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First published in the United States of America by HarperCollins Publishers in 2016
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2020
HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd,
HarperCollins Publishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
The HarperCollins website address is:
www.harpercollins.co.uk
Text copyright © Sona Charaipotra and Dhonielle Clayton 2016
Cover design by Michelle Taormina
Cover art © Sean Freeman 2016
Sona Charaipotra and Dhonielle Clayton assert the moral right to be identified as the authors of the work.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780008392819
Ebook Edition © 2020 ISBN: 9780008392833
Version: 2020-07-30
To our girls—Kavya and Riley
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Cassie
Act I: Fall Season
Chapter 1. Bette
Chapter 2. Gigi
Chapter 3. June
Chapter 4. Bette
Chapter 5. Gigi
Chapter 6. June
Chapter 7. Bette
Chapter 8. Gigi
Chapter 9. June
Chapter 10. Bette
Chapter 11. Gigi
Chapter 12. June
Chapter 13. Bette
Chapter 14. Gigi
Chapter 15. June
Chapter 16. Bette
Chapter 17. Gigi
Chapter 18. June
Chapter 19. Bette
Chapter 20. Gigi
Chapter 21. June
Chapter 22. Bette
Chapter 23. Gigi
Chapter 24. June
Act II: Spring Season
Chapter 25. Gigi
Chapter 26. Bette
Chapter 27. June
Chapter 28. Gigi
Chapter 29. Bette
Chapter 30. June
Chapter 31. Gigi
Chapter 32. Bette
Chapter 33. June
Chapter 34. Gigi
Chapter 35. Bette
Chapter 36. June
Chapter 37. Gigi
Chapter 38. Bette
Chapter 39. June
Chapter 40. Gigi
Chapter 41. Bette
Chapter 42. June
Chapter 43. Gigi
Chapter 44. Bette
Chapter 45. Gigi
Acknowledgments
Keep Reading …
About the Authors
Books by Sona Charaipotra and Dhonielle Clayton
About the Publisher
SOMETIMES YOU WANT SOMETHING SO badly you’re willing to do whatever it takes to get it. Your mind stretches your dream out in front of you like putty, folding it into perfect shapes. Your soul whispers anxiously, You aren’t meant to do anything else. Your heart pumps blood and adrenaline and hope. Each turn, each leap, each role onstage brings you one step closer, reminding you that ballet is one with your heartbeat. Hard-tipped shoes lift your body above everyone else, making you weightless and ethereal.
Because that’s what ballerinas are supposed to be. It’s what I want to be. Have to be. I’ll do anything to get there. Almost.
Two pills stare up at me like eyes, smooth and oblong. Full of promises. They’re packed into a vitamin case like pointe shoes in a storage bin, begging to be used. Their glossy coatings gleam in the café’s overhead lights. I click my finger along their surface, then taste my fingertips and the acidic bitterness they leave behind. Just take one to see if it makes a difference.
The other girls flutter past me. It’s the thick of November, and they’re talking about things like Thanksgiving break and the latest movie and the boy they think would make the best Nutcracker Prince. All things familiar and mundane, but since I moved back from London, it all feels so foreign. Here, the bodies are smaller, lighter, a little more delicate than mine. I can’t quite blend in like I did there. They hate me for it. That’s what it feels like, anyway.
“Are those your little secret? The reason you’re so good?” Bette slides into the seat beside me. She scoots close, so close I can smell the hair spray she uses. We are the same shade of blond. Or we were. Now mine is tinted purple because someone put hair color in my conditioner.
“No, they’re just vitamins.” I scan the café for Alec. RAs staple paper turkeys up on the café bulletin boards, and the lunch ladies set out low-fat pumpkin yogurt as a treat. When I look back at my tray, Bette’s staring me down. I’m still not used to being around her alone. I should feel grateful that she sits with me when the others won’t. It’s like her presence at the table creates a protective bubble around me. It’s safe, secure, and impenetrable, except that now I’m trapped in here with her. “I don’t do pills.” I try to keep my voice from having a judgey tone.
Bette’s hand goes to her collarbone, her fingers following the little chain down to her locket. She wears it everywhere, like it’s a glittering ruby she wants us to look at, instead of just a dull and faded thing, the size of a half dollar. “Then what’s in the case? What were those?”
I want to ask her why she cares so much. But here at the American Ballet Conservatory, no one asks her those types of questions.
“Vitamins. For extra energy,” I lie, looking down at the little diet pills. The food in this café is different from that at the Royal Ballet School, and even though I’ve only been here two full months, all the adjustments make me feel like I’ve lost my center in a pirouette. I’m up three pounds from where I want to be. My eyes volley between the petit rats stacking their lunch trays on the conveyor belt and tables full of Level 7 and 8 dancers stressing over what to eat before ballet class. But I can’t dodge Bette’s strong glare.
