Audition Page 6

  That I don’t ache all the time,

  That I’m not lonely,

  That such tenderness exists for me

  Outside my dreams.

  Do the minimal homework.

  What’s the point of trying too hard

  To compete against the Upton kids

  With their fancy cars and private tutors?

  Good enough.

  Do I feel that way about ballet, too?

  What’s the point of staying in Jersey all weekend

  For one lousy Saturday class

  Where Lisette will show us all up

  With her unbeatable arches

  And endless energy?

  Of pushing away Mom’s apple pie

  When I can maybe just suck in my gut a little harder?

  I fend off tears the whole ride back.

  At Señor Medrano’s door, I wave to Dad.

  “No, you go ahead.

  I should get some rest.

  Don’t want you to get stuck

  Driving in the dark.”

  Watch the gray Volvo

  Wend cautiously away.

  My parents always buy Volvos,

  Safe, sturdy, crash-protected cars.

  They have plenty of life insurance,

  A generator in case the power goes out,

  Shelves of bottled water in the garage.

  They take vitamins, buy organic foods,

  And their only daughter,

  Who takes the vitamins along with them and still

  Wants a night-light in her bedroom?

  Her they drop

  Three hundred miles away

  On the doorstep of a stranger

  To chase a dream

  That exists completely

  Outside

  Steel car frames

  Venerable insurance companies

  Apples uncoated by a layer

  Of shiny protection

  Made from the shells

  Of toxic beetles.

  Inside, Julio sits,

  Guitar in hand,

  Sneering

  At me

  Or at practice

  Or at life in general.

  He plays a melancholy scale.

  The twanging metal strings

  Reverberate up my spine.

  I take my bag of clean laundry upstairs.

  Glance at the math textbook—

  I should have read chapter four last week—

  Leave it unopened on the cheap dresser.

  Crawl under the slippery nylon quilt.

  The Upton kids sleep in on Monday,

  Maybe still in their fancy vacation houses

  In the Poconos

  Or on the Jersey shore.

  I hit the snooze three times before

  Señora’s less-than-gentle tapping on my door

  Reminds me I am living in someone else’s house

  On someone else’s schedule.

  Later, at the studio,

  Yevgeny grabs my foot

  Extended in développé a la seconde,

  Squeezes my toes down hard

  Toward my heel.

  “Like that,” he snaps,

  Almost satisfied.

  My glow at his attention

  Darkens to a blush of inferiority.

  Without his hand to force my toes,

  My pointed foot reflected in the mirror

  Looks weak,

  Hopeless.

  I hold up my chin until the end of class,

  Uncertain whether I can stop it wobbling

  Until Señor is ready to go home.

  In the dressing room,

  Bonnie drops beside me on the bench.

  Rummages through her bag.

  Removes an enormous pair of scissors.

  “Give me your pointe shoes.”

  “My shoes?”

  She holds out her hand.

  “Last year Yevgeny said the same thing to me.”

  I try to forget

  Mom’s anxious face crunching

  The long string of Upton tuition numbers,

  The cost of gas to and from Jersey,

  Room and board, despite the ballet scholarship,

  As Bonnie rips the shank

  Of my eighty-dollar pointe shoe

  Away from its satin sole.

  With surprising strength

  Her long, thin fingers

  Hack the rigid material of one sole

  Across its middle,

  Then tackle the other.

  “Here, put them on.”

  I relevé.

  Unencumbered by the stiff, full shank,

  My mediocre arches

  Bend impressively

  Over the pointe shoe boxes.

  In arabesque, it is easier

  To mimic Yevgeny’s demanding squeeze.

  Bonnie giggles at my smile.

  “Does everyone do this?”

  “Not Lisette, of course.”

  Bonnie rearranges

  The strand of white silk flowers

  Around her bun.

  I relevé in fifth, piqué,

  Admire my feet in the dressing-room mirror,

  Pink, curved, showy,

  My silhouette more like a beach house in a grand location

  Than a solid, Vermont saltbox

  With its stoic lack

  Of shank-bending trickery.

  I am awake

  Before the alarm clock

  Blares into the darkness.

  The audition is this afternoon.

