Leap (10 page)

That was much better than I could have done. Lisa rocks.

“How does your leg feel, Lisa?”

“Warm and tingly. Thanks for the balm.” She wiggled her hips and swung her leg back and forth in its socket.

Jamie grabbed Sasha and the two of them pranced by. Sasha hooked Lisa's elbow. “Come on, Lisa, we're on soon.”

Lisa squeezed my hand and looked me in the eyes.

“
Merde
,” I said.

“
Merde
.”

I found a spot in the wings so that I wouldn't be around when the jazz piece ended and the girls came streaming back into the change room, giggling and complaining: “You stepped on my foot!” “Could you believe that guy hooting in the balcony?” “What the hell happened to the CD? Did it skip, or what?”

I stayed there throughout the junior girls' jazz number, Jamie's solo, and the junior girls' ballet number, stretching and bouncing to keep warm. When the time came for the modern piece, I joined the other girls on stage. As the music started and the curtain rose, I disappeared into the piece. For eight and a half minutes, I melded with the movement, the other dancers, the wooden boards under my feet.

We lay intertwined as the lights came up. Slowly, we began to rustle and shift. Crouched in a ball, one girl raised her back into a cat arch and let it fall. Another lifted an arm and let it drift back down. On my stomach, I snaked in a wave, then pushed into a downward dog pose—hands and feet pressed into the floor, head down, hips high. Gradually, the others rose and began a repetitive motion—Jamie held both arms together as if wielding an ax and swung them down, her arms parting at the bottom of the stroke and smoothing the air to touch Sasha's head. Half squatting, half kneeling, Sasha rolled back on herself to stand up. Her left arm reached overhead and drove down as if dunking a basket. Lisa made a circle of her arms, caught the impulse, and spun. I joined in. Backed by a soundtrack of major chords, we formed a kind of assembly line.

The lights brightened, and our movement expanded. One by one, we took solos along an arcing pathway in front of the group. While each girl claimed center stage, the rest of us bore each other's weight, then let ourselves be supported. Everyone worked together. To finish, the soloist rejoined the line at the opposite end. Her arrival cued the next dancer to peel off. We adjusted our spacing to fill in the gap that each left.

During Sasha's solo, the music changed. It pulsed and sped up, became more frenetic. In response, she jerked her arms and head and jumped erratically. Soon her solo time had elapsed, but she didn't return to the line. The music turned into noise—shattering glass, thunderclaps, distorted voice-overs like military orders. The group splintered. In spokes, we tumbled, rolled, leapt, and dove. We narrowly missed colliding until one by one our pathways led us into the wings.

In twos, threes, or alone, we crisscrossed the stage. In pairs, girls pushed, shoved, and tripped each other. In a trio, two ganged up on the third, either trapping her or shutting her out. When I crossed the stage alone, I staggered, disoriented, searching the ceiling. Loneliness welled to the surface and sapped my strength. My legs weighed me down. I was rooted to the spot, barely able to move.
This wasn't choreographed. I was wrecking the dance
. I lagged behind the music until, with a panicked surge of effort, I propelled myself to the other side.

A change in music renewed my energy. All of us entered and circled each other. We picked up speed and started to race. What would happen if someone couldn't run with the pack?

Lisa tripped and fell. The survivors scattered and kept circling. A sparring match broke out between Sasha and Jamie. The rest of us clapped like an audience at a cock fight until Jamie knocked Sasha down.

I knelt over Sasha, held her head, and helped her pull herself into a crouch. With my arm to support her, she rose to her feet, and Jamie backed away. Sasha and I returned to Lisa, who revived at our approach and climbed into a chair we made by joining our hands at the wrists. She rode on our stretcher/throne. All of us returned to center stage to rebuild the opening tableau. We changed positions and reversed the gestures. Lisa slid to standing and assumed center stage. She planed the air, grazing my head in a caress, and then swept her arms overhead into a cone shape. Her palms touched each other in prayer.

