Tiny Pretty Things (2 page)

I prepare to dance, waiting for the chord of music to start moving. My mind quiets: the worries, the criticisms, the faces in the glass all drift away. I see Will ahead waiting for me. I pretend that it’s Henri. I step into my first movement, folding myself into the music, each arm motion embodying the cadence. I jump and turn and leap and glide. I flutter over to Will.

“Right on the melody,” Morkie yells.

Will’s hands find my waist. He lifts me up into a flying shoulder lift. His right shoulder presses into my butt, carrying my weight, effortless.

“She’s not a box, William,” Morkie says. “She’s a jewel. Carry her like one. So pretty. So light.”

His fingers press into my hipbones as he struggles to hold me there.

“Beautiful, beautiful,” Morkie yells over the music. “Smile, Cassandra.”

I smile as hard as I can. I keep my eyes on the mirror and focus on Morkie’s instructions. Here comes the fish dive, slow, graceful, deliberate. Except it’s not. Will’s not supporting my weight anymore, and I wobble, trying to counterbalance, but it’s too late. His fingers feel like they’ve disappeared. Not at all like we’ve practiced. With his support gone, my right leg drops.

I topple, like I’ve fallen off the edge of a cliff. The floor feels so far away until I hit it.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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THEY SAY ANTICIPATION IS SOMETIMES
sweeter than the actual event, so I’m going to enjoy every moment of the waiting. Mr. K certainly loves dragging it out. We swarm around him in the American Ballet Conservatory lobby, waiting for his annual speech on
The Nutcracker
. Then he’ll reveal the student cast list. Twice a year, in the fall and the spring, students get to replace the company dancers for a night at Lincoln Center, a test of our mettle. A taste of our future.

That piece of paper basically sums up your worth in our school, the American Ballet Company feeder academy. And I’m worth a lot. Alec and I hold hands and I can’t contain my smile. In just a few moments, my name is going to be on the wall next to the role of Sugar Plum Fairy, and the rest of my life can finally begin.

I saw my older sister, Adele, dance the role six years ago, when I was cast in the part of a cherub and bouncing around in gold wings and my mother’s lipstick. Back then, the anticipation
wasn’t
the best part. Back then, the best part was the heat of the lights on my skin and the presence of the audience before us, and dancing in perfect time with my little ballet girlfriends. The best part was the scratchy tights and the sweet metallic smell of hair spray and the sparkling tiara pinned into my baby-fine hair. The glitter dusted onto my cheeks. The best part was the hole of nervousness in my stomach before getting onstage and the rush of joy after we pranced off. The best part was bouquets of flowers and kisses on both cheeks from my mother and my father lifting me in the air and calling me a princess.

Back then, it was
all
the best part.

The school’s front doors are closed and locked. Mr. K’s speech is that important. I glance over my shoulder through the big lobby windows and see a few people with red noses, bundled up to fight the October air. They’re stuck on the stairs and in the Rose Abney Plaza, named after my grandmother. That door won’t open again until he’s finished. They’ll just have to freeze.

Mr. K rubs his well-groomed beard, and I know he’s ready to start. I know these little things about him, thanks to Adele, a company soloist. I straighten up a bit more and wrap my hand around Alec’s neck, tickling the place where his buzzed blond hair meets his skin. He grins, too, both of us perfectly poised to finally take our places as the leads in the winter ballet.

“This is it,” I whisper in his ear. He smiles back and kisses my forehead. He’s flushed with excitement, too, and I just know that from here on out I will love everything about ballet again. Both of our auditions went well. I remember how ridiculously happy Adele looked when she was dancing the Sugar Plum Fairy, and how the role got her plucked straight out of the school and given a spot in the company, and I just dream of feeling that full. There’s no one standing in my way. Liz is struggling a little bit this year. And no one else can do what I can.

I drop my hand down to his and squeeze Alec a little tighter. Alec’s best friend—my ex-friend—Will glares at me. Jealous.

Parents and siblings grow quiet, standing behind the expanse of black leotards.

“Casting each of you in
The Nutcracker
isn’t just an exercise in technique,” Mr. K begins. Our ballet master speaks slowly, like he’s just deciding on the words right now, even though he gives some version of this speech every year. Yet I cling to every word, like I’ve never heard it before. Mr. K is the single most deliberate human being I’ve ever met. He makes eye contact with me, and I know my fate is cemented in that quick connection. That look my way is purposeful. It has to be. I bow my head a bit with respect, but can’t stop the edges of my mouth from doing their own little upward pull.

“Technique is the foundation of ballet, but personality is where the dance comes to life. In
The Nutcracker,
each character serves an important purpose to the ballet as a whole, and that is why we take such care in assigning each of you the perfect part. Who you are comes across in how you dance. I’m sure we all remember when Gerard Celling danced the Rat King last winter, or when Adele Abney danced the Sugar Plum Fairy. These were seminal performances that displayed unbelievable technique as well as exquisite joy and beauty. The students stopped being students and transformed into artists, like a caterpillar leaves its chrysalis and becomes what it was designed to be—a butterfly.”

