The painful story of a young and beautiful girl who used to perform as a dancer at the restaurants to get her brother educated but the spectators dubbed her as ‘whore’ without knowing her circumstances.   

[author title=”Sherzod Artikov” image=”https://sindhcourier.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Contemporary-WorldLiterature-Sherzod-Artikov-Sindh-Courier.jpg”]Sherzod Artikov, short story writer and poet, was born in 1985 in the city of Marghilan of Uzbekistan. He graduated from Fergana Polytechnic institute in 2005. He was one of the winners of the national literary contest “My Pearl Region” in prose in 2019. In 2020, his first book “The Autumn’s Symphony” was published in Uzbekistan.[/author]

 

Tango Dancer

Seeing that I had entered through the main door of the Oilers House of Culture, the library manager, Sister Rano, who was talking to the cleaners in the corridor, approached me.

“Rashod”-she said after greeting me. “I wondered seeing you from a far and thought if you had read the books so fast.”

“As you can see, my hands are empty,” I said, smiling at her. “I came to the event hall on the second floor, not to the library.”

“I forgot,” she said, glancing up the stairs to the second floor. “Autumn Dances” event will be held today, that’s right.”

She grabbed me by the armpits, talked about her problems, and, accompanied by me, went up the stairs to the second floor. The House of Culture was run by an oil refinery factory in the city, a library, a musical theater, and a dance ensemble worked here. All of this was designed to provide cultural recreation for factory workers and their families. I used to come here to use a library with a rich book fund. Moreover I also tried to enjoy by occasionally attending theater performances or dance events that took place here.

Sister Rano was an old woman, so she was tired until she went up the stairs to the second floor. After catching her breath for a while in the hallway there, she entered the auditorium with me. There were more people in the hall than usually, and I think most of the factory workers also came because it was Saturday. They were divided into groups in the back rows and indulged in a mutually intense gurung. We went and sat on one of the empty seats in the front row.

After a while, the event began. The dancers, who worked in the House of Culture dance ensemble, took turns to show off their skills on stage. Firstly, a black girl performed a Tanovar* dance in a satin dress. Before the applause subsided, the girl with curly hair played skillfully to the dance Dilhiroj*. Again applause echoed throughout the hall in its acoustics. After that, seemingly, according to the script, they moved from national dances to samples of the world dance school. A girl dressed as a gypsy performed the dance of a gypsy girl in the opera “Carmen” by the French composer Bizet.

Then a girl dressed in Spanish women’s make-up, with her hair styled like a fountain, and a long, wide dress in dark red, came out on tiptoe like a ballerina. Following her, two young men brought a brown table made of walnuts to the stage.  The table was large, and it settled majestically in the middle of the stage. By the time many people understood why a table had been brought on stage, Spanish music came out immediately behind the stage, and the white-and-yellow girl, smiling, walked around the table and started dancing to the tango.

She stared at the table as if she was looking at her beloved, fluttering around it, using a pleasing expression in her eyes to show her charm to it, caressing her gently with his fingers. Her movements created an attractive balance with this lifeless table, and in this dance the signs of innovation in a special spirit were clearly visible.

As the hall watched the dance, no one uttered a word, all of them were in love with her talent and art, were sitting silently perhaps suppressing the excitement. Honestly, I also could not get over from the real amazement and excitement. She danced incredibly beautifully and tastefully. It was not even known that the table didn’t move in the background of this delicate dance, but on the contrary, it seemed that the table was moving in unison with her.

I got tired on the half of the dance. My kidney stung from time to time. But I endured the pain and continued to dance. For some reason, a stranger sitting in the front row kept his eyes on me. When I caught a glimpse of him, I wondered if he hadn’t seen a person. He watched my every move carefully. I don’t think he was just an ordinary interested person or factory worker. Probably a dance expert or choreographer. Whoever he was I didn’t like that he stared at me. But he was very handsome, cheerful. I would also like to emphasize that his eyes were calm and looking like a child’s. Besides me, he looked at the table from time to time, presumably because he either didn’t understand or couldn’t imagine that I was dancing tango with the table. It is possible to dance the tango with the table, good guy!

