First published in the United States of America by HarperCollins Publishers in 2015

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 2015

Cover design by Michelle Taormina

Cover art © Sean Freeman 2015

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: 9780008390419

Ebook Edition © 2020 ISBN: 9780008390426

Version: 2020-07-30

To Navdeep, for all the things you did, and continue to do, to help make all our magic (and mayhem) possible

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Cassie

Act I: Fall Season

Chapter 1. Bette

Chapter 2. Gigi

Chapter 3. June

Chapter 4. Gigi

Chapter 5. Bette

Chapter 6. June

Chapter 7. Gigi

Chapter 8. Bette

Chapter 9. June

Chapter 10. Gigi

Chapter 11. Bette

Chapter 12. June

Chapter 13. Gigi

Chapter 14. Bette

Chapter 15. June

Chapter 16. Gigi

Chapter 17. Bette

Chapter 18. June

Chapter 19. Gigi

Act II: Spring Season

Chapter 20. Bette

Chapter 21. June

Chapter 22. Gigi

Chapter 23. Bette

Chapter 24. June

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. June

Chapter 46. Bette

Chapter 47. June

Chapter 48. Bette

Chapter 49. Gigi

Chapter 50. June

Acknowledgments

Keep Reading …

About the Authors

Books by Sona Charaipotra and Dhonielle Clayton

About the Publisher

IT ALWAYS FEELS LIKE DEATH. At least at first. Your muscles stretch and burn until they might rip. The bones in your hips threaten to rotate right out of their sockets. Your spine lengthens and twists into impossible shapes. The veins in your arms swell, blood pulsing through them. Your fingers tremble as you try to hold them taut but graceful, just so. Your toes jam into a pretty pink box, battering your feet with constellations of blisters and bruises.

But it all looks effortless and beautiful. I hope. Because that’s all that really matters.

Studio B is a fishbowl today, and I wish the three glass walls were blacked out or covered up. I can feel Liz’s glare hot and heavy, her face pressed up against the glass. I knew she wanted this—maybe even more than me—but that doesn’t mean she deserved it. She’ll claim that I got lucky, that it was nepotism, that being Mr. Lucas’s niece has its perks. I mean, Bette told me she said as much in her drunken babblings last night. But I know better. I earned this.

Morkie barks orders at the corps girls, then turns to the pianist to nitpick a chord pace for the spring ballet, La Sylphide. I’m the only Level 6 girl cast as a soloist, and while the others pretend to be happy for me—well, most of them anyway—I know they’re hoping to see me fail. But I won’t give them the satisfaction. Even though it’s hard being the youngest one in here. And earlier, when one of them asked me if I was fifteen, I wanted to lie and say I was seventeen or eighteen like them. As I watch the other dancers spin across the floor in a series of pirouettes, I keep my smile plastered across my face. I won’t falter. I can’t let them know how hard this is. My muscles ache and my stomach churns, empty from a morning spent reliving last night’s revelries. I never should have let Bette talk me into drinking. I’m definitely paying the price now.

The music stops abruptly, and Morkie towers over Sarah Takahashi, making her do the turn over and over again, yelling corrections in Russian like Sarah understands her. Sarah bows, and it seems to infuriate Morkie even more. She’s my understudy and a Level 8 girl. An 8 girl should’ve had the lead—an opportunity for the company masters to see her talent and offer her a spot.

I take every second of this break to review the variation in my head, to think through the music. Morkie does the steps one by one, stamping her little heeled ballet slippers. Even nearing seventy, she’s still a strong portrait of grace—a true danseuse russe.

Bette slips through the door. And she lets it bang closed so I know she’s here. I hate how she always finds a way to announce herself, but I could never tell her that. Everyone watches—her halo of blond hair pulled taut in its bun, her designer dance skirt floating around her like cotton candy, her pink lipstick expertly applied. She’s told to find a spot in the back, and plops down right near the dance bags. There were rumors that a fat check from her mom secured her a seat in the studio to learn the role, too, but I didn’t dare ask her. She’s been so gracious and helpful. Defending me to Liz and the others when I first got here, showing me the ropes, threatening the other girls if they didn’t stop messing with me.

Will enters a few moments after. His red hair is gelled up, and he’s wearing a face full of makeup. He blows me a kiss and waves. It was announced this morning that he’d be my pas partner’s understudy. He sits in the back with Bette.

Morkie calls me to the center. The music starts, light and fluttery and serene. Usually I let it take me, the notes lifting me away so I’m no longer myself, the movements of my arms and legs transforming, allowing me to become the forest fairy romancing the Scotsman. But today I’m very much anchored in my too tall, lumbering body. I can feel the pull in each muscle as I glide across the floor, trying to make sure I land every step in the right spot.

I catch myself looking down at the tape marking the stage placements, focusing on the counts in the music. I try not to think of each precise motion making up the variation. Old habits. Bad habits. I should know this by heart now. I tell myself I’m as light as air. But my feet are a second too slow, my arm movements too heavy.

“More! More!” Morkie yells, her voice bouncing off the mirrors. I feel my smile falter. I’m totally graceless in her presence. My confidence seeps out of me with my sweat. Scott waits for me stage left. I flitter over to him, presenting my hand. He pulls me into his chest.

Morkie yells over the music. “Smile. You’re in love with him.”

My grin looks pained in the mirror. My stomach muscles clench when his hands squeeze my waist as he prepares to lift me.

Morkie waves her hands in the air. We stop midlift.

“You’re supposed to be in love. Where is it? Where is it?” she says, motioning me out of the center. “Did we make mistake in casting, Cassandra?” Her Russian accent makes the words sharp, tiny knives that tear at my insides. “Find it! Find the reason we picked you.” She waves me away with one skinny arm.

Sarah takes my place with Scott to practice the flying shoulder lift I couldn’t do. I tell myself that it’s fine. Necessary. Both boys have to learn how to lift Sarah, then me. Just in case. Frustrated, I head to the back corner, toward Bette and Will. “You’ve got to,” I hear her whisper, but he shushes her as he watches me approach.

“Hey.” He grins, patting the floor next to him. “Rough start, huh?”

I catch my breath, wiping away the little beads of sweat on my top lip. As Bette’s ice-blue gaze settles over me, I feel disgusting and heavy and off. Will gives me a sad frown, like I’m a puppy who’s just been kicked. “Don’t take it to heart,” he whispers again. “Morkie’s a beast.”

“You okay?” Bette asks, offering a smile that’s half grimace.

“I don’t know where it all went,” I say, closing my eyes. I stretch my limbs out every which way. “I was fine yesterday. You saw me.”

“You looked scared of him,” Will says, his eyes on Scott, tracing his every movement. “Have a little crush?”

“I have a boyfriend,” I snap without meaning to. I wish I was partnering with Henri, but he’s at the Paris Opera School. I trust his hands. “Sorry, I can’t figure out what’s wrong with me.”

“Hmm,” Bette says, noncommittal. “Too much alcohol is my guess.” And it makes me remember how she kept filling my cup with the expensive wine she’d taken from her mother’s collection, despite my protests.

I nod my head, eager for an excuse. “I should’ve gone straight to bed after we hung out.”

“You didn’t?” Her forehead crinkles with surprise.

“Sometimes I dance late at night, so it can all stick in my head when I finally sleep.” I put a hand on my forehead, not sure why everything is coming out of me right now. But I can trust her. Alec told me so, even when I doubted Bette at first. And Will is Alec’s best friend. “My legs are a mess.” I scoot over a little, pressing my back against the glass wall that faces out onto the street. The warmth of sunbeams erases the cold that’s settled in my stomach. Even though it’s spring, I’m shivering. “What should I do?”

Bette and Will share glances. They know what Morkie wants. They’ve been here forever. They know how to please her.

“You need to get it together,” Bette says, picking invisible lint off her impeccable sweater. “Morkie doesn’t do drama or excuses.” She leans into a stretch, warming up as if she’ll be called to the center any second. As if she’s here for a reason. “And you need to not drink so much.”

“Ouch, Bette,” Will says.

I try to keep the shock off my face. “I actually never drank before,” I tell her in a whisper. If Bette is surprised, she doesn’t let it show. But it’s humiliating to say it. Before I came to New York and moved in with my cousin Alec and his family to go to the conservatory, my whole world was just dance class and school and sitting on the couch with my British host mother, waiting for a call or text from Henri. New York is totally different from London. “I didn’t know it would hit me that hard.” I want to call Bette out for pushing the wine on me, but I don’t. She’s pretty much the only real friend I’ve made since I’ve got to New York, and I’m not about to mess that up.

“Some days we’re just off,” Will says, and pets my leg like that will help.

I feel my eyes get watery. I lick the strawberry gloss off my lips, hearing my mom’s scolding voice in my head as I do it. She says it’s totally unladylike. I look over my shoulder and watch Sarah Takahashi nail the lift with Scott that I couldn’t. Morkie beams at her.

“Don’t worry, Cassie,” Bette says. “Will can help you look good out there. He’ll rescue you like he’s always done for me.” The word rescue lands hard. Will’s eyes dart around the studio, like he’s watching a fly.

Bette flashes me a smile that’s so big I can see all her teeth. Perfect, just like the rest of her. I’m called back to the center, and now Will is too. I can feel Bette’s gaze following Will as Morkie shows Will and me the next part of the pas. We mark the movements one at a time, with painful precision. It takes me almost an hour to perfect them the way Morkie wants them before she lets us try on our own. Then, finally, I stand in the center, ready to show her what I’ve learned.

I prepare to dance, waiting for the chord of music to start moving. My mind quiets: the worries, the criticisms, the faces in the glass all drift away. I see Will ahead waiting for me. I pretend that it’s Henri. I step into my first movement, folding myself into the music, each arm motion embodying the cadence. I jump and turn and leap and glide. I flutter over to Will.

“Right on the melody,” Morkie yells.

Will’s hands find my waist. He lifts me up into a flying shoulder lift. His right shoulder presses into my butt, carrying my weight, effortless.

“She’s not a box, William,” Morkie says. “She’s a jewel. Carry her like one. So pretty. So light.”

His fingers press into my hipbones as he struggles to hold me there.

“Beautiful, beautiful,” Morkie yells over the music. “Smile, Cassandra.”

I smile as hard as I can. I keep my eyes on the mirror and focus on Morkie’s instructions. Here comes the fish dive, slow, graceful, deliberate. Except it’s not. Will’s not supporting my weight anymore, and I wobble, trying to counterbalance, but it’s too late. His fingers feel like they’ve disappeared. Not at all like we’ve practiced. With his support gone, my right leg drops.

I topple, like I’ve fallen off the edge of a cliff. The floor feels so far away until I hit it.

THEY SAY ANTICIPATION IS SOMETIMES sweeter than the actual event, so I’m going to enjoy every moment of the waiting. Mr. K certainly loves dragging it out. We swarm around him in the American Ballet Conservatory lobby, waiting for his annual speech on The Nutcracker. Then he’ll reveal the student cast list. Twice a year, in the fall and the spring, students get to replace the company dancers for a night at Lincoln Center, a test of our mettle. A taste of our future.

That piece of paper basically sums up your worth in our school, the American Ballet Company feeder academy. And I’m worth a lot. Alec and I hold hands and I can’t contain my smile. In just a few moments, my name is going to be on the wall next to the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy, and the rest of my life can finally begin.

I saw my older sister, Adele, dance the role six years ago, when I was cast in the part of a cherub and bouncing around in gold wings and my mother’s lipstick. Back then, the anticipation wasn’t the best part. Back then, the best part was the heat of the lights on my skin and the presence of the audience before us, and dancing in perfect time with my little ballet girlfriends. The best part was the scratchy tights and the sweet metallic smell of hair spray and the sparkling tiara pinned into my baby-fine hair. The glitter dusted onto my cheeks. The best part was the hole of nervousness in my stomach before getting onstage and the rush of joy after we pranced off. The best part was bouquets of flowers and kisses on both cheeks from my mother and my father lifting me in the air and calling me a princess.

Back then, it was all the best part.

The school’s front doors are closed and locked. Mr. K’s speech is that important. I glance over my shoulder through the big lobby windows and see a few people with red noses, bundled up to fight the October air. They’re stuck on the stairs and in the Rose Abney Plaza, named after my grandmother. That door won’t open again until he’s finished. They’ll just have to freeze.

Mr. K rubs his well-groomed beard, and I know he’s ready to start. I know these little things about him, thanks to Adele, a company soloist. I straighten up a bit more and wrap my hand around Alec’s neck, tickling the place where his buzzed blond hair meets his skin. He grins, too, both of us perfectly poised to finally take our places as the leads in the winter ballet.

“This is it,” I whisper in his ear. He smiles back and kisses my forehead. He’s flushed with excitement, too, and I just know that from here on out I will love everything about ballet again. Both of our auditions went well. I remember how ridiculously happy Adele looked when she was dancing the Sugar Plum Fairy, and how the role got her plucked straight out of the school and given a spot in the company, and I just dream of feeling that full. There’s no one standing in my way. Even Liz is struggling a little bit this year. And no one else can do what I can.

I drop my hand down to his and squeeze Alec a little tighter. Alec’s best friend—my ex-friend—Will glares at me. Jealous.

Parents and siblings grow quiet, standing behind the expanse of black leotards.

“Casting each of you in The Nutcracker isn’t just an exercise in technique,” Mr. K begins. Our ballet master speaks slowly, like he’s just deciding on the words right now, even though he gives some version of this speech every year. Yet I cling to every word as if I’ve never heard it before. Mr. K is the single most deliberate human being I’ve ever met. He makes eye contact with me, and I know my fate is cemented in that quick connection. That look my way is purposeful. It has to be. I bow my head a bit with respect, but can’t stop the edges of my mouth from doing their own little upward pull.

“Technique is the foundation of ballet, but personality is where the dance comes to life. In The Nutcracker, each character serves an important purpose to the ballet as a whole, and that is why we take such care in assigning each of you the perfect part. Who you are comes across in how you dance. I’m sure we all remember when Gerard Celling danced the Rat King last winter, or when Adele Abney danced the Sugar Plum Fairy. These were seminal performances that displayed unbelievable technique as well as exquisite joy and beauty. The students stopped being students and transformed into artists, like a caterpillar leaves its chrysalis and becomes what it was designed to be—a butterfly.”

Mr. K calls us his butterflies. We’re never his students, dancers, athletes, or ballerinas. When we graduate, he’ll give the best dancer a diamond butterfly pendant—Adele still only takes hers off for performances.

“It is because of Adele’s and Gerard’s relationships to the roles of Sugar Plum Fairy and Rat King that they experienced such success,” he adds. “It was the connection they forged with the part.”

I bow my head even farther. Mr. K talking about my sister is another deliberate nod to me, I’m sure of it. Adele’s performance as the Sugar Plum Fairy has been a topic of conversation since the first night she’d performed it six years ago. She was only in Level 6 ballet and hadn’t even turned fifteen yet. It was unheard of for such a young dancer to be given such a role over the older Level 8 girls. And when I was that seven-year-old cherub hugging my sister with my fiercest pride and congratulations, Mr. K approached us both with a confident smile.

