Alex Ko

by Alex Ko

  “I know,” I said. “I just . . . wish he were here the way he used to be.”

  “Me too.” Mom sighed. “But at least we have each other.”

  “Yeah,” said Matt, putting his little hand on top of ours. “And a Wii.”

  We all laughed and my sadness passed. But Mom’s words would soon be tested in a way none of us could foresee.

  On Wednesday, I arrived at the theater a little before twelve thirty, or, as they say on Broadway, “an hour before half.” Half means the thirty minutes right before the show starts. If you’re called, you have to be at the theater an hour before that. So for a two-p.m. matinee, I had to get there at twelve thirty.

  “Hey, Alex.” Robbie, from the ensemble, greeted me backstage. He was one of Kate’s dance captains, so he frequently led my warm-ups when she wasn’t around. He was short, but really buff, like a gymnast. “Ready to get started?”

  “Yup!” I slapped him five. “Kate didn’t give me any specific notes last week, but I thought maybe we could work on some of the hard stuff in Act Two, like ‘Electricity.’”

  “Good by me. Let’s start with the acrobatics back here, and when we get onstage we can work on your turns.”

  We always did the first thirty minutes of warm-up at the back of the house, so the stage was free to be set up. But they made sure I had at least fifteen minutes onstage before every show.

  “Electricity” was my favorite dance, because it had been choreographed especially for me. During this scene, Billy is being asked by a bunch of judges (who already don’t like him) what it feels like when he dances. It’s Billy’s moment to shine, so Kate made a different version for each actor, to show off our unique strengths. Mine centered on the flips, cartwheels, and aerials that I’d learned in gymnastics.

  But I had to go right from tumbling into a series of difficult turns one after another. Now I knew why they’d drilled us on our turns in the audition.

  “Remember,” Robbie said encouragingly, “spot before you turn.”

  I did three, four, five turns in a row before something happened. I heard a loud pop! and suddenly I wasn’t moving. In fact, I couldn’t move. My left knee felt like it was made of stone. It wouldn’t bend it at all. Carefully I slipped to the ground.

  “Alex!” Robbie yelled, frantic.

  “I’m fine!” I said. “I’m fine!

  “What was that?” Bonnie, the stage manager, came running from the wings and nearly tripped over me. “Oh my God, Alex, was that you?”

  “I’m fine, really,” I said anxiously. I didn’t feel anything. I couldn’t move my knee, but it didn’t hurt. “It’s nothing. I just need a minute.”

  “I heard that backstage,” she said. “You are not okay.”

  “We need a sub for Alex,” I heard Robbie say. “Call BT and let him know. You okay, buddy?” He crouched down next to me.

  I opened my mouth to tell him I was fine and could do the show.

  That’s when the pain started.

  Chapter 21

  Broken Dream

  Just eight blocks from the Imperial Theatre is PhysioArts, where everyone from Billy Elliot went for physical therapy when they were hurt. Broadway is its own little village inside New York City, containing everything a show might need all within a few short blocks.

  Or at least, they seem short when you’re not injured. But when your left knee won’t bend and there’s a searing pain running up your leg, they take forever.

  Come on, Alex, you can do this, I told myself. I gritted my teeth and forced my way along the crowded sidewalk. Six blocks to go.

  I’d told Robbie I could walk to Physio on my own since there wasn’t a guardian available to go with me. In gymnastics, I’d learned to push through the pain, and I didn’t want to disrupt the show more than I already had.

  “I’m fine, really. It’s bad enough you have to replace me—I don’t want to cause any more headaches.”

  I was embarrassed by my injury. It was only my fourth show and I’d already let the team down. All I wanted was to walk to Physio, get a brace, and go home to ice my knee. But every step of the walk burned, and by the time I arrived, I was worried. I tried to play it down, but the physical therapist took one look at my knee and declared that I needed to see a surgeon.

  She called the show to send a guardian, told me not to put any weight on my leg, and gave me a pair of crutches. As soon as I saw the crutches, I knew I was in trouble.