When she finished dancing, I apologized to Sister Rano, got up, and went backstage not hurrying. The guys who were guarding there, carrying that table, recognized me, shook my hand, and saw me off to the backstage not refusing to me. I went to the back. From the slightly open doors of the dressing-rooms, facing each other, the merry voices of the dancers, the shouts of laughter, the shouts of the dancers could be heard in the corridor. Almost all the dancing girls also knew me. As soon as I appeared in the hallway, Gulmira in a gypsy dress (I didn’t recognize her in deep make- up on stage) stuck her head out of one of those open doors, ran up to me, and immediately thanked me.

“My mother’s pension will be paid in cash from the bank. It was with your recommendation. Thanks, my friend!”

“My dear,” said the choreographer Nigina Talgatovna, yawning, seeing me by chance. “The book you have recommended is wonderful.” I enjoy reading Halina Posvyatovskaya’s poems.

“When are you going to invite me to lunch?” asked Farida, who performed a dance “Dilhiroj”, passing by me with a mysterious smile (I didn’t even recognize her on stage because of her make-up).

I didn’t pay much attention to them. I just looked around for a girl who was dancing to a tango.

“Are you looking for me?”, said  Nigora Karimovna with white hair, who appeared in the corridor and laughed. This open-minded woman, who was the leader of the ensemble, came up to me and hugged me tightly. “It was good that you gave me a loan for repairs. I repaired my house for the winter.”

I must say that the unknown young man sitting in the front row of the hall, staring at me, seemed to be very popular among the members of our ensemble, and when they saw him, everyone’s faces lit up and a smile ran down their lips. Hearing his voice in the hallway, Gulmira hurried out of the room at first. As I glanced down the hallway through the sloping open door, Farida deliberately asked, passing by him “When are you going to invite me to lunch?” The other girls gave him wonderful descriptions too. When I quietly asked them who he was, they called him a banker. He comes to use the library here, and since the House of Culture’s account is in the bank where he works, he has always benefited many people in our ensemble.

Standing in front of Nigora Karimovna, I froze for a few minutes, not knowing what to say.

“Nigora Karimovna,” I said at last. “Now a girl was dancing on the stage.” Is she new? I didn’t recognize her.”

After listening carefully to me, she nodded to say that she understood me and went into the room at the end of the corridor. Soon she led the girl with her from the inside.

As I washed the make-up residue off my face and tidied up my face in the washroom, our artistic director’s voice was heard in the room. At first I didn’t hear it in the roar of the water. She asked me from the girls. I went out of the bathroom wondering if everything was ok, and I saw Nigora Karimovna in the middle of the room, folding the newspaper in her hand, openly showing off her impatience.

“A young man wants to talk to you,” she said, leading me by the hand.

The girls then looked at each other meaningfully. I followed her out into the hallway. That young man was standing in the hallway with his hands behind his back and leaning against the wall.

“Assalamu alaykum*,” I said as I approached him.

“Introduce yourself closer, “- said Nigora Karimovna jokingly, leaving us alone.

“Diyora,” I said, reluctantly holding out my hand.

“Rashod,” he said, introducing himself.

Then he coughed a couple of times:

“You dance tango very well,” he said piece by piece.

“Not much,” I said, getting red at his praise.

“I have never seen you here before.”

−I am new to work.

She was bowing her head beside me, and there was not a trace of her haste on the stage. She was a shy girl, twenty or twenty-two years old. I was hesitant to ask if she was the same girl or someone else who was wearing a tango in the beginning because she was wearing her usual casual clothes, not a tango. However after looking into her eyes, the suspicion dissipated. She was this girl who danced the tango. The breath of sincerity in her sad eyes that blew around the stage a few minutes before was felt by person standing in front of her even now.

“I’m sorry,” she said suddenly during our conversation. “I have to go home as soon as possible because I work somewhere else as well. I have to have a rest a little. I am feeling bad, apologize me.