Her eyebrow lifts. “Just two vitamins?” She takes the case from me before I can close it. She peers at the pills, like she’s trying to decipher some code, then hands it back to me, done with her little detective game.
“My daily dose. I take them with food.” I snap the case shut and slip it into my dance bag, hoping it ends this conversation. Eleanor walks toward the table, clearly planning to sit with us. I almost sigh with relief. But Bette flicks her hand like she’s shooing away a fly zooming too close to the water she sips. Eleanor slips away, just like that. “She could’ve sat with—”
“It’s fine,” Bette says. “I’m not really in the mood to deal with her today.” She drums her nails on the table, scans it for my case. “You know, you don’t have to keep things from me.” Her blue gaze sinks into mine. “You’re new, so I want you to have a friend here. We’re practically family now. I told Alec I’d look out for you. He thinks it’s a good idea.”
I want it to be a good idea. I want to have a confidante here. I miss my friends from Royal Ballet. She inches even closer. Her shoulder rubs against mine and we slip farther into the bubble. She looks left and right, then unclasps her necklace, taking it from around her neck. Laying it down on the table in front of us, she opens the locket delicately. A perfect circle sits in the tiny space, a blue outer layer of pills surrounding a smaller white one. The white ones look identical to mine. It makes me wonder how they can all share similar shapes and sizes but promise different things.
“I don’t really do pills, either,” she says. “Only when I really need them. That extra boost to get through Morkie’s corrections. Even my sister and others in the company take these. It’s not a big deal.” She pats my leg in just the right way. Café noises underscore her words. “A little advice—don’t ever run out of energy. The Russians will take things away as quickly as they give them.”
“I know,” I say, thinking about how I was cast in La Sylphide with the Level 8 girls. Mr. K says I’m one of the most gifted dancers he’s seen at my age. But I’m not sure if I should’ve left Royal Ballet to come here. She slides her locket closer to me. “What are they?”
“Adderall. Gives you energy.” Her eyes grow larger as she studies mine, looking for a response.
“Side effects?”
“Seriously? Your loss.” She snaps the locket shut and puts it back around her neck. She snatches her offer away as quickly as she’d given it, but manages a smile to soften it, like she’s doing me a favor. “Just trying to help.”
“Thanks, but—”
Alec and his dad, my uncle Dom, walk into the café and straight to my table. Uncle Dom sweeps me up into a hug, and Alec slips into my empty seat.
“How are things, Cass?” Uncle Dom’s worried tone brings tears to my eyes, but I rub them away before he sees them. His eyes are the same as my mom’s. He touches my hair. “The purple’s almost gone. I kind of liked it.”
He’s trying to make me laugh, but I struggle to smile.
It’s one of the many pranks the girls have pulled on me in my two months here, along with the vinegar-soaked pointe shoes, shredded tights, and stolen mail—the love letters from my boyfriend, Henri, in Paris. Just thinking about that makes the tears come again, but I can’t cry. Not here. Not now.
“I’m okay,” I say, wanting it to be true. He kisses my forehead and smiles at my brave face. “The beginning is always rough, right?”
“Hang in there, Cass.” Uncle Dom gives me one more hug, then turns and leaves the café. I miss him instantly.
Alec stands, too, looking at his phone. “Ready to go?” He’s asking both of us, but looking at Bette.
Ballerinas shuffle out of the café, headed to stretch before class. I turn back to the table. Bette is holding my vitamin case in her hands. “Don’t forget these. They slipped out of your bag.” She sets them on the table, then sidles past me. “See you in there.” Alec wraps his arm around her neck, gives me a goofy grin, and they leave the café.
I guzzle water from the fountain, but still have trouble swallowing the pills down. I think of them dissolving in my stomach, helping me be the best I can be.
In the studio, I find a space tucked away near the back, far from the others—especially Bette. I pull out my ballet slippers. I sprawl along the studio floor and start a long, deep stretch, my legs in a wide V, my arms up and over my head, then extended down to my toes. We warm up for twenty minutes, then Madame Genkin claps her hands, calling us to attention.
We work at the barre, completing exercise after exercise to warm up our legs and feet and core. Madame Genkin smiles at me as she inspects my tendus. “Your line’s perfect, Cassandra. Everything in place.”
I flush with warmth and feel like today might be a great one.
She moves back to the center of the room, and the mirrors on either side make it look like there are a thousand of her. “Time to work in the center. Change into pointe shoes.”
We scramble to our bags, tape our toes, pad them, slip on our pointe shoes, and lace the pale pink ribbons around our ankles. We leap up and down, warming up the shoes. The thumping and thwacking of pointe shoes fill the room. Madame Genkin gives Viktor piano chord instructions.
“Girls, we will do a short combination that ends with four turns. Two times each before the next pair begins from the corner. I need to examine your spotting.”
There are low groans.
