And if he had really wanted to know
He should have asked Anne.
But I stupidly say I’ll find out
And he agrees to call me after school.
Ruby Rappaport’s car is in the shop
So I ride the evil bus down Harris Avenue,
Heart pounding,
Unusually distracted.
By the time the bus arrives
At the studio,
I have decided Barry was trying
To ask me to the dance
And that I should suggest we go together
When he calls.
I cannot sit still.
Pace the studio halls
Trying to forget
The tantalizing electricity of Rem’s lips,
The disapproval in Don’s stare,
The urgent knot in my stomach,
Until my cell rings
Three minutes before class.
I slide into a corner.
“Hey, Barry.”
“Hey, Sara.
I guess I don’t need any help.
I asked Katia.
She said yes.”
My stupid heart
Drops into my worn ballet slippers.
My face burns.
Ears ring.
I stumble into the studio
Even though, until four hours ago,
I had not stopped dancing long enough to reflect
On fall formals, Arabian Nights,
The kind of music ordinary teenagers move to,
Or whether any of it is made
Of violins, violas, twinkling pianos
That are an easy fit
For ports de bras
And pliés.
After class, Jane is sitting on Rem’s lap
But he gives me a curious look over her shoulder.
My insides clutch,
Remembering
His hands under the table.
I cannot figure
Whether I care
About Barry’s rejection,
About Jane’s fingers
Twirling through Rem’s straight hair,
About Upton Academy,
Or ballet,
Or anything at all.
We cluster around the bulletin board
Where Shannon has posted the cast lists.
I have the part of Mama Bear
In the “Goldilocks” Tour.
But all I can think about
Is my role as a Snowflake
In The Nutcracker,
Which will mean I cannot go home
For Christmas.
That’s enough to stop me eating.
Well, not completely.
I eat dry toast at breakfast time,
Ignoring the strange bean-based meals
And stinking cups of maté
Señora and Julio enjoy.
At lunch there is the salad bar at Upton:
Grapefruit sections, lettuce,
And sometimes a cookie.
I have little self-control
And I hate myself for that.
I am not hungry anymore,
Though I crave chocolate, sweets, love.
I am numb to the days as they pass;
Their numbers no longer lead to my escape
Back to Vermont.
And there are rehearsals all the time.
For another thing,
It turns out Rem is my Papa Bear,
Which feels more dangerous than dessert.
In Ruby’s car after school
My cell rings.
Mom’s voice is garbled
By the shearing wind.
Ruby says
She will not close
The convertible’s roof
Unless there’s an inch of snow at her feet.
On the awful bus yesterday
Before Barry called,
I had texted Mom,
“I might need
A new dress.”
Now, regretting typing every letter,
I shout my pat replies
About breakfast, lunch, dinner,
Dreams.
Pretend I don’t hear questions
I cannot answer.
Mom has not come to Jersey to see me.
Says her bank schedule keeps her in Vermont.
Perhaps she has begun to enjoy
Parenting from a distance,
Clean and sanitary
Without visible tears.
Bess is going to the Darby Days dance
With Stephen, who has been her boyfriend
For a record-breaking three months.
I don’t tell her about Barry and the Fall Formal,
Or ask who Billy Allegra is taking,
Or for her advice on stolen kisses from an older boy,
A man.
Text back,
“Too many rehearsals.
Have 2 skip Upton fall dance.”
Just a safe, painless,
Nine-word
Lie
I try to believe myself.
My head feels light as my leg
As I push through ronds de jambe
That circle endlessly back to front,
Reminding me my stomach
Has nothing to ponder.
My leg has nowhere to go
But back where it started.
Rond de jambe
Muddles me.
Don’t see a way
To make it beautiful,
Much less perfect
Or even finished.
Upton, ballet
Billy, Barry
Rem, Rem
Remington
Round and round
And round and
Round.
Allegro,
As in its essential counterpart,
Music,
In dance means fast,
Movements quick, precise.
Rehearsal life is all allegro, rushing
From studio to studio,
From practicing the tour lecture – demo and story ballet
To learning the opening steps for The Nutcracker
Snowflakes
And then back to classes.
In Variations, we are learning to dance
Aurora’s Act III solo,
Where the cursed Sleeping Beauty
Awakens to
A handsome prince,
A perfect marriage
And, despite her century of sleep,
Performs a virtuosic dance
That I can only stumble through, regular sleep cycle
notwithstanding.
My part in the tour is easy.
Mama Bear wears a costume, padded fat.
I do not even wear pointe shoes.
They are the province of everyone’s favorite,
Lisette.
I plié and pas de basque,
Gambol and fake stumble
While Goldilocks Lisette
Pirouettes and flutters
In her charming pas de deux
With Fernando
The woodsman
(Not in the original tale).
But in the bus
On the way to the auditoriums,
Janeless Rem sits with me in the back.
Tells me about making dances
Or tucks an earbud into my ear to share
Some new, strange piece of music I imagine
Bess would understand.
And sometimes,
On the long rides home,
I fall asleep
With my head on his shoulder.
Thanksgiving is about food,
Which is complicated,
But not so much for me
As for Lisette and Bonnie,
Whose bones nearly poke through their skin,
Whose periods never come.
I am naturally thin enough,
Too lonely and bored
For fasting.
My diets are more distraction
Than discipline.