“Adele, you are luminous,” he’d said. It’s a word I have been itching for him to call me ever since. He still hasn’t. Not yet. “And darling little Bette, I can tell from your lovely dancing tonight that, in no time at all, you will be following in your sister’s footsteps. A Sugar Plum Fairy in the making.” He’d winked, and Adele had beamed at me with agreement.

He is surely referring to that moment now. He is letting me remember his prediction and assuring me that he had been right all those years ago.

I shift onto my tiptoes, unable to suppress that bit of excitement. Alec squeezes my hand.

Mr. K’s voice softens. “Young Clara, for instance, must be sweet and invoke the wonder of Christmas with every step and glance.” His gaze drifts to a pretty petit rat in a pale blue leotard, her dark hair in a perfect bun. She blushes from the attention, and I’m happy for tiny Maura’s moment of joy. I played Clara when I was eleven. I know the thrill, and she deserves to experience every second of it.

Years later, I still think of that performance as the most fun I’ve ever had. It was right after the Christmas season that my mother started showing me old videos of Adele and asking me to compare my technique to hers. It was that Christmas when everything between my mother, Adele, and me shifted beyond recognition, distorting into a bad TV drama. I get a little light-headed just thinking about it. I can still hear the whir of the X-ray camera like it was yesterday. Looking too hard at those memories isn’t a good idea, so I close my eyes for an instant to make the thoughts disappear, as I always do. I give Alec’s hand another squeeze and try to focus. This is my big moment.

“Uncle Drosselmeyer must be mysterious and clouded—a man with a secret,” Mr. K says. “The Nutcracker Prince should be regal and full of confidence. Untouchable and elegant, but still masculine.” Mr. K looks then at Alec, who breaks out into a fully dimpled grin. He is describing Alec to a tee, and I lean against him a bit. He lets go of my hand and wraps his arm around my shoulders. As if this moment weren’t wonderful enough, Alec’s affection has me soaring even higher. Mr. K lists off a few more characters and the necessary qualities the dancers must bring to them. I smooth my hair to make sure I look perfect for my big moment.

“And the Sugar Plum Fairy,” Mr. K continues, his eyes searching the crowd. “She must be not only beautiful but kind, joyful, mysterious, and playful.” His eyes are still searching the crowd, which is strange, since he knows exactly where I am. I try to dismiss it as a bit of Mr. K playing around, as he’s known to do.

The Sugar Plum Fairy’s ideal qualities—they’re not mine. They are not words anyone has ever used to describe me.

But the part is mine. I know it is because of the way Mr. K finishes his speech.

“Above all else,” he says, “the Sugar Plum Fairy must be luminous.”

I squeeze Alec’s hand again.

That is me.

I am luminous, like Adele. It is me. It has always been me.

But still, Mr. K’s eyes do not find their way to mine.

I NIBBLE AT MY BOTTOM lip until I taste blood. The spot is a tiny heart thumping harder than the one in my chest. My teeth sink into the cut despite the sting, and I can’t stop. I won’t go to the bathroom to see how bad it is. I can’t miss all the excitement. I can’t be anywhere else.

Shoulder to shoulder, we are a sea of paper-thin bodies. One large gust could push us around, like the fall leaves tumbling past the lobby’s picture windows. We are that light, that vulnerable, that afraid. Nervous excitement flutters through me. Even the little ones, the petit rats, gnaw at their fingernails, and the boys hold their breaths. The gurgles of half-empty stomachs churning a ballet diet of grapefruit and energy tea invade small pockets of silence when Mr. K finally pauses, all showmanship.

We listen intently. The occasional whisper is a firework. The melody of his Russian accent makes the words feel heavier, more important. He paces before us, waving his hands in fiery motions, and leaving the scent of cigarettes and warm vodka wrapped around us. I fixate on every word coming out of Mr. K’s mouth like I could catch each one in a mason jar.

Our other teachers are lined up behind him. Along with Mr. K, there are five of them that decide our fates. The piano accompanist, Viktor, the lowliest of the lot. His smile holds a cigarette, and he barely speaks but knows everything—all the things they think of us. Then Morkie and Pavlovich, our ballet madams. We call them the twins—though they’re not related and look nothing alike. Their narrow eyes flit over us ever so briefly, as if we’re ghosts they don’t quite see.

Lastly, there’s Mr. Lucas, the board president, Alec’s father—and Doubrava, the other male teacher.

Mr. K concludes his speech by congratulating us on making it through the audition process like the budding professionals we are. They all retreat into the admissions office. Someone whispers that they’ve gone to get the cast list. The open space feels lighter without them in it. Everyone starts to talk softly. I hear the words new and black and girl whispered in various combinations. After one month here at school, the first major casting makes me feel my skin color like a fresh sunburn. I’m the only black ballerina aside from a little one named Maya. Most times, I try not to think about it because I’m just like everyone else: classically trained, here to learn the Russian style of ballet, with a shot at moving from the school to the company.

But my skin color matters more here than it ever did at my California studio. Back there, we held hands while waiting for the cast list and hugged each other with hearty congratulations. Aurora in Sleeping Beauty, Kitri in Don Quixote, Odette in Swan Lake came in all colors. There were no questions about what looked best onstage. There were no questions about body type. There were no mentions of the Russians’ love of the ballet blanc—an all-white cast onstage to create the perfect effect.

Here, we tug our hair into buns, we all wear colored leotards that signal our ballet level, we put on makeup for class, and we only learn the Vaganova style of ballet. We follow traditions and age-old routines. This is the Russian way. This is what I wanted. This is what I begged my parents to send me across the country for. My best friend, Ella, from back home, says I’m crazy to come this far just to dance. She doesn’t understand when I tell her that ballet is everything. I can’t imagine doing anything else.

Someone whispers, “Who will he choose to dance the Sugar Plum Fairy?” but she is quickly hushed. Besides, we all know that it will be Bette.

Everyone wants a soloist part. Everyone wants to be the prima ballerina of the American Ballet Conservatory. Everyone wants a spot in the company. Everyone wants to be Mr. K’s favorite. Even me.

The moon stares in through the glass, even though it’s barely past dusk. At home it’s still the afternoon. Mama’s just finishing up in her garden about now. I wonder if she’s waiting for the cast list news, too, and if she’s finally getting excited about me being here. She wanted me to keep dancing at my local studio. Keep ballet a fun after-school activity.

“You could permanently hurt yourself,” she’d said before I auditioned for the conservatory, as if the rigor of ballet is like falling off a bicycle. “You could get sick. You could die.” Death is her favorite threat.

I fight the nerves. I fight the feeling of homesickness that creeps up on me. I fight the weird knot forming in my throat as I look around and it sinks in that I am the only black ballerina in the upper ballet levels. I’m lonely here. Most of these kids have been at the school for years, like my roommate, June, and Bette and Alec, who’ll likely be cast as the leads this year. I watch Bette lean her golden head against his, a matched set, and hear her sigh, content, knowing that her big moment is coming. I suppress a little pang. I just got here, I’m the new girl. I shouldn’t want what she has—the role, or Alec. But I can’t help it. I look away, trying to find somewhere else to put my thoughts.

I stare up at the hundreds of black-and-white portraits of the American Ballet Conservatory graduates who went on to be apprentices, soloists, and principals in the American Ballet Company. They cover all the walls in the halls here, looking down on us, showing us what we could become if we’re simply good enough. In the almost fifty years of history on the wall, there are only two other black faces in a white sea. I will be the third. I will earn one of the few spots in the company saved for conservatory members. I will show my parents that every part of me can handle it: my hands, my feet, my mind, my legs, and my heart.

I scan the crowd for my aunt Leah, who is decked out in leggings and a hand-knitted sweater dress. I can hear her voice above the others, a little too loudly introducing herself to other parents and guardians as Mama’s younger sister and an art curator at a Brooklyn gallery. She grins and waves at me. With her pink knit hat and freckly brown skin, she’s as much an outsider as I am in this lobby, and she’s been a New Yorker for decades.

I wave back. The girls around me tense up. My roommate, June, moves a small step away from my side. Even my waving is too loud, but I don’t care.

The office door cracks open, its squeaky hinges hushing everyone. We all gasp. I put a hand to my chest. Clapping echoes through the room as he reenters. Mr. K’s pretty secretary walks to the board with a sheet of paper, her arms outstretched to tack it up.

Mr. K looks around. “Podozhdite! Wait, wait.” He raises his hand before she exposes the page.

He crisscrosses between us. He’s dark—almost ominous—dressed in all black. Anton Kozlov, a danseur russe. Frantic energy bubbles through me. The other dancers squirm and part, giving him way. I drop my head, my body still jittery whenever he comes near. I haven’t quite overcome it.

I will my hands to settle. I will my muscles to relax. I will my heart to slow. Beside me, I hear other girls’ breathing accelerate. We are one sphere of nervous, nauseous focus. I try to use Mama’s calming technique: listening to the noise inside our gigantic pink conch shell. I picture my dad finding it in Hawaii that summer. I attempt to listen for the gauzy melody, but the calm doesn’t come.

I hear footsteps, then see my reflection in the toes of two black shoes. Two of Mr. K’s long fingers lift my chin and I meet his mottled green eyes. Sweat dots along my hairline. I feel dried blood mar my mouth like a tiny streak of Mama’s paint. All eyes turn to me. Our ballet madams watch. The parents go silent, including my aunt Leah. I lick my cut, hoping to stop the pulsating thrum.

Mr. K’s face looms right above me. Heat gathers in my cheeks.

I can’t escape his gaze. He holds me there and everything slows.

I DON’T MIND THAT MR. K’S interrupted his speech to lift Gigi’s chin and force her to pay attention. It’s terrible, but I like seeing her get in trouble for her California spaciness. Serves her right. He didn’t say a word. But I know he’s sending her a warning: tune in. Always.

I sip tea from my thermos to hide my smile. The bitter omija herbs warm my irritable belly, calming the bile that’s constant company. I fight the urge to retreat to the bathroom and escape to the cold comfort of porcelain and an empty stomach. But I can’t afford to miss this moment. I have to know where I am now.

Mr. K’s secretary holds the page close to her chest, as if we’d attack her for it—and maybe she’s right.

“Luminous,” he says, then goes on to repeat it five more times, asking dancers close to him to define it, to describe what it means onstage or else he’ll delay the casting announcement even further. They quake and stutter, unable to answer him. If he’d have asked me, I’d have known just what to say—to be luminous onstage means to glow, to shine, to own it. It’s a quality few among us possess, but I know I’m among the very few. Still, they don’t give me the roles I want, no matter how well I think my auditions have gone. But it’s only a matter of time.

A tingle tickles its way up my spine. The worry, the anxiety, the nerves. I savor it. My classmates, they’re all stupid and empty-headed, wrapped up in their emotions, unable to see things clearly. They don’t pay attention. If they had, they’d already know whose name will be written in each spot. Mr. K never changes. Those who have been here forever know his habits, his choices, his patterns. Newbies don’t stand a chance. Ballet is about routine, training the muscles to obey tiny commands. I’ve been here since I was six—shuttled back and forth from Queens until I got old enough to live in the dormitory above us. I know the drill.

It all comes down to this: the casting of The Nutcracker. The first ballet of the school year. This one starts the game. I can’t wait to finally be in it.

By now, the American Ballet Conservatory is more like home than the two-bedroom apartment in Flushing that I shared with my mom. I know the studios, the academic classrooms, the café, the student lounge, my corner bedroom. I know that the elevator won’t take you to floors thirteen to eighteen. I know every staircase exit that lets you onto boys’ dorm floors, all the dancers in the black-and-white photographs, quiet places to study or dark corners to hide from the RAs, the best places to stretch or make out. Not that I’m doing much making out. Or any, really.

The lobby crowd thickens with more adult bodies. Parents. Someone opened the door for them. They’re here to pick up the petit rats or to nose around to find out who got what role. When Mr. K’s ex-wife Galina, a retired Paris Opera ballerina, was here, she’d block the door and gather us—her petit rats—all around her, willing us to be silent as we watched the older girls get cast. Any serious dancer tells their parents to stay in the far hallway or, even better, just wait by the phone. Mr. K doesn’t like when we act like children who need mommies. We may be young, he says, but we’re supposed to be professionals.

My parents are not here, of course. My mom refuses to set foot in the atrium. When she does come, she just pulls up out front of the school and makes me take the rice cakes, the endless packs of seaweed and tea she’s brought for me from the car. And I don’t have a father.

Gigi’s big-haired aunt keeps inching closer and closer to us students, and I can hear her talking. It’s distracting me from hearing Mr. K explain how difficult it was for him to choose student roles this semester. I let my eyes burn into the back of Gigi’s head. I want to tell her that she should’ve clued her aunt in and told her not to talk until after the cast list is revealed. I want to whisper under my breath, joyonghae—be quiet—just like my mom always does. I need to hear every word out of Mr. K’s mouth. His announcement will show how far I’ve come, what he thinks of me now.

Mr. K pauses and the parents clap awkwardly. He nods, placing a finger to his mouth. Maybe he’ll add something new. Probably not. I could give the spiel myself. And I know his cast list before his little blond assistant tacks up the page.

Gigi shakes in front of me, trembles working their way down her back and legs. She’s like one of the petit rats at the front of the pack. I feel her fear and excitement. Mr. K will cast her as Arabian Coffee, just like the other brown girl from two years ago. Gigi’s exotic like her. Can’t even remember her name, she gave up so quickly once it all got tough. She complained it was so lonely being the only black girl at school. Try being the only half-Asian ballerina. Not quite right anywhere. That’s tough. And Mr. K’s just predictable enough to put minorities in ethnic roles. He’ll cast the pack of Korean girls as Chinese Tea. But my face isn’t Asian enough to join them. And I wouldn’t want to. I want to be as far away from them as possible.

Everyone knows Bette Abney will be the Sugar Plum Fairy. Ever since her sister landed it when we were kids, no one has stopped talking about her performance. And the mean girls always get what they want here. Bette isn’t anywhere near as luminous as Adele, but that’s what Mr. K will do. Her feet are good—quick and light—and she is undeniably elegant. Even though we aren’t friends (and never have been, nor will be), I actually wouldn’t mind seeing her as the Sugar Plum Fairy if I had to lose the role. Bette has a razor-sharp edge. It’s a fascinating contrast to her sweet, doll-like face and stately pedigree.

Her lapdog roommate Eleanor will be her understudy and nothing else, of course. And Bette’s clone, Liz Walsh, stands two bodies away from me, in consummate formation. Chest out, soft hands at her sides, and feet in first position. Her body ballet perfect. An icy brunette, she’ll be just right for the Snow Queen.

But even though she looks relaxed, Liz’s eyes are wild, darting about the room, and I’m glad I don’t have to feel that desperation. No matter how many knits she piles on, it won’t hide her underweight body. I sip my tea, happy it leaves me satisfied, without the pains of hunger. The white girls don’t know much about diet teas from Asia. They fill themselves with calorie-packed American brands. We should tell them. But of course we don’t.

“Mr. K, c’mon already,” Alec shouts out. “Let us see the list.”

Mr. K breaks out in a smile. Only blond and blue-eyed Alec can get away with that. His father stands beside the other male ballet teacher with a bright grin on his face. Alec is the son of the president of the board of trustees. He can do what he wants.

