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,

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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.

“I didn’t push Gigi.” My words echo in the room. They feel heavy, like they’re my very last words.

“If you’re innocent, prove it.”

I can. I will.

STUDIO D BUZZES LIKE DRAGONFLIES swarming in the September sunshine. Everyone’s chatting about summer intensives, their new roommates, and their ballet mistresses. The parents are comparing ballet season tickets or grumbling about the rise in school tuition this year. New petit rats storm the treat tables, and other little ones steal glances, cupping their hands over their mouths. I hear my name whispered in small voices. None of the other Level 8 girls are here.

Just me.

I should be upstairs, unpacking with the rest of the girls on my floor. I should be breaking in new ballet shoes to prepare for class. I should be getting ready for the most important year of my life.

Mama’s hand reaches for mine. “Gigi, please be an active participant in this discussion.” I’m back to reality, where Mama has Mr. K pinned in the studio corner. He looks pained. “Mr. K, what have you put in place so that Gigi is safe?”

“Mrs. Stewart, why don’t you set up an appointment? We can go into more detail than we did in our last phone call.”

Mama throws her hands up in the air. “Our last conversation was all of ten minutes. Your phone calls have been—how can I put it? Lackluster. You wanted her back here. She wanted to be back here. You told me she’d be safe. I am still unconvinced.”

Her complaints have been following me around like a storm cloud. Why would you ever want to go back to that place? The school is rife with bullying! Ballet isn’t worth all this heartache.

A younger dancer walks past me and she whispers to her friend, “She doesn’t look hurt.”

I look at my profile in one of the studio mirrors. I trace my finger along the scar that peeks out from the edge of my shorts. It’s almost a perfect line down my left leg, a bright pink streak through the brown.

A reminder.

Mama thinks the scar might never go away completely, even though she bought cases of vitamin E oil and cocoa butter cream made for brown skin. I don’t want it to go away. I want to remember what happened to me. Sometimes if I close my eyes too long or run my finger down the scar’s raised crease, I’m right back on those cobblestoned streets, hearing the metal-crunching sounds when the taxi hit me, the faint blare of sirens, or the steady beep of the hospital monitors when I woke up.

I flush with rage, hot and simmering just under my skin.

I will figure out who did this to me. I will hurt the person who pushed me. I will make them feel what I went through.

Mama touches my shoulder. “Gigi, participate in this conversation.”

I watch her anger grow.

“She’s still in the hall with all those girls.” Mama’s tone is pointed.

“Each student lives on a floor with the others in their level. The Level 8 hall has been traditionally the most sought after of them all,” Mr. K says in that soothing voice he uses with benefactors and board members. “We wouldn’t want to isolate her.”

“She is already isolated by virtue of what she looks like and what happened to her.”

“Mama, it’s fine. It’s where I need to—” She shushes me.

Parents turn their attention to us. In this room, Mama sticks out like a wildflower in a vase of tulips, in her flowy white dhoti pants, tunic, and Birkenstocks. They all take in Mama’s exasperated hand gestures and facial expressions, and how calm Mr. K remains under all her pressure. He even smiles at her, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder, like he’s inviting her into a pas de deux.

“I assure you that we’re doing everything we can to make sure she is safe. She even has her own room this year—”

“Yes, and that is much appreciated, but what else? Will there be a schoolwide program initiated to address bullying? Will teachers be more mindful in addressing incidents? Will security cameras monitor—”

“Aside from Gigi having her own personal guard, we will do as much as we’re able to,” he says.

She jumps like his words are an explosion and shakes her head, her billowy afro moving. “Do you hear that, Giselle? They don’t care. Is ballet really worth all this trouble?”

I touch her arm. “Mama, just stop. We’ve had this conversation a million times.” A flush of embarrassment heats every part of my body. “Please trust me. I have to be here.”

No one moves. Mama’s eyes wash over me. I chew on the inside of my cheek, afraid that she’ll change her mind and take me back to California. I want to tell her that she doesn’t understand what ballet means to me. I want to remind her that I almost lost the ability to dance. I want to tell her that I can’t let Bette and the others win. I want to tell her that I’m stronger than before, and that those girls will pay for what they did. I have been thinking about it since the day I left the hospital. Nothing like what happened last year will happen to me again. I won’t let it.

Mr. K winks at me and moves to stand beside me. He places a very warm hand on my shoulder. “She’s moya korichnevaya. She’s strong. I need her here. She was missed during summer intensives.”

His words fill up the empty bits of me. The tiny broken parts that needed a summer of healing, the ones that needed to know I am important here. I am supposed to be dancing. I am supposed to be one of the great ballerinas.

It took all summer to heal from a bruised rib, fractured leg, and the small tear in my liver. I stayed in Brooklyn with Aunt Leah and Mama, dealing with countless X-rays and doctor visits, weekly CAT scans and concussion meds, physical therapy twice a day after getting out of my cast. And, of course, counseling to talk about my feelings about the accident.

I worked too hard to get back to this building.

Mama touches the side of my face. “Fine, fine.” She pivots to face Mr. K. “I want weekly check-ins with you. You will have to make yourself available.” He walks Mama to the beverage table. She’s smiling a little. It’s a tiny victory.

Warm hands find my waist. I whip around. Alec’s grinning back at me. I practically leap into his arms. He smells a little like sunscreen.

“They’re calling you the comeback kid, but can I just call you my girlfriend?”

I laugh at his terrible attempt at a joke. Young dancers look up from combing through their colorful orientation folders, full of papers that list their current ballet levels, new uniform requirements, and dorm room assignments. I grab him and push my tongue deep into his mouth, giving them something to stare at.

I didn’t get to see Alec a lot this summer. Dance intensives kept him too busy. Phone calls and video chatting and texting took the place of hanging out. I almost forgot what he tasted like, felt like, smelled like.

He pulls back from kissing me. “I’ve been texting you.”

“My mom’s been interrogating Mr. K.” I point behind me. Mama and Mr. K are still talking.

He groans. “Wouldn’t want to be him.”

“Nope.”

“You all right?”

“I’m great.” I stand a little taller.

“Nervous about being back?”

“No,” I say, louder than I mean to.

He touches my cheek. My heart thuds. The monitor around my wrist hums.

“I’ve missed you.” He takes my hands in his and turns me like we’re starting a grand pas. He lifts me a little, so I’m on my toes. My Converse sneakers let me spin like I’m on pointe. It feels good to partner and dance, even if it’s just playing around. Being hurt made me miss dancing every single day.

Everyone clears away, giving us some space. Enthralled, they watch us.

We do the grand pas from The Nutcracker. Our bodies know every step, turn, and lift without the music. I can hear it in the rhythm of his feet and how he reaches for me. Invisible beats guide our hands, arms, and legs. The music plays inside me. He sweeps me into a fish dive.

“You’re even better than you were before,” Alec whispers as he brings me back down, his mouth close to my ear.

His words sink deep into my skin, making it feel like it’s on fire. The room claps for us. Mr. K beams. Mama smiles.

No one will take this away from me ever again.

IT’S LATE BY THE TIME Jayhe and I finally get to school. Jayhe double-parks his dad’s delivery van and hops out to unload my stuff. Usually my mother drops me off, and we suffer the whole hour trek in from Queens in an uneasy silence, her disapproval seeping into every nook and cranny of her silver car and my brain.

But this year, everything is different.

I have a boyfriend. Now that I know about Mr. Lucas, my mother doesn’t have the power to control me anymore. My hard work is finally paying off. Summer intensives went well, and I’m ready to be on top this year. It’s finally my time. I plan to enjoy it.

I look up at the towering buildings that surround Lincoln Center. The conservatory sits nestled in the northwest corner of the complex, in the shadow of the most beloved performance space in the most important city in the world. Sometimes I still have to pinch myself to believe this is actually my life—that at this time next year, I’ll be one of two apprentices at the American Ballet Company. Well, if all goes according to plan, anyway.

Which it will.

“Hey, you going to help?” He rushes around to the front of the building with the first batch of stuff. His too-long hair falls into his eyes and his forearms flex as he lifts the heaviest boxes first.

“In a second.” I breathe in the scents of dogwood trees, the fountains, and even the pretzels sold at the food truck on the corner, so familiar, so comfortable, like a second skin. Jayhe pauses all his hauling and pulls me into a deep kiss. It makes me want to leave those boxes on the stairs and get back into the van, to let him drive us off somewhere. It erases the world around me until I’m forced to take a breath.

As I open my eyes and see the school buildings rising behind his head, part of me aches for the daily tedium of school, like muscle memory. I crave the countless ballet classes, the endless rehearsals, the control that comes with calorie-counted cafeteria meals, and even Nurse Connie’s scales.

I stay with the van as he finishes unloading. I spot other girls—ones with moms and dads—lugging boxes inside. A father teases his daughter about the rocks he claims she filled the boxes with. “Dad!” She giggles, her eyes lighting up with love and laughter. The word dad thuds inside me like an anchor, and I think of Mr. Lucas, even though I shouldn’t associate that word with him. My dad. A flush of embarrassment zips through me when I think of the email I sent him this summer and the voice mails I left on his phone that went unanswered. I won’t make that mistake again. I can’t even remember why I tried to talk to him.