I’ll try any fad—
Boiled eggs,
Lemon water,
Lettuce and tuna—
For the chance to talk about it
With the other girls,
To belong,
If only in my abstinence
From food.
Dad is driving me home the day before
Thanksgiving
And back Thanksgiving night.
Too many rehearsals for more.
I will go north,
Stuff myself with apples with onions,
Mom’s cautiously overcooked turkey,
Sleep restlessly with the knowledge that Rem
Is going to Jane’s uncle’s house
In Pennsylvania.
It feels like I am always returning
From my brief escapes to the country,
Where I try to remember the dreams
That stole me away
From my cozy four-poster,
Pastel-colored quilt,
Couches peppered with contented cats.
Try to forgive
My friends at home
For their prom dates and sleepovers and regular lives,
Myself
For my troubling ambitions in a distant city,
My parents
For letting me go.
At Upton, Katia shows me pictures:
The Fall Formal,
The gym draped in gauzy Arabian scarves,
Barry in a ridiculous blue tux.
I tell myself I am glad
To have missed standing beside that clown.
I am an artist
Untroubled
By childish high school affairs.
I do not say to Katia
That Barry kind of asked me first,
Because I do not want to tell myself
About another kind of rejection.
I have this fantasy
Where I am a famous ballerina
And my picture
Is displayed on the cover
Of a thousand magazines.
All the coolest kids at Upton regret
Not noticing the shadowy ballerina
Dancing through their halls.
Try to be my friends.
Remington confesses his true love.
Swears he only stayed a little with Jane
Because I was so young.
He was waiting for me.
In my fantasy I never
Actually
Dance.
Jane looks depressed,
Sitting with a cluster
Of company ballerinas.
Marie, whose legs cross and uncross,
Tipping her cigarette ash
Into a soda can
With ethereal grace.
Galina, with her romance novel
Title in gold letters,
Volume fatter
Than her waist.
I think of my tattered copy
Of The Thorn Birds,
Stolen from my grandmother’s hall bath
Last summer.
The way those chapters
Make my breath come fast—
Make me want
Some unspeakable thing.
Do such books
Agitate
These queens of the ballet,
Make them come undone inside
The way that one does me?
But it can’t be so,
The way they flick that ash without a quiver.
Or is it just that their training,
The great, technical control
They have over their bodies
Protects them even
From wanting?
In the locker room I hear
Why Jane is so upset.
Simone always spews gossip
While she pins up her hair.
At Thanksgiving Rem told Jane
There was another girl.
My heart stops,
Wondering
If the girl
Is me.
Simone knows all the crushes
And even I cannot miss
Her incessant queries
About Julio.
Last week, she stood beside me, watching
My face as much as
Rem dancing
In the small studio.
I am light with hope
At the brushup rehearsal for “Goldilocks.”
I try to feel a difference
In Rem’s palm
As it guides my elbow.
He escorts me, waddling
To our mock breakfast table
Where we pretend to be disgusted
By overheated porridge.
His brown eyes twinkle.
They always do.
He pushes his straight bangs
Off to the side,
Smiles a silly Papa Bear smile
That makes me want to dive into his giant arms.
He is too tall to be a star dancer
But so expressive, smart.
Rem occupies a curious space
Between student and teacher.
A man, yet, as a choreographer,
Something of a prodigy.
Are we alike
In that in-betweenness?
Can he see,
When I smile my blue eyes back
At his brown ones,
The country-city-woman-girl
Dancer, student
Bewildered
Unbelonging
Yearning?
Do I dare ask him about
Catcher in the Rye
Daisy Miller
The Great Gatsby?
Do I dare ask him for what I want,
As if I knew it,
Could find it on some page
In some chapter
In some book?
Rem and I lean against the barre
While Lisette does her “Goldilocks” solo.
She piqués, relevés, and the music follows her,
Playing a game of follow-the-leader
As if they could take turns
As if the music sees her step and twirl
As if she knows every tune before
It leaves the piano keys.
It would be easier
If I could hate her.
Perhaps I should,
As I watch through the glass
Where she practices
Alone
Before and after
The teacher and the rest of us
Fill the room
With our lesserness.
Is she trying
To make it hard
For all us others
To scurry in the shadow
Of her dedication?
Yet there is sweetness
Behind those driven eyes.
Ballet
Is her one and only
Uncomplicated lover,
Best friend.
We begin the bears’ feature.
Remington’s fingertips
Trace the stiff ridges of my forearms,
Meet my palms.
Simone, the Baby Bear,
Ducks beneath the bridge
Of our joined hands.
Can she see my hair stand on end?
Does everyone notice my fleeting glances toward the
window
Where I am always checking for Jane?
Rem is like chocolate,
Making me feel hungry and guilty
Always and at the same time.
Would it help if I told him
I am all of sixteen?
Though I try not to mention this
At the studio.
Sixteen is
Wanting.
Battered toes, aching shins.
Hope for the growing strength of my arches.
Curious despair at the curve of my breasts.
Sour not sweet.
They hand out the paperwork
After rehearsal.
The fall tour will finish with a three-day trip
To schools in northern Jersey
And a stop for a dance class
In New York City.
After that
Our lives are in the clutches of The Nutcracker,
The bread-and-butter of the ballet economy,
The chance for us students
To dance with the company
On a giant stage.
I read the trip itinerary,
Pushing beans and shreds of meat
Around the jade-green dinner plate.
Julio taps my shoulder.
“Want to play cards?”
Audition Page 7