  “How serious is it? Do you know when I’ll be able to perform?” I asked everyone. They all shook their heads and said it was too soon to tell. But I could see the worry in their eyes.

  Todd, my appointed guardian from the show, arrived, took me to the doctor’s office, and contacted Mom. She was furious they hadn’t called her immediately. At first, they’d hoped the injury wasn’t serious, and by the time they realized it might be major, they were focused on getting me to a doctor. But still, it took hours before Mom was notified, and everyone at the show felt horrible about it.

  Mom arrived at the doctor’s office right before they showed me my X-rays.

  “Alex!” She ran into the lobby. “Are you okay?”

  “I don’t know,” I told her truthfully. “It hurts. A lot.” But having her there made everything less scary.

  We both looked down at my knee. Underneath my gym clothes, it was swollen and puffy. I’d been injured before, but it had never looked as bad as this.

  “Alex Ko?” an older man in a doctor’s outfit approached us. “I’m Dr. Hamilton. If you come with me, we can look at your X-rays.”

  I hobbled down the hallway, trying not to wince every time my knee brushed against something. Mom walked with those hard, precise steps that meant she was angry and scared. Like she was going into a fight.

  Dr. Hamilton’s office was decorated with posters of famous athletes. His practice specialized in sports medicine, which is the reason Broadway shows used him. My X-rays were clipped to a light box on the wall.

  “This here is your knee,” Dr. Hamilton said, pointing at a spot on the X-ray. “There’s a definite tear in the tendon.”

  He paused.

  “I’ve scheduled an MRI at the hospital tomorrow so we can find out exactly what we’re dealing with.”

  “So you don’t know what’s wrong?” Mom said.

  “His tendon may be torn or it could be Osgood-Schlatters, or choirboy knee,” said Dr. Hamilton. “It happens to very active children when they have repeated small knee injuries in the same place.” His voice softened. “I know you’re both scared, but I’m going to see you through this. Alex, you’ll be out of the show for at least a week. But I can’t be certain how severe it is until the MRI.”

  “A week?” I said. I smiled, even though my leg was killing me. I could handle being out for a week. “So it’s not too bad?”

  “Don’t get ahead of things,” Dr. Hamilton cautioned. “It could be worse than it looks. But right now I don’t think it’s terrible. We’ll know for sure tomorrow. Until then, I want you to rest, ice it, and fill this prescription. It’ll help with the pain.”

  Just his words were help enough. Knowing I might only miss a week of the show improved my spirits. I still couldn’t bend my knee, but maybe it wasn’t as bad as it seemed.

  Kate called almost immediately after I got home. She’d become the person who contacted me for all show-related business.

  “Well, this will all be okay,” she said as I picked up the phone. “What’d they say?”

  “I have to get an MRI tomorrow,” I told her. “But Dr. Hamilton thinks I could be back in a week.”

  That wasn’t exactly what he’d said, but it was what I wanted to believe.

  “Good,” Kate said. “We’ve taken you off the schedule for now, though. Let me know what he says after the MRI.”

  “Sure thing.”

  There was a long pause on the other end of the phone. Finally, Kate cleared her throat.

  “If you’re not better next week, Trent’s going
to replace you at Lincoln Center.”

  My stomach dropped as though I’d been punched. Amid everything else, I’d forgotten I was supposed to perform “Electricity” at Lincoln Center in a week. I felt like the world was falling in on me. I put my hand over the phone and tried to breathe.

  “Alex? You there?”

  “My family’s coming,” I whispered.

  “What?”

  “My family. From California. My cousin Emily was going to come, so . . . She already has her plane ticket.”

  “Oh, damn!” Kate huffed. “Sorry. That’s awful. But maybe Dr. Hamilton’s right and you’ll be fine by then.”

  “Yeah, maybe.”

  There didn’t seem to be anything else to say.

  “We’re pulling for you,” Kate said. “Call me as soon as you know anything. Or . . . even if you just want to talk. Anytime.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “I will.”

  I spent the rest of the evening on the couch with my leg propped up, holding an ice pack to my knee, but if anything, it looked more swollen than before.