I hear a giggle again and see one of the younger Korean girls point in my direction. I stare right back at her until she walks up the school stairs. I look left and right for Jayhe, but he’s still MIA. I wonder if Sei-Jin’s here already, if her aunt dropped her off early like she usually does. Her texts popped up on Jayhe’s phone this summer, and I know he didn’t respond. I checked. I feel bad for a second, but I have to look out for myself, even with him.

I’m afraid to ask him about the exact details of their breakup. What did he tell her? How did she react? How did they leave it? He probably let her down easy, with his usual diplomatic touch. But did he mention my name? Deep down, I don’t really want the answers to those questions. I shouldn’t want to know. I shouldn’t care. It doesn’t matter. But it does.

His cheeks are rosy when he comes back down, and there’s a bit of light sweat running down the side of his face. The old June would think it’s gross, but I kind of think it’s sexy. Everything about him is sexy—the depths of his eyes, the charcoal on his calloused fingers from his hours of drawing, the way he says my name—especially when he’s annoyed.

“There’s only a small box left.” Jayhe sets it on the curb. “You got it?”

“Yeah.” I want to be in two places at the same time: here on this curb with him and upstairs in my new single, unpacking.

Jayhe’s phone rings and for a tiny second, the paranoid place in my heart and brain thinks it’s Sei-Jin. He speaks in a flurry of Korean, but I hear the words restaurant, grandmother, and busy. I’ve learned more Korean from hanging out with him these past few months than my mom taught me in all of my sixteen years. He would cup his hand under my chin and make me speak the words back to him—wouldn’t kiss me till I got them just right. I always had to ask him in Korean—kiss-jwo. No Korean, no kissing. The thought makes me smile.

He hangs up. “I left your stuff in the foyer,” he says. “They wouldn’t let me upstairs. Something about no boys on the girls’ dorm floor even on move-in day.” The irritation must show on my face, because he touches my cheek and grins. “Parent volunteers are taking it up.” His hands wander to my waist. “I’m really glad you got a single this year.”

“Me, too,” I whisper, suddenly feeling embarrassed. Gigi got a single this year because of her injuries, and that means I get one, too, by default. It’ll finally give me and Jayhe some space. Part of me thrills at the idea of sneaking him past the RAs and anyone else who’s watching, at the chance of getting caught, at the possibility of people knowing that a boy wants me. That Jayhe wants me.

I grab the last box, the one with my teakettle, and my rolling bag. I give him one more kiss and head around to the front of the building.

Ten minutes later, keys in hand from the front desk, I’m ready to make myself at home. I take the elevator up to my new floor—twelve—where only the senior girls live. But when I finally get up to my room, the door is wide open—and someone else’s stuff is sprawled all over it. Well, most of it. A pink frilly comforter covers one of the beds, ballerina posters hang on the wall, and postcards from Paris are already lined up on the bulletin board above the pair of desks. When I look across to the other side, there, entangled on the bare mattress, are Cassie and Henri, sweaty and giggly and flushed like little pink pigs.

Henri nods, acknowledging my presence, and tries to get back to nuzzling Cassie’s neck. But she shuts him down cold, sitting up straight and readjusting her deep V-neck sweater.

“About time you got here,” she says, perfectly content and casual, as if she was expecting me. I was most definitely not expecting her. “Nurse Connie came looking for you. You missed dinner. Apparently she thinks I’m your keeper.” Her voice is as cold as those ice-blue eyes.

“What are you doing in here?” I ask.

“I was supposed to have the single, but I gave it up, you know, because of Gigi’s situation. I don’t want to make things harder on the poor girl.” She frowns at me.

“But—”

“Look, I’m not happy about it either. But it’s not like you’re entitled to a single.” Her words are clipped, sharp, with a hint of a British accent popping up now and again. “Anyway, it’s too late to do anything about now, right, E-Jun?” She stretches out my name like it’s a heavy, foreign thing she has to carry. A burden.

“Everyone calls me June,” I say, which she should know because we’re not strangers.

“Cute,” she replies flatly. It makes me feel like I’ve said my American name is Star or Poppy or Rainbow.

Then she lumbers off my bed, as if it just occurred to her. When she catches me frowning, she shrugs. “He knows I hate messing up my covers.”

Henri smirks. “Among other things,” he adds, then winks in my direction. Gross. He gives her a deep, grabby good-bye kiss before he slinks off. I shudder at the thought of him. Something about that boy has always been off to me, and I hate the idea of him being here, in my space. Well, our space, I guess.

I seethe in silence as I start unpacking slowly, mentally willing away Cassie and all her stuff. There’s just so much of it. The closet is two-thirds full already, and she’s got stacks of books—Machiavelli, Marx, and other political things, along with all the major ballet books—lining her shelf. In the corner, a small cube is filled with dance gear—dead toe shoes, leotards, ribbons, warm-ups. My side of the room—what’s left of it—is stark in comparison.

When Cassie started at the conservatory in tenth grade, she’d take half her ballet classes with us in Level 6 and the other half in Level 7 with the junior girls. No one really knew her. No one really wanted to know a girl who was too good of a dancer. She was Alec’s cousin—my cousin, I realize with a start—and everyone knew that she’d been specifically recruited from the Royal Ballet School. She was that good. But then, after what Bette and the girls did to her—the hair, the shoes, and especially the lift accident with Will—she disappeared. Now here she is, completely invading my space.

I unpack the box marked “tea” and plug in the electric kettle, filling it with bottled water, hoping it will relax me. I open up my new glass-lidded tea box—a gift from Jayhe—and pull out a small satchel of chamomile and lavender that he prepped for me. “It’ll help you chill,” he always tells me. As if anything could really help with that tonight.

“Careful with the kettle,” Cassie announces. “Fire hazard and all.”

“I’ve had it for years and nothing so far.”

I don’t realize I’ve said it aloud until she whips around and comes right up in my face. “I don’t want any attitude from you.” She stares down at me, her skin pulled taut over her skull, like Charlie, our bio class skeleton. I wasn’t exactly nice to her when she first came to ABC. When I flinch, she laughs. “Mr. K pretty much promised me the Sugar Plum Fairy, and that basically guarantees one of the apprentice spots. So you better not mess with me.”

My heart sinks into the depths of my stomach, where it’s sloshing along with the bits of grilled chicken I ate off my sandwich. It all threatens to come up again, right then and there. I rush to our private bathroom, locking the door behind me.

Cassie’s put down a bubblegum-pink mat that’s enough to get me nauseated. I run the tap, waiting until I hear the room door close with a thud. She’s gone. Thank God.

There’s a scale in the corner. The last time I checked my weight was during summer session. Mom doesn’t keep scales around the house. I try to focus on breathing and my face in the mirror. But I can see it out of the corner of my eye.

I can’t resist. I need to know. The numbers quickly shift from 0 to 80 to 90 to 100 and then 110, 112, 115. I shift my weight a little and they scramble again, settling, finally, at 108. That’s heavier than I’ve ever been. By far.

I swallow down the sob that’s rising in my throat. I hear Cassie’s nasty words in my head again. Seconds later, I’m cradling the toilet, the tile floor cold and hard under my hands and knees, the familiar scent of lemon disinfectant triggering that same response instantly. With it comes relief, a sense of control. I tell myself it’s just the bile and burning that’s causing the tears. No matter what Cassie says, I’ll be the Sugar Plum Fairy when that cast list goes up, just like I’m supposed to be. My performance in Giselle last year made that happen.

This is my year. This is my turn. I’ll be the lead soloist. I’ll be chosen for the company. I’ll do whatever it takes.

I’M SITTING ACROSS FROM MY father in his favorite steak house downtown. The restaurant, with its high ceilings and marble floor, echoes with snippets of stuffy conversations and the clink of wineglasses being set on white-clothed tables. Ours overlooks the Hudson, and while he chews, I watch a boat sail up the edge of Manhattan, headed north. You can forget this place is an island when you live close to the large expanse of Central Park cutting right through the middle.

He’s grown his beard in. White hairs poke through the blond. He lives about eight blocks from our house on the Upper East Side, but I haven’t seen him in months. My mother insisted on having it that way, ever since I was twelve and he bailed on Adele and me for a Christmas brunch, jetting off to the Turks and Caicos with his latest assistant girlfriend instead. But before that, he was around, sometimes, randomly, cooking breakfast in the kitchen on a Sunday morning or spending the afternoon reading the Times.

The Times Magazine pokes out of his bag under the table. I peep at it, wondering if it’s a sign that things will go back to normal. I used to love reading it with him while Adele was busy in the basement, getting in extra rehearsals with the latest Russian expat ballet mistress my mother had hired. He’d tell me about the state of the world, explain it to me like I was a grown-up, like it should all make sense. And it did, the way he said things. I would fish those old magazines out of the trash to save in stacks under my bed.

Blood seeps out of his rare steak, and I watch it ooze out into the fluffy mounds of mashed potatoes. I push my salad around my plate, my appetite disappearing.