My heart was pounding by the time the curtain fell. The crowd was hushed. They seemed in shock and had to rouse themselves to applaud. This wasn't the packaged entertainment they were used to. It was art. We held hands to take a bow. For a few seconds, Sasha and I stood hand-in-hand. But even before the curtain fell, she shook herself free.

Petra rushed backstage afterwards. I couldn't look at her. She was going to be so disappointed in me for screwing up the timing on my solo crossing. I hung back as she moved through the ranks, giving hugs and shaking hands. “Well done, Lisa! Way to go, Sasha!” I kept turning so that I faced away from her, but finally she ducked in front of me. “Nat, what's wrong?”

I covered my face with my hands. “I'm sorry about the crossing. I don't know what happened.”

She rested her hand on my shoulder. “You were phenomenal, that's what happened!”

I peered at her through my fingers. “Seriously?”

“Nat, the entire audience was holding its breath at that moment. You made us
feel
the struggle. Do you know how hard that is? Most professional dancers never get there. It's one thing to be pleasing to look at; it's another thing to move the audience. You moved us.”

I threw my arms around her. It's not that I believed her. But it was obvious that she wasn't mad at me. I was so relieved that I wanted to cry.

Petra corralled everyone into the lobby for group photos. After a few formal shots, we struck poses. I was making a blowfish expression—cheeks puffed out, eyes bugged—when I met Sasha's eyes and my face went slack. Her look was so bitter, it chilled me.

A friendly looking, gray-haired man stood next to Petra. She introduced him to me as Lance Irving. He wasn't very tall, but when he turned his attention on me, he seemed much larger. His deep blue eyes made me feel understood. He gripped my hand. “Lovely work.”

I blushed. “Thank you.”

“Natalie, Lance is moving to Victoria. He plans to teach modern here this fall,” Petra said.

“If there's enough interest, that is,” Lance said.

“You would love his class,” Petra said. “I can't recommend it highly enough. I wouldn't be who I am today without Lance.”

Lance hid his face. “Oh, stop.” But when he moved his hands, his eyes were shining. I could see that, deep down, he accepted her praise.

“You can count on me, I know that,” I said. “And I'll spread the word.”

He tilted his head and nodded. “That's very kind.”

Behind Lance, Ms. Kelly was greeting parents. Just then, she turned and saw me. She hesitated, then squared her shoulders and lunged in Lance's direction, her hand outstretched. I gave her a wan smile and turned away.

Mom and Paige approached and gave me a homemade bouquet of bluebells and daisies. I hugged them both. “I'll get changed and then we can get out of here,” I said.

Alone on the senior side of the change room, Sasha was undoing her hair, her arms raised and her elbows pointed towards the walls, like she was about to do a sit-up. “Secret admirer?” Sasha said when she saw the flowers. “Kevin will be jealous.”

“Give me a break, Sasha. They're from my mom and Paige.”

“Must be nice.”

It struck me that Sasha's parents hadn't been in the lobby. I'd taken it for granted that Kevin wouldn't come; he never attended any of her performances. But her mom always came, and her dad often joined her. What had happened tonight? I softened my voice. “Actually, it
is
nice.”

Sasha turned away and rifled in her locker. I stepped out of my flowy pants and pulled on my jeans. Sasha's shoulder blades winged out as she bent forward, and the fine hairs on her neck caught the light. Her ribs rose and fell. Her legs pushed the ground away, lean and strong. But without Jamie at her side, she seemed smaller, almost fragile. She stopped moving.
I miss you
, I wanted to say. I was about to ask her if anything was wrong when she snapped, “Quit staring at me!”

“Sorry.” She moved aside to reveal a mirror in the locker door, small and cracked but obviously still functional.

“Good show, Sasha. See you later.”

“Sure. Have a nice life.”

I took a step towards her. “Why are you so mad at me? Is this still about Kevin?”

Sasha was flinging her clothes off and on. It made me think of tears in motion. If she moved fast enough, she wouldn't have to cry. I knew she didn't want me to interrupt. “Call me if you want to talk, okay? Sasha?”