Alec heckles Mr. K once more. He will be the Nutcracker Prince and he will dance with Bette. It makes sense for the only couple in our grade to dance together. Of the sixteen girls and six boys in the junior class, only two of the boys are straight—the new superstar boy, Henri, and Alec.

Bette beams and touches the side of Alec’s face like some doting wife, and Alec’s best friend, Will, jostles his shoulder. Bette thumbs her silly locket, the one she’s worn forever. It was probably a gift from Alec. I touch my bare neck. The only jewelry I ever want is Mr. K’s butterfly pendant.

Redheaded Will, of course, will be relegated to playing old Drosselmeyer. Slack chested and delicate, Will could dance the female variations better than most of the girls in our class. If allowed on pointe, he would. His eyeliner is always expertly applied and he possesses a grace most of our class would kill for. But Mr. K and Doubrava frown at him, and until he becomes supermasculine—a true male danseur russe—he’ll keep getting stuck there.

Mr. K steps into our midst once again. He’s winding us up for the big finale. He’s finally ready to tell us. Dancers shuffle out of his way. Gigi keeps throwing glances back to that aunt of hers, and she almost does a jump with excitement. She’ll learn soon enough not to do that here. Never show how you feel about a particular role. People are watching. Always. They’ll take what you want.

Mr. K stops at Henri, glaring at the mess of hair around his shoulders. Even though the dance mags have called him the next great ballet star, a mini Mikhail Baryshnikov, we still treat him like he’s nothing. He came for the last summer session. Henri says something in French and gathers his dark, shaggy hair into a ponytail. He used to date Cassie Lucas. I shudder, thinking of what the girls did to her last year, how we all have to suffer through those seminars on competition now. He doesn’t talk to anyone, and no one wants to talk to him anyway. Guess they worry he knows the things that happened to his girlfriend. That he might tell someone who matters. Ballerinas have their secrets. He has a mean glint in his eyes.

I would cast him as the Rat King just because of that.

While Mr. K inspects a few others, the room simmers and bubbles into a rolling boil. I review all the major parts, counting them out on my fingers, and assigning each of my classmates their obvious role: Clara, the Nutcracker Prince, Snow Queen, Snow King, Uncle Drosselmeyer, Arabian Coffee, Chinese Tea, the Russian Dancers, the Mechanical Doll and Harlequin, the Spanish Dancers, Snowflakes, the Sugar Plum Fairy, Reed Flutes, Dew Drop Fairy, Mother Ginger.

It’s not till the end of the list that I realize my mistake. I didn’t cast myself.

WINTER PERFORMANCE: THE NUTCRACKER

Cast

Major Soloist Parts

Clara: Maura James

Older Clara: Edith Diaz

The Nutcracker Prince: Alec Lucas

Snow Queen: Bette Abney

Snow Queen Understudy: Eleanor Alexander

Snow King: Henri Dubois

Drosselmeyer: William O’Reilly

Arabian Coffee: Liz Walsh

Chinese Tea: Sei-Jin Kwon, Hye-Ji Yi

Sugar Plum Fairy: Giselle Stewart

Sugar Plum Understudy: E-Jun Kim

Rat King: Douglas Carter

Dew Drop Fairy: Michelle Dumont

IT’S MIDNIGHT. CASTING DAY IS officially over. The shock and the excitement of it all keeps me up. I am the Sugar Plum Fairy. Me, Giselle Stewart! I am Mr. K’s korichnevaya babochka. His brown butterfly. I let the words flutter around in my head like my own little butterflies in my windowsill terrarium, all light and frantic and impossibly beautiful. They keep me company here.

I got a handful of congratulations that felt mostly strange and hollow and a few stiff hugs. Like it was all for Mr. K and the teachers who were watching.

I can’t stop thinking, fidgeting. My muscles itch to move even this late—past curfew, past lights out. It’s the only way I’ll be able to clear my head, get some sleep, and be fresh for morning ballet class tomorrow. I slip out of bed and tiptoe from my side of the room, careful not to wake my roommate, June, on my way out. I listen for the nighttime RA patrolling in the girls’ hall before sneaking out. I should rest. Mama would insist on it if I were home. It’s the healthy thing to do. But I know what I really need is to dance. Especially now. I need space to think it through. I need space to get ready for it all.

The elevators have cameras, so I take the stairs down eleven flights to the first floor. I don’t want anyone to know I’m out of bed. I’m a bit breathless as I tiptoe to my secret place, passing the administrative offices, through the lobby, and dashing from hall plant to hall plant, hoping not to be spotted by the front desk security guard. The whispers from earlier follow me, buzzing in my ears and my head as if the parents and other dancers were still standing there, mocking me.

The black girl. The new girl. She’s no Sugar Plum Fairy. Her feet are bad. Her legs are too muscular. Her face won’t look right onstage. It should’ve been Bette. Bette’s sister was luminous, you heard Mr. K say it. Gigi could never be that.

The ghost words push me forward. I walk as quietly as possible down the hall. The ballet conservatory is at the back of the Lincoln Center complex, in one of the beautiful buildings that makes up the performing arts center. The first time I walked along the promenade, it seemed impossible that there was a place that housed it all: dance, theater, film, music, opera, and more. The studios on the first floor are glass boxes that let in light. I graze my fingers along the cool panels as I pass.

I hold my breath and duck past the nutritionist’s office. Her charts and scales and cold metal examining table provoke hysteria, and the tiny woman wields the power to boot a dancer out of the conservatory for falling underweight. It’s enough to keep me eating, that’s for sure.

I jump when I catch sight of Alec slipping out of one of the studios. It’s the middle of the night, practically. Our eyes meet. I open and shut my mouth like a fish, and start to mumble out some explanation for why I’m down here. He smiles like he’s not going to tell anyone.

“What are you doing up?” Alec says, grabbing my hand and leading me to a dark spot in the hall away from a camera. The gesture means nothing, of course. He belongs to Bette, whose face is porcelain and smooth and whose words and expressions are so carefully chosen they are always dead perfect. My hair is frizzy and wild and I never say the right thing. I hope my hand isn’t clammy.

“They’re always watching,” he whispers. “You’ve got to know where to hide.” His body is close to mine. He smells good, especially for someone who’s been dancing all evening, and I take an illicit breath of his woodsy deodorant and the sweetness of new sweat making his forearms glisten in the dark.

“I like to dance at night,” I say, trying to remember how easy talking used to be back in California. “I go to the locked-up studio. The one in the basement.” I don’t know why I tell him this.

“Just came from a late-night workout myself,” he says.

I try on a smile and force myself to hold on to Alec’s eye contact. Secretly, I’m wondering about him: why he dances, what he dreams about, what kissing him might be like. I’ve never really been this curious about a boy before. Boys are distractions. Well, to ballerinas. Not to normal girls.

Bette’s boyfriend, I say in my head, even as I take note of how wide his shoulders are, how I can make out the shapes of the muscles under his tights and hoodie. There’s something so romantic about a ballerina couple. You can’t help admiring their beauty and symmetry when they walk down the hall together. Long limbs and blond hair and a graceful ease that can’t be denied. And onstage, I bet the audience can sense that they’re together.

I mean, obviously.

“You won’t tell on me, will you?” I try to flirt like girls in the movies.

“I won’t tell if you don’t, Sugar Plum Fairy,” he mock whispers. There’s nothing sinister in the words, no threat. If anything there’s a laugh underneath it all. I smile back. I’m not sure anyone has really smiled at me for the entire month I’ve been here. Though he’s always been so nice to me.

“Deal,” I say, and reach out to touch his arm. I don’t know why. The deal doesn’t require a touch to lock it in, but letting my fingers rest on his strong forearm is a strange reflex. His muscles tense, but he doesn’t pull away immediately.

“You’re an interesting choice for a Sugar Plum Fairy,” Alec says.

I don’t know what to say to that.

“I mean, you’ll bring a lot of energy to the role,” he says, filling the space where I am not talking. His arm grazes mine—a breath between our skin, so close I can feel the heat of it, but neither of us moves away to get more space.

“Thank you,” I say, letting myself believe, for just one second, that Alec is just as curious about me as I am about him. “Didn’t Cassandra dance it last year? Wasn’t she only a sophomore?” I don’t know why I say it, and I wish I could erase the words after seeing his face twist into a pained expression.

He nods. “Yeah, she did. Cassie’s my cousin.”

A strange silence stretches between the two of us. No one really speaks about the girl who left last year, which makes me sad and curious. And I didn’t know she was his cousin. I start to say I’m sorry.

“It’s cool. Let’s not talk about it. Let’s talk about you dancing the role.” It’s not lost on me that Alec smiles when I smile right now, or the way his eyes light up when I say in way too small a voice that I’m excited to work with him. And he doesn’t move away. I wonder if he needs to get back upstairs to his room, if he needs to get some sleep.

“I’m excited to work with you, too,” he says, the blueness of his eyes glowing even brighter.

There’s a noise at the opposite end of the hall. He moves away. “See you tomorrow, okay?” he asks.

“Yeah,” I say.

“Don’t stay up too late,” he says, and walks in the opposite direction, leaving me to think over the words and the light touch while I walk farther down the hall, farther into the dark.

The corridor dead-ends at a staircase that leads down into the basement level. I’ve noticed people never walk this far down the hall. I race down. This area is separate from the student rec lounge and the physical therapy room, like it has been purposefully blocked off. There’s a studio here that’s locked up. A small studio window gives a view inside: the shadowy outline of stored objects. The first week of school I’d asked June about the unused studio, and she’d said it’d always been under construction, and that the teachers hated it because it had no windows, and ballet needs light. The Russians call it plokhaya energiya: a room brimming with bad luck and darkness, and so it isn’t used.

But I don’t believe in superstitions. I don’t exit the dressing room with my left foot first or sew a lucky charm into my tutu or kiss the ground in the stage wings before going on for a performance or need other dancers to say merde to me on opening night. At home, my parents have their silly broom to sweep out evil and often burn sage to keep the house energy clean. But I only believe in my feet and what they can do in pointe shoes.

I pull a bobby pin out from my bun and push it into the old lock, waiting for the tiny bolt to ease downward and click out of place. I like to be in places where I’m not supposed to be—in my old high school’s attic or in the empty house in my San Fran neighborhood. There’s a tiny thrill in picking a lock and exploring a space that others want closed up.

The lock gives without much effort. I look to the left, then look to the right, and disappear into the dark space. Dirt and debris crunch under my sandals, and I run my hand along the wall, and click a switch.

The one working light sputters, and then buzzes on. The bare lightbulb flickers an erratic pulse. Its half-light illuminates covered objects, a partially gutted dance floor, and mirrors draped with black sheets. Broken and decayed barre poles lean at odd angles, coated in a constellation of cobwebs and dust. The air is thick and inviting.

I head to my little corner, plop down my dance bag, and inspect myself in the only uncovered mirror. Descending from the upper corner of the glass, a tiny fracture stretches across my reflection like a lightning bolt. Mama says looking into a broken mirror is bad luck, but I don’t care. My lip has a hilly scab. I can’t believe I bit it so badly. That my nerves made me do that. The ugly aberration replaces whatever is pretty about my face. I won’t let myself get nervous like that again.

My phone buzzes in my bag. My parents. They know I’m still up. I click them to voice mail. I know what they want. They’ll ask if the nurse checked me after the cast list excitement. They’ll gloss over my accomplishment, only wanting to know how I’m feeling physically. Since I came out here, they treat me like I’m sick, some patient who shouldn’t be out or who should be in a wheelchair, or better yet, a bubble. I was officially cleared to dance at the conservatory months ago. I try not to think about it. I don’t want anyone to know. Ever.

I turn on the music on my cell phone. The Nutcracker score sounds tinny and distant, but it will have to do. I need to dance. I dig my pointe shoes out of my messy bag and put them on. My legs start first, extending out of my hips so far I feel like I’m on stilts. Long and tall, I stretch from the top of my head down to my tiptoes, trying to become one straight line. As I dance my mind quiets and my body takes over. I follow the current of music, each chord a wave, each note a splash. My feet move to match the rhythm, drawing crazy, invisible patterns on the floor.

My heart’s racing. I tell myself it’s just from the dance and the excitement of landing the role. But a voice in my head whispers that it’s because I’m thinking of Alec, too. Bette’s Alec. My chest tightens. Control your breathing. I haven’t had one episode, not in ballet class, not in Pilates, not in character dance, not even once all last year at my old regular school. I’m fine. I will my heart to slow. I’m in control of my body.

I come down off pointe, wipe the sweat from my forehead, and put my hands on my head until I can catch my breath. If I stretch a bit, maybe I’ll relax even more. If I focus on the deep pulls in my muscles, I can get it together. I push my leg across the barre to feel the stretch and the calm that usually comes afterward. My muscles tremble, my feet spasm, my hands shake. My fingernails are purple. The light flickers off for a long moment. Sad darkness surrounds me until the light comes on again. Maybe I’m not good enough to dance the Sugar Plum Fairy. Maybe I’m not cut out for the role. Maybe I’ ll disappoint Mr. K and Alec and prove everyone right. Maybe Mama was right—I’m not well enough to dance.

“Shut up,” I say to the mirror. “Chill out.” I fight the negativity. “I got the role!”

My heart’s not slowing down. This hasn’t happened in a whole year. My body usually obeys. I sit on the floor and press the soles of my feet together so that my legs form butterfly wings. I press on my knees. I try to breathe like a yogi—deep, slow breaths. Nothing will take this away from me. Nothing.

NO ONE HAS SPOKEN TO me since the cast list went up, not even Eleanor, who is breathing heavily in the bed next to mine, so comfortable with mediocrity as an understudy that she can sleep right through her failure. I do all the tricks: counting sheep, picturing myself afloat on the ocean, pretending my body is filling with grains of sand and getting heavier and heavier.

It does nothing for me. On endless loop is one impossible thought: I am not the Sugar Plum Fairy. I am not the Sugar Plum Fairy. I assume I have text messages on my phone from Alec, checking to make sure I’m okay after I ran off and hid in my room, but nothing can interrupt the flow of those words and their hold on my mind. Which is why it takes me a few moments to register the loud knocking at our door at one o’clock in the morning, when the dorm should be all silence except for room-mate whispers or secret hookups.

“Bette?” Eleanor says, and it’s her voice, sleepy and soft, that breaks through the loop. Then the harsh knocking and our RA calling out my name, louder and louder.

“Jesus, what’s going on?” I say, and get myself out of bed and to the door. Eleanor moves more slowly, rubbing her eyes and grumbling about the time and the noise. Our sour-faced RA is at the door when I open it, and she rubs her knuckles as if the incessant knocking has caused her an injury.

She does not look pleased.

Then again, neither do I.

“Your mother,” she says.

“You can’t send her away?” I say.

Eleanor is awake enough to scoff behind me.

“So not my job,” our RA says, and she stomps off, slamming the door to her room behind her and probably waking up the students who didn’t already stir from all the knocking. A few people have opened their doors, and others are shuffling behind them. The gutsier ones take the elevator right after me and come down to the parents’ lounge on the first floor, though Eleanor tries to motion them away and Liz threatens them with bodily harm. It’s useless: my mother always puts on a show, and they know it. Besides, these girls have been waiting a decade for my downfall. They wouldn’t miss it for the world.