“I guess Adele isn’t coming,” he says after finishing his bite. Even though we’ve been sharing this awkward silence for forty minutes. Even though we both already knew that and ordered without her. Even though he’s halfway through his steak. Even though she hasn’t spoken to him in years. She won’t even talk to me about it.

“She has rehearsals,” I lie, not sure what she has planned this evening.

“What role is she dancing? What ballet are they performing again?”

He doesn’t even realize that casting hasn’t happened for the winter season yet.

“I don’t want to talk about ballet.” Our gazes finally meet, and it’s like looking into my own eyes. Ice-blue and cold. Adele says I crinkle my nose like he does when I’m upset or I’ve said something rude.

“What do you want to talk about?” He motions for the waiter to bring him another Scotch and soda. I want to give him a list of off-limits topics: my mother, Adele, ballet, school, what I plan to do with my life, what actually happened last year, the reasons he’s been away so long, why he left us, his latest girlfriend. Which means that we really can’t talk about anything aside from the weather, which is relatively cold for a Sunday in the middle of September.

“Your tutor? How’s that going?” There he goes again, with the interrogation. “The private ballet lessons? Your friends? Have you seen any of them?”

I don’t answer. What is there to say? Nothing’s changed, least of all him.

“The point of having dinner is to talk to each other,” he says. “How’s Alec?”

“I don’t want to talk about that either.” I fill my mouth with slimy lettuce tossed with too much low-fat salad dressing. I wish that I didn’t still eat like a ballerina. I’m in the real world and not in the third-floor café at the American Ballet Conservatory. I could eat like a normal person—whatever that is—if I wanted to. But I have to stay in shape for when I get back to school.

My dad raised an eyebrow when I ordered salad—just salad—for dinner. He hasn’t gotten used to the difference, still. We haven’t had that many meals together since he left, and he still expects the little Bette that would order a kiddie burger or chicken nuggets when he’d pick me up from the conservatory for a visit.

Plates come and go before us, even a palate cleanser of mint leaves. I escape to the bathroom and open up my locket. I swallow a pill and I wait for some kind of focused calm to emerge after it hits my system. I wait for the warm flicker of relaxation. But it doesn’t come. I want to wretch or scream or call Adele and cry, which would be the worst thing of all. I dread the I-told-you-so on the other end of that call.

She warned me about going to dinner with him. She told me I would end up disappointed. But she’s always been my mother’s girl, and I was always sort of his, until he left.

When I return to the table it’s been cleared.

“Are we ordering dessert? They have a panna cotta I was thinking about trying.” He thumbs the dessert menu.

“I shouldn’t eat dessert, Robert.” I test out using his first name to see how it will land on him. “I’m a ballerina.”

“Robert? I’m your father.” He waits for the accusations—“then act like it”—but I won’t give him the satisfaction. He sets down the menu. The woman at the adjacent table hears the deep pinch in his voice and looks over at us. He clears his throat and leans forward. “Are we getting dessert tonight?”

“I’m a ballerina.”

“Are you going to still be a ballerina?” he asks, his words clipped. I’ve clearly hit a nerve. “Your mother told me about the school’s decision, Bette.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” Head high and eyes straight ahead, I make sure not to look away. He taught me that. “You all of a sudden care now what happens to me?”

“I’ve always cared.”

“Then where have you been?”

His wide shoulders seem to jump with what I can only assume is surprised humiliation. I think about saying something to smooth over the anger, but my mind fills with other mean things to say instead. Since he left, our relationship has been a series of missed dinners and empty apologies and bank deposits.

“Your mother can make things quite difficult.” He puts a hand under his chin, like the words coming out of him are too heavy for even his firm mouth to handle.

“Mom is difficult. No, she’s terrible. And you left us there with her.” I clutch the locket around my neck. It was his grandmother’s. He gave it to me for my thirteenth birthday. My hands are shaky. The buzz of the pill is finally settling in and I am hyperfocused on the way he looks at me, the fact that he opens and closes his mouth more times than words actually come out.

A flicker of guilt flutters in my chest as I think about what it must’ve been like to be married to my mother. But I won’t feel sorry for him. I can’t. He chose to marry her. He left us with her. We didn’t get a choice. So, no, he won’t get any pity from me. Not now, not ever. “Have your panna cotta,” I tell him. “I’ll see you next time. Whenever that is.”

The maître d’, used to scenes like this, I guess, already has my slim red peacoat waiting for me and slips it over my shoulders as I walk out, my stride strong, not revealing the shakiness inside.

But once I’m out the door, my shoulders drop and my pace slows. It’s exhausting pretending to have it together. I wait a few seconds, thinking he’ll run after me and beg me to come back to the table. I had hoped—stupidly, I guess—that maybe, just maybe, today I’d find in my father an ally. Like the way we used to be. But no one comes outside. And now more than ever, I know that I’m in this on my own.

On Monday morning, after my mother goes off to the spa for her usual weekend recovery appointment, I call the lawyers’ office. I pretend to be her—slurred, angry voice—and demand that the files from the settlement with the Stewart family be sent over for her review. They arrive within an hour.

I have the courier set the lawyers’ boxes on the dining room table. In the dark, they are shadowy tombs. I turn the light up, pull open the drapes, and the boxes become less scary in a haunted-house way but more intimidating in a real-life way. My whole life is in these boxes, filed away forever, everything in them shouting that I was bad.

I riffle through the files. The first one has pictures of each person in my class, their names scrawled along the bottom in black marker. I set them out on the table like I’m a ballet master placing dancers into a piece of choreography.

Giselle Stewart

E-Jun Kim

Eleanor Alexander

William O’Reilly

Henri Dubois

Sei-Jin Kwon

Alec Lucas

I run my fingers across Alec’s face, missing him. He hasn’t called. Not once. I haven’t exactly reached out to him. I couldn’t bear the idea of calling him and being clicked to voice mail or sending a text and having it go unanswered.

I comb through the boxes and lay out all the evidence that led to the settlement with Gigi’s family:

1) A copy of Henri’s statement saying that he saw me push Gigi in front of that taxi.

2) Pictures of the crime scene: the street outside the club, the curb where we stood, the hood of the taxi bent with an indentation from Gigi’s body.

3) The police report from that night.

4) A copy of Will’s statement about past pranks I’ve pulled on other girls. Though there’s no mention of the role he played in any of those pranks, of course.

Reading these just confirms what I know: I am the most hated person at American Ballet Conservatory. Maybe I deserve to be, according to the quotes from Will, Henri, and half a dozen other dancers, some of whom I’ve never even talked to.

“Bette is toxic.”

“Bette has it out for anyone who is better than her.”

“Bette’s jealousy turns to madness.”

“Bette terrorizes people.”

I’m not supposed to be going through these files. The Abney family therapist said I shouldn’t fixate on things that I don’t have the power to change at this moment. But she should know by now that I don’t listen, and I don’t follow directions well unless they’re doled out by Madame Morkovina. I wonder what Morkie thinks of me now. I feel a hot pinch in my stomach. One I can’t ignore.

I look at a lawyer’s crude drawing of the scene. They’ve used basic, almost stick figures to draw where I said everyone was standing that night. I’m on the curb next to Alec, Gigi, and Eleanor. Henri is off to the left or maybe it was the right. This summer my memories of the night skewed each time I was asked to replay them out loud for the lawyers. Sometimes Henri was on the right. Other times he was behind me. Sometimes Will lingered behind Gigi.

I bend the edges of Gigi’s picture. The audition photo she took before getting accepted to the conservatory smiles up at me. Bright white teeth, happy eyes, and perfect sun-baked skin. I look at my own picture. My mother had a famous fashion photographer take it. I don’t think I’ve ever been as happy as Gigi is in that single photo. I remember her first ballet class with us. She stuck out. It made me realize, for the first time ever, just how white the ballet world is. Even the Asian girls sort of blend in at initial glance, with their pale little arms and tiny frames and quiet personalities.

But not Gigi. She barreled into the room, her hair a burst of wild curls, pins between her teeth as she wrestled it into a bun, and she wore a hideous, multicolored leotard, totally ignoring the very specific ballet class uniform instructions in the conservatory packet we all received. I remember thinking she was gorgeous, despite it all. Her skin glowed like she’d just run three miles.

I close my eyes and can see her dancing. I see how loud it was. How riveted everyone was. How much fire she had in her movements. A hot and angry knot forms in my stomach. I throw her picture back in the cardboard box and slam the lid on it. I may hate her but I didn’t push her. I didn’t hurt her in that way.

I take my phone from my pocket and dial Eleanor. Voice mail. I hang up and dial again, and again. She still doesn’t answer. I leave her several messages, telling her I need to talk to her, that I miss her and she’s my best friend. My only one.

I build up my courage and dial Alec just once. I leave the smallest, vaguest message ever: “Call me. Need to tell you something.” I’ll regret it in an hour, but the adrenaline of it all pushes me. If he calls me back, I need to figure out what that something is.