Not wanting that, I said goodbye. Then feeling disappointed I went outside into the hall where the dance event was still going on. There I sat for a long time in my car parked next to the kiosk on the sidewalk. My goal was not to sit down and leave, but to wait for Diyora to go out. During this time, a feeling radically different from some simple curiosity warmed my heart. After a while, Diyora wrapped herself in a gray coat and went outside. She closed the door after leaving and looked at my car. She clearly saw me sitting in the car. But she walked away as if she didn’t care.

“It’s not good,” someone said, tapping the side window of my car laughing. “You’re betraying me.”

Eleonora was standing in front of my car. When I noticed her, I said her to get in the car by my hand. She opened the door and sat in the front seat.

“Which way did the sun rise today?” she said sarcastically.

“Stop the sarcasm,” I said, setting the car on fire. “I want to see you off home.”

On the way, I asked her about Diyora.

“I don’t know enough about her,” Elenora shrugged. “It’s been a week since she came to us. Her mother is retired and she herself graduated from an art college. That’s all I know. Nigora Karimovna knows more information.”

He had an expensive black car. In the rainy, damp, breath-taking landscape, dusty November, I was amazed at how clean it was, unlike the dirty cars around it, and how dazzling it was (he must be a person who loves cleanliness by nature). When I went outside, he was sitting in that car. I walked a little farther, pretending not to notice him. It wasn’t until I walked a long way that I looked back. Eleonora, who came out after me, immediately took the front seat of his car. It seemed strange to me.

Seemingly, there is something like friendship or love between them. Then why was he interested in me? Why did he call me and talked? Men are completely incomprehensible. They are really worth a penny.

When Eleonora went off in front of the house, I came to the bank in my car. There is a bad habit in the banking system: Employees come and work on Saturdays, although not officially (this is the requirement of the department). When I entered my room, I caught a cigarette butt and dug into my pocket to get a cigarette. As I smoked it and walked in the room, I reminisced about what had happened in the House of Culture. Diyora, her wonderful tango with the table, our short conversation with her in the hallway… Diyora impressed me immensely. Assuming that I was more impressed by her tango dance, my heart pounded and said no. Is it herself?

I fell asleep as I laid on the couch at home. As soon as I opened my eyes, I quickly looked at the clock on the wall. The clock showed fifteen to five. If I did not hurry, I would be late to one of the prestigious restaurants in Fergana. Yesterday its boss had invited me on the phone to dance there. According to the agreement, I have to dance in four different outfits, four types of dances for the customers in the restaurant. I will open the dance night with an Arabic dance. This is the main condition of the agreement. The restaurant pays me two hundred thousand soums* for these four dances. As I was thinking about this, the pain in my sick kidney intensified and tried to stop me from it. But I threw four of my painkillers on the shelf under my tongue and got up.

After buying a men’s perfume with a sharp odor from a young man who sold it at a department store, I set my car on fire to go to a familiar restaurant in town. My classmate Comron had invited me there – for his birthday. To be honest, I didn’t want  to go to  that restaurant, I went there once if I’m not mistaken, and at that time I didn’t like the absurd atmosphere there. But this time I had to go. If I don’t go, Comron will be upset. Anyway, I’ll sit for a while, I said as I turned the car in that direction.

I took the relevant instructions from the restaurant owner’s room. He advised me to keep calm even if any drunk customer started approaching, not to be rude to him, because today the restaurant was visited only by sensitive customers. After putting on the clothes I needed for the Arabic dance, I was sad for a while in front of the mirror, embarrassed. In front of it there was a real artist, who instantly transformed from a dancer who loves to dance tango to a street dancer who dances for an order.

When I entered the hall of the restaurant, I felt dizziness from the suffocation of the air and the unpleasant smell that was spreading towards the door. I wanted to cover my ears from the noise reminiscent of the market. All the tables in the circle were occupied, and the people at the table were having a good time. Almost all the tables were filled with alcohol and huge, oriental-style cigarette cases, and around many tables men and women were mixed. Moreover, they hugged without hesitation.

Seeing me enter the hall, Comron called my name and showed to come to the table where he was sitting. I went there. The table was designed for six people, and Comron had invited four more people besides me. Three of them were women, and one was a man of character no less than these women. My friend introduced me to them one by one with no laziness. During the introduction, I knew that they were Comron’s colleagues.

