Let us dance

A troupe of small, vintage, artist models, manipulated into a macabre ballet, meticulous in detail, danced across a makeshift stage on top of a yard sale occasional table.

Arms bowed, legs extended, bodies were frozen in eerie arabesques. Effigies twisted into poses of grace and elegance, black magic victims, some oceans apart, in the throes of agonizing spasms. A dance choreographed by their torturer, the performance’s only balletomane.

From his opera box behind the antique store’s cash register, the dance master watched as patrons wandered through the labyrinth of vendor booths, the main stage in his direct line of sight.

He waited with maniacal glee for some inquisitive child or meddlesome grown-up, inexplicable drawn to the dancers, to pick up a danseuse. When they reposition model arms and legs, they unknowingly added to the suffering of their all too human counterparts. His “Display Only” sign ensured none of the figures were ever sold, and that the misery would never cease

When the shop was still, and he was alone with his puppet ensemble, he could almost hear their cries of anguish, and it brought him unholy satisfaction.