I pace around the room for what feels like hours. That night floods back to me—dressing up June to come with us to the club, the cab down to SoHo, seeing Gigi dance with Alec. I remember trying to be nice to her and buying her a drink, making a truce, and owning up to some of the petty things I did. I think through every step I took that night after we left the gala, like it’s a difficult variation I have to learn. In slow motion, I try to recall every detail again: the slur in Gigi’s laugh as she and Alec were tripping on cobblestones in front of us. The spring mistiness in the May air. Alec’s hand resting on the small of Gigi’s back as we walked toward the street. The look on Will’s face as he caught that same moment. It must have mirrored mine.

And then, the light shifting from red to green as Gigi stumbled forward, traffic taking her with it. I shudder at the memory, so vivid in my mind.

“Who hates me?” I say out into the room.

A voice inside answers: Everyone.

Tears prick my eyes. I shake my head. This is not the time to fall apart. My mother would say Abney women never fall apart. I pull my hair out of my face, sweep it up into an easy knot. It is trained to behave even without the bobby pins and hair spray and water.

I pore through the papers again, trying to figure out who could have done this. The obvious choice: Cassie. But Cassie wasn’t there that night. Henri made his intent to destroy me clear last year, with Cassie as his impetus for the whole thing. And I can’t remember where he was standing. The feeling that I’m right is overwhelming as it bubbles up inside me, ready to erupt.

All the evidence I really need is inside the dorms because everyone is there.

I have to find a way back.

A MAGIC SORT OF FEELING zips through me as I change for ballet class. The sounds of slippered feet and laughter push through the thin walls of my room. Doors open and close. The ping of the elevator echoes. I can feel the excitement of the girls getting ready for afternoon ballet class.

I pull on tights and try to figure out if you can see my scar through the pink. Just a little. I pack my dance bag, which is now outfitted with one of Mama’s ugly suitcase locks. I sew the key into the lining of my leotard so that it’s close. It makes me wonder whatever happened to the little rose charm Alec gave me last year for luck. It’s long gone.

I put on my heart monitor. Everyone knows about it now. I don’t care anymore. I text Alec that I’ll see him downstairs and receive a smiley face back. I filter through all my social media feeds. First-day-of-ballet-class posts fill the screen. Good luck messages and pictures of pointe shoes flash. I check various students’ feeds: Eleanor, June, Will, Alec, new girl Isabela, even Bette. I let my guard down last year, and it nearly killed me. This year, I plan to know exactly what everyone’s up to.

I skip going to the café for lunch and head straight down to the first-floor studios instead. I can’t eat anyway. My stomach is a tangle of nerves.

The lobby is thick with bodies. Moms and dads drop off their petit rats for afternoon ballet. Little dancers zip around in a chaos of white, red, yellow, and green leotards, looking for their ballet class locations. Parents position themselves outside the glass walls of the studios, hoping for a prime watching spot. For a small moment, I wish Mama was still here, fussing with my hair, slicking down the edges so they won’t frizz. She used to love to watch me dance, and she’d bring me to the studio early and stretch alongside me. Then she’d peer through the glass, ignoring the other watching mothers who tried to chat with her, focusing on me. She’d always ask me how it felt to move like that. She used to like ballet then.

One of the moms stares at me. She nudges the woman beside her. They cup their hands over their mouths, exchange looks, and whisper. A few others have now spotted me. Some of their faces bear weak half smiles or pitying grimaces. I want to elongate my arm and break out into the deepest arabesque penchée they’ve ever seen. A full 180-degree standing split right above their heads. They’ll know nothing’s wrong with me after that.

The elevator opens. I just see the blondness—a familiar golden halo—and it feels like I’m seeing a ghost.

I step back. A knot twists in my stomach. My heart beats faster. The little monitor on my wrist vibrates.

I tell myself, You are not afraid of Bette. She should be afraid of you.

But it isn’t Bette. It’s Cassie.

“Hey,” she says.

Their resemblance is unnerving.

“Hey,” I finally manage. We’ve never spoken before.

“I’m Cassie. You must be Gigi.” She grins, and in that moment I can see the difference between her and Bette. “I’ve heard we have a lot in common. I mean, besides my awesome cousin Alec, of course.”

“We do.”

Her eyebrows lift in a telling way. Dancers stare at us from their stretching spots as we walk down the corridor toward Studio B. When we pass the front office, Madame Yelena Dorokhova—one of the company directors—steps out. She’s dressed in dancewear and is tapping away at the tablet in her hands. Instantly, every girl in the hall sinks into a deep révérence, bowing her head in respect. The teachers command a presidential authority here. I’m in awe of her. After all, she is a former principal at ABC and danced fifteen years as one. I can’t help but smile. She smiles back. She’s beautiful—dark hair, dark eyes, pale white skin. She nods, and we all disperse, like we’ve been unpaused by a remote.

Cassie and I scurry toward Studio B. We drop our stuff in the hall and plop down. She fingers the suitcase lock on my bag. “Smart. I should do that, too.”

“Yeah.” I look at her profile as she sinks into a deep stretch and realize that she’s the only other person in this building, in this entire city, in the entire world, who knows the exact shape my life took last year. “I guess I was the new you.”

“You’re not kidding.” She faces me. “Did you find out who did all those things to you?”

“Yes. And you?” A strange web of energy grows around us. We’re complete opposites, and yet we’re exactly the same—the hurt, the fear, the anger connects us.

“Yes.”

Neither of us says her name.

“I had my boyfriend, Henri, investigate a little. You know, to confirm everything. I was so naïve when I first got here. I didn’t realize how far people would go just to dance.”

I nod and think of Henri, that weird intensity in his eyes and the surprising softness in his touch. It makes me shiver.

She helps me stretch forward. “We should keep each other informed.” The word lands in my bun. I nod, then inhale and exhale. I lift up and pull her forward toward me. Her hands are soft yet strong, and she smells like hair spray and baby powder and resin. Like Bette. But she’s not, I remind myself. She’s not.

“Henri told me you were always so nice,” Cassie says. We open our legs into a stretch, touching our feet together. I wonder if he told her that he kissed me. Just my cheek, but still. I wonder if that was part of his investigating. “How’s your foot? He told me what happened with the toe shoes. Also, the whole ballet school online world.”

“Brand-new.” I flex my foot. Aside from a tiny scar, you’d never know shards of glass had pierced the skin and muscle.

“Henri told me that Sei-Jin’s the one who did that.”

I drop her arms. She sits up. Her face is calm despite the hugeness of what she’s just said to me. “What did you say?”

“That Henri overheard Sei-Jin bragging about the glass in your shoe.” She doesn’t break eye contact with me.

“How could he just hear something like that?” I’ve never done anything to Sei-Jin. I’ve barely even spoken to her.

“He’s good like that. People pretty much ignored him last year. Didn’t realize he was even around, let alone listening.” She lets her arms glide over her head and down to her ankles. “I just thought you should know, in the interest of us, you know, being in the same situation.”

Girls shuffle down the hall as ballet classes begin. Cassie and I stand up and walk into Studio B. She rests a hand on my shoulder before we enter. “I know exactly how you feel.”

I follow her into the studio. The space is just as I remember it. Clear glass walls, smooth floor, sunshine streaking through, the scent of tights and ballet shoes and a little bit of morning sweat. Chairs hug the front mirror. Viktor sits at his piano, tinkling the keys to warm up. Next to him, perched on a chair, is Madame Dorokhova—already making notes about us. A little flutter bursts in my chest. Why is a company director here on the first day of class?

The other girls cluster along the walls, stretching their muscles, hydrating, and sewing ribbons and elastics onto new pointe shoes.

I scan the room. I make eye contact with Eleanor. She smiles but quickly drops her gaze. Her face looks the same—round, rosy, with impossibly bright and hopeful eyes. I don’t smile back at anyone. I want them to know I’m not the same girl anymore. I want them to be afraid of what I might do.

There are new girls: another brownish girl named Isabela from Brazil, and a new Japanese girl, Riho, who seems to have been adopted by the other Asian girls. Maybe if they had taken me in, I’d have a group. I look for June, but she’s not with them, of course. She never was. I see Sei-Jin. She smiles. Cassie’s words echo inside me. Anger simmers.

I turn away.

“Hey, Gigi. Welcome back,” a few voices say. I don’t return their warmth. I ignore them. I find a spot to plop down and get a final stretch in. I feel eyes on me, but focus my attention on loosening my hamstrings and making sure my hips are open.

A foot touches my leg and I look up. It’s June. She’s smiling down at me. No, beaming. It catches me off guard—the smile is gracious and real, like it’s coming from deep down inside. I get up and we just stand there, staring at each other for what feels like a long moment. Then she wraps her arms around me and the hug feels so out of place. I don’t know what to do with my arms and head. I try to sink into it, to find a place to rest my worries, and finally she just pulls me closer and tucks me in, as if she knows. She feels softer than before. More comfortable.

“How are you?” Her words rub against the nook of my neck.

“Okay.”

She pulls back and opens her mouth several times, the words stuck in her throat.

“It’s good to see you,” I say, so that she will stop wrestling with whatever she’s trying to tell me and just be. “How was your summer?”

“Good. You look a lot better,” she says, tentative. “Stronger.”

“I’m great.” I can feel the others listening in. “Brand-new.”

