Bright Burning Stars

by A. K. Small

  A lump in my throat made it impossible to swallow but because we were looking into each other’s eyes, some of the emptiness subsided.

  “I’m glad you came to visit,” he said, then, smiling, “One more thing. Would you do a back bend?”

  For the hundredth time, I found myself blushing. Practicing a cambré en arrière was common but doing it on the boys’ floor with The Demigod staring felt different. Intimate. Even risqué. I slid my feet into fifth position, making a couronne with my arms. I lifted my rib cage toward the ceiling, dug my heels into the floor, and bent back until my torso tilted upside down, the tips of my fingers grazing my hamstrings.

  “If this were a test,” Cyrille said, “I’d give you a ten out of ten. See you tomorrow night?”

  Yes, I thought, but then he added, chuckling, “Just don’t wear those overalls.”

  Blood rose to my cheeks again, but before I could reply or smack him, Cyrille reached over and grabbed my hand, making me melt.

  “Anger is good sometimes,” he said as if to apologize.

  “You’re a piece of work,” I said, but then I offered him my sweetest smile.

  A door slammed.

  “You better go,” Cyrille said.

  I ran down the hall, into the stairwell, all the way down the five floors. I didn’t pay attention to the sharp pang in my heart, to the twist deep in my gut. I could only think about how storm-gray his eyes were beneath those long lashes, how he’d called me pretty and had understood me better than anyone. My mother’s absence was as thick as the brush bordering the river behind our backyard.

  In the common room, M was finishing up. Some of the younger rats were placing their shoes in their ballet bags. Others were admiring the stitching. I couldn’t look M in the eyes and I could hardly breathe.

  “Where have you been?” she said.

  The question made the little rats stop, curtsy, and wait for an answer.

  “Sweeping?”

  I helped M pack all the demi pointes, pointe shoes, ribbons, and rubber bands. When we got back to the room, I was so unglued by the trip upstairs that all I said was that I needed to study.

  Marine stood by her desk, the bag overflowing with ribbons still on her shoulder, eyes dark. “You went to see him.”

  I nodded.

  “Were you planning to tell me?”

  “Yes. But not in front of half of the Sixth Division.”

  “Anything happen?”

  “No,” I said, relieved that here I was telling the truth. “He wants me to come back tomorrow.”

  Marine put away her bag and changed into her nightgown. I did the same. In the bathroom, we brushed our teeth and washed our faces in silence.

  “I don’t think you should go,” Marine said as she slipped into bed and brought the covers up to her shoulders.

  I kept my night-light on and spread my notebooks across my lap. I thought about how a lower-division parent had once said that boarding school made girls age faster than normal, but when it came to M, I decided it was the exact opposite. It was almost as if Nanterre had frozen Marine into a thirteen-year-old forever. Sure, M had a crush on Cyrille, too, but in the same way she crushed on celebrities. The more unattainable the person, the more she loved them.

  When I couldn’t take the silence anymore, I turned to her to say something like, “Don’t worry. Our bond is unbreakable no matter what. The moon is made of hardened lava. Remember?” But M was curled up and fast asleep.

  Outside our room, girls laughed. It was Friday night. Some of the older rats would play foosball in the common room, maybe smoke unfiltered Gauloises or Gitanes, hiding in the bathroom, or spin the bottle when no one was looking, but I reached for the red construction paper instead, cut out hearts, dipped them in my favorite sandalwood essential oil, and wrote down more questions.

  five

  Marine

  Early Saturday morning, I sat in the foul Ajax-smelling cafeteria beside Luc, my pas de deux partner from last year and only guy friend. It was sort of an unspoken tradition: he and I, eating together on weekends. The Nanterre cafeteria was modern, a rectangle with large windows and a courtyard view. If everyone congregated inside, which happened between eight thirty and ten a.m. on weekends, the noise could be deafening.

  Today, aside from a row of younger boys gorging themselves on demi baguettes lathered with butter and raspberry jam at one table and the Fifth Division girls getting ready for Saturday school at another, Luc and I were alone.

  “Müesli?” He slid his cereal bowl over to me. He’d cut a banana in it and I watched the little circles float around.