When I came out into the hall in my half-naked dress, the music was almost starting to play. The hall was full of people. Most of them were drunk, and even the women, without hesitation, drank from the alcohol on the table, filling their lungs with cigarettes from the copper hookah. When I saw this, I felt sick and almost vomited.

The fact that women, in particular, got into the arms of men and leaned on them as usual caused me to sneer, my lips involuntarily opened and closed with sneer. The hall was filled with their whispers, the warmth of the bodies of the men who embraced them with animal greed and passion, the stench of alcohol, and finally the smoke that slid out of the cigarette butts like a snake. Under such conditions my appearance with half-naked body, with a silk net on my face, raised the temperature here even higher. As I began to dance, the eyes of these cheerful human beings burst into passion, pretending to eat me, and as they rose from their seats as if they were competing with each other, they began to howl like stallions and howl like wolves.

The atmosphere in the restaurant had not changed much. It was the same as before. Looking around, I was convinced of that. During the day or in the meetings of the state and public institutions where they work, glorious and important figures, who brag about morality, purity of heart, humanity, quote from the didactic works of Tahir Malik * and give valuable advice, reprimands and advice to young people, are drunk around the tables?  The smoke billowed out of their mouth and nostrils, and they were in their lover’s or overnight companion’s hands, and sat round the table.

As I sipped my apple juice, being frown, an Arabic dance rang out across the hall. I didn’t pay attention to that at first. Because the more I looked around, the more my heart was pounding, and the more it was filled with poisonous whey, and I was about to make someone upset for a single extra word.

“The dancer is great,” said Comron, pushing me once.

I was sitting backwards to the hall. That’s why I didn’t see the dancer. I turned around after Comron’s words. In the middle of the hall, a seductively dressed third-class dancer danced to Arabic music. I muttered saying that her clothes were awful and sipped my apple juice again. The voice inside me asked me to pay an attention to him once again. The next time I concentrated: she was dancing, her face was covered with a white silk net, her half-open chest and waist fluttering, and the filthy crowd around her greeted her every faceless movement with thunderous applause.

After a while, two drunk men approached me, and the two of them began to move like mules rather than dance, leaning close to me. They stared at me greedily as they danced, and the animal lust hidden in their eyes was ready to emerge. Suddenly, one of them approached me and tried to grab my wrist. I pushed him away a little. The other one poured the drink from the half-emptied wine bottle in his hand under my feet, and a moment later tore off the curtain that was hiding my face.

I didn’t understand what was going on in the middle of the hall. Two drunk man, who were as fat and drunk as pigs, surrounded the dancer and teased her, while the rest of the audience applauded, as if inspiring and inspiring them. What would these disgusting hands, who were constantly applauding, do if that were their elder sisters, little sisters, wives instead of that dancer? Would they continue to clap like that without changing a single hair on their faces, which is a high example of indifference and insensitivity? Lord, what a humiliation it is. I suffocated more and more here, losing control of myself without suppressing my anger. I hardly talked to my interlocutors either, answering their questions on the tip of my tongue, keeping my eyes on the dancer who was trying to defend herself from the two men.

It all happened so fast. The man who tore the veil off my face was about to come to me, when someone grabbed him by the neck and pushed him under a nearby table. He punched the other in the face, and that man staggered to the musicians and snorted as he grabbed his bleeding nose and screamed. The person beating them turned out to be the same guy I met behind the scenes at the House of Culture. I don’t know where he came from. I think he was sitting among those here. I noticed at a glance that he was in a bad mood. Rashod was staring at me with hatred, ready to suffocate me if he is allowed to. At that moment, with a strong hatred pouring from his eyes, whole my body was engulfed in flames, and his flames burned my whole body.

“Follow me,” he said suddenly, throwing his suit over me and holding my hand.

That dancer was Diyora. When the curtain that hid her face opened, I almost shouted when I saw it. My heart suddenly pounded. I can’t remember what happened next. I took out those two. I grabbed one of them by the neck and pushed him under the table of the women who were smoking cigarettes. Without sparing the second one, I punched him in the face with all my strength. Seeing this, their companions sitting at the tables tried to throw themselves at me. Sensing this, I smashed an unopened cognac bottle on the edge of the table, which was standing on a table near me, and showed the sharp-edged side of the glass piece to those who were coming.