“I’m—” she starts, but a round of claps cut her off. Mr. K strides into the studio. Our female teachers trail behind him, Morkie first, then Pavlovich. Madame Dorokhova hugs Mr. K briefly, then she settles into her seat again.

The rest of us stand, smoothing our buns, and shuffle into the middle of the studio, ready to listen, ready to dance. I remember why I love this so much—the routine, the discipline, the elegance.

“Welcome to the most important year of your life,” Mr. K says with a flourish of his hands. We all clap and bow. “You all are reaching the pinnacle of your career as students entering Level 8. And this year, some of you will transition into the realm of professional dancers.” He paces around the front of the studio, rubbing his goatee. “You must love it. That’s the only way through the rigors you will face this coming year. Love.”

The group starts to part as he enters our flock. I feel his strong gaze on my face. He’s towering over me again, and I flash back to the first casting last year, the moment that started me on this difficult path.

“And speaking of it, let’s welcome back moya korichnevaya, Giselle,” he says.

Brown butterfly.

I think of my own fluttering butterflies, slaughtered and sacrificed and pinned to my room wall, and I can’t stop the shudder that shoots through me. He kisses both my cheeks, takes my hand like we’re preparing to do a pas onstage. I wonder if he notices that it’s shaking. He leads me to the front of the studio. He turns me. “You are resilient,” he almost shouts, then faces everyone. “That’s what ballet is all about.”

I do a deep curtsy down to the floor before he reaches for me again. Morkie squeezes my hand and kisses me.

“You are better,” she says, shaking my hand. “You look good and strong.” I want her words to sink into my skin and down into my muscles and bones, which still feel so fragile and out of practice.

Mr. K goes back into the group and pulls out Cassie. “Another one has returned to us.” He presents her. She does a spin. “Cassandra Lucas. I’d thought I’d lost this butterfly long ago.” He lifts her by the waist and twirls her. She winks in my direction. Everyone claps again before he leaves to go next door to the boys’ studio.

We start class at the barre with Morkie hovering around us. Right away I can feel the difference—my tendus are not as smooth, my relevés are not as high on my left foot. I’ve been working all summer, but I have a long way to go. As much as I tell myself that nothing’s changed, my confidence plummets. I can feel Madame Dorokhova’s eyes on me, curious, judging.

Morkie doesn’t say a word. She notes every little fault in the other dancers, but she skips right over me, not mentioning even my stumble as we make piqué turns across the floor. She’s trying to make me feel better about all this, but it’s just making me feel worse.

After class I wait for June, thinking we can go to the café and fill each other in on our summers. But she rushes out without a word. In the hall, I see Jayhe. He kisses her, lacing his fingers through hers, and they head for the lobby. When did that become official? Was I just not paying attention? I think back to the end of last year, and my head starts to hurt. I remember Jayhe’s face at the club after the gala. I remember seeing them together and Sei-Jin being upset. I remember wondering if June actually liked him or if it was just a ploy to make Sei-Jin angry. I remember Alec walking in front of me, and trying to catch up.

I stop in the middle of the crowd of dancers. The noise of their feet and chattering voices, the pings of the elevators, piano chords escaping other studios, it all drains away and the faces blur around me. I can feel my feet slipping out from under me, feel myself plunging forward into the darkness, all of me shattering, just like on that night. The night when everything changed. I back into the nearest wall, desperate to cling on to something.

A hand on my shoulder pulls me back into this building, into this hallway, into this space. It’s Cassie again.

“Just breathe, Gigi, breathe.” She’s looking deep into my eyes, making me focus on hers. “Better, faster, stronger, payback,” she says with a smile.

“Yes.” That’s what I have to be. That’s what I have to do.

I lean in close, so the others can’t overhear. “What you said about Sei-Jin—”

“Every word was true.”

I don’t have to say the rest. My eyes tell her everything. Sei-Jin’s going to pay. They all are.

“The new Gigi is going to be mean,” Cassie says, grinning.

I let myself sink into that tiny four-letter word. Mean. Yes. It’s about time.

THE SUN POURS IN ON me from the studio’s wall of glass windows, warming the back of my shoulders. I sip my omija tea from my thermos and wonder why Mr. K is calling us all together so early in the year for a meeting. It feels like fall casting, but it’s not even October yet.

The room is filled with hushed chatter, all butterflies and anxious expressions. It’s just Level 8s in the room, except for a few random students, like the Brazilian chick, Isabela, and the new girl hanging with Sei-Jin’s crew. They are both from Level 6. They’re giggling and gushing, admiring Sei-Jin’s new pink leather dance bag—a Korean import, no doubt.

Surrounded by everyone, I’ve never felt lonelier.

I watch Gigi and feel that same strange pang in my stomach. She’s sitting beside Cassie and powdering her face with makeup. When did she start wearing it? Maybe she’s different now. Maybe everything’s different now. She was my roommate and sort of my friend. Part of me hopes that she’ll never find out what I did last year. That I can still consider her someone who actually likes me.

She laughs with Cassie. Everyone turns to look. They’re hysterical, falling all over each other. When did they become close friends? It’s only been a few days since school started.

My heart sinks down to the depths of my empty stomach. I feel like I can’t breathe in this place anymore—not even in my room now.

The boys trample in. Alec sits with Gigi, then Henri follows, tucking himself against the wall next to Cassie. Will lingers near the door. Cassie watches him for a second, and then her ice-blue eyes flitter in my direction, cutting right through me, her face serious and smug, her body confident. She leans close to Gigi and whispers something, and the movement sends a tremor through me. More whispers, and Gigi throws her head back with that old tinkling, hiccupping laugh, like she’ll die if she stops, bringing all eyes back to her again. It’s all coming together, the beginning of the end. Cassie is the new Bette, and Gigi is her Eleanor.

Gigi catches me staring at them, and she sort of waves for a second, but Cassie says something funny again, and they all erupt into laughter.

I look away.

As if echoing my loneliness, Eleanor walks in solo. She’s carrying with her a gaping hole in the shape of Bette. She sits close to me, but we’ve never really talked, so the thought of starting now feels weird. I focus on the lint on my tights.

Snippets of conversation envelop me. The biggest worry: Why are we having a morning meeting? The second: Why is Mr. K late?

Mr. K is a stickler for punctuality, in himself and his dancers—and his assistant is waiting with a frozen, panicked smile pasted on her face as she tries to keep us at bay.

Mr. Lucas walks into the room then. A deep heat rushes through me, like I’ve just touched a hot stove. He takes a seat in one of the chairs along the front mirror. I try not to stare, but I can’t help but compare the planes of his face, his long fingers, the shape of his nose to my own and to Alec’s. He must feel me staring. I let my eyes burn into him like a laser. But he doesn’t even glance my way. He acts like he doesn’t even see me.

“He’s coming,” someone says. An instant hush falls over the room when Mr. K finally makes his way into the studio, his shoes clacking across the floor. But this time, the reverence isn’t reserved just for him. With him is Damien Leger, the dark-haired former principal of the American Ballet Company, who was recently announced as the new director. If Mr. K is the moon or the sun in this world, then Damien is the sky—endless and all encompassing.

There’s a silent shift in the energy of the crowd, a collective sway toward the front of the studio where Mr. K and Damien stand side by side. I try to stand taller, hoping my energy is brighter, willing a glance my way, willing them to notice me. Their faces are expressionless as their eyes scan the crowd, giving nothing away.

“I’ve called you all together because things will be different this fall,” Mr. K begins, waving his hands in his signature flourishes. “Usually, by next month, we would be doing auditions and casting for the yearly production of The Nutcracker. But this year, the winter show will be danced by the underclassmen in Level 6 and below.”

I’m so shocked that I can’t look away from his mouth, afraid I might miss something. He pauses and taps a pointed finger to his lips. “Last year’s tragedy has left a stain on the American Ballet Conservatory and the company itself. What you all don’t realize is that our beautiful ballet world is very small, and what happens here”—he motions all around him—“ripples out. That scandal has affected even other notable ballet schools and companies. We need to do something—something big—to rescue the school and the company.”

He pauses to let that sink in. “This means boosting enrollment numbers, increasing ticket sales, revitalizing the school and company’s image—making ABC a force once again in the dance world. Revamping the way you all interact with one another—creating a real community here. What dancer wants to come to a place where she feels under attack?” He looks pointedly toward Gigi and then Cassie. “How will American Ballet Conservatory put a legion of talent into its own company, and those around the world, if people don’t want to come here? If people are afraid?” He gestures toward his assistant and the papers she’s holding. “To that end, we have started a new initiative—a mentorship program. Some of you will be paired with the newer students in order to guide them as they adjust to life at ABC. Make them feel welcome and integral.”

He holds out his arm. “I’ve also asked Gigi and Cassie to speak a few words about how the bullying affected them.”

Gigi stands first and walks over to Mr. K. He puts a hand on her shoulder. She takes a deep breath. “Everyone basically knows what happened to me.” Her voice quavers.

My heart races. I grip my thermos tight, the heat of it almost burning my fingers.

“It all started as little things. Nasty looks, whispers, and messages. Glass in my shoes. Even—” Her voice breaks and I know what’s next.

