a thing you say!” With this, she turned and stormed up the stairs.

  28

  ONE OR THE OTHER, NOT BOTH

  Giselle shook with rage as she slammed her door shut and then locked it. She heard her mother’s light tread on the stairs and then heard her mother and Babushka exchanging harsh whispered words. Then, for a moment there was silence. It was broken by the sound of her grandmother’s slow tread, climbing the stairs.

  Her grandmother paused in front of Giselle’s bedroom.

  “Giselle?”

  The handle rattled as her grandmother tested it.

  More silence.

  A few words murmured in quiet Russian. The opening and closing of the front door. A knock on her own door.

  “Giselle?” Her grandmother added Russian words of endearment. When those failed to move Giselle to open her door, Babushka switched back to English. “Let an old woman come in and rest her tired feet.”

  Giselle rolled her eyes. Her grandmother’s feet could support her through a five hour rehearsal. But then she bit her lip: her grandmother’s feet had already supported her through a long rehearsal.

  “You will let an old woman tell you an old story,” said Babushka, carefully placing each article correctly.

  The extra effort shifted something in Giselle’s heart. Rising from her bed, she unlocked the door.

  Babushka walked in, her normally erect frame drooping slightly.

  “Here,” said Giselle, remorseful. “Sit down.”

  “First you are calling little Ykaterina,” said Babushka.

  Giselle leaned her head through the bedroom door. “Katya?”

  Her sister peered around from th
e other side of the stairwell.

  “Come up,” said Giselle, sighing. “Babushka wants to tell us a story.”

  Katya dashed up the stairs. Babushka patted the two spaces to either side, indicating the girls should sit on the bed.

  “Once upon a time, there is prodigy of the ballet, name of Ruslana Chekhov.”

  “Our mom?” asked Katya.

  “Da,” replied their grandmother. Yes. “And you are listening now to whole story without interruption.” Here she raised her brows fiercely at both girls, a glance designed to command the attention of an entire ballet company.

  Then she continued.

  “Ruslana dances so beautifully, perhaps she will be another Markova. But when she is only seventeen, she is meeting Dmitri, danseur of no ordinary talent. Ruslana is dancing role of Giselle, and Dmitri is her Albrecht, and she falls in love. Mother of Ruslana—that is me—tells her to stay away from Dmitri. I warn her he is sleeping his way through beds of every girl in ballet company.”

  Babushka sighs heavily.

  “But daughters do not listen to mothers, and soon Ruslana is pregnant with Dmitri’s child. She thinks he is being pleased and will marry her, but he is not pleased. He says child is not his problem and begins flagrant affair with balyerina dancing role of Myrtha. And now Ruslana is asking me to take her to hospital. To be finished of pregnancy, you are understanding.

  “But when we are inside hospital and doctors are confirming pregnancy with finding tiny child on screen, Ruslana asks to see picture of child. She is looking at blur of gray and white and she says, no, she has changed her mind and she will keep baby after all.”

  Giselle’s brows drew together and she opened her mouth to speak.

  “You are letting me finish story,” said Babushka, cutting off the unasked question. “So I am explaining to Ruslana, you can have child or you can have role of Giselle. One or other, not both.”

  Giselle’s throat tightened and when she tried to swallow, her mouth felt dry as dust. She realized what her mother had chosen. Her mother had chosen … her. Giselle. The daughter and not the role. The room seemed to tip to one side.

  Babushka sighed. “And so, Ruslana chooses baby.”

  Gently, the old woman took Giselle’s hands in her own. “Ruslana is under consideration for principal balyerina, you understand. Opportunity will not come twice. She chooses you, milaya moya, and when you are born, Ruslana is announcing she will raise you in United States of America. And you are so beautiful and helpless that I say I will go also.”

  Babushka fixed her eyes on Giselle, waiting until Giselle met her eyes.

  “You are understanding?” asked her grandmother.

  Her mother had chosen her. Not ballet. Her.

  I should feel something, Giselle thought, but a numbing cold seemed to have enveloped her. Why didn’t she feel something? Shouldn’t she be feeling … grateful? Happy? Loved? But she felt none of these things. Rather, she felt … numb. Cold. Cut off from Babushka’s story, as though it had nothing to do with her. Giselle’s brows drew together and something cold and hard settled in her belly.

  Why should she feel anything? She hadn’t asked to be born. Why did her grandmother have to tell her the story at all? Giselle didn’t want to feel warm and fuzzy about her mom. She refused to. She wouldn’t. It was impossible after how her mother had treated her. In her mind’s eye, she took the story and compressed it like a wad of paper until it was nothing at all. And then she threw it away.

  Almost immediately though, another thought clamored for her attention: Papa wasn’t her father. Could this be true? Her father was short, with long pianist’s fingers, like hers. He loved Russian sour cream and drank too much vodka on New Year’s Eve and called them when he was drunk and sad, to say how much he loved them.

  “Papa’s not my father?” she heard herself whispering.

  “Pyotr is not biological father,” replied her grandmother. “But you are missing I think most important point of Babushka’s story.”