She’s right outside the elevator when the doors open, moments away from heading up without permission: steely, skinny, mouth in a line so straight I could use it as a ruler. My mother. She smells like red wine and rare steak and the angry kind of sweat.

“Bette,” my mother says, her lips tight and too pink from Chanel lipstick, which has been hurriedly drawn on over red wine–stained lips. The Ts in my name land hard. She pulls me past the front desk and toward studio C. The three other elevators open with a ping. More students pour out. She doesn’t seem to notice, or care. Someone laughs, but the cowards mostly hide near the elevator bank or chat up the front-desk guard, waiting to hear whatever she’s come to say to me. They are too far away to smell the booze on her breath or to see the unfortunate pit stains that have ruined her couture gown. But they’ll be able to hear every slurred word. “Next time, please tell me the truth about how your audition has gone.”

My mother doesn’t raise her voice. Not ever. It’s more powerful all low and practiced anyway, and she knows it. Even when the vowels are long and loose and the words slip on top of each other, she stays in control of the volume. We’re WASPs; we don’t shout.

“It’s not like I’m some understudy, Mother,” I say. I do not let my voice break, but my eyes are filling with tears. During the last winter ballet, I was the only Level 6 girl, besides Cassie, to dance a soloist part. I was the Harlequin Doll, cast with the Level 7 and 8 girls. I try to remember that feeling, but my mother erases every inch of it.

“I’d already called some very important people to come see you perform, Bette,” she says. “You said your audition went well. I took that to mean you were ready to be seen. When your sister—”

“You want to take it up with Mr. K?” I say. “I killed it. He smiled. He ever smile at Adele? At anyone? He was practically beaming.”

“Maybe it was because he was laughing at you. Did you ever consider that?” she says. I tell myself that she would never say this if she hadn’t been drinking, but I know that’s not true. She keeps that pink Chanel smile on her face and her eyes don’t leave mine. She’s not that drunk. There is not a pinch of sadness or regret in the words coming out of her mouth.

Eleanor and Liz slink out of the late-night shadows. Our unspoken rule is that neither of them will leave me alone with my mother if things get out of control, and I guess this qualifies. Eleanor, Liz, and I give one another a look, and both of them take a few steps closer to me.

“Hi, Mrs. Abney!” Eleanor’s voice chimes out, a welcome interruption, but too light and pretty for this time of night and this kind of conversation.

“Hey, Mrs. Abney!” Liz adds, her tone thick with exhaustion. My mother ignores them both. She’s not done tearing me to pieces, not yet.

“You don’t think. You just act,” she says. “Just like your father. That’s your problem.”

I decide not to cry at the mention of my father, but promise myself that I can feel upset about it later, alone in my room, maybe when Eleanor is in the shower or something.

“Who got it?” my mother says then. I can practically see her little ears prick up like a dog’s, hunting for the next target. She’s come straight from her charity event to find out the answer to this very important question. Her eyes settle on Eleanor, then comb over Liz—my only obvious competition.

“Doesn’t matter. Not me,” I say. I didn’t want to say Gigi’s name. I don’t want to hear the things my mother will say about her or the accusations she will make. I don’t want Gigi, if she’s listening somewhere with the rest of them, to think she matters to me. Or my mother.

“Who, Bette?” She leans in a little closer, so that instead of just seeing the Chanel on her lips I can practically taste the shit, that pitch-perfect perfume and the acidic way it mixes with her boozy breath. The combination hits my taste buds hard.

“New girl,” I mumble.

“Oh Christ,” my mother yells, breaking her vow to stay silent and calm in spite of everything. Liz steps away; even she can’t handle it. Eleanor grabs my elbow, like I might topple over from the cruelty without her help.

“Her name’s Gigi,” Eleanor breaks in. “She’s really a totally different type from Bette, so I don’t think it was even really about the dancing—” She tries hard to protect me from the unstoppable gale wind that is my mother.

“Gigi …” My mother puts it all together. The woman spent the summer reading up on the newest recruits to the conservatory. If anyone can put a face with a name, it’s her. “Gi— no.” She stops. Her eyes widen as she stares at Eleanor’s red face.

I should feel relief. The pressure is off me so fast I almost lose my balance, all that weight just sliding away. Eleanor’s grip on my elbow tightens.

“Well,” she says. “We can certainly fix that.”

I grab for her arm, knowing she’s going to head right for Mr. K. She knows he sometimes stays very late in his office. But my hand is too shaky and sweaty from the third-degree interrogation that’s just gone down. And so she escapes, her gown sweeping behind her as she makes her way to the office with the kind of singular determination only ever rivaled by my sister, Adele. If I’m lucky, he’s not there, and she’ll just leave an angry, drunken voice mail that I hope his secretary will erase in the morning. She already has her cell phone in her hand, armed with everything she needs to make a fuss and to make a joke of our family.

“It’s okay,” Eleanor whispers in my ear, which means it definitely isn’t. Eleanor only ever says that when things are really bad. Liz doesn’t say a word. Just lets her forehead frown and her mouth purse, acknowledging the complete mortification of this moment. She knows it’s bad. She doesn’t lie to me. Not even to make me feel better.

Other students punch at the elevator button, no longer trying to stay quiet. There are guttural laughs and a few imitations of the great, drunk Mrs. Abney.

I look over at one of the elevators. Will stands there holding it open for everyone, red hair gelled up with the color-enhancing treatment he puts in every night, his cell phone in his hand, no doubt sending out mass texts (and hopefully not video) about what just happened. And I know he’s the reason half the school is down here watching in the first place. He loves seeing me fall.

Eleanor tries to hold me in place, so that I don’t run after the vultures, but I practically throw her off me. Maybe I got drunk on my mother’s breath. I don’t know. But I’m getting really tired of keeping it together, especially when it doesn’t make a difference. I fly after the students, fueled with the desire to hit one of them. I almost do, too. June’s just a hand’s length in front of me, and I could push her too-skinny ass straight into the elevator doors if I wanted. And I do want to. Just to hurt someone. Just to feel a release.

Hitting her will only get me into more trouble, though, and she’s not the person I hate most of all right now.

“Watch out, ladies! Bette’s a real animal,” Will calls out with a smug grin on his face. I want to slap the look off his face, but I shove past him, past June, past all of them, making sure to elbow as many girls as possible on my way to the last elevator. I don’t let anyone get in with me. It zips up to the eleventh floor. I throw open the door to my bedroom. And then the door to my bathroom. And there she is, the girl I hate. The one I really want to punch. I draw my hand back, make my first real fist, and punch the mirror. Hard. So hard it shatters around my hand. So hard that sad pieces of glass clatter in the sink. So hard my knuckles start to bleed. It hurts, but not as much as the rest of the day.

AT 7:30 EVERY MORNING AND 8:30 every night, on the dot, my mom calls. Like clockwork. She wants to ensure that her good little girl remains exactly that, which means I have to be tucked away in my room, safe and sound, a half hour before curfew. To confirm that I’m actually in the dormitory and not just pretending to be, she doesn’t call my cell phone but rather the pay phone in the girls’ hallway—a relic from the old days. What she doesn’t realize is that I am always here—in the studios, the dorm, a classroom, or the student lounge. I do nothing but study and dance. I am her good little girl.

I watch the hall and wait to see if Gigi’s back. That nut got up at six a.m. to go to Central Park to feed the ducks. Last time she brought me a flower for my desk, which is kind of nice or whatever. She’s really into nature, but she should be stretching or seeing how Bette’s looking this morning, since she slept through all of last night’s theatrics. She’s the Sugar Plum Fairy, after all, and that means she is probably Bette’s next victim. Or everyone’s victim for that matter. We don’t handle change to our hierarchy very well. I’m still shocked by Mr. K’s decision. And I’m still on the fence about Gigi. Some days I like her, some days I don’t. It’s been so long since I’ve had a friend, I don’t know what to do, how to behave.

This morning I’m worn out from staying up late to watch Bette’s mom cut her down to size. I didn’t relish it the way the other girls did, but I like to know what I’m up against. I like to know everything about everyone because it all matters at this school—what you eat, what you wear, where you came from, how much you weigh, your ballet training, who your friends are, how much money you have, if you have good feet, if you’ve won any competitions, what kind of connections you have, if your parents have season ballet tickets, if your mother or father was a dancer, if you know the history of ballet. And I plan to know it all. About every single dancer here. That’s the only way to be on top.

I thumb the pay phone’s receiver at 7:26 a.m., my stomach griping as I wait for it to ring. I feel like I ate too much for breakfast. My mom is always exactly on time, so, knowing I have exactly four minutes, I run into the hallway bathroom. I throw up a mix of water, tea, and grapefruit. Two fingers bring it out smooth and soundless. The third grade was the first time I ever did it. I caught my mom vomiting after a dinner party at the neighbor’s house. She’d swept me from the bathroom, her face clammy and hands shaky, telling me that American food can poison you, and you must always get rid of it. I asked her why she’d eaten it in the first place, and she said that one has to eat to be polite. Never be a bad guest or you won’t be invited again. And that would be shameful.

Now, I get rid of most things I eat. Even Korean food.

I bury those thoughts, though. It’s all for ballet, for my love of the dance. My head feels clearer now. My stomach is calm. Back in place, I glare at the phone, hoping to catch it on the first ring. I check my watch. One minute until half-past. Restless, I run through basic positions—first, second, plié, tendu, and pas de bourrée—when she finally calls. 7:30. On the dot.

I grab it before the second full ring. She doesn’t waste time with greetings. Doesn’t waste time confirming that she’s actually talking to me, and not one of the other girls on the hall. Her voice fills my ear. “I got an e-mail from Mr. Stanitowsky. You have a D in math. A D, a sixty-two percent. I don’t understand what the problem is. You have it so easy. Kids in Korea are at school after school. They work hard. You dance all day, and still you get poor grade.”

I try to respond, but her tirade continues. “You know, E-Jun, colleges look at everything. You will not get into good school. You will not be successful.”

She’ll never call me June. Always my Korean name. She buzzes on and I move the phone a little away from my ear. Even now, after I’ve been at the conservatory for nearly a decade, it still doesn’t occur to her that this is my dream. That this is my reality. That I will be a dancer. That I won’t go to college. To her, it’s some silly, short-lived phase that I’ll eventually grow out of. It’s a résumé builder, perhaps, something to put on my college applications, but nothing more.

I attempt not to listen or to care and to discount her mispronounced words, but each one finds its way into my ear. My cheeks are hot and sweat clumps up my foundation. I work desperately to look perfect. To have that doll-like ballerina face. Delicate and soft. The feel of the makeup on my skin and the scent of the powder remind me I’ve transformed into a ballerina, something better than being just a regular girl.

If I add another layer of powder I feel like I can erase this stress altogether. My mom yells and I dig through my dance bag—half listening, half worrying, half obsessing—hoping my missing compact is floating around in the mess of shoes and bandages and leg warmers jumbled inside. I order my little compacts special, and I’m useless without them. My newest one has been missing since yesterday. I had to use an old one earlier, and there’d barely been any makeup left in it.

“It’s time to give up dancing, E-Jun,” my mom says.

“No,” I say. It just slips out.

“What did you say?”

There’s silence. Korean kids aren’t supposed to talk back to their parents. Only white kids do that—and being half-white still doesn’t afford me that privilege. I hear her breathing accelerate. Whether she’s willing to admit it or not—and usually she’s not—dancing is in my blood. I may not have the white-blond hair or crystal blue eyes, but I belong here just as much as Bette or Eleanor or even Alec.

“You danced,” I whisper, slightly afraid she might reach through the phone and slap me.

She clears her throat and I know she’s smoothing the front of her ironed skirt and trying to remain composed. Sometimes I wish she’d tell me what it was like when she danced here, or share those tips only veteran ballerinas know. I wish she’d put on one of the old leotards she hides under her bed and dance with me in a studio.

I listen to her breathe for three more beats. She finally speaks: “What did you have for dinner last night? Stay away from that fatty American food. I’ll drop off jap-chae and baechu gook.” And there she goes, burying her secret, the thing my mother will deny until the day she dies. “Maybe Hye-Ji can tutor you in math again. I was speaking to her mother. Mrs. Yi says that Sei-Jin and the other girls always ask you to their parties, but you never go. Sei-Jin and Hye-Ji are nice, pretty girls.”

Sei-Jin is not a nice girl. Deep down, neither am I. Our moms think we’re sweet and obedient kids, behaving just how we would if we’d been born and raised in Korea. Sei-Jin and I used to be roommates and best friends. My heart squeezes a little, even though I don’t want it to. I glance at Sei-Jin’s room door, our old room door, and remember how close we used to be. I haven’t had a real friend since her.

I tell my mom a lie. “I went to one tea that Sei-Jin had. And they all spoke Korean the whole time. And really fast. I couldn’t keep up.”

“That’s your own fault,” she interrupts, not taking any of the blame for the way she raised me. I know little Korean phrases, all the foods, and just enough to eavesdrop during her Korean social events, but not enough for a full conversation, which is depressing when I think too long about it. “I raise your allowance, you take a language class. Will help on college applications. Oh, also, you sign up for the SAT? The academic counselor says one is in late October and …”

“I have rehearsals for three hours every night for the next two months,” I say, quietly seething. “I told you, I’m the understudy for the Sugar Plum Fairy.”

“Understudy,” she says with disdain. I want to give her the understudy speech Morkie gives after every casting: that I could be thrown in last minute, that I was picked because I’m a fast learner, that I can handle the pressure of dancing the role for the first time live, that it’s an enormous responsibility.

“E-Jun, that’s all you’ll ever be. They’ll never cast an Asian in the lead. You accept that. The Russians never did, even when I was there …” She pauses, tucking those secrets back in. “Better start working on getting into good college now.”

“They cast a black girl as the Sugar Plum Fairy. My room-mate, Gigi,” I say, not really sure if that made things worse or better. Point is I didn’t get the role.

Silence follows again. She says the word understudy again. I can hear her disappointment turn to anger. “I’m serious now, E-Jun,” she says. “No more nonsense. Time to focus. This will be your last year if you can’t be any better than understudy. No more dancing. You’ll be going to the public school in our neighborhood.” Then she simply hangs up, not even waiting for me to argue or to say good-bye. Listening to her talk about dance, you’d never know she’d walked through these very halls, lived in one of these tiny dorm rooms, danced in the studios, was part of the company. But something happened, something bad, and she never told me why she’d stopped.

She’s since become a successful businesswoman, importing high-quality dancewear from Korea, and she wants me to follow in her footsteps and eventually take over. That is the Korean way. What little of it that I know. She raised me all alone—her parents disowned her for staying here and having me. I’m all she’s got. So part of me knows I should obey her. Be a good daughter. Go home on weekends, and shop with her at the Korean markets on Saturdays, attend church with her on Sundays, and return to the time when I used to curl up in her bed like a little spoon in front of her.

But the thought of going to a public school unnerves me, making me want to throw up again. Now, the bathroom is full of girls getting ready for ballet class, and my stomach is basically empty. So I head to the Light instead. It’s a little storage closet at the end of the eleventh-floor girls’ hall that’s become a confessional booth of sorts. No one knows who started it. But it’s been here forever. Wallpapered with a collage of pictures, kind of like a living, breathing picture feed—from famous ballerinas to gorgeous costumes to the perfect arched foot to anonymously posted inspirational quotes and messages. Even things from the ’80s. There’s a tiny TV and DVD player, and a cabinet filled with discs of the greatest ballets ever performed, if one needs some inspiration. And I could definitely use some.

