To Mason,
my favorite little man
—Granny
Text copyright © 2010 by Whoopi Goldberg Illustrations © 2010 by Maryn Roos
All rights reserved. Published by Disney • Jump at the Sun Books, an imprint of Disney Book Group. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information address Disney • Jump at the Sun Books, 114 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10011-5690.
ISBN 978-1-4231-4149-5
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Table of Contents
Sugar Plum Ballerinas
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Jerzey Mae's Guide to Ballet Terms
Sugar Plum
Ballerinas
Book One Plum Fantastic
Book Two Toeshoe Trouble
Book Three Perfectly Prima
Chapter 1
I look at my new set of felt-tipped pens. There are thirty-six, all lined up neatly in the holder on my desk. Well, they’re neat now. At first, Forest Green was out of line by a sixteenth of an inch and Magenta’s label wasn’t facing straight up, but I got them back into place. So now, they’re perfect. Satisfied, I settle onto my pink canopy bed and open my book.
Then it starts. Thumping, thumping, and more thumping.
Then humming—the theme song for Robo-Knights, a cartoon about robot knights on wheels who don’t seem to do anything except crash into each other.
Then thumping and humming together.
“Mason!” I holler.
My door opens, and my seven-year-old brother sticks his head into the room. “What, Jerzey Mae?” he asks. He’s wearing his striped brown shirt, which makes his huge brown eyes look even darker. And his eyelashes are so long they look like giraffe eyelashes. It figures—he gets the long eyelashes, not me or either of my sisters. He dribbles his basketball as he watches me.
I sit up on my elbow and stare at him. “I’m trying to read. Can’t you stop humming and banging that ball around for two seconds?”
He looks at his watch, the big digital one Mom gave him for his last birthday. “Okay.” He stops the humming and the dribbling. Exactly two seconds later, he starts again. “You said two seconds.” He grins.
I jump to my feet and close the door in his face. I hear him laughing, “Hee hee hee!” as he dribbles down the hall. I yank open my dresser drawer and pull out some earplugs—pink, to match my room—and stuff them in my ears.
The door opens. It’s Mason again. He’s saying something.
I point to my earplugs.
He starts yelling so I can hear.
I sigh and pull out the earplugs. “What?”
“Can I use your new pens?”
“Well…” I say. At least it would keep him from thumping for a while.
“Please?” he asks.
“Okay,” I finally say.
A big smile spreads across his face. He heads to my desk, where I keep all my art supplies.
“But there are some rules,” I say.
He stops dead in his tracks. Then he looks over his shoulder at me. “You mean, like the keep-them-lined-up-in-a-row-in-order-by-color rule?”
“Yes,” I reply. “And the put-the-lids-back-on-before-you-put-them-down-even-if-you’re-going-to-use-them-again rule. And the put-them-back-in-the-holder-with-all-the-labels-facing-up rule.”
He backs away from my desk, looking pained. “Why do you have to have all these rules?” he says. “No one has rules for coloring.”
I don’t even know how to answer that. Everyone should have rules for coloring. “Well,” I say, “that way the pens stay perfect. They don’t get dried out like yours do. Besides, don’t you think pens look better all lined up neatly, instead of jumbled everywhere?”
“No,” he says. “I like jumbled.”
“Fine. Then go jumble your basketball, but you’re not jumbling my brand-new pens.”
He sighs deeply and turns to leave. As he does, he accidentally knocks over my pencil-holder, where I had all the pencils neatly arranged by height.
“Mason!” I moan, as the pencils roll across the floor.
“I’ll help, I’ll help,” he says. He starts picking up the pencils and putting them back, some pointing down, some pointing up, until I can’t stand it.
“Never mind! I’ll do it myself,” I say.
He races out the door.
After I pick up all the pencils and rearrange them, I close the door and start to read my book again. It’s the autobiography of Miss Camilla Freeman, a very famous prima ballerina. My friends and I all met her two weeks ago. Our ballet teacher, Ms. Debbé, had a very special pair of toe shoes autographed by Miss Camilla. My friend Brenda borrowed the shoes, although unfortunately Ms. Debbé did not exactly know that Brenda was borrowing them. And also unfortunately, Brenda’s cousin’s dog, Pookiepie, ate the shoes when no one was looking. We all went to see Miss Camilla to ask her for a pair of her toe shoes to replace the ones in Pookiepie’s stomach. Amazingly, everything turned out okay. We even got to have tea with Miss Camilla afterward, which was one of the Most Significant Experiences of my life.
Here is a list of some of the things I admire about Miss Camilla Freeman:
She was the first black ballerina with the Ballet Company of New York.
She was an incredible dancer, even though she is an old lady now.
She is extremely well dressed and elegant.
She is an only child. This means that she does not have a little brother.
Unfortunately, only list item number three is true about me. I am very particular (my sister JoAnn would say “fussy”) about my clothes, and I try to look nice. For instance, right now, even though I am sitting at home, I am wearing a very cute pink top and some jeans that fit me exactly right. As opposed to JoAnn, who always wears slobby old sweatpants and baseball caps, and Jessica, who wears odd combinations of things. That’s because while she is getting dressed, she’s usually thinking about some poem she’s writing instead of paying attention to what she’s doing.