  “No thanks,” I said, then I added, “How soon do you think we’ll find out about anchor partners?” My stomach growled and I hoped he didn’t hear.

  Luc shrugged. His hair was uncombed, the color of wet sand.

  “I bet they’ll give me someone on probation,” he said.

  I shook my head. “It’ll be sad when they split us. I’ll miss you.”

  “Liar.”

  “I’m not,” I answered.

  It was true, the missing part. But I also knew that faculty would assign us new partners to see how we adapted to different styles, to see who shone with whom. You couldn’t fake chemistry. Luc and I had been good partners. Maybe even great. Luc was a jazz fanatic, a piano player with a keen ear who’d been nicknamed Scales. We’d bonded over music, over counter notes. We’d rapped melodies. Laughed when we messed up steps or accidentally hurt each other, which happened a lot. Luc’s only downside was height. At our measuring last fall, he’d been only two centimeters taller than me. Faculty liked five to thirteen centimeters between rat partners.

  Of course now, knowing that this year was my final opportunity to go after The Prize, I did, secretly, want to partner with The Demigod. Who didn’t? He was self-explanatory: well-worn leather jacket, tall, olive skin, sinewy muscles. Most importantly: Number 1 on The Boards. Every rat-girl’s dream. Ever since that moment at the start of term when Kate had gushed over him, I saw his glow too, plain as day. And hadn’t I ranked higher than Kate for the first time? That was something. But I also knew my own weaknesses. As The Witch liked to remind me, I had the body of a flamenco dancer, not of a classical one. I had a small waist but unfortunately too-wide hips, which had formed very late. Dancing with Cyrille was a pipe dream.

  Luc drummed his fingers on the table, told me he was working on a new piece full of cross rhythm and did I want to hear it, but then he pushed himself back and out of his chair. “Never mind,” he said. “I’m off. Deities and divas are here.”

  When I turned to see what he was talking about, most of the First Division crowd was coming in. They wore their ivory leotards. Some sported stirrup leggings, others jumpsuits and leg warmers. The girls’ buns were as tight as peaches and the boys’ hair was gelled back. I was hoping to see Kate’s face, to wave her over, but Kate wasn’t there. The lower divisions stopped what they were doing and ogled them like rock star groupies. My ears warmed. I dug inside my bag and pretended to search for one of my notebooks. Then, I looked back up.

  Cyrille led the pack. Within seconds, he’d plopped his tray by the window-table closest to mine. If I reached my arm out to the right, I’d touch him. I was so overwhelmed by his presence, by the way he grabbed a huge bite of croissant, and by the butter-shine stuck to his lips, that I barely noticed Short-Claire following him like a puppy, then sitting across from him. Or Ugly Bessy and The Brooder choosing seats to his left, or Colombe and Marie-Sandrine also sitting at that table despite Jean-Paul’s leers, or Sebastian, who wore a pink tee with the words Drag Queen written on it. I did hear Bruno, the soft-in-the-middle rat who always wore a holey winter hat no matter the season, say “Good morning” and I whispered it back.

  Cyrille’s hair was wild and wavy and he was not dressed in ballet clothes. A gray scarf wrapped around his neck. For
a second, I thought he looked up from his plate and scrutinized me. Me! Sit up straight, I coached myself. Borrow some of Kate’s confidence. But all I could do was glance back at him and think, Tu es Le Demi-Dieu. You are The Demigod. What was wrong with me? I was under a spell. My body tensed. My hands felt icy. Cyrille had this weird magnetic scent to him, a combination of musk and sweat that followed him like a cape and overpowered the Ajax.

  Cyrille gestured toward The Ruler, who was making her way to their table. Gia’s nickname had been bestowed upon her because, from the side, she was as wide as one. Plus, she ruled The Boards. She’d ranked first since last spring. Her thighs looked like arms. And her arms like thick rope.

  She smiled at me and I politely smiled back.

  “God I hate her,” Bessy murmured from her seat.

  “Ditto,” Isabelle said, kohl already spreading under her eyes.

