Noose Dance

    I met Sandra LaChance at an exhibit of her work in an art gallery here in San Diego. Sandra was a famous noose dancing competitor who’d faced the rope many times but was never singled out to jump, but she was even more famous as a noose-dancing sketch artist. Her sketches, usually made on the spot at noose-dancing parties while someone or other was voluntarily hanging to death were the envy of not only the noose dancing community, but also much of the fine-art world, as consensual hanging, or noose dancing as it was called by it’s fans base, gained social acceptance. The was a rumour was that she was going to be retiring as an artist soon, and I made a note that I was here to see if I could afford to purchase one of her sketches before the price skyrocketed.

    I got very interested in noose-dancing myself after purchasing a book of her works, though as some of you have probably figured out, my fascination with hanging goes all the way back to adolescence, as it does with most noose-dancers. Anyway, the clerk at the book store was a noose-dance enthusiast herself and when she saw what I was purchasing offered to take me to a noose-dancing party.
 
    “You don’t have to compete your first time,” she said, but I promise you that you’ll want to once you’ve seen a dance or two.” 

   

    I was intrigued, and went with her. Her name was Wendy. I say “was,” because her number came up last year and she hanged herself at a party in which we both competed. My number didn’t come up however and I walked out of that one alive. But I kept going to the parties, sometimes competing, and sometimes just watching in pleasure as another chick would do the noose dance.

    Anyway,  just this morning I was at the museum of fine art here in town deeply admiring Sandra’s work; how she was able to not only capture the beauty of the individuals as they danced, but the accidental beauty of hanging to death itself, which is something only a small percentage of the population really understands. The nude human body takes takes on a variety of beautiful poses when slowly hanged by the neck. They are inimitable by any other means really. Many have captured this, but Sandra’s work I thought, also captured the soul of the dancer, their passion for the noose, and the peace that would come over their faces at the end of the dance when their spirits had passed.

    “Do you like the sketches?” I heard a very feminine voice with a distinct French accent inquire from just behind me and to my left. I turned to answer, and to my astonishment, it was Sandra Lachance herself who had posed the question. It took me moment to find my voice.
 
    “Yes, very much! I blurted out. Then I began to babble about why I liked them, how beautifully she captured the emotions that the subjects expressed in the final moments of the their lives and so on. She just smiled through it all as I babbled excitedly.
 
    “You are too kind, responded Sandra. “I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced however. I’m Sandra Lachance.”
 
    "Enchanté," I responded in my best high school French. Je m’apelle Tracy Hempheart.”

    “Enchanté, Tracy, she responded. “Hempheart? That is a very beautiful and unusual surname. Maybe it is appropriate for you? Do you ever attend noose dancing parties or are just an admirer of art?” she inquired next. She must have known what the answer would be, but I suppose the question was to open a door.

    “I’ve been attending the parties for a few years now. I’ve competed several times, but obviously, I’ve never danced the dance,” I replied. “I’ve always kind of hoped that if ever my number came up and I did the dance for real, that someone as gifted as yourself would be at the party to capture my last moments. It’s so much less vulgar than people snapping photos or shooting videos with their phones.”

    “That’s very kind, Tracy,” replied, Sandra. “Tell me, have you had lunch yet?” I couldn’t fucking believe that Sandra Lachance was inviting me to lunch, but that’s exactly what happened next. She took me to a small, very cosy little French restaurant that was close to her studio. The cuisine was incredible. We were there for over two hours, talking about art, noose-dancing, how each of us got into it. I told her that I fully expected to die at he end of the rope one day; that it was my destiny, to which she replied by saying that she too wanted to end her days with a noose dance.

    “Tell me Tracy,” she inquired as we were finishing our coffee, are your personal affairs all in order?”

    “Yes; yes of course they are,” I answered.

    “As you know, I am about to retire as an artist. But before I do, I want to create one final, definitive work to mark my retirement. For this I need a model who will dance for me privately in my studio. Do you think you might be interested in being that model? she inquired gently and sincerely. She must have known I wanted that I very badly wanted to hang right in front of her, but she asked the question anyway.
   
    “Absolutely!” I blurted out. I must have sounded like an overexcited teenage girl about to get her first kiss from that dreamy guy on the football team.
 
    “You understand that this is a real dance, not a simulation and that if you walk into my studio, you will not leave it alive?”

    “I do!” I answered without hesitation. It’s one thing to attend a party knowing that you might be hanged, quite another to know that you will hang later that very afternoon, but at the same time, I knew that one way or the other, my number would come up at a party one day and I’d do the dance. And if I never got chosen at a party, then one day, I would just get bored with life or just decide that I had to find out then and there the answer to the question of what thoughts go through a person’s mind and what emotions they feel just as they tip over the chair or jump off the scaffold and before they touch bottom. There is no-way anyone can know this for sure without trying it. But then there was the Sandra LaChance factor. If I were the subject of her final work of art, then my passing would be immortalized and in some way, so would I. I could not possibly pass up this once in a lifetime opportunity, even if taking it meant the end of my life, at least in this spiritual plane.
 
    “Would you promise to use a good heavy rope, not some thin cord that would really cut into my neck?” I inquired.

    “I have an Italian silk hemp rope so thick we could use it to tie up the Queen Mary,”she responded.

    “When would you want me?” I inquired, knowing the answer already.

    “Immediately of course,” said Sandra gently. “My studio is just around the corner, and you’ve just had a meal very fitting or a last one, no?”  I agreed and she paid the cheque in cash, leaving a very generous tip for our waiter.

    “Merci, Mademoiselle Sandra. Merci beaucoup. On vous revoie demain a midi? he inquired in perfect Parisien French.

