Up to This Pointe (14 page)

“Hey!” Owen smiles.

“Hey.” I brush flour and red and green sparkle sugar from my hands, tuck stray hair off my face, back into my messy work bun. Why am I either sweaty, distressed, or half naked every single time I run into this guy? “Luke,” I call. “Owen's here!”

“Dude!” Luke shouts from the ovens. “Be out in a minute!”

“I will have one bagel,” Owen says, stepping to the register.

“We don't make bagels.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Huh. Okay.” He examines my neat rows in the case. “Plain croissant?”

I slide the very last one into a paper sleeve. “Three fifty.”

He pays with a five, puts his change in the tip jar.

“Thanks.”

He smiles and takes the croissant from the bag, pulls off a section, and chews. “Oh, wow…,” he mumbles. “That's a lot of butter.”

I nod.

He stands there and pulls the whole croissant apart and eats it, one section at a time.

I find a clean rag and go back to the case to wipe the crumbs from beneath the paper liners. Through the glass, I watch Owen brush croissant from his hands, toss the paper sleeve in the recycling bin, pour a glass of lemon water from the pitcher near the door, and down the whole thing.

He even drinks in a casually dashing way. Oh my God,
dashing
? I am not well.

“Okay,” he says. “What are you doing today?”

I look up from the case. “Sorry?”

“Today. What are you doing?”

“Uh…you're looking at it.”

“All day?”

Johnny Mathis is in a marshmallow world, and he's not shy about his love of it. Owen perks up. “You know Johnny Mathis grew up here? Richmond District. Seal Rock.”

I did know that. But I'm amazed Owen does, too.

I've been not only sloppily dressed and unshowered, but also way less than receptive to his attention every time we've talked. So why does he keep trying? And what exactly is he trying at?

Dad steps out from the kitchen.

“Owen!”

“Hi!”

“How are things at Star Wars?”

“Oh, you know…” Owen smiles, mostly at me. “Pretty good.”

Dad stands there, wiping his hands on his apron.

“Harp.”

“What.”

“Go home.”

“What?”

“Baking's done, and Luke and I can handle the afternoon. Go. What're you up to today, Owen?”

“Not a thing, sir,” Owen says.

“Oh, Owen, cripes, call me Dave.”

“Not a thing, Dave.”

Dad nods. “Owen, want to walk Harp to the bus for me?”

“Absolutely, Dave.”

“Uh,
Dave,
I'm on the schedule till three,” I say, low.

“Now you're not. You don't sleep anymore. Go take a nap. Or something.”

“I'm staying. I need the money.”

“Good Lord, Harper,” Dad says, pulling some cash from his wallet. “I am
paying
you to take a day off, okay? Come on.” He hugs me, covered in flour and sugar, and now I am, too. “You're bony,” he whispers into my hair. “Go eat a burger. Please.”

I take off my counter apron and hand it to Luke, who is talking with Owen, and I go in the back to wash my hands and face, run water over my hair, and then give up. I look ridiculous.

“Ready?” Owen says when I come out.

“Sorry?”

“I'll walk you to the bus.”

“Oh, that's—no, I'm fine,” I say. “Thanks.”

He follows me out, calling, “See you, Luke. Bye, Dave!”

The bells ring. Outside, the sun is shining cold. I pull my coat on.

“So. Off to nap?” Owen asks.

“No.” I walk away from the park, toward the N-Judah Muni stop.

“Going home?”

“No.”

“Mind if I join you?”

“I've got errands.”

“What kind?”

I stop walking. Owen does, too.

“Did you ask Kate out and she said no?”

“She asked me.”

“Oh.”

“I said no.”

Thin clouds move swiftly from the ocean, hazy in the bright blue sky. The sea air is clean and cold. Seagulls float above the Jordan almond–colored row houses; blackbirds sit on the telephone wires.

I love this city.

“I have errands,” I tell him again. “Really boring ones.”

He smiles.

We get off on Market Street in the Financial District. Owen follows me out of the cold winter sunshine into San Francisco Dancewear, the place nearly every penny I earn ends up.

It's busy. Little girls with their mothers, older girls alone, and chattering groups in the racks and racks of leotards. Tchaikovsky blasts from wall speakers: “Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy.”

My chest hurts. I've never been here without Kate. She's not at Saturday breakfast anymore, no more slumber parties.

The staff of willowy, long-haired current and former dancers are up and down ladders and stairs, in and out of the curtained stockroom.

“Harper,” my favorite, Mirielle, calls above the chaos. “Where's Kate?”

“Home,” I say. “I need shoes.”

“Sit and hold on a minute.”

Owen tags along to the square of parquet flooring in the center of the room, mirrors on every wall and freestanding barres to stretch and rise with. I sit in a wooden chair. Owen sits beside me, hands on his knees. The music plays, and we watch girls try on slippers and shoes, model leotards, throw tantrums. Owen is the only guy in the store. He smiles. Nervously.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” he says. “It's just…do the male dancers have a separate store or something?”

I laugh.

Owen beams.

Mirielle brings a stack of narrow shoe boxes, whips off the lids, and offers them to me one by one, in case I've changed my mind since last month. There are so many brands of pointe shoes—some last longer, some are more flexible, some have stiffer shanks, some are more salmon than pink. But I've found the ones that fit my narrow feet and arch, the kind I can make last nearly a week before they're destroyed and ultimately fail me, and I'll never switch.

