The Yuletide Child

CHAPTER ONE

ONCE the curtain went up and the music began Dylan lost awareness of everything outside the enchanted circle of light in which she and Michael moved, their bodies in total harmony, gliding sinuously, like snakes, entwining, limb against limb, slithering down each other in erotic invitation, then suddenly breaking apart, whirling away in opposite directions, leaping so high the audience always gasped in disbelief. Not that Dylan heard them.

She heard, saw, nothing but Michael and her own black shadow flying across the white backcloth, the white-painted boards under their feet, until their bodies met once more, writhed in embrace, caressing, imploring, slid to the floor and joined there, rose and fell over and over again, quivering in breathtaking ecstasy.

You could have heard a pin drop in the audience. It was the same every night. The watchers were transfixed and aroused, barely breathing, not moving, until the final second when the two young lovers sank into completed repose.

It wasn’t until they took their curtain calls and the thunder of applause broke over them that she began to come out of the hypnotic trance in which she always experienced ‘Exercises for Lovers’.

Sweat pouring down her body, shuddering with anguished breath, trembling and exhausted, with Michael holding her hand, supporting her, she looked out into the audience for the first time, curtseying, bending her head in recognition of the audience response.

Normally she never noticed anyone out there, but tonight her flickering gaze stopped suddenly as it moved over the rows of faces. She stared into dark eyes in a sort of shock.

He was sitting in the front row of the stalls, leaning forward, his stare glowing and intense, face pale in the shadows, hair black as night. Prince of Darkness, she thought, a little feverish, wildly hyper after the fierce concentration of the dance. That was what he looked like: a creature of the night, a lost soul.

She had never seen him before, yet she felt instantly that she had always known him, that he had haunted her dreams all her life.

Michael felt the shudder which ran through her, and shot her a quick, sideways look.

Turning, lifting her hand to his lips, his lithe body bent in a gesture of adoration, he whispered, ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing, just a ghost walking over my grave,’ she lied, and was surprised that she did, because she and Michael knew each other better than anyone else in the world. She had never hidden anything from him before, but she couldn’t tell him what had just happened to her; she had no words to describe that weird, out-of-this-world sensation.

The flowers came on, as they always did at this point, cellophane-wrapped bouquets from fans. She and Michael accepted them gracefully, cradled them in the crook of their arms, each blowing a kiss to the audience. It was all a ritual, part of the performance, and she went through it in the same well-rehearsed, smiling fashion.

Tonight was different, though. Tonight she kept looking down into the front row of seats, finding those eyes, and feeling her heart beating right through her until her entire body seemed to be one passionate heartbeat.

What is the matter with me? she thought as Michael led her off, their hands still linked, into the wings, followed by the roar of applause which was like waves beating on a rocky shore. They walked past smiling backstage staff who softly clapped.

‘You were wonderful tonight,’ a stagehand said.

She smiled mistily. ‘Thank you.’

‘Beautiful,’ their director told them both. ‘You just keep getting better, both of you.’

At last they escaped into the quiet, narrow, shadowy corridor which led to the dressing rooms. Only then could she begin to wind down from the heights on which they had danced.

Walking into the square, white-painted box of a room with her name on the door, Dylan sat down on the stool in front of her mirror and blankly gazed at her own reflection: a white-painted face, the face of an icon, not of a human being, a make-up created for this performance by a great make-up artist who had taught her how to renew it quite quickly before every show.

A dew of perspiration showed on the white mask, her painted red mouth was trembling, and under the thickly drawn in black brows her blue eyes were dominated by enlarged pupils like glistening black fruit.

‘You sure you’re okay?’ asked Michael from the door, frowning. ‘You aren’t sick, are you?’

She could never talk after a performance. She shook her head, managing a smile.

‘Sure?’

She nodded.

‘Okay, then. See you in twenty minutes?’ Michael said, his grey eyes watchful. He looked after her as if she was a child, but for the moment he let it go, closing the door.

She shut her eyes and just sat there, breathing. The relief of being alone was wonderful. Dancing in a spotlight with hundreds of eyes watching you was an ordeal to her, even though she had been doing it now for years. Oh, of course she loved to dance, and the audience response always lifted her, but she always had the fear of making a mistake, stumbling, missing a cue. The tension wound up and up until you thought you would die, and it took time to unwind afterwards.

She slowly began to remove her make-up; underneath it her skin was red and prickly with heat, so she used a handful of gel to soothe as well as cleanse her skin. She had no dresser; she didn’t need one. Her costume was very simple, just a flesh-coloured, skintight body-stocking which covered her from her neck to her feet. Seen from the auditorium, it looked as if she was dancing in the nude, which was exactly how Michael wanted it to look.

Dylan slowly and carefully unpeeled the costume, like a snake shedding a slippery skin, then dropped it into a wicker basket. Tomorrow morning it would be put into a washing machine by the wardrobe mistress, spin-dried and hung up ready for tomorrow night’s performance.

She always had to dust it inside with talc before she dressed; it was not easy to wriggle into the costume and she had never enjoyed weari

ng it.

Naked, she walked into her en suite bathroom, used the lavatory, which she was never able to do from the moment she put on her costume until she took it off, then had a long, cooling, relaxing shower, taking her time, dried herself and put on clean white panties and a matching bra.

The new dance ate up energy. It was physically demanding; every night she felt limp and drained afterwards. She was shivering now as if she had flu. For some reason tonight was worse than usual.

Because of those eyes, she thought, seeing them again: primitive, disturbing, the glittering eyes of a wolf in the forest, watching, stalking you before it leapt.

Oh, stop being melodramatic! she told herself, laughing at her own imagination as she went back into the dressing room. He was just another fan staring, and wasn’t that what Michael wanted from the audience—that fixed intensity of attention on what the dancers on stage were doing?