'Those are two strong boys.'
'You know who to ask if you can’t get the lid off a pickle jar.'
'Ah, they wouldn’t be my first choice.'
'No?'
'No, definitely make the reserve list though.'
I was about to ask who would be at the top of the list when all chance of talking was drowned by cheers from the next table as the twins took their final bow. The ninja prop shifters jogged on in their wake, bearing a huge plastic sheet. They spread it across the stage, ran off and returned with a full-size bathtub and half a dozen buckets of water. A trapeze was lowered above the bath, then the next turn came on and I worked out the answer for myself.
Kolja’s naked chest shone with oil; he stalked across the stage, pecs puffed out, shoulders thrown back, spine straight all the way down to the swell of his muscular buttocks. The bulge on the other side of his white leggings looked unnaturally large. I whispered to Sylvie, 'I see he’s packed his sandwiches.'
But she ignored me, concentrating on the vision of Kolja circling like a young Nureyev about to wow the Bolshoi. He stopped, rubbed some chalk theatrically into his palms, casting a superior glance at us mortals below, sneering slightly, as if he didn’t even deign to pity us, though I knew the lights rendered everything beyond the stage invisible.
The trapeze looked impossibly high but Kolja sprang effortlessly into the air and grabbed it with both hands, hoisting himself steadily upwards until his chest was level with the bar, he hung there for a moment, letting us admire his silhouette, then swung his legs into the dark, tipping himself slowly up and over into a leisurely 360 degree turn that made his muscles swell. The men at the table next to us sat without touching their drinks, nodding in appreciation as Kolja threw himself into a faster loop and then another, spinning round and through the trapeze, switching hands, making his slim hips follow through, his white leggings shining against the black backdrop of the stage, his speed increasing until he no longer looked like a man, just a twirling birling blur in the centre of the stage.
I nudged Sylvie, thinking she’d be amused by the body culturalists’ captivated stares.
But she put her hand on my arm, staying my elbow. I turned to look at her and saw her lips parted, her tongue pressing against her teeth. I downed the dregs of my beer and signalled for another.
Up on stage the trapeze was descending with Kolja astride it now, he sat motionless for an instant above the bath, then somewhere a needle hit shellac and a slow number started up.
The stage lights switched to a cool midnight blue, Kolja swung to and fro, clutching the supporting rope, making his muscles swell in the deep indigo, then he fell suddenly backwards into a turn that made my stomach slide and Sylvie give a quick short gasp.
Kolja caught the bar of the trapeze, holding his body rigid above the tub, ignoring but somehow basking in the audience applause. Then he swung himself into the water, all the time holding tight onto the U of the trapeze, drenching his legs, torso, chest, emerging dripping, his costume clinging. The men at the next table went wild and Sylvie joined in their applause.
Kolja continued, oblivious to the audience. He swung himself up and over, submerging then resurfacing, sparkling with droplets as if it were all for his own amusement.
Then finally he slipped from his swing and into the tub, sinking his head beneath the water, releasing himself from the audience’s gaze. He broke the surface and lay looking up towards the heavens and into the beyond like a man with serious troubles on his mind. The music carried on.