“Cassie and Bette first, followed by June and Sei-Jin.”
We both come to center and stare at each other through the mirror. We echo: pale blond hair, ice-blue eyes, and even our builds are similar.
Madame Genkin shows us the combination—a series of piqué turns from the corner to the center, a jump left and a jump right, three pirouettes into a balancé. Bette drops into a deep plié. She flutters her arms out. I mimic her.
The music starts. She’s quick and balanced, her rhythm falling in line with the music effortlessly, like she’s done this a million times. I extend my leg forward into another turn, and I absorb the music. My mind quiets: the worries, the criticisms, the faces in the studio windows, everything drifts away. I catch myself in the mirror as I do each turn—the long, lean lines; the twirl of pink and black and cream, like a prima ballerina. Like the ballerina I was born to be.
The lines get fuzzier with each turn. My limbs feel heavy and thick. I can’t get them to lift as quickly as I want them to. I spin faster, pushing myself to spot. Madame Genkin claps along the beat. I’m too slow. In the mirror I see Bette, the hot-pink bow of her mouth as it purses. A wave of heat trickles over me, and I feel like I’ve lost my strength, floundering as I do another turn.
My eyelids flutter. I fight with their heaviness. The need to sleep overwhelms every part of me.
I drown under the spell of the music. Bette catches me, smiling as she whispers, “It’s okay,” when my body slumps toward her, heavy and cumbersome. Like she was expecting this. Like she knew it would happen all along.
I’M BACK TO THE BASICS: fifth position in front of the mirror. The Russian teacher my mother hired—Yuliya Lobanova—rotates my left hip forward and backward with small wrinkled hands. It pinches and burns, and I relish the heat of the pain. It reminds me that underneath all this pale pink, my muscles are strong and trained for ballet.
Yuli’s gray-streaked hair is swept into a bun, still obeying the elegant, upward pull. Bright green eyes stare back at me in the wall of mirrors in my home studio. “You keep sitting in this hip, lapochka.” She used to be one of the stars of the Maryinsky Theater. I had her picture on my bedroom wall, young and bold and startlingly beautiful. “Turn out, turn out.”
I push harder to please her and myself. To be strong again. To be me again.
“Lift! Higher, higher.”
Practicing five hours a day, seven days a week keeps me from having to think about everything that happened last year. The pranks, the drama, Gigi’s accident, and my suspension are replaced with pirouettes, fouettés, and port de bras.
“Show me you’re ready,” she says, happy with my new and improved ultra deep turnout.
I step toward the mirror and lengthen my spine as long as it can go. I am still the ballerina in the music box. I am still an ABC student. I am still me.
My mother keeps paying my tuition, and she’s on the phone with Mr. K and Mr. Lucas every night battling to get me back into school. “Bette did not push that girl. She’s completely innocent. And you have no substantial proof that my daughter was the only one teasing Miss Stewart.” She’d said the word teasing like I’d called Gigi fat. “Still, we’ve settled with the Stewarts. They’ve been well compensated. So Bette should be back in school as soon as classes start. The school can’t afford any more scandal. The Abney endowment has always been generous to the American Ballet Conservatory and the company. The new company building is proof of that. I mean, it’s called Rose Abney Plaza, for god’s sake!” She never even paused to let whoever was on the other line get a word in.
“Now, turn for Yuli.” My ballet mistress doesn’t care about rumors and truths. She’s focused on practicalities, the here and now.
I take a deep breath and exhale as she starts to clap. The smell of my hair spray—powdery and sweet—fills my nose and the room. For a second, I’m back in Studio A for the very first time, the sun pushing through the glass walls while I swing my leg into a turn.
I’m a new Bette.
A different Bette.
A changed Bette.
Last year is a blur of images that I don’t want to deal with. If I let my brain drift away from focusing on my ballet lessons, the memories squeeze in like a vise: losing two soloist roles, losing Alec, losing the attention of my ballet teachers, being accused of pushing Gigi in front of a car, being suspended from school.
“Faster!” Yuli hollers. Her claps and shouts fold into my movement. “Out of that hip. Don’t lose your center.”
I can’t afford to lose anything else. My mother won’t tell me how much it cost her to settle with Gigi’s family or how much Mr. K’s been charging to keep my slot open. But I know it’s more money than Adele cost in all her years of intensives, private lessons, and special-order dancewear. I’m the expensive one now. But it’s for all the wrong reasons.
“Now, opposite direction.”
I hold my spot in the mirror, whipping my head around and around. Sweat drips down my back. I feel like a tornado. If I had my way, I’d be returning to ABC, ready to take down everyone and everything in my path.
In a week, everyone moves into the dorms. Eleanor will settle into our room. My room. I should be there.
Not here, in a basement studio that might as well be a prison.