−I’ll put it all in your throat.

They looked at my condition and moved backwards. I put my suit over Diyora’s shoulders and walked out of the hall, which was as silent as water pouring as I led her. I waved to say goodbye to Comron, who still did not understand what had happened. I handed my business card to the manager who was standing with the musicians at the door.

“Tell your boss,” I said, looking bitterly at his face which was full of protest.” Say him to call my phone number here in the morning. I will fully cover the damage.”

He was squeezing my arm so hard that he would break it. I could feel his hand shaking. I couldn’t tell if it was because he was nervous or because of hatred. I followed him blindly. A lot was going on in my mind. As I stepped out into the street in the evening, he walked over to his car and opened his front seat and shouted at me to saying to sit down. I barely sat down on seat.  He himself was in no hurry to get on the car.  He wiped his hands with a handkerchief the cognac water that splashed on him. When he had finished, he smoked in the open air and bowed his head for a longtime. He kicked the front balloon of his car several times, beat it with his hands, and cursed with all insulting words. As he got behind the wheel, he turned his face to me in pain.

“Whore,” he whispered, and then repeated the word in disgust. “Whore !!!”

Then I slapped him in the face. He squeezed my hand tightly with a twinkle in his eye, shook it hard, and set his car on fire.

“Where are you going to take me?” I asked, worrying.

“To your home,” he said nervously.

“Should I say what my mother will say if we go home now?” I said, laughing bitterly.

He stared at me as if in a daze, not understanding why I suddenly started laughing like that.

“She will look at you and say something like, “My daughter dances in the evenings. She works. Weren’t you ashamed to fire her? Then the blood pressure will rise and we will have to call an ambulance.

Saying this, I suddenly burst out laughing. She was still staring at me in that condition.

I wanted to take her home.  God knows, it was so. I wanted to take her from the human beings here, who have no difference from the animals, away from the filthy environment to which they belong. She disagreed. She was afraid of her mother. I grabbed my collar in amazement what her mother would tell her.  She shook her head in pain and laughed. She laughed without stopping. I sat there staring at her as a statue, as if I were in a house of culture during the day.

After a while she concentrated and became much more serious. There was silence between us, and this silence lasted for a few minutes. Both she and I were left alone in the depths of our thoughts. All we could hear was the breath we were taking inside the car and the sound of its burning engine.

“I haven’t been touched by any man,” said Diyora with a heavy breath. “But there is some truth in your words. I have almost no difference from women like that. Here is my condition today; the clothes I am wearing prove it. You are right, I am whore.

At first I was upset by what he said to my face. But he was right a little bit. I was burning as I confessed that he was right and what I had to say. My tongue got stuck to my palate, and I pulled every word out of me.

“Please turn off the car’s engine,” I said, holding the wheel. “Anyway I can’t go home right now.”

He reluctantly turned off the engine. The car calmed down.

“I’ve been dancing in cafes and restaurants for two years,” I continued. “I graduated from college and got into this life. College…When I was in college, I saw life from a different perspective, I lived with dreams. Indeed, i did. I also saw dance as an art. I adored and admired it. I studied diligently and thoroughly from the theory of dance art to the history of each type of dance. I wish I could dance on the big stages. More Spanish dance type – tango attracted me, I was fascinated by it very much. My dreams were closely connected with this tango. I tried to master it better than other types of dance. I participated in the classes with all my might. I found myself in this type of dance, and when I performed it, I felt like a completely happy person and forgot about the environment, the colorless life, the thousands of people living in indifference. I was inventing new things about it, made inventions. Dancing tango with a table is one of my inventions. I also have inventions like dancing a tango with a simple fan and umbrella. You haven’t seen them. If you see, you will like my inventions.