The word butterflies. It thuds in my chest and I can’t help but remember the worst thing I did last year. The worst thing I’ve ever done.

Everybody says butterflies are beautiful. In Korean they’re called nabi. My grandmother used to send me cards every spring back when she and my mom still spoke. She told me to look for pretty yellow butterflies out my window because they signaled good fortune.

Maybe some are lucky and pretty. Gigi’s were not. They were a dull orange, with black stains streaking across their backs, and large, menacing dark eyes that stared at me when I reached into Gigi’s window terrarium, that trusted my delicate and graceful hands coming toward them. Eyes that still haunt me now. But in that moment, it felt good to push needles into them and finally still that endless, frenetic flapping that bothered my sleep for months.

My halmeoni would say that I gave up all my good fortune that day.

The memory causes me to shake. I will myself to forget about it. I tell myself I’m not the same girl who did that. I can make it up to Gigi. Mr. K claps and I startle out of it. Cassie and Gigi hold each other’s hands before sitting down again.

Mr. K motions at Damien. He steps forward. “Thank you, Anton. I’m not going to sugarcoat anything. Honesty is part of what makes us all artists. I’ve heard much about you—some of it good, a lot of it not so good. The press calls you a morally flawed lot of dancers. Last year’s Level 8s were a disappointment, too. Their talent and technique subpar, and not ready for the ballet world. You all have the talent, but your choices have had a tremendous effect on the company itself. Along with not dancing The Nutcracker, you also won’t be choreographing senior workshop pieces at the end of the year.”

The gasp is an audible, deep, collected breath. The weight of it, of hearing this news aloud, is staggering. We knew this could be a possibility. All of us knew, deep down inside, that our actions could deem us unworthy—after all, we nearly killed a girl. But surely Gigi should get to dance? I’m staring at her—we all are, I realize—and her face has gone pale, the way it does when her heart gets out of control.

“This year, under a close collaboration between Mr. K and myself, we will be performing Swan Lake in the spring for the fiftieth anniversary of the company. The company will dance opening night, and you will dance the second. The principal positions—in particular Odette and Odile—will be danced by two different dancers. I will choose my apprentices from that performance.” He takes a moment to breathe, sipping lemon water from a glass. “However, the dancers cast in the principal roles are not guaranteed to be my apprentices.”

“Damien will choose two girls and two boys. And maybe fewer, if you don’t rise to this grand opportunity,” Mr. K adds. “He chose no one from last year’s class.”

Shoulders slump a little. Some are already accepting defeat. I refuse. I know that I was born to do this, that I will do it. Mr. K rounds this out with his serious, signature three claps, refocusing our attention. “Mr. Leger and Madame Dorokhova will stop by frequently to observe you all, which means you must be your best in every ballet class, every rehearsal.”

The applause starts slowly but spreads through the room, and soon I find myself clapping, too. It’s hard to not want to please these men, to show them you’re ready for this challenge. But so many of us want this, and so few will get it.

I will be one of the few, I tell myself. And I’ll do it the right way, by simply dancing my best. The best.

I will.

I WAIT UNTIL THE LIGHT snores waft from my mother’s bedroom before calling her car service. I hide outside near the holly bush my mother sets out in the little front patio every fall.

I spot the car lights as he turns on to Sixty-ninth Street. I’m on the curb before he can call up to the house to confirm a pickup.

“Sixty-fifth and Broadway,” I say, like I’m an adult and he shouldn’t for one second question where my parents are. It’s only 8:56 p.m, but at school, most of the students will be heading back to the dorm for curfew. At least those who are following the rules will be. But Eleanor posted a picture of a fresh latte five minutes ago. She’s at the coffee shop a block away, probably with her head in some book, instead of being out on a Friday night like normal people. The way we would both be if we still lived together.

“Lincoln Center?” he asks.

“Yeah.”

The driver cuts through Central Park. It’s pouring and the wind whips fat raindrops across the windows. Dark trees have already lost their leaves. Fall is coming too soon. As the weeks slip by, so, too, does any chance of my ever really coming back to school.

He zips down the winding street until we exit the park and we’re on the West Side of Manhattan, where it’s all bars and restaurants and late-evening chatter. Green subway lamps leave a glow along the sidewalks. The driver makes a left to head downtown toward the school, following the bustle of Broadway.

My heart bangs against my rib cage like I’ve just rushed offstage. “Get it together,” I tell myself. They’re just kids, like me. They can’t actually do anything to me. Besides, it’s not like I’ll really be on school property. I can’t risk turning my suspension into an expulsion.

The driver makes the final turn and the great glass windows of the American Ballet Conservatory glitter in the streetlights. It’s still just as beautiful as it was the first time my mother brought me here to watch Adele dance.

I get out of the car. I don’t march up to the front doors and stomp past the guard like I wish I could. I casually walk past the building, heading south. The coffee shop windows glow with warmth.

I linger at the edge of the window and steal glances inside. I recognize a few girls from Level 7, but nobody I know too well, thankfully. I’d blend right in here. I’m dressed like a ballerina who has spent the day dancing. Big, cozy sweater thrown over the lean lines of dancewear, leg warmers tucked into sheepskin boots.

In the far corner next to the coffee shop’s small fireplace, Eleanor sits at a table by herself. I pull up my hood.

Before walking in, I listen, like I’m counting the beats of music before I have to go onstage. There’s a flutter in my chest. The door opens and someone leaves. I catch it before the bell jingles and slip inside. I hear Eleanor’s humming as I take the smallest steps in her direction. She sounds very pleased with herself. She has earbuds in and dips carrots into a tub of hummus. She gazes between her phone and a set of math problems, half-solved.

She hits a high note in whatever terrible song she’s singing along to, and as much as I hate to admit it, I wouldn’t even mind having to deal with her pitchy voice again every night. Because then my life would be back to normal.

I steel myself, drop my shoulders, and walk up to the table. She seems skinnier, happier. I tap her shoulder. She lifts her head and yanks the earbuds from her ears.

“You look good, El.” Quiet, direct, for the most dramatic effect.

She drops the earbuds on the table.

“What are you doing here?” Her eyes bulge so big that they’re no longer bright and beautiful. She looks like a bug.

I wait for her to stand up and hug me. She doesn’t move. I slip into the seat in front of her. “Happy to see me? I called you a million times.”

“Bette, you shouldn’t be here.”

“I need to talk to you.”

“You—”

“I already know I’m not supposed to be here, but I don’t care right now.”

She retreats to her chair. A long, cold moment stretches between us, one that the fire can’t even begin to thaw.

I press on. “How are things?” The air is thick with the scent of coffee and pastries and things that need to be said, but that’s all I can manage for now.

“Fine.” She puts her phone in her lap. “Bette—”

“Just be normal.”

“What is that?”

I shove the lump down in my throat. We spent so many nights here at this very coffee shop—dissecting all the crap that went down in ballet class, with Will, with Alec. She spent countless days with me in hell on family vacations to the Cape or in the Hamptons, witnessing my mother’s drunken dramas firsthand. We danced every class and performance together, whispering merde to each other for good luck, ever since we were six. She’s not getting off that easy. “I need us to be us. Just tell me what’s going on at school, like we’re in our old room again and about to go to bed.”

She sighs, not looking up. She picks up her phone, texting, like I’m not even there.

“Why can’t you just talk to me?”

“So much has changed.” Her eyes finally meet mine. They aren’t scared or begging for my approval like they used to. They’re different now. Her pupils are dilated, drowning out the golden sunflowers that usually rim them. They glitter with newfound confidence or self-assurance. Something she didn’t have last year. Something she hasn’t had in the whole time I’ve known her. I want to like her new strength, but it might mean she doesn’t need me anymore.

I move my chair closer to her, so close to her I can smell the rose-scented shampoo she’s using now. “Please, Eleanor. I miss you.” I drape my arms around her and don’t let go until I feel her hands finally land on my shoulder, the stiffness slowly softening. I can feel her breathing, that old hiccupy rhythm. I wish I’d been nicer to her all these years, treated her better.

“I miss you, too,” she whispers.

“I’m going to fix everything. I didn’t do it. I swear to you.”

She doesn’t tell me she believes me. I just feel her hand stroke down my back.

“We’ll be roommates again and everything will go back to normal.”

She pulls away a little. “The accident has caused problems here. Serious ones. The company has lost major sponsors and donors. Mr. K is being crazy. Enrollment is down. My scholarship could go. Families are pulling their kids out. Especially, the petit rats. There’s been bad press about the school—”

“I’ve seen the papers.”

“Level 8 isn’t even allowed to dance in The Nutcracker this year.”

“How is that—”

She railroads through my question. “Be quiet for a sec, so I can tell you.”

The words keep bubbling up and pushing out and I’ve lost all sense of how you’re supposed to talk to people in the real world. I used to be great with words. Mean ones.

“They’re doing a performance of Swan Lake for the fiftieth anniversary. Opening night is the company, then the next night is us. The new director, Damien Leger, will be casting us along with Mr. K. He’ll decide from there who gets spots at ABC. If any of us do.”