    “Non, je ne pense d’être disponible demain,” she repliedfollowed by a quick “Bonjour.”

    It was just a few minutes walk to the studio, and the whole time I kept thinking to myself that if I was to chicken out, now was the time to do it, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do that. I knew I would be dead by supper, but also famous by next week. Once inside the studio, she introduced me to hear apprentice, Amélie whom she instructed to bring out some brandy.

    “The work will take much of the afternoon,” insisted Sandra. We might as well be relaxed, n’est-ce pas?

    I agreed. She showed me to dressing room, complete with washroom and instructed me prepare undress and prepare myself carefully; my body would be on a medical examiner’s table tonight or tomorrow and it might even be in a tabloid photo somehow, though she hoped it wouldn’t be. I took my time and prepped myself as though I were going on a date with a hot guy, fully expecting to sleep with him. When I finished, I came out dressed in a bathrobe that Sandra had provided for me, though I doubted I would be wearing it for long. To my surprise, she too was now dressed in a robe; this one a short and slinky Asian thing with all sorts of beautiful embroidery. She gave me time to finish my brandy then motioned me over to a small table where some papers had been placed for me to sign. It was boiler plate stuff in which I essentially attested that I was a willing participant and committing suicide for artistic purposes, with no pressure of any sort; that the decision was mine, etc, etc. She then had me basically repeat all the same things in front of a video camera. Blah, blah. I was getting a bit bored actually.

    Finally, she asked me to disrobe and we walked together to her mini gallows. Yes, she actually had a short drop gallows right there in her studio. I looked at the noose and she had spoken the truth; the rope must have been a good inch-and-a-half in diameter; twice the normal. The coil was just huge. I was turned on just looking at it and I wanted badly to feel it around my neck. But first, Sandra bound my wrist to my waist using a special leather restraint. She then finally put the huge noose around my neck, tightening it and adjusting it the way she wanted it.

    “You are not too uncomfortable?” she inquired. “We will be working for a while in this position before the actual hanging,” she explained.

    “I’m just fine,” I assured her. She spent the next hour doing several sketches, from different angles. All the time, I asked if I might see them, but she denied the request, promising me that I could see them before she sprung the trap. Finally, she climbed back up on the scaffold, calling Amélie to come with her. When she got there, she instructed me to close my eyes and keep them closed until told to open them. I felt her loosen the noose as if to adjust it, but just then, I felt a naked body place itself back to back with mine.
 
    “Sandra?,” I inquired. “What are you doing?”

    “Shhh,” she hushed me. “Be quiet now and keep your eyes closed.” I obeyed. I felt a pair of hands adjusting the position of my head so that it was a little bit to the side of the one behind me, and I felt another pair of restraints binding my arms to the ones behind my own. I couldn’t believe what was happening. Sandra was standing on the same trap as me, the heavy noose around both our necks. I started to breath very hard.
I heard the ding of a small timer bell just then and Sandra told me to open my eyes. In front of me, Amélie was holding up the sketches Sandra had drawn. It was not clear why she hadn’t shown them to me before. She had included herself in them. She had also taken my suicide note and made a small sketch of me with the noose on, strangling.
 
    “We’re both going to hang that time runs out in less than three minutes,’ Sandra said. You have just that much time to ask me what you want to know before we die. Amélie will do the final sketches as we dance. Tomorrow, she will be the new Sandra LaChance in the world of noose art.”

    “Why are you hanging yourself as well?” I asked.

    “I told you that I was retiring from the art world. That alone will drive up the value of my work, but my death will cause it to skyrocket, especially a death this way.”
“But you won't be around to enjoy the wealth,” I protested. "So what’s the point?"

    “It’s not about wealth. It was never about wealth. It’s about fame; about reputation, about accomplishment, and yes, about art. It’s like you told me at lunch. You have always known you will die noose dancing, one way or the other. For me, it’s not that simple. Yes, it’s how I want to die, but whenever I compete try to compete at a party, I’m either shouted down or if my number comes up, someone else always jumps in my place to spare my life so that I can keep making sketches. I can’t dance at a party and I don’t want to dance by myself alone in my apartment when I’ve grown bored with life. I want to dance close to someone just like me. I want to die with someone who understands all the things that have been going threw my head since I was a teenage girl. At lunch today, you showed me that this person is you, and so now you and I dance together as noose sisters.

    “Noose sisters,” I thought. “That’s an interesting way of putting it.” Both our heads had been leaned backwards to facilitate the noosing and I could just see the corner of her left eye out of the corner of my own. Her perfume smelled wonderful and I thought to myself that there where a hell of a lot of worse persons to be strapped to in the last moments of my life.

    "But why not two nooses, instead of squeezing us both into one? Doesn't that make it more likely we'll take a long time to die?

    "Are you in hurry, or do you want to savour every moment of the experience?"  She answered. And besides, I want my last work of art to be as unique as possible. I think that just the way we are bound and noosed together is in itself a work of art. It is unique and I spent a great deal of time practicing how to do it with Amélie and making certain we would get it right.
   
    “Thank-you Sandra,” I said in a tiny voice, then made a kissing sound, to which she responded in kind. There wasn’t time for anything else. The bell timer rang again and the trap sprung open. Sandra and I fell about a foot and a half or so, coming to a jarring halt that made both our bodies jerk like rag dolls. The noose tightened instantly with such force that it tore large chunks of flesh from my neck. I felt it crush my trachea and started to do the noose dance with Sandra, our legs kicking one ant others as we did. Just for a moment, opened my left eye again, being able to just make out Sandra’s before closing it again to fight the pain.
   
    “Tomorrow I will be famous,” I think as the blackness begins to close in. "Adieu!"