Cyril Jones was a soft spoken boy with a baby round face, thin and flexible. As he started school, being an only child, he was very quiet yet intelligent. During the first term, one of the year 4 boys tried to dominate all of the new boys in school. When he went to punch Cyril, he missed and ended up face forward in the dirty brown puddle of water. To make thing worse, the headmaster saw his actions and could not help himself from laughing loudly. He told the year 4 boy to go to his office and wait until lunch break is finished. Due to his bullying ways he was expelled from school. They had a lot of complaints from parents on his bullying but this was the first time he saw him trying to bully anyone.

Cyril was treated with respect from that day. When he reached the age of 8, his father enrolled him into team sports but he failed. In the third term he was enrolled in fencing. Now in this he did excel and won the school competition. Personally he only did the sport to please his father. At the start of the next school year, he saw some boys dancing and decided to try it. He loved it, not ballroom dancing but ballet dancing. His mother enrolled him into the local dancing school making sure his hours did not conflict with his fathers decision to do fencing. The father did not want his son associated with that gay sport of ballet.

In the second week of dancing school, he watched the boys doing Ballet and followed their training steps, he was noticed by the ballet dance teacher and she realised he had the gift. At the end of his lesson she asked him to stay for another 30 minutes. Just as well as mum was late in pickup. She taught him a few more steps and he just clicked with it. He had found his passion, funny thing was his ballet dancing was extremely helpful to his fencing. It was only, because of this reason, he was allowed to continue ballet. He combined the strength, stretching, and poise of both sports daily at home for at least an hour. By the end of term two he had advanced three levels in both sports.

Cyril continued to advance rapidly in both sports until he went to high school at 11 years old. It was then he had to make a choice, but circumstances did make the decision very hard. His father was killed in an industrial accident and his company tried to cover up their lack of safety procedures. Cyril had to choose between ballet and fencing. He choose ballet. Lucky his fathers company did agree to pay for his lessons and costs whilst he was at school, which did please his mother.

In ballet he excelled with his skills, so much so, that they recommended he join the state ballet company, however his mother could not get him to classes being 150k away. His studio teacher did give him extra lessons every week. He collected three eisteddfod chairs for his standard of work. At 16 he was awarded a scholarship to cover his ballet and schooling at a private school in the state capital. His fathers company did pay his mother $25,000 to assist, which meant he could attend. Cyril was so happy. On leaving his dancing school he advised he would never forget them and was proud to wear their badge.

Two years later he was recommended for a role in the state annual ballet. Whilst he was in the area, he called into the performance area and seeing the stage was vacant, he asked the caretaker if he could look at the performance floor and do a couple of jumps. He agreed and in his 15 years of the role he had never seen or be asked by anyone to look pre performance.

He took off his joggers and in bare feet he practised his turns and jumps on the stage, just for the feel of the area. He did the third act in the play and unknown to him he did have an audience. A man called out to him “What are you doing on stage boy?”

Cyril replied “Just asked the caretaker if I could have a quick practice on this floor. I have to do an audition here tomorrow. Not knowing the stage I do like to check them out sir.”

He asked “What’s your name young man?”

Cyril answered “Cyril Jones sir. If you wish I can come back tomorrow sir?”

He seemed to smile “No. You continue, I like a go-getter who put in that extra bit. Carry on.”

Cyril did not really see who he was talking to, but did some more practice for the next ten minutes. When he finished he put on his shoes and said “I shall leave you in peace sir.”

He answered “Nice style son, good luck at your audition.”

Cyril replied “Thank you sir.” and walked out to thank the caretaker.

The caretaker asked “Did the old man in the audience say anything?”

Cyril replied “He was quite happy to let me finish, he said he liked people that put in that extra bit. Why do you know him?”

The caretaker smiled “See me after your audition son and we will talk, I have some work to do now and good luck tomorrow.” Cyril left the hall for his accommodation.

Cyril had now completed his schooling and came in the top five students of the school and state exams. He was happy with the results. All he needed to do now was pick a future life.

At the audition they were all dressed and given numbers to place on both back and front of their leotards where the judges could clearly see them. Five minutes before the music call this older man walked in dressed in a scruffy leotard and quite a few guys groaned at his attendance. He had played the lead role for the last five years and was a pain to work with. Cyril did not know his history. All of the males were required to do ten single spins then march off the stage. If your number was called you exited the stage area, you were out. Of the first thirty some 15 exited. There were only five roles for the males. 40 for the female roles. The next was a series of three leaps across the stage, the males dropped to six, Cyril still being alive. The final test was one minute action from the third act. Cyril was first. He presented, did two leaps, three single spins and pirouette, presenting to the audience. He walked off the stage to mild applause. The next three did similar parts but no applause. The final one was the older man. Well he was so cocky he did not present and did the same move as Cyril except he only did two spins where as the act required three. He walked off stage, again no presentation, knowing he was going to get the role just through experience.