Fakir sits in the dark, leaving him alone despite his seat in the full theater. When was the last time he was on this side of the curtain? It must have been the trip to see the Eleki Troupe. But the trip didn't leave him knotted inside, his fingers softly drumming against the abstract swan-shaped metalwork in his lap.
The orchestra warms up, snippets of Tchaikovsky floating in. Fakir lets out a breath he didn't realize he was holding.
He applauds Erina's entrance, jolting when he first sees her. She holds up frail hands, steps back on timid toes, and Fakir swears she trembles when Siegfried reaches for his Odette. He's glad for the black cover of spectator. What would Erina tell him if she could see? "Did you think I couldn't dance Odette?"
But the tension only builds, weighing down on his innards. While Erina and the new top danseur are superb, he itches to see the swans.
A hush of recognition falls over the audience, everyone intimately familiar with the song but only now realizing it was born here in Swan Lake. It does well to cover Fakir's soft gasp as the moment he anticipated arrives.
The cygnets come forward, Duck standing entwined with them in the third spot from the left. She fits her steps precisely with her partners, aglow with the movement. Fakir smiles in her stead, knowing that she must be bursting at the seams under her practiced restraint.
"Fakir!" she cheers once the curtain finally falls, rushing forward to meet him. Somehow they remain balanced even as she throws her arms around his neck and nearly crushes him. He manages to move the swan sculpture around just in time to keep it from being sandwiched between them. "Fakir, it was wonderful! We all got it just right and it was so fun and Erina told me it was really beautiful even though she was really beautiful and-"
Fakir holds her back and laughs and tries to tell her in return that it was wonderful and she was wonderful and he has a gift for her premiere but he doesn't worry. He knows they'll have time walking home beneath the curtain of night, the dark bringing solitude once more.