  I didn’t hate The Ruler. I did envy the fact that Gia flaunted her extra-bony rib cage without meaning to. That all her poet shirts draped too large on her. And that five ribs consistently poked out from above the pinched-front neckline of her leotards. The consensus was that four or more ribs should protrude above the line, not counting collarbone or sternum.

  “My lady,” Cyrille said.

  Gia bowed gracefully.

  Cyrille stood up and said, “Jean-Paul and Sebastian are requesting a short performance, a morning pas de deux. Would you do me the honor?”

  “Cafeteria pas de deux! Cafeteria pas de deux!” the two boys shouted, slamming their fists on the table, making all the other boys join in.

  “Now?” Gia replied, lifting her puzzled gaze to them.

  “Please!” Sebastian hooted.

  Gia wore one of her signature ivory shirts with butterfly sleeves atop her leotard. As if she’d known this dance was coming, she’d put on tights and leg warmers. Her pointe shoes were fastened. Cyrille grabbed her fingers and between the tables they began the white swan pas de deux. What I noticed was not that their bodies merged and unmerged naturally or that Gia laughed as she tipped her long leg into a gorgeous arabesque. It wasn’t that the whole cafeteria quieted and that all one could hear was the soft squeaking of their shoes. What I noticed for the very first time since Cyrille had transferred from the conservatory was the resemblance—not in looks but in skill—between Cyrille and Oli, or what Oli would have danced like at seventeen had he lived.

  Cyrille owned the stage. He wore a carefree attitude and a relaxed upper body. His movements alongside Gia’s were clean. Every jump seemed an explosion, every balance a delightful game of gravity. He held his positions with confounding authority, like a surgeon might hold his tools. At the perfect moment, he drew back and accentuated Gia’s impeccable technique. I couldn’t look away. Between chairs, he threw her into the air, then demonstrated his own perfect splits, meters off the ground, feet pointed like daggers. As a finale, The Demigod did a quadruple tour en l’air to the right, never once brushing the back of a chair, while Gia held another long arabesque. They came together and spun until their bodies were one, his jeans a blur of blue ink.

  While everyone in the cafeteria clapped and hollered, my throat squeezed shut. Nothing here came easy. Not even the smallest step. An optional and illegal pas de deux (you didn’t dance outside the studio for fear of hurting yourself) was preposterous; something I would never do. But Oli would have.

  Jean-Paul and Sebastian were showering the performers with kisses. The cafeteria ladies stomped their feet behind the counters. The Third and Fourth Division rats who’d come in the midst of it were sitting at a table still transfixed.

  Gia said, after bowing once, “Calm down or Madame Brunelle will show up and punish us all.” She laughed, not a hair wisp out of place.

  I waited for the frantic clapping to settle down. Then I walked away, dropping my utensils in the soapy bucket. Cyrille is what Oli could have been, I thought. At once, the Oli-pain sideswiped me. It had been more than six years since Oli died, but I still missed him the way I sometimes missed food. The withdrawals were physical, like a surge of acid inside my gut. I inhaled, blinked, and saw him, mon petit Oli, stretched out, back on the concrete. I gritted my teeth.

  Toute ma faute. All my fault.

  Acid, remnants of burned toast, and black coffee rose in my throat. I forced everything back down into the pit of my stomach. When the wave of nausea dissipated, I hurried to the door. Everyone roamed and chatted loudly in the cafeteria, and the noise bothered me. But before I could get out into the quieter hallway, Little Alice, my Sixth Division mentee, curtsied in her pale pink leotard and threw herself into my arms.

  “I want to dance like them someday,” she said.

  “Me too.”

  Seeing this raw desire from such a young apprentice made me suddenly envious not only for better technique, skill, and guts, but also for acclaim. I vowed to count my calories even more carefully, to cut in half every bite of food going into my body, and to keep on dedicating myself to ballet. Then maybe someday soon I would be the one to make Oli proud and to take everyone’s breath away.

  six

  Kate

  Saturday night couldn’t come fast enough. I’d skipped breakfast, slept in. I’d spent the afternoon working on my new générale—an under-one-minute beast of an allegro full of jetés and soubresauts from a Gershwin piece Monsieur Chevalier had assigned. I’d studied for a chemistry test in the language lab. My goal was to maintain my grades (they were average) and to keep my mind busy, off the rumor I’d heard during one of my cigarette breaks that Gia and Cyrille had danced inside the cafeteria, and that Short-Claire had sworn it meant something symbolic.