  My feet will look all new

  In Bonnie’s doctored pointe shoes.

  I pillage through the leotards and tights

  Piled on the closet floor.

  Today I won’t wear black—too commonplace—

  Nor red—too bold.

  Navy blue with a velvet bow in my hair?

  Burgundy with pink flowers?

  Does it matter there’s a tiny hole

  Where I’ve gathered the front of the burgundy leotard

  With a safety pin?

  Does it matter the navy is a little stretched out in the seat?

  Will it make any difference?

  And if they don’t choose me,

  Can I pretend that I don’t care?

  The floors of the ballet studio

  Are sticky with resin.

  The mirrored walls so peppered with fingerprints

  Reflections look like those impressionist paintings

  Made from tiny dots.

  Every conversation is underscored

  By the accompanists’ plonking piano notes

  As if we are all

  Always

  Onstage.

  “Do you have an extra hairnet, Sara?”

  Simone fidgets on the bench beside me.

  “Sure.” I rummage through my bag.

  Her hair is black and mine is brown.

  The net won’t match

  But such things trouble Simone no more

  Than carrying on a half hour’s conversation

  Wearing only a pair of tights.

  I need to breathe,

  Push out the fear

  With the perfect, driving burn of my hamstrings

  When my thighs first kiss the floor.

  They call me

  Into Studio C with Simone and Lisette,

  Bonnie and Madison.

  We are auditioning for a pas de deux so . . . Yes!

  Remington is here.

  And my eyes are so stuck

  On his broad back

  I almost do not hear them tell me,

  “Double pirouette, Sara.”

  From fourth position

  I push my heel against the floor,

  Snap my head around,

  Open my arms to catch the sunlight

  Coming through the side window,

  Reach for something . . .

  For him.

  Everyone is relieved

  When it is over.

  Dra
ped across the hallway benches,

  Lingering awhile before returning

  To the locker rooms

  To change back from ballerinas

  To ordinary girls.

  “What did they tell you?” Simone asks.

  They said very little, so I just go,

  “Could you believe Fernando?”

  Bonnie says, “He sure loves his own face!”

  I laugh along.

  Pretend I don’t notice Remington

  Come back through the door,

  An absent-looking smile on his face,

  Cigarette dangling from his fingers.

  The aroma is chalky, dirty, metallic.

  I know it is bad

  But I like it.

  Simone waves him over

  But he sits beside me,

  His arm dropping along the back of the bench.

  Small talk about the audition combinations,

  How Yevgeny is a taskmaster.

  “But a great teacher.

  Don’t you think, Sara?”

  Rem sounds so casual I can’t figure

  Whether all he’s thinking about is the audition

  Or if some part of him feels the blood

  Pulsing through my skin where his wrist touches my

  shoulder,

  The way every other part of me is straining to be

  The forearm his fingertips are absently stroking.

  Has he been feeling my eyes on his back?

  Sensing me hovering near him?

  Madison and Simone can’t join him and his friends

  For pizza at Denardio’s tonight.

  And me?

  “Where’s Jane?” escapes from my stupid lips.

  “She’s in Ohio. A family reunion.”

  I will myself to hear disapproval in his tone,

  Feel my head nod yes.

  I do not know what I am doing,

  Only that I want to go with him.

  Stand up.

  Leave my fears, my sense

  In the sticky dust

  Of the studio floor.

  For once I don’t hesitate to undress

  In the locker room.

  Tear down the bun.

  Add some lip gloss.

  Ditch the baby-doll dress for jeans

  And the scoop-necked black jersey

  That shrunk in the wash.

  I am already by the door when Rem shows up

  With two more grown-ups—corps dancers.

  Paul has a car.

  Don sits in front,

  Criticizes his driving in a strident yet tender way.

  Rem jokes with them and doesn’t seem to mind

  I have too little breath to speak.

  At Denardio’s I sit beside him,

  Lifting pizza to my mouth

  For minute bites,

  Feeling ensnared in the red vinyl booth,

  A half-acknowledged warning that I shouldn’t have come

  Without any other girls.

  “So we’re back into Nutcracker season,”

  Paul sighs.

  “Again.” Rem nods.

  “Not much time for my new piece.”