I slip inside, still reeling from the conversation with my mom.

If I can just have one chance, I know I can do this. I am a prima ballerina. I just have to make them see. I have to make my mom see. I can’t leave the conservatory. I won’t. The Sugar Plum Fairy is my shot. Maybe my only one. The understudy is just one little step away from the lead. I’ve got to make it happen. No matter what. I fight off my thoughts about Gigi, how we sometimes stay up late watching old sitcoms and online videos of classic ballets, how she’s always leaving me little notes and flowers. This is too important. This is my career.

I riffle through my duffle bag for my compact, and my old jewelry box distracts me. A gift from a father I’ve never met. It fits perfectly in my palm. I carry it with me everywhere I go, a promise that I will someday find him. I run my fingers along the back, winding the tiny key and opening the lid to watch the little ballerina twirl. Muyongga, dancer. The sweet melody reminds me of all the things I love about ballet: the control, the beauty, the music. In ballet, I can work on things over and over and over again until I achieve them, training my muscles until my body submits to what I want. It doesn’t matter who my family is or if I have friends or if guys like me—only what my body can do.

A copy of the cast list is up on the wall, alongside ones from previous years. I see Gigi’s name above mine. I stare until the typed letters blur, until I can see my name above hers. I can’t be invisible anymore. No matter how nice Gigi might be to me.

The staring contest with the wall helps me calm down, the conversation I just had with my mom drifting away. I won’t give up. I’ll push someone out of the way to get it. I pick up a marker from the floor. My hand shakes. Guilt creeps into me, but on the wall, in bold black ink, I write: Gigi should watch her back.

A WEEK AND A HALF after the cast list went up, we’ve settled into our rehearsal schedule. We pile into the second-floor studio E, where I won’t be able to see the rest of the sunset. I’ve been trying to follow Mama’s advice and watch it every day in order to stay positive. “Don’t carry worries around,” she always says. “They’re heavy.” It’s hard to hold on to her words here. Nerves erase them easily. But I have to, and it helps that I haven’t felt sick since the list was posted. So they have nothing to worry about.

Eleanor walks into the studio beside me and I make a joke about our ballet madam’s new haircut, just to get her to talk to me. It’s hard to have real connections or even conversations with the girls here. She laughs, and so do I.

The room is a mess of leg warmers, pointe shoes, and chatter as we stretch our bodies so they’ll fold like putty. June rests her head against the wall, her legs two arrows shot in opposite directions. She always warms up, even though she doesn’t get to dance in the center with the rest of us. She only sits and marks variation movements and timing in the understudy book off to the side. I imagined that we’d rehearse together, laughing, teaching each other little things, moving in sync, like we used to do back home. But she won’t. No matter how many times I ask her if she wants to.

Bette finishes tying on a translucent dance skirt as if she has all the time in the world, and she’s watching me from her peripheral vision, like I’ve angered her even more by coming to rehearsal with Eleanor. Like I’ve broken some rule. There has never been a knife sharper than those blue eyes of hers. And where her eyes go, everyone else’s follow. It takes only a few moments until the eyes of the whole cast are on me. Enjoying my audience, I make a fart sound with my mouth. Some of them laugh, some of them frown, and Bette rolls her eyes.

I plop down next to June and smile, and she gives the worst imitation of one in return. I’ve learned it’s just her. Not to take it personally. I peel off my warm-ups: cutoff sweatpants that used to be Mama’s and one of my old T-shirts cropped at the top and bottom. I sew new ribbons onto my pointe shoes, my fingers fumbling with the needle and dental floss and slippery satin. I try to shake out the nerves in my hands. Today I have to mark my solo for timing and progress in front of everyone. I’ve only had a week and a half of character instruction with Morkie and Pavlovich. And I should’ve broken these shoes in yesterday so they’d be perfect. I pull the dental floss through the shoe and it snaps.

Get it together, I tell myself, resewing. I stand and push my heel on the front of each shoe, feeling the glued fibers in the toe box break under my weight. With quick fingers, I work with the inside of the shoe, peeling back the fabric to expose the leather shank, like it’s a banana, and use my pliers to pull out the tiny nail. I remember crying when I had to break in my first pair of pointe shoes. I thought it would make them ugly instead of able to support all the new movements I would make. I cut away part of the shank under my heel right where the curve in my arches begins. I secure it with quick-dry glue and tape, then test my weight. I pad my toes with a swath of lamb’s wool, slip the shoes on, and tie the ribbons in a square knot.

Eleanor warms up next to me, and her shoes make a weird crunchy noise. We look at each other and burst into laughter.

A bag clobbers my head. “Oww!”

I glance up.

“Oh! I’m so sorry! I didn’t see you there,” Bette says, standing above me, no longer hovering in the background. Bette plops down in the small space between Eleanor and me, and pulls aside a bit of the fabric covering the mirror. All of them are draped with curtains because Mr. K insists that reflections distance dancers from becoming their characters, that they make dancers lazy.

Bette stares at herself. Her lips, when they are pursed together and painted with that hot-pink lipstick, are an impossible heart shape. With a mouthful of clips and pins, Bette slicks her blond hair into the perfect bun. Each strand obeys her touch, unlike my own hair. She adds hair spray to seal it in place.

I feel my curls fighting against the bun, transforming into a frizzy nest. I should’ve gone to all the trouble to straighten it or asked Aunt Leah to take me to the hair salon. I search the mirror for Bette’s gaze. Casually, artfully, she applies fake eyelashes, dark and feathery, like the wings of my butterflies in their terrarium upstairs. I touch my cheek. My face is naked—no makeup, no lipstick, no eye shadow. Since the first day of school, June’s warned me that I should make up my face, that it is part of being a serious ballerina, that the teachers favor it. But I can’t. I don’t like the feel of it on my face, clumpy and goopy. The lipstick Bette wears would make me feel like a clown. I only wear it for performances, and even then I can’t wait to wash it off in the green room room afterward.

She must notice my fingers tiptoeing over my bare cheek, because she stops her expert application to look at me. “I love how you don’t do anything with your face,” she says, but I can’t tell if the word love might actually mean hate. I am not fluent in the language these ballerinas speak to one another. The girls at my old dance studio were never like this. “Don’t you just love it, Eleanor?”

“Mmmm,” Eleanor says.

“Oh. Yeah. Mama’s always saying she thinks makeup is dishonest, so …” Of course, as soon as the words leave my mouth I want to catch them and press them back in. “I mean, not that she’s right, I just never really got into it.” I give her the biggest, most sincere smile I can muster. “You always look beautiful, though,” I add. “Seriously.” I feel like an idiot.

“I really admire your confidence and everything,” Bette says, so smooth she erases how awkward I was. “But you really should put on a little something. Playing the part and looking the part are sometimes the same thing, don’t you think?”

I don’t really agree, but she was so graceful in forgiving my faux pas that I nod a little. She hands me a compact and a blush brush. “Just try a little. You’ll love it,” she says, matching the largeness of my earlier smile. “And boys like it.”

I sweep on a tiny bit of the powder, and maybe’s she’s right. The blush complements my skin tone. I have an extra glow. I’m just about to keep the conversation going and bask a little more in the attention Bette’s suddenly lavishing on me. But before I can say anything, she’s on her feet and hooking her foot on the barre. The moment is over. Liz tramples over. She whispers something in Bette’s ear, and looks down at me, crinkling her thin white nose like she’s smelling garbage left out on the curb.

The boys shuffle in—Alec in the lead and Henri last, as always. Alec winks at me, then swoops in and gives Bette a hug. I feel an unexpected twist of jealousy.

“You coming over tonight?” she purrs in his ear, just loud enough for us all to hear.

“Let’s see how tired we are after rehearsal,” Alec says. I could swear he shifts his eyes for a half second over her shoulder and looks right at me. Smiles, even. But it’s too quick to tell.

“You promised,” Bette says. It’s not a whine, which would be below her. It’s a statement of fact, and she crosses her arms over her chest, straightens her back, taking the stance of a lawyer questioning a witness.

“Can you continue your soap opera later, please?” Will says, interrupting the long look between the two of them. “I’m sure you’ll get your way.”

Bette bristles, even though it’s a compliment, I think. A confirmation of Bette’s beauty, her seductive powers, and most of all how much Alec must love her. Alec gives her a kiss on the cheek, and my heart twists a little more when Bette takes his face and moves it so his mouth reaches hers. The whole room looks away from them, as if on cue. As if they’ve been doing this their whole lives. Which, I guess, they probably have.

But I haven’t, so I don’t know the rule about giving Bette and Alec their little private moment, and my eyes alone stay on them. So it is only me who sees Alec slide Bette off his mouth. Her whole forehead creases, and he tries to kiss her cheek again, but she turns her face away from him and takes a step back, so full of hurt I can practically smell it.

She catches me looking straight at them, as ill advised as staring straight at the sun. Bette makes an audible, animal noise, but covers her mouth before it’s all the way out. Whatever niceties we just exchanged while making ourselves up in the mirror have disappeared. I was not supposed to see what I just saw.

I look away what feels like hours too late. I lift on pointe in a series of relevés, bounce on the balls of my feet to loosen the shank further, and make sure my toes feel comfortable in the toe box.

Mr. K storms into the room with the other dance teachers on his heels. They take seats along the front of the studio. We all scramble forward.

Mr. K claps his hands and nods. “We will mark the last part of The Nutcracker this evening. I want to see the progress. Snow Queen, you’re up first. Snowflakes, gather around her, and others dart in and out of the center like windblown flurries. We’ll just do the first two minutes, since your pas with Henri hasn’t been practiced yet. I want to see your entrance, Bette. Henri, stand off to the side as if you’re getting ready to join her.”

This is Bette’s first run-through, and when she moves she is a snowflake skittering across the floor: the very definition of grace. Her turns are effortless, her flourishes melodic, her hands and feet and face perfect. The other girls twirl around her, trying to keep up, but they are mere beginners in her presence. She holds her arms and hands in just the right way—the way our teacher Morkie holds hers. Her face is soft and she knows just the right way to turn it, a moth looking for the light. Everyone watches her in awe. A twist of pain stabs at me. Does everyone feel like Mr. K’s made the wrong decision? Do they think Bette should be the Sugar Plum Fairy? I fight away those feelings.

Mr. K yells above the music, “More charisma, you are the snow. Lighter. Lighter!”

Bette’s cheeks turn red. Morkie says something in Russian and Bette adjusts her leg. She does one pirouette and the music ends. We all clap. Bette curtsies and exits stage left. She puts her hands on her head and I notice that they’re shaking.

Mr. K turns to Morkie. “The turns are sloppy. They’re not spotting properly.”

Morkie answers in Russian. Mr. K throws his hands up. “The basics should be sharp, so ingrained, that they’re automatic. Second nature. They look like amateurs in here.”

Mr. K motions for Bette to return to center stage. She stands before him.

“Your whole combination was pretty. Your piqué turns, pirouettes all fine. Nice extension and perfect body alignment.” He strokes his goatee. “The difference between the kind of performance that gets you in the corps and the one that lands you Aurora, Kitri, and Odette is character, feeling, and transformation, butterfly. I need to forget who you are, Bette Abney, and see only the Snow Queen before me.” He dismisses her, and she curtsies and hurries from the center. She leans into the barre with her back to everyone.

Mr. K plops down where Bette left, on the actual floor, to make sure the male dancers fly over him for their leaps and jumps. All the boys look nervous, except Henri. He does so well that even Alec hovers a little too close, watching how high Henri soars. I’ve seen his high jumps photographed in dance mags, which called him and Cassie an up-and-coming dance duo.

Finally, Mr. K extends his arm to me. My turn. I gulp and shuffle to the front, ready to dance. Viktor starts my music. I present my arms in little flutters, then wait for the third beat, inhale, and step into my first piqué. Mr. K waves his hand in the air before I can start. He paces about the room with his hand on his mouth. “Sorry to interrupt, moya korichnevya. One thought before we proceed tonight …” He scratches his head.

My stomach sinks. I fidget in my pointe shoes and wipe sweat from the back of my neck. I pretend to push some of my bobby pins farther into my bun, but it’s an empty gesture. Not a curl is out of place.

Mr. K and Morkie fuss back and forth in Russian. He puts his hands up, and she stops talking.

“Can we use the mirror, maybe?” Will says, like he’s translated their squabbles. “Just for today? I know it’s a safety blanket, but maybe it would help. I know it would help me.”

My chest collapses in relief at Will’s suggestion. I have never practiced this early on without a mirror. He gives me a wink when I glance at him gratefully. I mouth the words thank you.

“Fine, fine. Boys, push back all the curtains.” Mr. K shakes his head and frowns at us. Disappointed. He tells them all to split up. The boys scramble about to different areas of the room and pull back the black drapes.

My music starts again. I concentrate on my footwork and the variation. I start to dance, tiptoeing across the floor. It flows, my mind letting go and my body taking over. My feet find every chime and melody. I feel ready to smile, to stop thinking about the steps, and let the music guide me. But I hear whispers rise above my music.

They grow louder and louder until I’m pulled out of the dance, my focus shattered.

“Do you see that? Look!”

“It’s written back there. Kind of random, right?”

“Creepy. It’s about Gigi.”

Viktor’s hands bang the piano keys in frustration, and he stops playing. Voices explode through the studio. I wobble from the sudden drop in energy. I put my arms out to catch my balance. I don’t have to worry that someone’s seen the awkward move: they’re all looking at the mirrors. Every last one of them, crowded into a pack. One of the girls points.

The teachers burst into a flurry of Russian, and I move to the edge of the crowd.

“What’s going on?” I say, all out of breath and too quiet for anyone to really hear me. The bodies block my vision. My heart races and my hands begin to shake as people turn to stare at me. Mr. K motions for Doubrava to come. They shout at each other in Russian. He hollers for everyone to get back.

Bette watches my face. The boys grip the curtains they’ve just pulled aside, seemingly frozen in place. People shuffle away from me and whisper. I can’t see anything over the crowd, all the bodies blocking me, fluttering around like butterflies. All I hear is my heartbeat. I push through the bodies.

Mr. K peers at the glass, shaking his head. I hear him say, “Who did this?” He turns to glare at us all. He repeats his question three more times, and lunges at us. “I will not tolerate this type of behavior in my school! Not again! Ballet is supposed to be beautiful. You’re making it ugly.”

I want to ask, “What happened?” But I swallow hard. I feel shaky.

Mr. K stalks through our now silent group. My head feels light from my racing heart and all the voices and the confusion. I get a clear look at the mirror. A message is scrawled across it in pink lipstick:

The Sugar Plum Fairy has farthest to fall.

FRIDAY NIGHT REHEARSAL ENDS EARLY after the message is discovered. I’m on a high with a rare chunk of free time, so I’m going to use it wisely. I took a pill after seeing the way Alec rushed to Gigi’s side after the message was revealed, and another after hearing snippets of Gigi’s conversation with Mr. K about the bullying incident and her delicate feelings.

