The Ballerina & The Devil

Four. Her Safe Haven

I parked the car in front of my old, run down dance studio and cut the engine. I grabbed my duffel bag and hopped out. I pushed open the creaky, old door and flicked on the light switch that was to the left upon entering the building and looked around.

The studio looked like any other dance studio you'd find around town only more dilapidated, I guess you could say. Picture it as a person passed their prime. The cataracts in the four large windows that lined up to the right of the entrance were so dusty and stained that the view was distorted to the point you couldn't see outside properly. The building seemed to sag under the weight of the roof tiles that were left untouched by gravity from the top of the tired edifice. The wooden floor was a faded brown.

Across from the entrance was a doorless entryway. A long, narrow hallway was on the other side of it, and that led to the changing rooms. In the front of the spacious, main area where the dancing was done, there was a huge mirror stretched out the entire length of the room. A ballet barre was attached the furthest left and right side of the room.

Usually the dance studio I went to was the one across town from here. It was refurbished and beautiful and, well, not as "disgusting" as this one. At least, that's what some would say, but I couldn't agree with that.

I loved this studio. Sure, it was really rundown, and yeah, it could do with some cleaning. Major cleaning...but it was my place, and I had grown to have sort of an attachment to it.

I had discovered it last year when I had been going through some issues in my life that weren't the easiest to deal with at the time. I remember was walking in a downpour, not really heading anywhere in particular. I had gotten into a major blowout with my parents, and instead of facing it, I ran.

Eventually, I got ridiculously cold and was soaking wet from the rain that was coming down in bucketfuls. That was when I happened to stumble across this abandoned, old studio that looked way past it's time. Without much of a choice, I huddled up here until the storm outside lightened up.

While I waited I felt an unexplainable lull of peace come over me which was weird considering the fact that the pounding rain on the rooftop made it seem like the ceiling was going to cave in at any minute. It wasn't the most relaxing thought in the world.

Maybe it had something to do with the fact that I was in my "element" per say. Ballet had always been something like an escape for me. It was therapeutic, and it was how I released pent up frustration and negative energy that would more than occasionally build up inside of me.

Some people had stress balls, I had dance. Ballet more specifically, and apparently I now had this run down, old place.

The day after the storm, I came back here to see the studio in the broad daylight. To get a better look of it, seeing as the previous night I had been here it was dark, and I wasn't exactly in the mood to play Dora The Explorer.

As I looked around the entire area, I began to find it to be kind of enchanting in a way, despite how wrecked it was. Something about the building was just so beautiful to me. I couldn't, and to this day, still wouldn't be able to tell you what it was.

Maybe I found beauty in the fact that I felt totally and completely safe there which, if I thought about it, was pretty ironic of me. To be able to find the beauty in anything given my mindset at the time.

It wasn't a choice to make it my place, nor was it a decision. I was instinctively drawn to the studio, and I just knew from that point on it would be mine.

It would be my safe haven.

It was easy to claim since nobody ever came here which was a major upside because I didn't have to share it with anybody else. That was one of the turn offs that came with the ballet studio I paid to go to. There wasn't any period of time that somebody wasn't there. I liked my alone time, and this old place suited my needs perfectly.