  “The one you work on in the little studio?”

  I wipe my greasy fingers on a brown paper napkin.

  “You watch me, Sara?”

  Rem’s smile starts in the left corner

  Of his mouth.

  I swallow hard,

  Saved from answering by Paul and Don,

  Who wave to some friends by the bar

  At which I am too young to sit.

  “We’ll be back in a minute.”

  “Sure.” Rem inspects the rim of his mug.

  I stare at the empty seats across from us

  But imagine Rem’s arm unraveling from Jane’s waist,

  Sweeping a gallant greeting to the little studio mirror.

  Under the table

  Rem drops his wide palm

  Over my knee.

  I mask my sharp inhale with babble

  About the fouettés in Le Corsaire,

  The audition, tour dates.

  But they are not words,

  Just the obligatory sounds of an accompanist’s piano chords

  Clanging and echoing in the dark tunnel

  Between my ear and my brain—

  They tumble from my mouth like marbles,

  Round and meaningless.

  All that makes sense is to feel

  The heat of his palm

  Burning through my jeans.

  “It’s fun partnering with you.”

  His face comes close, grinning

  Before he brings his lips to mine.

  Sometimes the earth shifts beneath your feet

  Like jumping on a hill of sand.

  What was true and solid begins to slide, dissolve.

  Your thoughts unravel faster than a satin ribbon

  Whose edge hasn’t been burned

  Until you sit amidst a tangle of limp, pink threads,

  Unable to reason

  At all.

  There is an uncomfortable silence

  Across the table.

  My eyes flash open for a second to see

  Paul and Don return to our booth.

  Their expressions seem to telegraph one syllable:

  Jane.

  Jane!

  I remember her offer

  To look at my sore legs

  With a millisecond of guilt

  But

  Rem’s head is turned,

  Kissing me.

  His lips are too soft,

  Too wet.

  But I have never been kissed before

  So maybe this is how it is:

  Hungry mouth devouring my face,

  Hands dangerous.

  I close my eyes again.

  How do nights like this end?

  Can I ask him that

  As the pizza cheese congeals

  And the condensation drips

  From the outside of forgotten drinking glasses?

  “Hey, we’re heading out.

  Early rehearsal tomorrow.”

  Paul takes out his wallet,

  Looks at the check.

  Rem pulls his hands away,

  His expression unreadable, bland.

  “How’d it get so late?

  We should get you home.”

  I stand up,

  Follow Don

  To the flashing neon exit sign.

  “How about you sit up front, Sara,

  So you can show Paul

  Where you live.”

  “Don’t you know where Señor Medrano . . . ?”

  I start,

  But Rem and Don are already

  In the back,

  Paul’s lips are pursed,

  The engine is humming.

  Outside Señor Medrano’s

  Rem doesn’t get out

  Or offer to walk me up

  The crumbling stairs.

  I watch Paul pull away from the curb,

  Try to recount the number of beers

  Rem drank.

  Is this what a first kiss is supposed to be?

  Disapproving eyes, probing hands, curious guilt,

  A lonely walk to the door.

  Señor Medrano’s front hall is icy from open windows

  Battling the acrid smell

  Of something recently burned in the kitchen.

  I wonder at the raw tenderness of my lips

  And whether Remington will still like

  Partnering with me

  Tomorrow.

  Another kind of dancing

  Is the Fall Formal

  At Upton Academy,

  Which has become the obsession

  Of Katia and Anne

  And the few other girls I’ve gotten to know

  In the little time I spend at the school

  Before rushing to the studio,

  Missing every sport, club, casual gathering,

  Mi
ssing everything that high school

  Really is.

  At Upton I am a wave

  Passing through—

  A shadow that will not be missed

  If I turn up late or leave too early.

  I do not even care

  About the stupid theme,

  Arabian Nights,

  Nor the dresses

  Nor the rented limousines

  Until Barry comes to me at break

  Before history. He leans against my locker,

  A flush creeping up to his narrow blue eyes,

  Tugs at his regulation tie

  As if it’s strangling him.

  Barry asks if I know whether anyone’s asked Katia

  To the dance.

  The question is odd

  Since Katia is not my close friend.