But I will never be list item number one, the first black ballerina with the Ballet Company of New York, because it’s too late. And I will also never be list item number four, an only child, since I am a triplet and I have a little brother.
I would like to be list item number two, an excellent dancer. However, so far I am a dancing disaster.
Jessica is good at ballet. She learns the steps easily. One of her legs is shorter than the other, and she needs to wear a special ballet shoe, but you could never tell by watching her dance. She moves in a dreamy, graceful way, and Ms. Debbé says she is very artistic.
JoAnn is a natural athlete. Even though she’s not crazy about dancing, she’s really good at it. She powers through all the moves. Ms. Debbé keeps reminding her that ballet is an art, not a pole-vaulting contest.
I hate to admit this, even to myself, but I stink at ballet. I mean, really stink. I never move in the right direction. It takes me forever to learn the steps. Then, when I think I’ve learned them, I still mess them up. Even on the rare
—very rare—occasions when Ms. Debbé says I’ve done something well, I know that my foot was turned out a little more than it should have been, or that my fingers weren’t extended exactly right. The harder I try, the worse I get. Some kids mess up all the time and don’t seem to notice. I know every single time I make a mistake. It’s very frustrating.
And the worst thing is, I love ballet. I watch ballet DVDs all the time. I would love to be a prima ballerina, like Miss Camilla Freeman. It’s not fair that both my sisters are good at dancing when JoAnn doesn’t even care and Jessica would just as soon be writing poems or taking care of all her animals.
Tomorrow in ballet class, we’re going to find out about the dances for our Thanksgiving recital. If I were a good dancer, I’d be looking forward to this. Instead, I’m dreading it. It’s bad enough being a terrible dancer in ballet class twice a week. Being a terrible dancer up onstage in front of everyone is a total nightmare.
I hear thumping on the door.
“Mason, what is it?” I yell.
The door opens, but Mason isn’t the only one there—Jessica and JoAnn are right behind him. Everyone says we girls all look alike, but if they looked harder, they’d see that we’re very different. JoAnn’s arms and legs are thin and muscular from all the sports she does. Jessica’s body is more rounded, and her eyes are softer.
“We’re going down to play basketball,” JoAnn says. “Wanna come?”
Our house is almost at the end of our block, and there’s a little park with a basketball court right next door. Mason and JoAnn play basketball there a lot, and Jessica goes with them sometimes.
I don’t want to get my clothes dirty. Plus, I don’t know how to play basketball, and I wouldn’t be good at it even if I did know. I’ll look stupid enough in ballet class tomorrow; why start early?
“No, thanks,” I say.
“You should try it just once, Jerzey,” Jessica says. “It’s fun.”
“No, thanks,” I repeat. “I need to read this.”
After they leave, I put down the book and stare at my pink ceiling. In a few minutes I can hear the others laughing and playing outside in the park. I go to my window and look down at them. Their bodies are as small as tiny dolls in the fading light.
I think about the recital tomorrow. I wish a miracle would happen and make me good at ballet. But I know it won’t. Once again, I’ll be terrible. Once again, I’ll be thinking about all the mistakes I made while everyone else is all excited and happy after the show.
Once again, I will be a very tidy, impeccably costumed ballet loser.
Chapter 2
The next day, Mom walks us to the Nutcracker School of Ballet. JoAnn leads the way on her skateboard, while Jessica tells Mom about a cute thing Herman the iguana did this morning. I don’t know how she can use “cute” and “iguana” in the same sentence. Just walking into Jessica’s room at night gives me the creeps, with Herman scrabbling around in his tank and Shakespeare the rat looking at me with his beady little rat eyes.
I walk behind everyone else, partly because there’s no point in a ballet loser getting to class early, and partly because I’m trying not to step on cracks in the sidewalk. It’s kind of hard, because it’s the beginning of October and wet leaves are piled up all over. Their smell fills the air. I breathe deeply as I skip over a crack that almost catches me off guard. It’s not a normal one; it’s a huge one that snakes across the sidewalk and into the street. Maybe a piano fell from the apartment above or something. I veer away from the building just in case.
“Have a good class, lovely ballerinas,” Mom says when we reach the school. She pulls her coat tighter around her. “Dad will pick you up today.”
“Why?” JoAnn asks, flipping her skateboard up into the air and catching it neatly. “He never picks us up.”
“I need to go in to the office,” Mom says.
Mom’s a lawyer. She usually works part-time, but lately she’s been working more because of some big case. Whenever she talks about a big case, I can’t help thinking of a giant-size suitcase, one big enough for a whole family to sit comfortably in, maybe with room for some furniture and a wide-screen TV. I wonder where the TV could get plugged in, then realize Mom’s still talking.
“…It’s been very busy. Things might have to change a bit.”
“What things?” Jessica asks.
A few girls in our class weave between us as they go up the stairs. Mom glances at her watch and says, “Don’t worry, honey. It’s not a big deal. We’ll talk about it tonight.” She kisses each of us on the top of our heads.