She slammed the locker shut and hoisted her pack to her back. She was going to beat me out the door. “Whatever.”

I caught up with Mom and Paige and we escaped into the summer evening. Mom offered to take us out for dessert, but I opted for a walk on Willows Beach. We drove the short distance and cooled our feet on the sand—fine and silky, if you avoided driftwood and cigarette butts. The surf pulsed, the moon lit the water, and the air eddied around us. Paige grabbed a stick and ran ahead while Mom and I sauntered. When we caught up to her, she had written NAT RULES on the shore. I went to hug her and she shrieked, “No! You'll squeeze the stuffing out of me!” She ran around in circles and I chased her till Mom called, “Girls, girls! Calm down. It's dark down here and someone is going to get hurt.” We collapsed on our backs and laughed up at the stars.

Wednesday, July 28th

Paige leaves tomorrow. As she packs, she keeps asking, “Do Dad and Violet have
Harry Potter
? What Wii games do they have? Do they have flippers in my size at the cabin?” It's getting on my nerves. I told her not to assume they had anything to keep a ten-year-old girl entertained. Dad shed most signs of us when he moved to his new place. A couple of outdated pictures of Paige and me hang as evidence of his former life, but otherwise he was born again as a freewheeling divorcé. (How come that doesn't sound right? What's the word for a divorced man? There isn't one, is there? Mom would have a field day. It bugs me when she's right about stuff like that.)

It's just as well. I'm not sure I could stand to walk into his condo and see the clay bowl that I made in Grade One and proudly presented to him for Father's Day, my thumbprints still visible where I pinched the sides into shape, a matte patch where I missed with the glazing brush. I wonder what ever became of it? Dad's décor is what you would call minimalist. Bare walls; a big, black television; a couple of tall lamps that stand in the corners like awkward newcomers at a party. The only bit of character in the living room is contained in the black CD stands that climb the walls. Not the stands themselves, but the music inside them: jazz, blues, classical, and even some experimental electronic music and indie pop. Last summer, I worked my way through his CD collection as I danced in the living room. By myself.

Next week, Mom vacations at the cabin with Marine. I haven't talked to Sasha since the night of the show. Claire says The Ice Cream Place isn't hiring. Opportunities have dried up all over. The Summertime Blues strike again.

Thursday, July 29th

Paige chattered all the way to the airport, reporting what she'd read online in a kids' encyclopedia about air travel: security checkpoints, cabin pressure, landing strips, baggage handlers. She wore a pink Hello Kitty backpack and carried a stuffed unicorn under her arm. When I hugged her goodbye, my eyes teared up and hers widened. Great, I was upsetting her. Luckily, the flight attendant arrived just then with a hundred-watt smile on her face. Her white teeth actually sparkled like in the cartoons. They're probably veneers like Sasha and I saw on
Oprah
: People have their teeth whittled away to stumps and covered with ultra-white falsies. Fake teeth or not, the flight attendant obviously knew how to interact with kids. Paige perked right up again and hurried through the gate. The lady had to prompt her to turn and wave.

When we got home from the airport, Mom and I made egg sandwiches and green tea. As we ate, I was reading the paper, and she, totally out of character, wasn't reading anything. “Have you thought any more about inviting Sasha to come and stay with you next week?”

I stared. Had I actually
mentioned
that idea to her?

“Your father said you were thinking about it.”

That's right. Dad and I did discuss it. During the same conversation in which I complained about not going to Toronto and he asked about my friend Hannah. I was about to snap back that Sasha and I weren't even talking to each other, in case she hadn't noticed, but I thought better of it.

“I haven't asked her. We haven't been hanging out much lately.”

“Have you two had a fight?”

I was reading the entertainment section of the newspaper. A young, locally born pop singer rose to fame this month. I turned her winning smile face-down and looked at Mom. It unnerved me to see her eyes focused on me. Normally, she's lifting her head from a book, dreamy-eyed, and gazing at some point past my shoulder. She uses books the way some people use illicit substances. Is there a support group for that?
Hi, my name is Denise and I'm a recovering bookworm.