  “I guess you know all this already,” I whispered to Dad that night. “But I hurt myself today. My leg. I think it’s bad, but I don’t know. I’d get on my knees and pray for help, but I can’t even do that. So I guess I’ll just wait.”

  We were at the hospital first thing next morning. The MRI was a giant tube that used magnetic imaging to get a picture of my muscles and skeleton. I had to lie perfectly still. With nothing to distract me, I could feel the throbbing in my knee like a second heartbeat.

  Ba-boom, ba-boom, ba-boom.

  When I finally got the results from Dr. Hamilton, the expression on his face told me everything I needed to know.

  “I’m not going to lie,” he said, frowning at the images. “This is bad.”

  I broke out in a cold sweat. I felt like the room was zooming in and out of focus around me. Dr. Hamilton’s voice seemed to come from far away. I grabbed Mom’s hand to keep myself from fainting.

  “You’ve torn about fifty percent of the tendon in the knee,” he said. “Healing could take a while.”

  “How long?” I asked, my voice tight.

  “I can’t say. A month? A year?”

  A year? My heart dropped to the floor. I felt like crying.

  “What about the show?” Mom asked. “What will happen to him?”

  “You’ll have to ask them,” Dr. Hamilton said. “But he’s going to be out for a while. And he won’t be able to rehearse either. Nothing that might stress his knee.”

  Kiril’s words from when we first met came floating back to me: “Eventually, we all age out.” I was thirteen, going on fourteen. Billy was supposed to be eleven. In a year, would I still be able to play the part? What if my voice changed, or I grew?

  Or what if they just didn’t want me anymore?

  “I can’t wait a year,” I told him. “I need to go back in. Isn’t there anything you can do?”

  Dr. Hamilton sighed heavily.

  “Surgery is an option,” he said slowly. “In fact, most doctors would tell that you that it’s the option. But I don’t think it’s the right way to go in your case.”

  “Will I heal faster if I do it?” I asked. That was the only thing I cared about.

  “Maybe?” said Dr. Hamilton. “There are no guarantees. Surgery is risky. Especially for a dancer. It could hurt more than it helps, or you could develop scar tissue that would damage your knee permanently. Or it might make everything better.”

  “What do you think we should do?” Mom asked.

  “Nothing.” Dr. Hamilton shrugged. “Alex is young. His knee will recover, if we let it. But that means healing on your body’s timetable, not yours—and not the show’s. Truthfully, Alex, you might not heal in time to return to the show. But if we perform the surgery and something goes wrong, you might not heal at all.”

  “We’ll have to think about this,” Mom said. “Get a second opinion. We have doctors back home, and—”

  “Of course,” said Dr. Hamilton. “Whatever you choose, I’ll support you. If you decided to operate, Dr. Mung is a fantastic surgeon. For now, we’ll fit Alex for a brace and get him started on a physical therapy routine to keep up his stamina and endurance.”

  I opened my mouth to say something, but nothing came out. What was there to say? I would heal, or I wouldn’t. The show would replace me, or not. There was nothing I could do.

  There was nothing I could do.

  Nothing.

  Chapter 22

  Giving Back

  Dear God,

  It’s been four weeks since my accident, and no one will talk about it. Every time I ask when I’ll be better, Dr. Hamilton says it’s too soon to tell. When I ask Kate when I can come back to the show, she says they don’t know. I have no idea what’s going on.

  I’m not going to ask you for anything other than understanding. I feel so lost. I don’t know what to do. I trust in you, but I’m scared.

  Please help me.

  When I finished saying my prayers, I slowly removed the knee brace Dr. Hamilton had given me. It extended from my hip all the way down to the top of my ankle, completely immobilizing my left leg. It was made of tough, black padding encircled by heavy metal rings. I strapped it on every morning and only took it off at night (or occasionally to scratch underneath when I couldn’t resist). My leg was always itchy, hot, and inflamed. The top and bottom of the brace rubbed against my skin when I walked, creating semipermanent red rings of irritation. I felt like an impounded car with one tire locked in a boot, like I was dragging around my own personal anchor.