Eleanor’s in the café, so I use our private bathroom to smooth a deep red 1940s Dior shade on my lips. But that won’t save me from the teachers’ suspicions about who did it. There will be the ones who recognized my loopy handwriting or the Chanel lipstick that is my signature color, and my sister’s signature, and originally my mother’s signature. A saturated pink that was way too obvious and will probably get me into serious trouble. But I couldn’t resist putting the message up there. It was sloppy. I didn’t even want her to see it yet. Will did that on purpose. He knows me too well. I used to be much more discreet. Undetectable.

I remember the secret pranks Liz, Eleanor, and I played on Cassie last year: putting purple hair dye in her conditioner so her blond curls got all stained, shredding up her leotards and tights just to see her get in trouble with the Russians for not having the right thing to wear for class, slashing all her shoes or soaking them in vinegar, trashing her room. But nothing compared to the look on Gigi’s face today. She’s such an easy mark. And the message was so much more clever, and the thrill of it made me feel powerful, but I can’t make the same mistakes I made last year.

I check my cell phone for a message from Alec. Nothing, but three missed calls from my mother, and no plans to call her back. I am certain Gigi’s mother bakes cookies and sends care packages and tells her she’s perfect as she is. Gigi has the glow of someone who has lucked out. She’ll probably get a special delivery after she tells them about the message and her hurt little feelings.

Leaning hard on the edges of the bathroom sink, I imagine Alec’s hands around Gigi’s waist, lifting her in a tutu and spinning her around during their pas. I imagine her liking the feel of his touch. I imagine him kissing her. I imagine him liking how different she is, her curly black hair and light brown skin and cute freckles and California mellowness. Two pills aren’t enough to erase those images and feelings. I swallow the third one dry and can taste the bitterness as it goes down. I’ll have to get more soon if I keep up this pace. The same energy that had me raring to go now gives me a new, singular focus. Find Alec.

The hum of the Adderall in my bones and buzzing in my head obliterates any sort of potential pity party. My entire body and mind want only Alec, now. After the pills, there’s only ever room for one desire at a time.

My phone buzzes, and I bristle, thinking it’s my mother harassing me still, but it’s Liz. She’s at the coffee shop on Sixty-fifth street, and, she reports, so are Alec and Will. It’s not an invitation exactly, but rather a warning. I don’t want Alec and Will alone together.

I slip off my ballet slippers and step into flats, but don’t bother actually getting dressed. Alec likes me in my leotard and dance skirt and leg warmers and slicked-back hair. He likes to pull the blond mass out of its perfect little bun and snap the leotard off my shoulders. I shiver at the thought. I should not have had that last pill. I’m practically rabid thinking about him, and that’s no way to get his attention. Alec likes me icy and unreachable.

And Will hates when I get Alec’s attention.

The evening guard has his boot heels on the front desk, his hands folded over his belly, and is in a deep sleep. I sign myself out. I slip out of the building and use the short walk to get myself under control. It’s chilly for late October. Usually New York City holds on to the summer heat a little longer. I’m shivering when I get to the coffee shop, fingernails blue. Snow Queen it is.

Alec’s at a table by the window, wrapped up in a striped scarf and a cashmere sweater. Freshmen and sophomore ballet girls watch him over calorie-filled cups. Even a study group of girls from the nearby Catholic school snatches glances at him. I hate being just one of the many girls drinking in Alec’s good looks. But here I am, standing just inside the little coffee shop and letting my gaze linger before I approach. I like seeing him when he can’t see me. No games. No pressure to look pouty and together. Just the pleasure of seeing someone beautiful and sure.

It doesn’t last.

From her corner, Liz smiles, flashing me a knowing look, as Alec waves me over. I’ll owe her one. I don’t go over to Liz’s table, not wanting Alec to know she texted me. That I have eyes everywhere. Will is behind him, partially hidden by a wooden beam. Too close to Alec. I grimace at how pathetic it makes Will look. I can never decide if I’m pissed at him or just feel bad for him.

“Here to see me?” Alec says, lighting up. I love that I have that effect on him, still.

“Of course she is,” Will says. His eyebrows reach toward each other. He used to be so fun. He used to be normal. He used to keep his feelings to himself.

“Aren’t you going to offer me a seat?” I say. I keep my lips pursed and let Alec look me over.

“I like you standing,” Alec says, trying to be edgier because I told him I liked it. Another girl could get shy in a moment like this. But I’ve been ass naked in front of costume designers and teachers and classmates. I’ve had them pinch my sides and weigh me in public and measure every last inch of me to see how far away from perfection I am. So I’m not shy. I put a hand on one of my hips. I let him take me in. He’s probably right. They’re probably all looking at me. I’m a prima ballerina, no matter what Mr. K has to say about it, and the rest of them can see it all over me.

“You look great,” Alec says at last. Which means I’ve won this round.

Will sighs loudly. I sit down hard on the chair, drowning it out. Finally, I wrap one of my feet around Alec’s ankle. He responds by pulling me into him and kissing me on the mouth, hard. He smells like coffee and hard work: he got his extra practice in. Smelling his sweat, I feel a pinch of guilt at being in here snaking my foot up Alec’s calf instead of throwing myself into practice, doing pirouette after pirouette, and using the early rehearsal end to keep working on my variation. I kiss him again to make me forget.

“Okay, enough, you two,” Will says. His voice is tense now, too. Just like his face. He’s saying the same words he always has, but they sound so, so different.

“Can’t you give us some alone time?” I snap. I can’t take any of his little jabs tonight. I press myself even harder against Alec, shrinking that centimeter of space between our bodies. Will looks like he’s about to say something else, but something in him must melt a little, because he nods and gathers up his stuff. The tiny surrender is enough to make me smile his way, but he misses the look and he’d probably misinterpret it anyway. The secret smiles and eyebrow raises we used to share don’t work anymore. He stopped being my surrogate little brother this summer, and now I just don’t know what we are.

“Alec, call me later?” he says. He lands hard on Alec’s name, and even pauses to accommodate the space where my name would have been. Just one more person who hates me. I know it won’t help matters, but I lean my head on Alec’s shoulder and put a territorial hand over his. Will leaves, taking long dancer strides across the coffee shop. I still like watching the way his limbs move, still admire his impenetrable grace. I’d love even half of his passion. I’d tell him so, if we were speaking in anything but clipped, one-syllable words.

“Get your own boyfriend!” I call out, when he is already half out the door. Will’s shoulders slump and everyone in the shop has heard me. He turns bright red, like his hair. He’s not quite out beyond the conservatory walls. Boys from Kentucky aren’t supposed to like other boys. His eyes look sad when they meet mine. I hadn’t meant to hurt him. Not really.

“Harsh, B,” Alec says. “Can’t you guys get over your little spat?” He smirks and puts a huge hand on my thigh. The warmth of his hand travels through my thin tights.

“Not yet.” His hand feels good on me, so I don’t move it away. “So stay out of it,” I say back, so he knows I’m not some weak, delicate flower scared to tell him what to do, like the other ballerinas who would love a chance to be with him. He loves me because I’m fiery, feisty, stronger than anyone else.

Neither Will nor I have told Alec the details about our fight. Because the fight is about Alec. Sometimes the words tickle my lips, and I want to tell Alec the secret Will told me, but the bigness of it keeps me quiet.

“You’re all wound up today. And I’m guessing that’s why you put that message up about Gigi,” Alec says. I put several inches of space between us, losing the warmth of his hand on my legs. I hate that he said her name. That he ever has to say it. Sounds too pretty coming from his mouth.

I think about lying to him. Saying I didn’t write the message. But he keeps talking.

“Look, just because Mr. K didn’t cast you as the Sugar Plum Fairy doesn’t mean what you think it does. Don’t be like those other girls who get all catty and start messing with each other. You’re better than that.”

I’m not better. I am that girl. I’ve just been good at hiding it from him.

“The Snow Queen is an opportunity to show Mr. K—”

“I’m fine,” I say, louder than I’d intended. “Stop looking at me like everyone else is. You know I’m fine. I’m great. Can’t I just come visit you?” I hear the edge in my voice and try to soften it into something sexy, kissing his neck and letting the last few words land on the stubble just below his chin. “We haven’t been able to hang out much.”

“Always happy to see you,” Alec says, but it takes him a moment to reach for my body again. He sounds sad, disappointed in me. It’s a familiar cadence to his voice these days. He grabs the menu from under his coffee mug. He starts making creases and folds in the paper. “You need your congratulatory flower then, if we’re celebrating,” he says. He’s been making me paper flowers since we were little kids. His Japanese nanny taught him origami and it’s a strange hobby that girls tease him about but clearly think is secretly sexy. Which it is. I love watching his hands manipulate the paper. Every crease is careful, gentle. Like him.

He finishes, and it’s a perfect rose, made even more beautiful by the menu’s text on the petals.

“For you,” he says. “And if you want to talk about it …” But his voice fades out because we both know that’s not going to happen. “Well, I’m sure you’ll enjoy working with Henri,” he finishes, the smirk firmly back on his face, like it never left. “He’s been asking about you. Tips for partnering you.” Henri and Alec are roommates. “Dancing with him might get you in one of those magazines.” For the first time ever, I hear a small pinch in his voice, and I know he doesn’t like Henri.

“Maybe it will.” I shrug, putting the paper flower behind my ear, where I secure it with a bobby pin. We’ve never danced with other people before. Alec and Bette are always paired. Our names have been listed beside each other so often that it’s burned into my memory. I don’t want his name next to Gigi’s. I don’t want to dance with Henri.

“I guess at some point we’d have to get used to partnering with others. It’ll be weird at first. Gigi’s got a different—” I kiss him to erase her name. It feels good to let go and to have him here with me. Just us. For at least this moment, Giselle Stewart can’t take anything else from me.

I take Alec back to my room. Sneaking him in is as finely choreographed a dance as any we do onstage. We shuffle past the sleeping guard and into the elevator together. We push the fourth-floor button first, to check that the RAs are all still there. Their office spans the entire floor. They continue to answer the phones and dole out meds to several puffy-faced freshman girls who’ve no doubt cried themselves headaches. Not one looks up at us as the doors ping open. Then Alec goes to his floor on the tenth, because the RAs watch the elevator video feed. I go to mine on the eleventh, and let him onto the floor through the staircase exit.

“Out,” I say to Eleanor, but smile to soften it after I open my room door. She’s stretched across the bed, I’m sure doing her “visualizations,” but if she were a real threat, she’d know she’d be better off actually still in the studio dancing instead of lying there thinking about dancing. One of Adele’s performance videos—the ballet La Bayadère from three years ago—is on my flat screen. I click it off and don’t comment. She’s been watching old films of my sister a lot lately. And I wonder what’s next. Will she show up at Adele’s apartment like a fan girl? Will she ask my sister for technique tips?

“We’re roommates, Bette,” she says, in a voice I’ve never heard come out of her before. “I’m not your little slave. And hi, Alec. Congratulations on your role.”

“I let you be my roommate,” I say. I don’t even have to lie. Eleanor couldn’t afford this room—Adele’s old room—the only one on the hall with a private bath. “Don’t make me remind you, okay? That’s embarrassing.”

“Bette,” Alec says. He never used to scold me like that. He liked that I said what was on my mind. Plus, Will used to be my snarky sidekick, and the two of us would make Alec laugh with our snide little comments.

Eleanor’s face falls. I guess it was my intention, but I’m not some robot, and she’s supposed to be my best friend. I take a deep breath. We’ve been getting into fights like this a lot lately, and I promised myself I would try harder to get back to the way we used to be. But some days I can’t even remember how it used to be, who I was, who she was, and what made us friends. Since I didn’t get the Sugar Plum Fairy role, nothing feels right. And she’s been watching these videos and disappearing for blocks of time and not telling me where she’s going. She’s keeping secrets from me. She’s making things weird lately.

“Alec’s just gonna hang out for, like, an hour. Could you work in the lounge maybe? You’re looking hot lately. We all know you’ll be bringing a guy over sometime soon, right?”

I even wink. And pout.

Her cell phone rings. She jumps to silence it, then caves. “Holding you to that,” she says on her way out the door.

“Cross my heart, hope to die,” I say and grin. It does feel good, remembering that we actually kind of love each other. I miss her a little, the second she’s out the door.

“Just an hour?” Alec says into my neck.

“We can make it a good hour,” I say.

And we do. But the whole time feels like another big audition, and this time the challenge is to be the sexiest, the most desirable, the wildest. I wrap my legs around him so tight I’m surprised he can still breathe. I can be the girl he fell in love with years ago. The girl he still loves now. The only girl he wants to partner with.

We don’t have sex, though. Alec says he’s tired and needs to conserve his energy for tomorrow’s rehearsal. I’m naked by the time he throws that one out, and I can feel my face shift from sexy to pissed.

“We always have rehearsal—” I say.

“I have a huge role. And a pas to practice.”

“With Gigi,” I grumble, then explode. “You shouldn’t have come up here then. Where the hell is my shirt?” I scramble out of bed to find something, anything, to cover up what he’s rejected.

“I thought we still had fun,” Alec purrs in my ear. He kisses the lobe, and then down my neck.

“Just seems weird that you don’t want—”

“I want you. I always want you. Just freaked out about impressing Mr. K tomorrow. I swear. This weekend I’ll be back to my normal self, okay?” He’s blushing, like we’ve both failed at our sexy, romantic relationship tonight.

When he leaves, he kisses me on the head and for just that one moment when his lips hit the space where my hair meets my forehead, I’ve won. It isn’t about Gigi.

“Tell Eleanor to come back in, okay?” I can still make him do things for me. He nods.

“Can’t wait to tell her all about me?” He likes to tease me, and even reaches down to tickle me. I squirm and hold back laughs. I could do this forever with him.

“Eleanor and I don’t sit around talking about our boyfriends all night,” I tease back. “Don’t get the wrong idea.” I let out a flirtatious laugh and touch his shoulder. He’s surprisingly tense. He even blushes a little. “Even if I love you,” I tack on, like maybe that’s what’s bothering him.

He doesn’t say it back, just kisses my forehead again. I almost repeat I love you, like maybe he just didn’t hear, but I can’t take the risk.

It’s a long, lonely five minutes before Eleanor reappears. I don’t want us to have another awkward spat right now. I just want my old friend back.

Eleanor throws the door open. “Done?” Her face is still rosy, like the first day I ever met her. Six-year-old would-be ballerinas auditioning for the conservatory, standing in tiny leotards, hands and feet ready to be examined.

“Can we watch Breakfast at Tiffany’s?” I say. My voice is quiet and I just want her next to me, sharing a blanket, watching the TV like it’s a portal to a world outside this stupid dorm. Eleanor sighs. I’m sure she thinks she’s supposed to stay mad, but I know she just can’t do it. Not strong enough.

We lie on the futon-couch thing we have set up and get to the part when Audrey tears up her apartment in grief. Eleanor’s breathing has slowed. She always falls asleep first. Her head flops on my shoulder. I wish I could sleep as soundly as she does. But I know I won’t be able to for a long time, until the spring ballet and my second chance to snag the lead.

“What do you think of Gigi?” I whisper into the dark, knowing she won’t hear, except in her dreams.

“Mmmm,” she says, which I decide means Gigi’s no big deal. Nothing special.

