There is no such thing as a slight flaw in a dance floor.
And all floors have flaws. Anyone but a dancer would probably call them slight: certainly the manufacturers do. Nonetheless, each floor has its own invisible peculiarities, lurking in wait for dancers' feet. Even the floor of Toronto's famous Drummond Theatre. The company had gone through two complete rehearsals, undress and dress, without a hitch; it was in the final onstage warm-up class, a scant hour before curtain, that John DeMarco, who had been dreaming of and working toward this night for all his professional life, found the flaw with his name on it. It broke his ankle.
At any other time it would have been a nuisance. The actual repair could be accomplished in less than ten minutes at the nearest hospital, after two hours of datawork and waiting in the emergency room. And once fixed, you'd be hopping around good as new . . . in a matter of mere hours. . . .
The ugly sound had riveted the attention of all. It took only minutes to establish that the nearest hospital was half an hour away in the best of times, and that everyone in the company seemed to have run out of painblock at once. So had John, of course. Dancers started to drift away to call hospitals and search dressing rooms and find the driver; the AD, watching her company scattering to the four winds an hour before curtain, bellowed them into stasis and bent over John's recumbent form. "Is there any hope at all?" she asked.
It was clearly a break, not just a sprain. John shook his head, and started to apologize.
She waved it away. "Then you'll have to live with it for a while. I can't spare anyone here: I have to recast the whole performance in forty-five minutes, and everyone I can see I need. We'll put you in dressing room two. Jacques! Harry!"
The pain was exquisite, almost nauseating. "No! Wait! Put me in the audience. If I can't be in it, I'm gonna see the run-through."
She nodded to Harry and Jacques. "Do it."
Harry, the stage manager, gave him a jacket to put over his warm-up clothes, promised to try and find him some painblock and a ride as soon as possible, and left him front-row center. Not an ideal seat, but convenient. One of the dancers who could be spared momentarily brought him an improvised pack of ice from the concession in the lobby. He concentrated on the frenzied activity onstage to distract himself from his pain.
Shortly after he decided Anna was fucking the whole thing up, he noticed that the pain was gone. Utterly.
He yelped, in astonishment and something like fright. Anna glared at him from the stage. "Harry, take him back-stage—"
"No," he said. "Sorry. I'm fine; won't happen again."
She went back to her work. He bent and looked at his ankle. No question, that was a broken ankle, all right. The swelling was already so advanced that he knew it was badly broken. Now why in hell didn't it hurt?
The swelling began to visibly reduce.
He yelped again. Anna turned and came to the edge of the stage. "John, I'm sorry, but—"
"Look at my foot!"
She blinked.
"God dammit, come down here and look at my fucking foot!"
The dancers followed her. They gathered around and watched his ankle heal itself. After a few murmurs and gasps, no one said a word. In minutes, the ankle looked just like its mate. John flexed it slowly, listening for grating sounds, and then extended it with the same care. Then he circled it, one way and then the other, and started to laugh. Soon everyone was laughing, even Anna. He got to his feet, took a few cautious steps—then took a running start and sprang up on stage. He did a combination on his way to his place for the first piece. "Come on, boss," he said, still laughing. " `Time's a-wastin'!" It was one of her catch-phrases; the company dissolved into hysterics.
Anna let that go on for a good five seconds. From then on they were so busy that it wasn't until midway through the triumphant fourth curtain call that John had time to wonder about it all.
He never did figure it out. He had to be told. But he didn't mind.