I try to absorb it all. Damien Leger? That means I actually may have a shot at the company. If I can prove myself innocent. If I can get back to school. I open my mouth to tell Eleanor all this, but she’s packing up her things.

“It’s late, Bette,” she says, sounding more tired than I’ve ever heard her. “I’ve got character class in the morning.”

I nod, zipping up my sweatshirt and pulling the hood up. “Will you help me?”

“With what?”

“I need everyone to know I didn’t do it.”

“But didn’t you settle? Everyone’s saying—”

“My family settled with hers, but that doesn’t mean that I pushed her. I didn’t. We just wanted it to all go away.” I feel the desperation slip into my voice and try to erase it. “I need help finding out who did this. Nobody believes me. But you do, don’t you? You will?”

“I don’t know what you’re asking me.” She stands.

Her phone lights up in her hand, and it’s like she’s gone already. I wonder if I made her feel that way—unwanted, unimportant—all those countless times. I wonder if this is how it felt.

“I’ve got to go.” Grabbing her bag, she pushes past me and out the coffee shop door. The bell chimes.

Someone recognizes me and snickers. A table of younger ballerinas point in my direction. A year ago, they’d be cowering in my presence or hoping I’d join them. They’d be coveting what I had: the looks, the roles, Alec. All of it. And now I stand here, the tears stinging my eyes, wanting what they have: nothing more than a group of friends who secretly hate each other. This is what it’s come to.

I slip back outside into the cold. The streetlamps glare down at me. I walk quickly toward Broadway, then pause, pondering calling the car service. Instead I decide to walk. Going through the park at night is a risk I wouldn’t usually take, but right now, in this moment, I’ve got nothing to lose.

“I NEED YOUR HELP.” I grab Will’s arm and drag him down the hallway outside Studio E. People zip by, dropping off their bags for afternoon ballet classes, and heading up to the café for lunch or off to find a corner to stretch in.

He wrestles his arm away from me. “Oh, so you have time for me now?” He pets the newly shaved lines in the left side of his scalp, and fusses with the perfect topknot he’s put in his red hair.

“I meant to text you back.” We haven’t hung out since the start of school, and every time I’ve invited him to hang out with Alec and me, he’s refused.

“Sure you did,” he says.

“I invited you to come for dinner last night.”

“I don’t want to hang out with Alec. I want to hang out with you.” His tone shifts from shattered to mock annoyed. Tears shimmer across his green eyes.

“Okay, come hang out with me now. I need you.” I poke at his side until he laughs. “Forgive me?”

“Fine. Since you’re begging.”

We laugh.

“I really missed you this summer, so you know I need my time with you,” he says, squeezing my hand.

“I saw you every weekend.” He showed up at Aunt Leah’s every Friday without fail. More than Alec even. He’d come with frozen yogurt and ballet movies. Aunt Leah’s boyfriend got so tired of seeing him that I had to make up fake Friday plans or pretend to be sick sometimes.

“But still”—he rubs my arm—“isn’t it so much better now that we can see each other every day?”

I nod, just to get that sappy, pitiful look off his face. He’s been weirdly clingy lately. But I should feel grateful for his friendship. I can only trust three people in this building: him, Alec, and Cassie.

“So what is it?”

“Cassie told me something,” I whisper.

“You two are friends now?” The way he recoils at her name, it worries me for a second. But I tell myself he’s just being sensitive.

“Um, not really. She’s been nice.” He starts to say something about Cassie, but I interrupt. “Sei-Jin is the one who put the glass in my shoe.”

His hand covers his mouth. “But—”

“I want to get back at her.” A cold tingle shoots up my spine.

“Why would you just believe Cassie like that?”

“Why wouldn’t I? What does she gain from lying to me?”

His eyes get all big. “She’s just—”

“What? The same stuff happened to the both of us. She’s looking out for me.”

“The Cassie I knew, she was just—different. So I wouldn’t—”

“Well, so am I this year. I’ve changed, too. Are you going to help me or what?”

“But I love the old Gigi.”

“The old Gigi was weak, and too nice.” I jostle his arm and try to get him to laugh. “Come up to the café with me. I need to see if Sei-Jin’s there. And I need vinegar.” I drag him into the elevator and up to the third floor. The room bursts with laughter and chatter and moving bodies.

“She’s over there.” Will nods his head to the right while he pretends to look over the makeshift fruit stand they’ve set up for us.

I look and see Sei-Jin and the rest of the Asian girls at a table.

I put a hand on Will’s shoulder. “Perfect. I’ll be right back. Watch her.” I walk to the doors that lead to the café’s kitchen. I ask one of the workers for vinegar to add to a foot soak. He gives me a small bottle. I thank him, tuck it under my ballet warm-ups, and rejoin Will. “Do you think she’ll be in here a while?”

“She just got her food.”

I smile. We go to Studio B, where our ballet class will start at two p.m. The studio is empty aside from Viktor warming up on the piano. He doesn’t look up. I scan the bags, looking for Sei-Jin’s. They’re all official conservatory bags embroidered with the school’s logo and our names. Except for hers. It’s bubblegum pink and covered in K-pop stickers and buttons. I drape the bag over my shoulder like it’s my own. We slip out of the studio and into the unisex staff bathroom near the elevator banks. Will locks the door behind us.

“What are you going to do?” He drums his navy-blue-painted fingernails on the sink.

I smile at him and unzip Sei-Jin’s bag. It’s a jumble of pointe shoes, seaweed packs, makeup, leotards, and tights. I fish out three pairs of pointe shoes—one brand-new and the other two worn in. “Pull the stopper up to close the sink drain.”

Will does it. His smile fills up the small bathroom. I place Sei-Jin’s shoes in the sink. I uncap the bottle of vinegar and pour the sour-smelling liquid all over them. The pale pink darkens as the vinegar seeps in, like a withering rose. The pungent scent mingles with the sweaty, stale odor of the older pointe shoes and erases the clean, promise-filled smell of the brand-new pair.

Will covers his nose and I try not to vomit. I toss the empty bottle in the trash bin, covering it with paper towels and bits of toilet paper.

“She’s going to be so mad.” Will examines the shoes. “Those were perfectly broken in. She’ll have nothing for class.”

“I hope she’s pissed. This isn’t nearly as bad as what she did to me.”

“And she’ll never see it coming!”

I smile to myself, ignoring the tiny pinch of guilt that rushes through me. A tiny voice inside me whispers: You’re not a mean girl.

“Yes, I am,” I say.

“Yes, what?” Will asks.

“Oh, nothing.”

“I should do something like this, too,” Will says as we wait for the vinegar to completely soak into the satin so it doesn’t drip.

“To who?”

He flushes pink. “Remember, I told you, last year that I had a sort of boyfriend?”

“What’s a sort of boyfriend?” I want to ask who, but can sense that would be the wrong question right now.

“I dunno.” He shrugs. “I thought I was with someone, and then it all disappeared. He won’t return my texts. Won’t talk to me here at school.”

“Well, did you all have the talk?”

“The talk?”

“Yeah, where you decide if you’re together or not.”

“It didn’t really work that way. It was more casual than that.” He fusses with his hair, avoiding eye contact.

“Then what was it like?” I lift one pointe shoe up and shake it a little.

“We’d hang out. He’d flirt with me hard-core. Find ways to touch me playfully. We’d stretch together.”

I don’t want to tell him that this doesn’t sound like a relationship.

He continues: “We did stuff for each other. A lot of stuff. Like I’d write his English papers for him ’cause he was bad at it. And I—I’m so mad he just dropped me.”

I put the vinegar-soaked pointe shoes back into Sei-Jin’s bag, and I can already see the wetness seeping into everything else. “Well, I’ll help you think of something. Let’s go. Almost time for class.”

Will eases out of the bathroom first. I count to twenty and follow. No one notices as I zip through the lobby and back to the studio. I drop Sei-Jin’s bag right where it was before. As I watch the others shuffle in—Sei-Jin among them—I fill with satisfaction.

Of course Alec’s house has a cherry-red door. I stand marveling at it and running my fingers over the smooth surface. The Lucas home looks like something out of a movie, with little candles in each window and wrought-iron bars arched into beautiful shapes. We’re here for his kid sister Sophie’s birthday, and I’m nervous. It’s my first time visiting, even though Alec and I have been together almost a year now.

“C’mon,” he says, pulling me inside.

It’s probably the most expensive home I’ve ever been in. The entire block feels so different from the one I live on in San Francisco. Mama used to tell me that our house was made of blue-frosted gingerbread, with its pale yellow panes and sky-colored trim and little red staircase.

“Welcome to our home, Gigi.” Mr. Lucas greets us in the foyer. A sparkling chandelier casts shadows on the hardwood floors and there’s a huge flower arrangement on a table. Tasteful black-and-white family portraits line the wallpapered hall, and shelves hold trinkets and knickknacks that remind me of a museum. I cross my arms over my chest so I don’t accidentally knock anything over.

Alec unwraps my arms and slips his hand in mine. He gives me a quick tour of the main floor—the living room, den, his father’s home office, and the kitchen. Mama would say just breathing would track dirt into this house. She’d hate it.