  I also wanted to stay away from M because I didn’t know how to explain the details of what had happened upstairs yet. Unlike with Saar, where I’d divulged everything to Marine, from the plunks of the hairpins on the conference table to the taste of his slightly sour lips, last night’s chat with Cyrille had felt personal and more profound somehow. In the privacy of his dorm room, The Demigod had been tender, compassionate, and part fairy tale. Forever washed in a shimmer of golden dust. Something I did not want to share, not even with M. Now I felt like a double-crosser. But if things went my way, I might be able to ask favors for M too. Maybe Cyrille could sprinkle a little of his magic on her as well. Help her pirouette once or twice while The Witch was watching. Why not? I would rise, M would rise, and the Moon Pact would live on.

  I waited until it was dark before climbing the back stairwell. I ducked behind the railing and avoided Monsieur Arnaud, the housemaster who was patrolling the third floor. But when I got to Cyrille’s room, Jean-Paul poked his head out.

  “Cyrille’s not around, mon sucre d’orge,” he said.

  It was true. I knocked on his door and no one answered. When I dared to turn the handle, to peek inside his room, the single was empty, his bed unmade. Dance magazines were tossed on the floor next to street clothes, some kind of journal, and dance tights. I longed to go in and snoop around, to read through his deepest thoughts, but I knew that J-P was watching my every move, so all I did was take one more glance in Cyrille’s room, at his desk, where my red heart still lay next to a sandwich wrapper. At its sight, I nearly cried with happiness.

  “Tick-tock,” Jean-Paul said.

  I had no choice but to bolt back down the steps.

  For the next week, I went up the stairs every night. Once, I bumped into Luc, who sat in the stairwell humming a jazz tune, pretending to play the piano in the air. At the sight of me, he stopped, raised a sharp eyebrow, and asked me what the hell I was doing. Another time I found Bruno smoking a joint. When he offered me the blunt, I took it and inhaled deeply, hoping that this time Cyrille would open his door and invite me back in. But each night the same thing happened: Jean-Paul told me to go away. The worst part was that during the day, I sat two desks behind Cyrille in French Lit. As the class discussed émile Zola�
�s Germinal, I couldn’t concentrate. Instead, I stared across the empty desk at the back of his neck. I sat on my hands, afraid I might reach out and touch him.

  At lunch on Wednesday, M plunked her tray next to mine.

  “Talk to me,” she said.

  I picked up a green bean from my plate and bit into it.

  When M asked if The Demigod situation was the problem, I shrugged.

  “You’ve been staring at him for days.” M covered my palm with hers. “Remember the odalisques?” she said. “How at the entrance auditions, we’d noticed them on the palace’s wall because there was a dark- and light-haired one, like you and me.”

  I nodded. Of course I remembered the odalisques.

  But then M flashed me a sad smile and only poked at her food. I finished my green beans, stood up, and grabbed her hand.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said.

  On Friday, Gia came first on The Boards, Bessy second, me third, and Marine fourth. As usual, Gia was absent from the ratings. Bessy gloated. Marine did not eat for the rest of the day and I decided I wasn’t going back up the boys’ stairwell. I didn’t want to humiliate myself any more. I couldn’t bear Jean-Paul calling me his candy cane, son chamallow, sa coucougnette de Pau, or any other lame French candy. After dinner, I left the cafeteria and walked over to the language lab, longing to Skype with my dad in private.

  As I crossed the outside path, a cool breeze and clouds overhead reminded me that soon enough it would be winter, that the doors would be locked until spring. The academic building was empty. I walked by dark classrooms and used my lab card to get in. There was something about the lab—the humming of the computers, the English words welcome, goodbye dangling from the ceiling. I loved and hated it at the same time. I sat down, logged on to my account, and within seconds, my father’s face popped up on the screen.

  “Katie,” he said. “What’s happening?”

  “I’ll never be Number One,” I replied, all of a sudden yearning for his arms to wrap around me.