Mr. K calls us his butterflies. We’re never his students, dancers, athletes, or ballerinas. When we graduate, he’ll give the best dancer a diamond butterfly pendant—Adele still only takes hers off for performances.

“It is because of Adele’s and Gerard’s relationships to the roles of Sugar Plum Fairy and Rat King that they experienced such success,” he adds. “It was the connection they forged with the part.”

I bow my head even farther. Mr. K talking about my sister is another deliberate nod to me, I’m sure of it. Adele’s performance as the Sugar Plum Fairy has been a topic of conversation since the first night she’d performed it six years ago. She was only in ballet Level 6 and hadn’t even turned fifteen yet. It was unheard of for such a young dancer to be given such a role over the older Level 8 girls. And when I was that seven-year-old cherub hugging my sister with my fiercest pride and congratulations, Mr. K approached us both with a confident smile.

“Adele, you are luminous,” he’d said. It’s a word I have been itching for him to call me ever since. He still hasn’t. Not yet. “And darling little Bette, I can tell from your lovely dancing tonight that, in no time at all, you will be following in your sister’s footsteps. A Sugar Plum Fairy in the making.” He’d winked, and Adele had beamed at me with agreement.

He is surely referring to that moment now. He is letting me remember his prediction and assuring me that he had been right all those years ago.

I shift onto my tiptoes, unable to suppress that bit of excitement. Alec squeezes my hand.

Mr. K’s voice softens. “Young Clara, for instance, must be sweet and invoke the wonder of Christmas with every step and glance.” His gaze drifts to a pretty
petit rat
in a navy blue leotard, her dark hair in a perfect bun. She blushes from the attention, and I’m happy for tiny Maura’s moment of joy. I played Clara when I was eleven. I know the thrill, and she deserves to experience every second of it.

Years later, I still think of that performance as the most fun I’ve ever had. It was right after the Christmas season that my mother started showing me old videos of Adele and asking me to compare my technique to hers. It was that Christmas when everything between my mother, Adele, and me shifted beyond recognition, distorting into a bad TV drama. I get a little light-headed just thinking about it. I can still hear the whir of the X-ray camera like it was yesterday. Looking too hard at those memories isn’t a good idea, so I close my eyes for an instant to make the thoughts disappear, as I always do. I give Alec’s hand another squeeze and try to focus. This is my big moment.

“Uncle Drosselmeyer must be mysterious and clouded—a man with a secret,” Mr. K says. “The Nutcracker Prince should be regal and full of confidence. Untouchable and elegant, but still masculine.” Mr. K looks then at Alec, who breaks out into a fully dimpled grin. He is describing Alec to a tee, and I lean against him a bit. He lets go of my hand and wraps his arm around my shoulders. As if this moment weren’t wonderful enough, Alec’s affection has me soaring even higher. Mr. K lists off a few more characters and the necessary qualities the dancers must bring to them. I smooth my hair to make sure I look perfect for my big moment.

“And the Sugar Plum Fairy,” Mr. K continues, his eyes searching the crowd. “She must be not only beautiful but kind, joyful, mysterious, and playful.” His eyes are still searching the crowd, which is strange, since he knows exactly where I am. I try to dismiss it as a bit of Mr. K playing around, as he’s known to do.

The Sugar Plum Fairy’s ideal qualities—they’re not mine. They are not words anyone has ever used to describe me.

But the part is mine. I know it is because of the way Mr. K finishes his speech.

“Above all else,” he says, “the Sugar Plum Fairy must be luminous.”

I squeeze Alec’s hand again.

That is me.

I am luminous, like Adele. It is me. It has always been me.

But still, Mr. K’s eyes do not find their way to mine.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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I NIBBLE AT MY BOTTOM
lip until I taste blood. The spot is a tiny heart thumping harder than the one in my chest. My teeth sink into the cut despite the sting, and I can’t stop. I won’t go to the bathroom to see how bad it is. I can’t miss all the excitement. I can’t be anywhere else.

Shoulder to shoulder, we are a sea of paper-thin bodies. One large gust could push us around, like the fall leaves tumbling past the lobby’s picture windows. We are that light, that vulnerable, that afraid. Nervous excitement flutters through me. Even the little ones, the
petit rats,
gnaw at their fingernails, and the boys hold their breaths. The gurgles of half-empty stomachs churning a ballet diet of grapefruit and energy tea invade small pockets of silence when Mr. K finally pauses, all
showmanship.

We listen intently. The occasional whisper is a firework. The melody of his Russian accent makes the words feel heavier, more important. He paces before us, waving his hands in fiery motions, and leaving the scent of cigarettes and warm vodka wrapped around us. I fixate on every word coming out of Mr. K’s mouth like I could catch each one in a mason jar.