  Perhaps she was. But Giselle didn’t want to consider the “point” of the story. It had nothing to do with her. She didn’t want to sympathize with Ruslana or forgive her or love her or whatever Babushka wanted her to do. How could Babushka expect it of her, after what Ruslana had done? There could be no forgiveness for that. She could be grateful her mother had chosen to give birth to her, but that was all, because although she hadn’t told her mother she wanted to be born, she had told her mother ballet was her life. That ballet was all she wanted. And what had her mother done? She had cast Giselle in a non-dancing role. Her mother had failed her. Giselle felt cold fury at the very idea of forgiveness for such a betrayal.

  “What about me?” Katya asked, interrupting Giselle’s angry thoughts. “Who is my real father?”

  “You are daughter of Pyotr. Katyusha and Zelya are half-sisters.”

  Half-sisters.

  The words pulled warmth back into Giselle’s frozen heart. There was nothing “half” about her love for her sister. But … their coloring, their height, Katya’s gift for music and Giselle’s own lack—it was so obvious now.

  “Did … did Papa know? About … Dmitri?” Giselle asked, stumbling over the name of the man who had fathered her.

  Ykaterina Chekhov rolled her eyes to the ceiling. “Believe me, everyone in entire ballet company was knowing.”

  Then Babushka’s expression softened and she smiled. “Your step-father is very compassionate man who was knowing all this and asks to marry Ruslana and be father to her child.”

  “He was a good father, wasn’t he?” murmured Katya.

  “Da,” replied Babushka. “Is good father still. Little gifts of chocolates and trinkets he sends to you, to your sister, to your mamulya on Russian Women’s Day? These are costing him small fortune, maybe all the den’gi—all the money—he has.”

  Giselle’s pale brow furrowed. “Do I … do I look like him? Like Dmitri?”

  Her babushka seemed lost in thought for a moment. “Da,” she replied at last. “Only with eyes of your mother. But you are dancing like Dmitri. Strong. Lines of such perfection….” She broke off without finishing, seeming to drift far away.

  Katya slipped from the bed, rounding their grandmother to approach Giselle.

  “I don’t care who our dads are,” Katya said, wrapping her arms around Giselle. “I couldn’t ask for a better sister.”

  Their grandmother sighed and stood. “Now is time for soup. I am going downstairs. You are following after a minute, I think.”

  Their grandmother departed.

  “It’s a lot to get used to,” murmured Katya.

  Giselle nodded.

  “And Mom,” said Katya, “I never thought about what her life was like before us. Did you?”

  Giselle shook her head. But she didn’t want to think about her mother right now. It was too painful. It was too … confusing. How was she supposed to act around her mom now, knowing … all this? The crumpled up wad of the story threatened to unfurl. She kicked it away.

  “We’ll probably need to give this a lot of time,” said Katya, “To let it all soak in.”

  Reluctantly, Giselle nodded. Maybe that was what she needed. Time.

  “Come on,” said Katya. “Put on some dry sweatpants and let’s eat dinner.”

  Giselle followed her sister’s instructions. Downstairs, she set the table automatically, but her mind was far away.

  Pyotr wasn’t her father, even though she carried his name: Petrovna, daughter of Peter. But at the same time, he was her father. He’d chosen to be her father while someone named Dmitri had chosen not to be her father. No wonder the siren queen spoke of her father with such disdain: the queen had meant Dmitri.

  And her mother …

  Slowly, tentatively, the thought unfurled inside her. Her mother had chosen her over dance. Was it possible her mother understood what she was going through? What it meant to give up dance? Maybe….

  But then the cold, hard thing in her belly
twitched, reasserting itself. It didn’t matter if her mother knew and understood. Or rather, if her mother truly understood, then her betrayal was so much the worse. It wasn’t just an oversight; it was cruelty.

  Babushka ladled pelmeni into Giselle’s bowl, but she could only stare at it, her belly freezing over. She couldn’t eat. She couldn’t possibly eat.

  Katya and Babushka slurped their soup, spoons clinking softly on bowls. Giselle sat without touching her food. Finally, she spoke.

  “I not hungry right now.” She pushed the bowl away. “I’m sorry, Babushka.”

  Her grandmother rose. Muttering quietly in Russian, she began to paw through the tea drawer, withdrawing something that smelled both bitter and flowery. One of Babushka’s special chais. Giselle wondered if there might be a chai that would help her forget about ballet, forget the sirens, forget the horrible fact of her mother’s cruelty.

  “Come on, Zelya,” Katya said to her. “Upstairs with you now. A hot shower and then a cup of sleep-tea.”

  Giselle nodded and rose.

  She stood in the shower until the hot water disappeared, her skin blooming pink as she rubbed herself dry and pulled on a ratty pair of sweats too worn to be seen even at the studio. Her heart tripped at the thought of the studio, the warm scents of wood polish and exertion. She pushed the memories away. That life was over.

  In their room, Katya awaited with a cup of Babushka’s special tea. Sasha lay curled into a tight, white ball at the foot of the bunk bed.

  “Drink,” said Katya. “And then sleep.”

  Giselle slept heavily. Her dreams brought yet another encounter with the white-clad creatures. This time, her sister had joined them in their frenetic dance. There was a man, as well, a male version of herself—tall, like she was, hair of the same pale blond color. The goblin girls took delight in leading him to the water, pulling him under. Her sister saw her and shrugged, indicating the motionless figure of James stretched upon the shore. “I can only save one of them,” Katya called to Giselle, whirling past in the frenzy.

  Giselle awoke to the sound of her alarm, her sister’s name on her lips.