His room is on the third floor. It’s clean and lavender scented, with white sheets and white walls and even a white wood desk. It doesn’t feel like Alec—at least not like the Alec I know. I feel completely out of place here.

“I have something for you.” He presses me into the wall and kisses me. His dad could walk in the room at any second. But I kiss him even longer, just to feel the tiny beat of excitement. He pulls away, reaching for a wrapped box on his desk. “A little welcome-back gift I’ve been saving.”

“Origami?”

“Look and see.”

I unwrap it slowly, instead of tearing into it like I want to. The wrapping paper is the expensive kind, glossy and thick with cutting lines and instructions on its underside. Mama doesn’t believe in spending money on such things, so she always wrapped everything in newspaper, then painted her own patterns over stories about wars and broken traffic lights. I always saved the wrapping, decorating the inside of my closet with her newspaper Picassos.

Under the paper is a cardboard box poked with holes. It holds a glass orb filled with soil, rocks, sand, and strange bright plants in purples and greens. Some are freckled, with thick, fleshy stems. Others are spiky and ridged. There’s even a cute little three-fingered cactus. The terrarium fits in my hands like a cantaloupe.

“They’re suc-succulents.” He stumbles over the term, and I fill it in for him. “I don’t really know what that means, but I bought them at the farmers’ market near the Museum of Natural History. I built it for you. I thought, you know, these could replace—” I put my finger to his mouth. I don’t want to talk about my butterflies. I don’t ever want to think about what happened to them again.

“It’s beautiful. Thank you.” The words fall out lopsided and tangled with one another, like I’ve never received a gift before. I try to keep my voice steady.

“I know it all must be hard.” He plays with my hair, tucking and untucking that section near my ear. “Coming back to the conservatory to dance.”

“I just like being here with you.” I kiss him again until someone calls his name from the hall.

We go back down another set of stairs. “Your home is beautiful,” I say to him.

“It never used to look this way,” he whispers close to my ear. “My stepmother changed everything. Renovated it for two years, and it feels more like a hotel than a real home.” He opens the doors to the dining room, and there she is with an unamused expression on her face, like she heard what he said.

“Hello, Giselle.” She takes my hands and kisses both of my cheeks. “So happy you could join us tonight.” Her lips are cold.

The table is decked out with candles, flowers, and ribbons. Sophie wears a crown of flowers, and she’s laughing with three other girls I’ve seen at the conservatory. They swallow their laughter after seeing me. I wonder if I should print out a sign that says Did Not Break and tape it to my chest and back, like an audition number. Then all the questions people are thinking when I’m not around might go away.

I’ve only said a handful of words to Sophie. She watched our Level 7 classes last year, and if our eyes met, she would smile and I would smile back, but it’s never been more than just that.

“Happy birthday, Soph,” Alec shouts out and rushes over to kiss her cheek. She squirms away from him.

“Lay off,” she says, but she’s smiling.

“You know Gigi, right?”

“Of course, everybody does.” Her friends parrot her and nod their heads. Their eyes volley around the room from me to each other and back again.

“Happy birthday,” I say.

When Sophie looks at me, I see Alec’s blue eyes and how the corners of hers crinkle up just like his when she smiles.

“Please sit.” His stepmother motions at two empty seats at the table. Her nails are painted cream and a diamond bracelet rings her thin wrist. She’s so put together she looks more like a portrait than a person. I know she isn’t Alec’s mother, who went back to England after the divorce, but she has the same blond hair, bright blue eyes, and pale white skin. Like Mr. Lucas buys them from the same factory every time. Mr. Lucas kisses Sophie on the top of the head before he takes his seat at the head of the table.

“I can’t believe Alec’s never brought you over for dinner before,” Mrs. Lucas says.

“Yes, why is that?” I tease him.

“We’ve always been too busy.” He reaches for a roll that seems to have appeared out of nowhere. I look around and catch the back of a woman dressed in a maid’s uniform. It reminds me of a Halloween costume from one of those tacky stores, except unsexy. I try to imagine Mama and Daddy at this birthday party. Mama likes messy food, she calls it—family-style dishes that litter even her nicest tablecloths with remnants of her cooking—and lots of laughter and singing until the neighbors call and tell them the music on her old record player is too loud.

The dining room door swings open. “Sorry I’m late.” Cassie’s voice rings through the room like a bell.

Mr. Lucas stands up to hug her, and he kisses both her cheeks. Cassie makes her rounds—tickles Sophie’s neck, acknowledges each of Sophie’s little petit rat friends, thumps Alec’s ear, and kisses her stepaunt on the cheek. She winks at me and takes her place to the left of Sophie. I’m actually happy to see her.

The server returns with a porcelain bowl. No one says thank you as she ladles the thick, rich potato leek soup into our bowls, but I whisper it.

Her smile is faint and brief as she moves on to Alec’s bowl.

“How’s Level 6 with Armeiskaya?” I ask Sophie.

“She’s always pushing—‘Swing, swing! Your legs are too heavy. Lift from the top of the head! Turn faster!’” one of the girls mimics.

The soup disappears before I can finish. It’s replaced with a perfect portion of salmon and green beans.

Mrs. Lucas waves her hand in the air. “No ballet talk please. It sets you all on a rampage. I need one ballet-free night.”

A deep blush settles on my cheeks and I chew several green beans in succession. I stab my fork too hard on the plate and the sound it makes brings everyone’s eyes back on me.

“Everything okay, Giselle?” Mrs. Lucas asks, her perfectly plucked eyebrow lifting with concern.

“Yes. Great. Everything is delicious.”

“I see that you enjoy green beans. I’ll have Marietta serve you more.” Mrs. Lucas motions at the woman who stands off to the side awaiting anyone’s wants or needs.

“Oh, I really shouldn’t have any more,” I say.

“I insist. You barely touched the salmon.”

“I have a slight fish allergy,” I say.

“Oh, my apologies,” she says. “I called Alec several times to go over the menu with him.”

Alec’s jaw clenches.

“I could never quite get him on the phone.” She waves at the servant. “Please serve Giselle something else. That’s so funny. Bette was allergic to fish, too.”

The woman approaches with green beans, piling them on my plate. The room freezes. Alec lets his fork hit the table and sighs. Bette’s name feels like a pinch.

“What would you like? I can have something else made for you.”

“No, it’s fine, Mrs. Lucas. I’m pretty full from the soup, the green beans, and salad.”

“Name it. Marietta, here, is a fine cook. What about some steak? We have a few nice fillets in the fridge. Or farfalle carbonara? That only takes a second.”

“Mrs. Lucas, it’s okay.”

“Don’t be silly. What would your parents think? You must—”

“Back off, Colette,” Alec says.

“Aunt Colette, I think she’s fine,” Cassie adds.

“Honey, it’s okay.” Mr. Lucas pats her hand.

“Yes, Mrs. Lucas, everything has been delicious. Wonderful. I am full. I promise.”

Her forehead creases. “I was just—”

Alec gets up from the table and cuts her off. “Let’s go.”

“Now just wait a minute.” Mr. Lucas stands, but Alec is already halfway to the door.

“No, we have to get back to the dorms.” Alec storms out of the room.

Cassie motions at me, and she gets up to exit, too. She kisses her uncle, then Sophie again. Alec’s stepmother is biting back tears now, her eyes all bloodshot and red. She bites down on her lip to, no doubt, keep it from quivering.

“Thank you so much for dinner, Mr. and Mrs. Lucas,” I say. “It was great. Really.”

Alec’s stepmother doesn’t say anything. It’s like she can’t get a word out.

“You are most welcome,” Mr. Lucas says, walking me out. “Anytime. I’m sorry we didn’t know about your fish allergy.”

“It’s fine, really,” I say. “And happy birthday, Sophie.” She doesn’t look up from picking at the pink, fleshy bits of salmon on her plate. The dining room is completely silent now. All the air sucked out of it, the little girls focusing on pushing the food around on their plates. I scoot to the front door.

Mr. Lucas closes the door behind me. Alec already has a cab waiting. He’s staring out the window when I slide in. Cassie sandwiches me in the middle.

I put my hand in Alec’s. He resists at first, then loosens his hand to let mine in.

“It was okay, you know?” I whisper.

“No, it wasn’t,” he says without looking at me. “You don’t force food on people. She’s always trying to control everyone and everything around me. I refuse to let her do that to me or anyone I bring over.”

“It was just food. Not a big deal. She was trying to be nice. A little pushy, but nice.”

“My mother would’ve never done that. ‘Those who are hungry—’”

“‘Will eat.’” Cassie finishes Alec’s sentence. “I miss Aunt Gemma, too.”

Alec puts my hand to his mouth and kisses it. “She would’ve loved you.”

He slumps in his seat, settling in for the ride, his head resting on my shoulder, his hand still tightly wrapped around mine.

Somehow, I had it in my head that today’s visit to Alec’s would bring him and me even closer. But instead, I feel like I really don’t know him well at all. I can’t help but think that maybe it was Bette who belonged there, at that long, carved mahogany table, not me. She’d know exactly what to do, what to say, right now. That thought, it kills me, just a little.

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