Jessica looks at me. I look at Jessica. Something is definitely up.
“Get going! You’ll be late.” Mom waits for us to start up the stairs, then turns to hail a taxi.
“I wonder what that’s about,” Jessica says. Her forehead wrinkles in concern.
“Who knows?” JoAnn replies. “She said it was no big deal. Come on.” She leaps up the remaining steps three at a time, and we follow.
Epatha, Al, Terrel, and Brenda greet us as we walk into the waiting room. “Buenos días!” Epatha says. Her dad is Italian and her mom is from Puerto Rico, so she speaks English, Spanish, and Italian—sometimes all at the same time. “Where have you guys been?” she asks. “You’re usually really early.”
Epatha is wearing a fluorescent orange leotard and tights. She looks like one of those glow sticks people carry around on Halloween. How do they even make that color? Maybe it’s radioactive. But they wouldn’t put radioactive stuff in kids’ clothes. Would they?
JoAnn sticks her skateboard under one of the benches. “We had to wait for Jerzey. One of the loops on her shoelaces was bigger than the other one, so she had to fix it. It only took about twenty minutes.” She rolls her eyes toward the ceiling, and the other girls laugh.
I feel myself flush. “Very funny,” I say. I think again about Miss Camilla’s being an only child. I wonder if some family would want to adopt a tidy, well-behaved nine-year-old. It would be a lot neater than adopting some baby that spits up all the time and needs to have its diapers changed.
Jessica changes the subject quickly. “We find out about the Thanksgiving dance today, right?”
“We do? Oh, man. I’m going home,”
Al says. Al accidentally ended up with the starring role in our last school recital, even though she had really bad stage fright and her turns were terrible. Until Brenda, Terrel, and Epatha taught her how to turn, Al spinning used to look like a tornado wobbling through a town, wreaking a path of destruction wherever it went.
Epatha elbows her. “Aah, come on. You were una stella brillante, a shining star.”
Brenda, as usual, has her nose stuck in a very thick science book. I make a point of not looking at it. Her books are always full of pictures of human intestines and other slimy organs, because she wants to go to medical school. She looks up. “Anyway, dance Thanksgiving a for do you do what?”
Brenda talks backward. She thinks talking that way will rewire her brain to make her smarter. She is very smart, so it must be working. We can all understand her, but grown-ups can’t, which can be useful at times.
“I dunno,” Terrel says, adjusting her left ballet slipper. “Dress up like turkeys?”
Ms. Debbé appears in the doorway. She is extremely elegant, just like Miss Camilla. Today Ms. Debbé is wearing a peacock blue turban and a black blouse and pants. A shimmering blue-and-green shawl envelops her. She looks as if she belongs on a barge floating down the Nile like Cleopatra, instead of in a ballet studio.
She thumps her walking stick on the ground. “The class, it begins,” she says. She turns and drifts up the staircase. We all follow. I watch Ms. Debbé closely and try to drift up the stairs the way she does. I concentrate so hard on drifting that I stumble, and Jessica has to grab my elbow to keep me from falling.
Chapter 3
We enter the studio. The barre runs along the length of the wall, and spots of weak autumn sunlight dapple the floor.
/> “Sit,” Ms. Debbé commands. We all sit on the floor, all of us Sugar Plum Sisters—that’s what my friends and I call ourselves—clumped together. Across the room, a girl wearing a glittery tiara stares at us. Epatha quickly sticks out her tongue at her. Tiara Girl sticks her tongue out in response—but not fast enough.
“Ballerinas, they do not stick out tongues,” Ms. Debbé says, rapping her stick on the floor sharply and glaring at Tiara Girl. “Ballet is about grace and loveliness. It is not about tongues sticking out like the giraffe grabbing at leaves on a tree.”
Epatha snickers, and JoAnn bumps knuckles with her while Ms. Debbé is looking the other way.
Ms. Debbé continues. “Now. The Thanksgiving dance. What is Thanksgiving? What does it mean? Who can tell me?”
Tiara Girl raises her hand. “You eat a lot, and you don’t have to go to school.”
Ms. Debbé’s eyebrow shoots up. “Well, those are some things about Thanksgiving.”
Other girls offer ideas.
“Turkey?”
“Pilgrims?”
“Native Americans?”
Clearly we’re not giving her the answers she wants. Finally, Jessica raises her hand.
“It’s about being thankful.”
“Exactly!” Ms. Debbé raps her stick so sharply that I’m surprised it doesn’t punch through the floor. “It is being thankful! It is gratitude! So this year, those ideas will be our dances. We will all dance our gratitude, our thankfulness, for things we love.”
JoAnn looks horrified. She’s not the touchy-feely type. She would be much happier dancing the Ice Hockey dance or the Changing the Oil in the Truck dance.
“So,” Ms. Debbé continues. “What are you grateful for? Think about things that make you happy, about stories you love, about people in your life.”
“My cat,” a tiny girl in the front says.
Ms. Debbé says, “Yes. The cats, they are very nice. Good. What else?”
“Ice skates,” says Al.
“Bright colors,” says Epatha.
Perfectly Prima Page 1
