The first pure, slow notes of the Debussy. One, two, three, four… I nodded at Denise, the first on stage. She stepped into position in the open rectangle, slowly pliéd, and began to dance. A few bars later Terry appeared in the second opening in the curtains.
No Mollie in the audience so much as breathed.
It was then I knew how wrong I’d been.
I could feel it, their reaction. I knew it, had known it my whole life: that rapt attention of an audience responding to the beauty of dance. It was more than parental love; this was the real thing. The extra arms, the childish adaptations I’d made to the Robbins choreography—none of it mattered, and not only because these were their children, or because they didn’t know any better. This audience was, on their own weird terms, experiencing beauty.
Terry and Denise stood side to side, still unaware of each other, each with one tentacle on the barre. In the rectangular openings appeared the second couple, Ellen and Tom. No one was yet on toe; I had choreographed only a few minutes of toe work for these inexperienced dancers, at the end of the piece. But Ellen’s lovely long extension, made longer by her toe shoe, paralleled Denise’s port de bras.
Some adult Mollie, somewhere in the back, made the first audience noise, a long sort of dying chirp. Even I could tell it was admiration.
All the lights went out, and the room was plunged into blackness.
Cacophony, crashing, screaming. I blundered into the music stand and knocked it over; the blackout was total, shocking. It only lasted a moment and then someone flung open a door somewhere and some light, not enough, flowed in from a hallway. Parents clambered forward, tripping over chairs and each other. The dancers stood paralyzed, or huddled on the floor, or writhing in the middle of the stage. No, only one writhed, crying and screaming piteously: Ellen.
I didn’t even think. I plunged toward the anguished dancer—my dancer—who had been injured, interrupted, kept from dancing. I didn’t remember the membrane until I’d plunged through it.
The lights went on.
I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t get air into my lungs, couldn’t breathe… then I could, in a great gasp, and my lungs were on fire, burning like the hell I didn’t believe in… help me, Col…
Darkness.
Randall swam into view above my bed. It hurt to look at him. It hurt to breathe him in, to breathe anything in.
“Don’t talk, Celia. You’re going to be all right. It will take a while for the burns on the esophagus to heal, but they will heal, I promise you.”
“I’ll be so good you won’t know me! I promise you!”
I croaked, “Sally?”
I had never seen his smooth diplomatic face look so grim. “Yes, she did it. She—”
“See… her?”
“She’s in custody, waiting deportation.”
“See… her!”
“No.”
“Vid…” God, he better stop making me talk!
“All right,” he said grudgingly. “That’s some niece you’ve got there. You have no idea how upset the Visitors were. The only reason the whole dance program didn’t end right there, with ripple-effect consequences throughout the entire range of human-Visitor relations, is those kids’ affection for you.”
Affection? For me?
Ten minutes later Sally’s face appeared on an interactive cube ponderously wheeled to my bedside by a disapproving medtech. Sally looked terrible. Her face had bloated from crying, her nose was red and raw, and words tumbled from her like a falling building.
“Aunt Celia, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to injure you, I never thought you’d go on stage, it was just supposed to be a stupid prank. Oh, God, you’re the only one who’s ever cared what I did—”
I had a sudden insight, completely unlike me. This was a rare moment. Sally was completely vulnerable, as I’d never seen her before and would probably never see her again, and she would answer truthfully whatever I asked her. Provided I asked her quick.
“Sally… why?” The words hurt my burned esophagus.
“You paid all that attention to them! I was… I was…”
Jealous. She was jealous.
“… but I never thought anyone would get hurt, not even them! I never thought I could hurt anything!”
And there it was. She never thought she’d have any real impact. Just as she’d never had any true, deep effect on my workaholic brother, or on her selfish mother, or even on me. Yes, I cared what she did, but not as much as I cared about ballet. I wasn’t going to apologize for that, though… I couldn’t apologize for it. Ballet had been my life, was my life, gave my life shape and meaning. Even if that shape now had six arms instead of two and bouréed forward on suckers. It was still ballet, and it still made its exquisite impact. I’d just seen that.
But this child… she didn’t believe she’d ever had any real impact on anything, or anyone. Until now.
“Sally,” I croaked, “you did… very bad. Might… wreck… all human-Mollie… relations…”
She looked scared, and horrified, and impressed. “Really?”
“You… must…” I couldn’t get any more words out. One last huge effort. “Make… right…”
“How?”
I shook my head and cut off the link. Then I pressed the button for Randall.
He arrived quickly, but I couldn’t talk anymore. I made him sit me up and get me a handheld. Everything in my body hurt. Nonetheless, I keyed in:
… Tell Sally she nearly ruined all alien contact for good. Make this very important. Very! Let her think everything hinges on her apology, let her make it, and get her a community service job on Earth with kids who really need her…
He snapped, “I’m not running a juvenile rehabilitation program, Celia!”
I glared at him and picked up the handheld again.
… Do it, or I quit as dance instructor…
Then I fell back on my pillows and closed my eyes, the exhausted dictator.
Would it work for Sally? I didn’t know. We don’t pick the things that define us—they pick us, which is a fucking random arrangement. But having an impact on something… yes. Even a negative impact was better than none. And a positive impact, however weird…
Yes.
When I had rested a bit, I’d call Randall again. I had to tell him he needed to reschedule my ballet students’ recital of Afternoon of a Faun.
Nancy Kress is the author of twenty books: twelve novels of science fiction or fantasy, one YA novel, two thrillers, three story collections, and two books on writing. Her most recent book is Probability Space, the conclusion of a trilogy that began with Probability Moon and Probability Sun. The trilogy concerns quantum physics, a space war, and the nature of reality. Kress’ short fiction has won her three Nebulas and a Hugo. Her work has been translated into fourteen languages, including Croatian and Hebrew. She writes a monthly “Fiction” column for Writer’s Digest magazine, and lives in Maryland.
The Siren Stone
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