“She can’t take everything from me, right?” I say, and listen again for Eleanor’s nondescript sigh. It comes, and I try to let it comfort me as much as it would if we could actually talk about this.

A few tears come before I finally fall asleep. Quiet ones. Just between me and the dark.

I WALK TO MORNING BALLET class alone, super early, so I can have studio C all to myself and get my head together before it starts. I’ve piled on the layers—it’s late October and the chill has already started seeping into every pore. Plus, layers give me just enough invisible padding. I blend right in with the rest of them. But I know, really, that I need to make Morkie see me. That’s how you become a star. Catch your teacher’s eye.

Right outside the studio, I almost drop my thermos. Sei-Jin’s boyfriend, Jayhe, sits on a booth seat in front of the glass, where everyone gawks in at us. He’s slouched, in unlaced Converses and slim black pants. His red hoodie is up and he’s looking at his phone.

I haven’t seen him since Sei-Jin and I stopped being roommates and friends. Almost two years ago. When did he start wanting to watch her dance? He looks sort of the same. But cuter. Less awkward. I’ve known him longer than Sei-Jin. We went to the same Sunday school as kids, he lived three blocks from me, and before I moved to the conservatory his halmeoni used to watch us both after school. She’d call me her little granddaughter, and I would swim in his blow-up pool. I even know he has a blue-bottom birthmark on his butt. But now, Sei-Jin and Jayhe are like a version of Bette and Alec: made for each other, perfect, royalty in our Korean community.

He leans forward and looks up at me.

I feel my face get hot. I’m afraid my makeup will run. He doesn’t say anything, just stares.

“Hi,” I say, not sure why I’m even talking to him. In the ninth grade, I lost all my friends when Sei-Jin turned on me. Everyone disappeared. Even him. Especially him.

“Hi,” he mumbles back, rubbing his sleepy eyes.

“What are you doing here?” I say, taking another sip of tea to fill in the space between his delayed responses. I wonder if he’s skipping school. I wonder if he’s changed.

“Sei-Jin,” he says. “Supposed to watch now, I guess.”

I try to make more small talk and realize that this is the first time I’ve actually spoken to a boy from outside the conservatory in a long time.

“Are you going to finally join ballet class with us? Remember when you used to try to do pirouettes in your basement?” I laugh, surprised at myself. For a second, I feel like I’m back in my old life. The one with friends and people who wanted to be around me. The one where I had inside jokes and memories and traditions. The one where I made room alongside ballet for hanging out, marathon chats, and adventures outside of school.

He kind of smiles. His cheeks are fuller, and there’s a touch of stubble that wasn’t there before. It makes my breath catch, with regret or maybe something else.

A throat clears behind me. Jayhe squirms and looks away from me, like I’m not there anymore, like he wasn’t talking to me at all. The tiny connection is lost. The feeling of my old life disappears in an instant like a popped bubble.

“Not so pretty this morning, are we, June?” Sei-Jin says, pursing her perfect pink lips.

She startles me. She sounds the way a snake might, if it could speak. The other girls twitter behind her, too scared to say anything themselves, but happy to look me over, laugh in my face, whisper in fast Korean, and point at my body like it’s a dartboard for their own insecurities. The new Chinese girl is on the edge of the pack, arms crossed, lost in translation, but still finding a way to nonverbally participate.

“Oh, you don’t look that bad,” I say in response, proud for a half second that I came up with a comeback. Sei-Jin steps closer. I can smell her breakfast and make out the scent of that same soft pink lipstick she’s worn since middle school. Trying to be like Bette.

When we first moved to the high school dorm floor, Sei-Jin and I were inseparable, jeol chin. Best friends. She was the sister I never had. But at the start of tenth grade it all changed. That was when she started a rumor about me, forced the RAs to move me out of our shared room, and never spoke to me again. It was really early on a morning like this one, a cold fall day, and we’d been sitting at the twin vanities her mom had bought for our room—just like the ones in the American Ballet Company dressing room. Sei-Jin’s mom was nice enough to get me one even though my mom couldn’t afford it. The bulbs cast a warm glow on our faces.

Sei-Jin opened her makeup case. “You should start wearing more makeup,” she’d said, removing a blush, lipstick, and powder. “Especially to ballet class.”

“I’ll just sweat it all off,” I said. I was so clueless then.

“Real ballerinas dance with it on, without a drop of sweat on their faces.” Leaning in close, she took my chin and pulled me into the light, like she was one of the makeup artists that made us up before our tiny girl parts in the company ballets. “You ever notice that?”

I didn’t answer.

“Close your eyes,” she said. I obeyed. I always obeyed.

She brushed the powder across my face, the strokes like butterfly wings fluttering against my skin. Then she used her soft fingertips to add blush to my cheeks, and rubbed a waxy stick of lipstick on my mouth. “These colors will hide your yellowy undertones. My mother always says you don’t want your skin to be the color of a dead chicken wing.” Her voice was full of wisdom. “This type of palette is best for us.” And I was in awe of the way she used words like undertones and palette, words I’d never heard before.

She wiped a smaller brush across my eyelids. “This will create a shadow. Like you have a crease along your lid. It’ll make your eyes appear less slanted. The Russians don’t like our eyes.” She set the brush down.

“I don’t care if they don’t like it,” I said, hating that so many Asian girls go through surgeries to change their eyelids’ shapes. That Sei-Jin wanted to be one of them.

“Oh, yes you do. Everyone cares what they think. Even though it’s disgusting. Too hard not to care. You won’t get the things you want if you don’t,” she said, rubbing her fingertip near the corners of my eyes. “Look,” she instructed.

I opened my eyes, unsure about what I was going to see. A different, softer girl gazed back at me. Sei-Jin leaned her face close to mine, her eyes big and doelike.

“See? You look different,” she said.

I felt different. Special. I felt like a soloist or principal in the company. Not like myself, who couldn’t seem to do anything effortlessly. I tried to say thank you, but I couldn’t find the words.

She lifted my chin again.

“You look very pretty,” she said, her voice just a whisper. She stared at me, and a weird energy stretched between us. She leaned in close. I saw the two tiny freckles on her nose and felt her breath on my face. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t pull back. Then she kissed me. Her pink lips pressed into mine. Soft, warm, and strange. I’d never been kissed before.

Her eyes closed. I kept mine open. Not sure what to do. I watched her eyebrows lift.

She tried to part my lips with her tongue.

I pulled away. “What are you doing?” I said. My heart lodged in my throat. The noise of it thumped in my ears.

Her nose crinkled, and a deep blush climbed from her chest up her neck and to her face. “Uh, sorry.”

She turned her head to her mirror and took a lipstick from her bag. Her shaky hand applied more to her lips. I wiped the gooey paste from my mouth on a tissue, some of it mine and some of it hers. I watched sweat appear on the back of her neck. I wanted to say something. That it was okay. That she was my best friend. That I didn’t know why she kissed me, but I would be here to help her figure it out. I looked at the clock. It was almost time for class. I got up to leave. Sei-Jin didn’t move to follow me. She sat, transfixed by her own image in the mirror. I didn’t know what to say.

I tried to wait for her to come. She didn’t. I rushed to the door.

“E-Jun,” she called out.

I turned around. She just looked at me.

“Tell them I’m sick, okay?” she said, her eyes brimming with tears.

“Okay,” I said.

“I don’t—I’m not—” Her voice broke. “I was just—”

“Of course not,” I said. Korean girls don’t kiss other Korean girls. They kiss boys. They marry boys. I wanted to ask more, wanted to know why she kissed me and what was really going on. To let her know that she’d be okay, no matter what. That I’d be there for her.

“It’s all right. All of it—” I started to say, but she put her hand up, and I had to go.

Before the end of that day, Sei-Jin asked the RAs to move me out of our room, and a week later a rumor surfaced. That I was a lesbian and she didn’t want to live with me anymore. My mother was called, and the guidance counselor lectured me about making other students feel uncomfortable.

Sei-Jin’s wearing that same shade of lipstick now, and I bet her mouth tastes like it did all those years ago. A mix of lipstick and grapefruit and tea. Probably a lot like mine does, actually.

“You’re always second favorite, aren’t you?” Sei-Jin says, taking a step closer to me.

Sei-Jin’s sweet perfume wraps around me. She bats her big eyes. “Understudy for Gigi. No one’s first choice. You think you’re so great, but no one else does, huh?” Her eyes narrow.

That hits. My momentary quick wit vanishes, and I fidget, trying to squirm out from under her gaze. It only hurts when it’s true, I guess. I feel the jewelry box shift in my duffle bag and hear the tinkle of its insides. I don’t know if she’s thinking of my father, too, but I can’t help myself. The only thing my mom ever said about him was that he started a new family, one he prefers more than us. What Sei-Jin says is true in more ways than one.

Of all the things she’s called me—a bitch, a poser, a wannabe-white girl—this is the worst. Understudy. I remember my mom’s words on the phone. And her threat. If I can’t do better, I’m getting pulled out.

“Nobody wants you,” Sei-Jin says.

I want to say that she wanted me. I want to bring up the kiss. Which I never have. Not in all these years. But I don’t. I’ve kept her little secret.

Jayhe says something to her in Korean. She stops.

“You already won,” I say at last. Sei-Jin doesn’t know what to do with that. I want Jayhe to see her as the bad one. The other girls throw a few Korean insults my way, and even though I can translate some of it and know how rude they’re being, they can’t come close to hurting me the way Sei-Jin just did. Sei-Jin hushes them, waving her hand in their direction the way I’ve seen Bette do to Eleanor and Liz. She really is trying to model herself after Queen Bette, and she’s pulling it off. The girls quiet instantly.

I turn to retreat into the studio.

“I found this,” Sei-Jin says, and reaches into her own bag. Something glints in her hand, and I know immediately what it is. My missing compact. She knows how important it is to me. It’s always in my bag or on my desk. I imagine her riffling through my room. I grab for it, like a child, and am surprised when she lets me have it. Her mouth twitches, holding back a smile. I open the compact, but inside the mirror is broken, and the glass has cut the perfect little powder cake. It’s destroyed.

“Oops,” Sei-Jin says.

The hall is now full of dancers and they all must be watching, because the space is silent and I feel the heat of a dozen pairs of eyes on my face.

Jayhe says something else. Sei-Jin and he spar back and forth. I wonder if it’s about me. I click the compact closed, wondering if I can glue the tiny mirror back together again.

Morkie sweeps everyone into the studio for class. We warm up, complete our barre exercises, then Morkie makes us do fouetté turns in the center. I go to the front of the class, squeezing between some of the other girls. I spread out my arms to get them to move. Some grumble. Others mutter under their breath. I don’t care. I want her to see me turn.

The music starts. The other girls around me finish their four turns. Just what Morkie asked for. But I can’t stop. I spin and spin and spin, stamping out the conversation I had with Sei-Jin. I do one revolution for every insult and mean word.

I feel eyes on me for the first time. Morkie walks in front of me. The other girls move away from me. I know they want me to stop. I know they’re thinking that I should’ve just done the four turns Morkie asked for. I am alone in the center. A spinning top.

I’ve lost count of how many I’ve done. I finally come down off my leg.

“Bravo!” Morkie says. She calls me dedicated in front of everyone. She says my fouettés are perfect. Usually, I’m a ghost to her and all the teachers. Not worth noticing. But not today. I took the risk. I pushed myself to show off a little.

Everyone claps for me, except for Sei-Jin. Some rub my back and give me compliments that don’t feel fake or ridiculously transparent. Gigi squeezes me so tight I feel like I can’t breathe. She grins like she’s proud she gets to live with me. I fight the warm feelings it gives me. I even see Mr. Lucas, Alec’s dad, watching from behind the glass wall—which he almost never does. He gives me a strange little smile and nod.

When I curtsy and return to the barre, I catch Jayhe’s eyes on me through the glass. He’s standing instead of sitting now. I hold his stare for what feels like an eternity, then turn my back, trying to fight off a smirk, the weight of his gaze heavy on my slim shoulders. Not so invisible anymore.

I know what I’m going to do to Sei-Jin.

I’VE BEEN VISITING THE MIRROR in studio E every night, looking for the edges of the message Bette left me. The girls told me it was her, and probably Liz, and maybe Eleanor, too. It was cleaned off days ago. Everyone else seems to have forgotten the way it looked, but I hear the threat in my head like my performance music. Each time it repeats, I get more determined to be the best Sugar Plum Fairy, more determined not to give into the ugliness and pettiness of it all.

I take the elevator to the first floor. Then I take the stairs to my basement room.

It’s empty, aside from dust bunnies in the corners and the creaks and clacks of the old radiator and the buzzing of nearly dead lightbulbs. But I get lost in the mirror in this room, too. I can’t move, can’t close my eyes to meditate, just keep looking at my reflection. Mama always says it’s unnatural to spend a lot of time in front of the mirror, that it calls out the worst of us. But for a dancer, the mirror is home.

I try to focus and imagine myself filling with light, the way I did in yoga class with Ella back home. I want the beams to erase the message and all my worries about it. Then I lift one of my legs, first to the barre, and then toward my ear. I want to become one straight, impossible line, from my left toe on the ground all the way to my right toe in the air. But my body isn’t responding as it usually does. There’s a little ache in my heart. I can’t decide if I’d prefer it to be over Alec or something medical. I’m not sure which is more dangerous.

“I can help you with that,” a male voice cuts through the silence.

I pivot with my leg in the air, assuming it’s Alec. He’s the only one who knows I dance down here. I beam, and turn to face him with a look far too eager to be truly innocent.

“Happy to see you, too.” It’s Henri Dubois, the other new kid, and he’s staring me down. He has eyes like the people in Mama’s artwork, dark and dreamy and haunted. He runs his hand through his dark, shaggy hair. He’s still in his dance belt and tights, and I can’t help looking between his legs. Those dance belts make everything look enormous. He catches my gaze and steps back, so I look at the floor.

“I’ve got it. I think,” I say, and sink even farther into a stretch.

He approaches me.

We haven’t said more than three sentences to each other. The only things I know about him come from articles I read in dance magazines. He was one of the rising stars at the Paris Opera School. Was being the operative word, at least according to the gossip. Rumor has it that he was kicked out.

“Oh, come on,” he says. “Ballet is a team sport.” He walks the rest of the way into the room, dodging broken barre poles.

“How’d you find me?” I say, bringing my leg down on my own. I’m not ready for his hands to be crawling up to support the place where my thigh meets my hipbone. I should be upset he’s found my hiding spot. I want only Alec to know about it.

I lower myself down to the floor, which seems safer for about one second.

“I was not looking for you.” He sits in front of me. His accent is attractive and flowing, and I can’t help liking the way his words blend together. For sixteen years I haven’t had a single spark of interest in ballet boys, in any boys, really, but suddenly I’m all butterflies and unexpected sweat. I don’t feel like myself. My head fills with new thoughts and feelings and ideas. Henri has probably always been cute in class and rehearsals, but I’ve never really noticed. In the strange, broken light of the notorious basement studio, though, he makes my throat go dry.

“You hide in here, don’t you?” he says. “When I don’t see you in the rec room with everybody else, you’re in here.”

I don’t answer. A half smile creeps across his mouth, and I’m not sure what’s so funny, but he has the most perfect dimples. I’m tempted to rest my thumbs in them. See how deep they are.