But life turned out to be more complicated than we think. I lied about my mother. In fact, she has no guilt. She would not have struggled so much if my father had not left us. She worked at the factory and made ends meet alone to raise me and my little brother, even if not completely, we got dressed, eaten, studied. Hoping for better days, she spent her life sewing, unfulfilled dreams for us. The only she has is now from my brother, who studies at the Financial Institute in the capital. We have been paying the contract money for his education for a long time. With her pension, my meager salary, which is paid me for working in ensembles, is not enough even for our living. That’s why my mother sometimes works as a cleaner, and in the evenings I dance in cafes and restaurants. In this way we collect money for the big contract, which is like a horse’s head.

I listened to her grabbing the steering wheel of my car. I didn’t say a word in between. I didn’t even turn to her. The unknown pain that was scratching my stomach pushed me deeper and deeper into the farthest reaches of the sea of suffering, as a result of which I was breathing heavily as if there wasn’t enough air. I don’t know if I felt sorry for her. I felt more sorry for myself. It was a pity that my heart, which had been kept untouched until the age of thirty-two, and which was famous for its indifference to women and its desire for nothing but friendship, could not bear to be overwhelmed by irrational feelings in these twelve hours. It seemed to get relaxed. For the first time, for some reason, I felt like a helpless, and young child who could do nothing in the face of life.

“Now I have to go back to the restaurant,” Diyora said, pointing to the restaurant.” I have to continue performing the ordered dances. Now when I come back in, the restaurant owner will insult me a little, maybe will slap me in the face for causing a problem, but won’t stop me from continuing my work, and will give me my money.”

Rashod did not resist when I took off his suit and got out of the car. I stood outside for a while. Going back to the restaurant a few minutes ago seemed easy. When I got out of the car, I couldn’t move as if something was holding my hand…

He did not get out of the car. I waited with all my body for him to come down, to insult me again in pain, to scold me, to shout that he would take me home in a state of shock. But he did not get out. He still didn’t move as he clung to the steering wheel. Eventually, I forced myself to walk to the restaurant, shivering from the cold. There were thirty paces to the restaurant. In the first ten steps, I memorized the events that took place in the House of Culture during the day.

One by one I wandered my memory as he sat staring at me during my dance, went backstage looking for me, and stood in front of me, thanking me generously for my art. This sweet dream in him corrected my snow-white feelings, which I had cherished like the apple of my eye for years, that I did not trust any man, that kept my body clean. As a result, I lost my composure in an instant, my mental balance was disturbed, something bitter stuck in my throat; my heart was pounding and pounding.

She walked towards the restaurant. I followed her with my eyes nervously. In my eyes, both sympathy and strong hatred were equally reflected. As I watched her from behind, I wondered what would happen if I went downstairs now and yelled at her not to go. This thought seemed so strange to me that I began to laugh at myself. Then I set the car on fire carelessly. My car, which always caught fire at once when I turned the key , caught fire only the third time I turned it. I turned on its headlights and turned the steering wheel to the main street without pausing. When I got to the main street, I drove home to an apartment where no one had been waiting for me for years, except for my uncle and his wife, who had adopted me after the death of my parents, and my dog, Caesar.

He drove away when ten steps left to the restaurant. He went out into the main street, joined the stream of cars, and disappeared. I cried involuntarily, unable to digest it. Tears welled up in my face, and I cried as I bend over, standing behind his car, disappearing from my sight. At that moment, I was ready to stop the taxi and follow him. I even looked for a yellow taxi among the speeding cars, chasing each other incessantly along the main street with this inclination. It would join the cars and disappear, and if I could, I would be able to take it to the side of the road. I listened to that thought for a second, just a second. However, the images of my mother and my brother, who were studying in Tashkent, soon faded. More, my brother didn’t get out of my sight. He studies in Tashkent, he is my and my mother’s hope, we have to pay the contract fee for his education, and I found strength in myself and continued to move forward. When I reached the restaurant door, the doorman saw me and opened the door. I wiped my face on my shoulder and walked to the door. From the inside, I looked out the window at the street. Then, for some reason, the lines that I remember from a poem read by Nigina Talgatovna during the day by the poetess Khalina Posvyatovskaya seemed to be drawn on the window:

… He accelerated

My heart beat

Joked hard with my body

Woke up my feelings

And left…

_______________________

Translated into English by Muslimakhon  Makhmudova