Level 8 is the year that matters. This is the year we finally get to do it all—choreograph our own ballets, travel the country (and the world) for audition season, explore other companies. But the main thing, the most important thing, is that American Ballet Company’s new artistic director, Damien Leger, will be visiting ballet classes and figuring out who his new apprentices will be. Only two boys and two girls will make the cut. I need to be there for that.
After my last pirouette, Yuli jostles my shoulder. “You ready to go back …” It’s half a question and half a statement.
“Yes,” I say, breathless. “I am ready.”
“Madame Lobanova.” My mother’s voice travels down the staircase and bounces off the mirrors in the studio. The slur beneath the words makes me cringe. “No more today. Bette has company.”
“Yes, of course, Mrs. Abney.” Yuli gathers her things and kisses my sweaty cheek. I want to reach out, touch her shoulder, tell her not to leave. But she slips away before I can say anything.
“Bette, freshen up,” my mother says once I reach the top of the stairs. She’s perched over the kitchen island and halfway through a glass of red wine. She points it up in the air, directing me to my room.
I go upstairs and take off my leotard and tights. I gaze out the window and look down on Sixty-ninth Street to see if there’s a car parked out front that I might recognize. Nothing. I take a two-second shower, change into a dress, then ease down the front staircase. Justina squeezes through the French doors in the living room.
“Who is it?” I whisper.
“Man from your school, I think. And a lady.” She pulls my hair away from my shoulders, smoothing it. Her fingers are warm, her touch light. “Be my good girl in there, okay?”
I peek through the French doors before committing to opening them. The back of Mr. Lucas’s blond head stares back at me. I nearly choke.
“Oh, there you are.” My mother waves me in.
I take a deep breath and exhale, like I’m standing in the wings, preparing to take my place center stage. I step into the room and sit across from him.
A man like Mr. Lucas doesn’t just show up at your house unannounced. He’s with a woman who isn’t his wife. She’s got one of those haircuts meant to make her look older, more sophisticated, less hot in a beach-babe way. She probably wants to get people to pay attention to more than just her very blond hair and the fact that her shirt is a tad too tight, showing off her large breasts.
“Hello, Bette.” Ballerinas are mostly flat-chested, so I’m lucky not to have her problem.
“Hi, Mr. Lucas.” I dig my nail into one of the curved rosewood armrests, leaving a half-moon shape behind. One evening, not long from now, my mother will settle into this high-backed chair in front of the fire and ask Justina for her nightly glass of wine. She will run shaky, wine-drunk fingers across the indentations and yell about it.
“This is my new assistant, Rachel.” He motions at the young woman. She gives me a slight smile. He unfolds a thick bundle of papers and flashes them at me. “Your mother showed me this.” He’s holding the settlement agreement. All the things I supposedly did to Gigi are spelled out in black and white. The little typed script makes them look sicker, more disgusting and official than they actually were.
“You know, I still don’t understand how any of this happened.” His brow crinkles in the same way Alec’s does when he’s confused.
“I’m sorry,” I blurt out because that’s what the Abney family therapist told me to lead with. I flash him a half smile. I try to show him I’m a different Bette. That I’ve learned whatever lesson they’ve been trying to teach me. That I’m ready to go back to normal now.
“Do you know what you’re sorry for?”
“Messing with Gigi.”
My mother steps in. “Dominic, we don’t need to go back through this entire incident. That can’t be why you came here.”
“It’s okay, Mom. I’m taking responsibility for my part.”
“Things have been settled, and you didn’t—”
“Mom, it’s fine.” It feels good to clip off her words the way she’s done to mine so many times. She takes hurried sips from her wineglass and motions Justina over with the bottle. Mr. Lucas’s assistant shifts uncomfortably in her seat and tugs at her shirt. Mr. Lucas refuses a glass of wine or any of the expensive cheese my mother goads Justina into offering.
“You’re lucky it wasn’t tragic,” he says in the gentlest way possible. The words hurt even more when they hit me softly. The sting burns long into the silence in the room.
“Can I come back to school?” I ask.
“No,” he says, and his assistant looks at me like I’m this fragile thing that might break at any moment. “We’ve deliberated long and hard, and we still can’t let you return. Not at this point.”
“But—” My mother rises out of her chair.
“What would it take?” My eyes bore into his. I hold my body perfectly still but my heartbeat hammers in my ears. I lift my rib cage and drop my shoulders like I’m ready to jump off this chair into the most beautiful firebird leap he’s ever seen.
“This”—he shakes the papers—“doesn’t fix it. Not all of it. Not by a long shot. I don’t understand you girls. The boys don’t behave this way.”
He’s right. But I want to remind him of how different it is to be a female dancer, treated like we’re completely replaceable by choreographers, while the boys are praised for their unique genius, their dedication to being a male ballet dancer when the world might think it’s unmasculine. He rubs a hand over his face and passes the settlement papers back to my mother.