“Shouldn’t you be cooling down from rehearsal?” I say, for lack of anything better.

“Shouldn’t you?” he spits back, then grins. “You ballerinas take things so seriously.” He mutters something in French, and I like the way it sounds and how his mouth curves as he speaks it. “Let’s stretch, Giselle.” He doesn’t call me Gigi, but says my name the way it’s supposed to be said—all long ls and soft es. I want to tell him my parents met as twentysomething ex-pats in Paris. That they’d named me Giselle after the famous ballet.

“We need a little music,” he says. He pulls out his phone and the button clicks echo until tiny chords ping from the device. Suddenly, The Nutcracker pours out. He opens his legs in a V and reaches for me. With strong hands, he pulls my hips toward his and adjusts my leg placement, like a doll’s. Not once does he ask, just curls his fingers around my legs and spreads them. Part of me doesn’t mind the feel of his touch. Part of me doesn’t feel like myself. He touches me like we’ve been friends for a while. And strangely, I welcome it.

He removes his moccasins, and we touch our feet together, letting the soles kiss. The balls of his feet are calloused and his toe joints are thick and raised—he’s got the feet of a dancer. Our legs make a diamond shape until he pulls me forward. I elongate my legs into a straight line. I haven’t stretched with a boy like this before. I never join in with the other students when they do it. There were no boys at my California studio, so the girls would stretch each other. Here, there don’t seem to be any boundaries. I’m not used to all this touching, but I move even closer though my mind says no, don’t stretch with him like this.

“Don’t hyperextend,” he warns.

I scoff and show off my flexibility. The space between my thighs inches closer to his dance belt. As he leans forward, I spot a tiny mole beneath his right eye. He’s so close he could kiss me if he wanted, and I wouldn’t be able to stop him. I’ve never been kissed before. A few close calls, a brush against my lips, a stage peck, but nothing real. Not a kiss with heat.

He rolls a white mint in his mouth. The tiny orb oscillates above and below his tongue—a white boat in a red ocean. Sweat dampens my brow and my hands get clammy. He doesn’t seem to notice, and just interlaces his fingers with mine. My heart jumps a little. I tell it to stop. I should get up and go to the dorms and get ready for bed. But I can’t. I feel glued in place.

“Come this way.” We change the stretch. He tugs me forward, lifting me off the floor, and I lie just above him, two inches from his chest, a deep tug in my hamstrings, pulling out the soreness caused by new rehearsal jumps. We hold the position and then switch. When he falls forward, I can feel his breath on my stomach. The hair on my body lifts and a faint pulse thrums between my legs, like a tiny drum.

I snap upright, knocking into him. “I’m all loose,” I babble, and close my legs, waiting for the new sensation to disappear.

The room feels too quiet. I hear the light buzz. It reverberates under my skin, half pleasant, half terrible. I hear his breathing. I hear the acceleration of my heartbeat. Control your breathing. He holds me in place, and his eyes study my expression. A chill rushes over me, like there are a thousand pairs of eyes on my face. Before I can dodge him, Henri leans forward and his lips brush my cheek and the side of my lips. Too close for comfort.

I snap backward. His face falls. “Giselle, I’m so sorry. I don’t … know … why I did that.”

I don’t know how to react.

“You just remind me of my ex, Cassie,” he says, dropping his head. “You’re both just really good … I miss her.”

I open my mouth, but nothing comes out again. I tell myself to get up and leave, but my body is heavy and awkward. I don’t know how to go without making things weird. We’re both the new kids at school. He got here just a few months before me, in the summer. We’re supposed to have a connection because of that.

I fill the silence. “So. France. I’ve been there. Well, Paris. And Toulouse. And … and Bou …” I stumble over the pronunciation. “Boulo …”

“Boulogne.” His voice is so low and husky compared to mine that I blush. He presses his thumbs into my leg muscles. “When you speak French, let your lips go soft and move your mouth slower.”

I nod. He makes me say the city name again, but I fumble with the long French syllables.

“So you’ve been many places in my country,” he says.

I nod again. My parents have an apartment in the nineteenth arrondissement near Sacre Coeur and we go most summers so Mama can paint, but I don’t say any of that.

“I was born in Charenton-le-Pont, just outside of Paris. My maman and I moved into the city when I was eight.”

“Is that when you started dancing?” I ask.

“Oui … eh,” Henri says, “I think I was almost ten.”

“Ten,” I say with a shock that embarrasses me. Most dancers start when they’re five, or even younger.

“I am a quick study. Ballet became my obsession. I have many,” he says. “Are you from New York?”

“Me? Oh, no,” I say. “California.”

“I have never been. Just seen it on American TV. Beaches, sunshine, surfing, little dogs in big purses, car chases.” He teases. “All smiles.”

I slap his leg playfully. “There’s much more than that.” He rubs my hand and I pull it back. I quickly ask another question. “Do you miss home? Do you like it here?”

“Do you?” he asks.

“Yeah, I guess. It’s growing on me.”

“You should be careful,” he says. “Cassie wasn’t.” He touches my arm. My stomach flutters and I wonder if I’ll ever get used to all these boys around me—Alec, and now Henri.

“What happened to her?”

He grimaces, and though I want to know, I don’t press any further. I know the discomfort of talking about something you don’t want to.

“Just watch out,” he says. “Especially after that mirror thing.” He shakes his head and mutters a word in French that feels like a curse.

“The girls told me it was Bette, most likely,” I say, not quite sure I should accuse her to other people.

“Be careful with that one,” he says, fingers grazing my cheek, almost as if he doesn’t realize he’s doing it. I try not to flinch. “I don’t want you getting hurt.”

The overhead bulbs dim, threatening to go out. The shifts in light make a mess of his face. In the new shadows, he’s a different person. Heavier brow, hidden eyes, frowning mouth. I feel like we shouldn’t be in here alone in the dark anymore. The last few notes of The Nutcracker ping out of his phone and then it’s just me and Henri and the silence. He reaches for me again as the lights stamp out, and he kisses my cheek.

IT’S LATE—ALMOST NINE P.M. CURFEW—but I head to the first-floor studios. I take the most public route I can think of, making sure to pass by a few open dorm rooms and even take the elevator to the basement past the student lounge. I want them all to see me exactly as I am: hardworking and dedicated and not willing to be thrown off course by something ridiculous, like Gigi Stewart, who probably got the Sugar Plum Fairy part by letting Mr. K touch her for a few beats longer than was actually necessary. Maybe she let her lips graze his neck. Or worse. It wouldn’t be the first time girls had thrown themselves at Mr. K for a role. And it wouldn’t be the first time he gave in to it, either.

Just a little something I learned from in-depth conversations with Adele. She slipped up and told me about those too-close moments brought on by hard work and late-night rehearsals. How working so intensely on something brings out feelings. How things might cross the line. And about how girls can get caught up in it all. But Mr. K’s never tried anything with me.

I know the history of this place backward and forward, and when an unknown, awkward nobody gets cast in an important role, there’s usually a good reason for it. My assessment makes me feel better.

I walk by the rest of the dancers with pride and a new leotard. Even during class I am the perfect ballerina. Even in a room by myself with all the doors locked, just me and the mirrors and the music, I am everything Mr. K and my mother and Adele and the school have ever asked me to be.

I am perfect.

I go back upstairs to the main floor, through the lobby, which is now being wiped clean of an earlier reception for the petit rats’ parents. I take another long route, fluttering past Mr. K’s dark office and the cast list. I peek into each studio, just so I know who’s dancing and who’s slacking off or prioritizing an English paper or a new boyfriend. Eleanor is in one of them, but she’s just doing barre work and checking herself out in the mirror.

We used to always rehearse side by side, pushing each other to do better and complimenting each other’s footwork. Somewhere along the way, though, she said I was too intense during practice and it wasn’t fun anymore. I guess she’s not wrong. And she does look happy now, inching away from the mirror, mesmerized by her own body. I would never want to take that away from anyone—especially not her.

I run into Liz. She’s drenched and clearly has been in the basement weight room. Not that she needs it. Her eyes are all hollowed out lately, and her arms and legs so thin and wiry that I worry about her strength. But we don’t call each other out on things like that.

“Pilates?” I say to her.

“Elliptical,” she breathes out, panting, wiping sweat from her face. It’s very unbecoming. “I burned six hundred calories.”

I frown at her. She doesn’t need all the extra workouts. In the past year, she’s shrunk down from a respectable size two to an I don’t know what. Negative two, if there’s such a size. How does she even find anything to fit her anymore?

“God, Bette, stare much?” she says as she pats the last few drops of wetness away, smoothing down her hair. “Hey, so, I’ve been meaning to ask—what’s it like practicing with Henri?” There’s a wink in her voice, but I don’t like the implication. Alec and I have had our ups and downs, but at the moment, we’re very much on again.

“Yeah, he’s hot,” I say, already heading in the other direction, my tone colder than it should be. “But you know I have a boyfriend.”

“Uh-huh,” Liz says, pulling her long dark hair into a high ponytail, and I can’t help but stare at her too-lean legs, not sure whether I should worry about her or be jealous, as she peers into the other studio, where a few of the boys practice jumps. She’s looking for Henri, no doubt.

Things between Liz and me have been good lately, but there was a time when we competed for everything—including Alec. But he made his choice pretty early on, and after a few petty incidents, Liz realized there was no changing that. It was just making her look desperate. Plus, we finally figured, we’re more powerful together than working against each other. It just makes sense.

She heads up to shower, and I’m about to enter studio C when I remember a little something Eleanor mentioned earlier—that Gigi practices in the old basement studio. I’d stored the information, and now I want to test it out. I want her to know she can’t do anything in this school without me knowing about it. I don’t miss much around here. She’ll learn.

I pass the nutritionist’s office. I pause at the top of the staircase. I remember being little and sneaking to the edge of these steps with Eleanor and Alec and Will. We’d dare each other to go stand in front of the locked door. Whoever did it the longest always got candy from a secret stash and, most important, glory.

Voices drift up to me. I can see the door is open a hair and I’m nothing if not graceful, so I tiptoe down, dip under the window, and peek in through the slightly open door without being heard or sensed. There she is. Gigi. The Sugar Plum Fairy. Except she’s not dancing. She’s on her back, legs splayed, Henri pressing on her thigh as he stretches her out in semidarkness.

I don’t know why, but I shiver as I watch. Almost like I’m outside in the crisp fall air. I remember that Cassie used to come here, too. The insomniac girl who got in trouble for dancing all night. The girl with the perfect 180-degree grand jeté. The only Level 6 girl to land a major soloist role last year, even above me. I don’t like thinking about her. I want to forget that I even knew her and how good she was. And especially that she’s Alec’s cousin.

Henri lets his hair drop around his face and says things I can’t hear. I don’t like the way he touches Gigi and makes her laugh. I don’t like how his fingers graze a loose curl near her neck. Her voice is light and delicate—it’s too pretty. Henri is eating it up. And if Henri’s eating it up, I worry that Alec will fall for it, too, when they start rehearsing.

My stomach twists. I can’t remember a time when Alec and I weren’t together. My first memories have him in them, from family dinners when my dad was still around to dance classes and kissing him in the school’s dark corners. It was always just us.

I take out my cell phone and zoom in on Gigi and Henri with the camera. I click the picture button. The flash is too bright, so I duck and slink away quickly, quietly. I don’t get caught when I do things like this, and I don’t need that to change. I run back to the upstairs to studio C and throw myself into the Snow Queen variation. I do five, ten, twenty pirouettes, but the image of Gigi and Henri races through my head alongside my music.

I drop down off pointe and pace the room. I scream at my reflection and hope no one hears me. Or sees me breaking down in this glass box of a space.

I cover my ears and let my head bob on my shoulders, falling into a deep stretch. I try to revel in the pink message and its cryptic cleverness. The powerful way it made me feel writing it and waiting for someone to discover it. How Gigi’s face had fallen, how lucky I was that everyone saw it at the same time. I was probably the only one who spotted the tears in her eyes. I hope she’s cried every night since. That’s not quite true. I hope she goes back to California. She’ll be happier there anyway, so it’s not even that terrible that I want her to leave. It would be better for everyone. The girl is too fragile and sweet and mellow to succeed here. In some ways, I’m just looking out for her. She’ll realize it soon enough. That ballet is too much for her. That it makes you do things. Makes you do whatever is necessary.

I remember Adele’s advice before my first casting audition. She yanked me out of the pack of petit rats. “You don’t get many shots, peach.” Her hands were in my hair, redoing my bun the proper way with a hairnet. “So when the opportunity comes”—she leaned into my ear—“you’ve got to claw your way to the top.”

My body relaxes at the memory. Adele would approve. Maybe not of these methods. But of my motivation for sure. I grab my warm-ups and head upstairs to my room. When I open the door, Eleanor jumps from the futon and turns off the TV. I see those old videos of Adele out on the floor.

“Again?” I say.

“She has perfect feet, Bette,” Eleanor says. “Arched like bananas.” I can’t even fight the compliment she gives my sister.

“Can I use your printer?” I ask, wishing I didn’t have to, but I’ve been avoiding my mother, so I couldn’t possibly ask her to send me new ink. I don’t have time to go get more.

“What for?” she asks, clicking the TV back on.

“Just a little surprise for Gigi.” My voice lifts an octave with excitement. “Got pics of her and Henri in some compromising positions.”

Eleanor frowns. “We’re not doing that again, are we?”

Her words bite and I almost drop my phone. “We are,” I snap, waiting for her to look away from me and apologize for her weakness. To join in on the little fun I have planned, like she’s done a thousand other times before.

“Uh-huh. Sounds great,” she says, easing slowly back into watching my sister perform a perfect rendition of Kitri’s solo from Don Q. “Let me know how it goes.”

I don’t let her hesitation stop me. I plug my phone into Eleanor’s computer and wait for the picture to load. I try to block the screen, so she can’t see, but she doesn’t even look up. Eleanor can turn into sort of a saint at times. But I know how to get her to do things. I print the picture, delete it from Eleanor’s downloads folder, and slip out the door while Eleanor’s still in an Adele trance.

The eleventh-floor hall is empty. Everyone’s mostly in their rooms listening to music, in the upstairs student lounges watching TV, on other floors, or sewing shoes and stretching. I go to the Light, and tap three times on the door. No one is in there. I lock the door behind me.

I exhale, surrounded by pictures of primas and beautiful thin bodies and perfect feet. The day after I turned twelve, my mother shipped me off across Central Park to the school dorms. Finally old enough to live on my own here. Back then, I used to visit this closet every night. I used to fall asleep on the floor sometimes, and the RAs would have to wake me to go back to my room. I run my fingers over the collaged walls and find a spot for the picture in my hands. Before I tack it up, I see a message that makes me smile: Gigi should watch her back. I rub my finger over it. Someone else hates her as much as I do. I’m not alone.

I grab one of the glue sticks that sit on top of the TV. I wipe it all over the back of the picture. I slam the page on the wall and smack it hard, like I’m hitting Gigi’s face a thousand times.

I step back to admire the picture among the others. At first glance you can’t tell it’s one unlike the others. I wish I could see the look on people’s faces when they spot it, and the look on Gigi’s face especially.

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