  “Alex?” Mom called from outside my bedroom door. “You ready?”

  “Yeah, come in,” I said.

  Then I pulled the sheet over my nose like an improvised mask.

  Mom pushed the door open with her shoulder and walked inside. In her hands she cupped a bowl-shaped piece of aluminum foil. Thick tendrils of steam wafted up from it.

  “Ugh,” she said, her eyes watering. “Let’s do this quickly.”

  “The faster the better,” I agreed as Mom took the chair next to my bed. I peered at the thick, brown sludge inside the foil. It looked terrible, and it smelled worse. In fact, we called it “poo paste.”

  My cousin Emily taught us how to make it. Even once we knew for certain that I wouldn’t be dancing at Lincoln Center, she insisted on visiting.

  “You’re still getting the award, right?”

  “Yeah, I’ll be up onstage,” I told her. “But I won’t be dancing.”

  “Pshh! I’ve seen you dance before,” she joked. “But I’ve never seen you get an award at Lincoln Center. I’m coming.”

  True to her word, she flew in from California a week later. When she arrived at our apartment, I couldn’t help but think how much had changed since her last visit, just a month ago. Then, I’d been on top of the world, opening my first show on Broadway. Now? There were some days when I felt like I had no idea who I was. I was trapped in limbo, unable to do any of the things I used to take for granted. Aside from Dad’s passing, it was the worst I’d ever felt.

  I didn’t even know how to be a good host. I couldn’t show Emily around, not with my leg the way it was. And even though I was no longer in regular rehearsals, I still had a pretty busy schedule. They kept me in the acting sessions, to keep the script fresh in my mind. From the beginning, I went to physical therapy three times a week. I couldn’t do much with my leg, but I still needed to keep up my endurance, which was important if I were ever going to return to the show. And there were stretches and delicate strengthening exercises I could do to help my knee heal properly. I spent a lot of time at PhysioArts on the arm bike, wishing I were eight blocks away, onstage at the Imperial, where I belonged. It was so close and yet so, so far.

  I also used the time to bank tutoring sessions. We were required to have a certain number of hours per school year, and I figured if I could do them all while I was injured, it would make returning to the s
how easier—whenever that happened.

  For the moment we’d decided to take Dr. Hamilton’s advice and let my leg heal on its own. Our physician back home, Dr. Mysnyk, said that he knew Dr. Hamilton and agreed with his recommendation. Dr. Mysnyk was a family friend (his family had actually come to my opening night in Billy), and we trusted him completely. We scheduled a trip to Iowa so he could examine my knee himself, but until then, we decided to leave it alone and hope for the best.

  If it had been anyone else visiting, I think they would have had an awful trip. But not Emily. She was always full of energy. She even helped make the Lincoln Center event fun. I was sad not to be able to do “Electricity,” but it still meant a lot to accept the award, and Trent did a great job dancing. There were tons of celebrities at the event, like Tamara Tunie from Law & Order: SVU, and Emily helped me get photographs with all of them. I thought I’d never want to look at that award, but when we got home, I put it on the desk in my bedroom and decided it was pretty cool.

  But there wasn’t much to do for the rest of Emily’s trip. When I told her that I couldn’t really travel around, she said it didn’t bother her.

  “Then pull out the Wii.” She smiled. “But no blaming your leg when I destroy you.”

  “You’re on!” I laughed.

  Nearly everyone in my life in New York was connected to the show, and seeing them made me feel sad and confused. But with Emily, I could just hang out and have fun. If not for her, I might seriously have become a hermit during that first month after my injury.

  We barely even talked about my knee, except right when she arrived. She asked me a few questions about what I had done and how it felt, then pulled out her cell and called her mother, my auntie Polly, back in California. A few days later, a small package arrived in the mail.

  “What’re those?” I asked as she pulled plastic bags of dried herbs out of the package.

  “A remedy,” she said, “for your knee.”

  “Do I . . . eat them?” I wrinkled my nose. They didn’t smell like something I wanted to put in my mouth.

  “No,” Emily said. “Come to the kitchen, I’ll show you.”