“Freed, please,” I say. “Three pairs.”

Mirielle smiles. “I've got a surprise for you.” She pulls from the stack a Freed of Londons box, my Classics, and stamped on the leather sole is a familiar maker's mark.

“Maltese Cross,” I whisper. “How many?”

“Just the one,” she says, “Let's see.”

I move to pull my boots off, but see Owen watching, and I turn to him. “Look away.”

“What?”

“Don't look. At my feet.”

He frowns.
“Why?”

“You like this girl?” Mirielle asks him.

That smile. “Yeah,” he says. “I do.”

“Then trust her,” she insists. “Do
not
look.”

He rolls his eyes and covers them with his hand. I ease my boot off.

He gasps.

“Owen!”

“I'm sorry!” he yelps. “You can't tell a guy ‘Don't look' and then think he's not going to look! A guy is
always
gonna look!”

“Yeah, at, like, boobs or something. This is different! Now you'll never see me the same way. I'm a monster!”

Mirielle laughs. Owen looks completely horrified.

But also impressed.

“Whatever, dude,” I sigh. “I was just trying to help you out.” I wrap a wad of lamb's wool around my ruined toes and slip my feet in the Maltese Cross shoes. I rise to demi, then full pointe. In the mirror, I catch Owen wincing.

“She doesn't feel a thing,” Mirielle assures him. “Nothing but calluses.”

He nods, eyes wide.

“Thanks, Mir.” I sigh.

“You're welcome. If those are good, I'll grab two more—save the Maltese for San Francisco. Need anything else?”

“Extra ribbon?”

“Yep. Meet me up front.”

I pull my socks and boots back on before Owen gets any more time to ogle.

He follows me to the register, where I pay in cash—$328 with tax—for the three pairs, which will last me, if I'm careful, till the beginning of February. Once I'm in the company, maybe San Francisco will be buying all my shoes. I take my bag, and we are on the sidewalk in the chill wind.

“Want to walk?” he says.

He's seen my feet. Might as well.

We walk past the tall buildings of the Financial District, toward the bay, two blocks before he speaks.

“Is there wood in there? In the toe—is that how you balance on it?”

“Flour-and-water plaster,” I say. “And satin.”

“And why do you like the ones you wear?”

“They fit.”

“They all looked the same.”

“No. These have a short…it's called a vamp, and a wide box, full shank, not too flexible…”

“Ohhh, right, the short vamp, I totally missed that. Well, no wonder, then.”

Oh my God, this guy is…Kate's. Hos before bros. Even if you hate the ho.

I don't hate her, and she's
not
a ho.

“And what's the Maltese Falcon about?”

“Maltese
Cross.
” I almost smile. “There are thirty people in the Freed factory who make the shoes by hand and bake them dry. That's why they're so expensive. They each have their own mark they stamp into the leather when they're done to keep track—my favorite dancer uses these shoes, Freeds, but only the Maltese Cross maker is allowed to build hers. Sometimes you'll find them in the stores. It was lucky I got these. It's a sign.
Feels
like a sign.”

He nods. “What are you auditioning for?”

We walk. “Why are you pretending not to be bored by all this?”

“It's not boring. At all.”

“Because I will admit, if I had to go to the video game factory, I would never stop complaining.”

“The factory probably
would
be boring. But LucasArts is fun.”

“Are you aware what you're getting yourself into, living with Luke?”

“Can't be any worse than the other three of us. It's a big house. Lots of space to hide from each other.”

“You'll need it.” I smile.

We walk. Seagulls cry and we are at the piers, crossing at the light to the Ferry Building. Students from the Conservatory of Music are playing “In the Bleak Midwinter” on cello, harp, and mandolin, and it is so beautiful that I stop, and Owen stops. The strings echo all around the cavernous marble hall.

Kate won't come over for Christmas Eve. What if her mom is at a party? Will Kate be alone? What about Christmas Day?

I drop my last twenty dollars into the open cello case.

“You okay?” Owen asks.

I wipe my eyes on my sleeve. The sleeve of my ratty old Sunday-at-the-bakery hoodie. My hair, sloppy at the start, is now a total falling-apart mess thanks to the San Francisco wind and two Muni rides.

Owen, on the other hand, I have a feeling came to the bakery for a reason. He is wearing clean jeans. A really nice wool sweater, blue and gray, striking against his warm complexion, his brown-black eyes. Hiking shoes that look like they've never once seen the dirt of a trail.

Kate doesn't even own any ratty clothes. Once they've been worn a few times, she gives them to me or to the West Portal Goodwill.

Kate asked
him
? He said
no
to
Kate
?

“Harper?”

“Yeah.”

He offers me his strong, lean arm. I wrap my own around it.

He smiles. “Let's walk.”

We sit on a bench on the dock beneath the Bay Bridge. We watch the ferryboats come and go, the sun on our faces. Owen's eating a sandwich from one of the Ferry Building deli counters, and without my asking, he's brought me a huge salad. Dressing on the side.

I wolf it gratefully.

“Who's the Maltese Cross ballerina?”

I chew, swallow. Drink some of the water he's also brought to me. “Yuan Yuan Tan. San Francisco Ballet.”

“Sugar Plum Fairy.”

“Yes! How do you—”

“Bus ads,” he says. “She's on every single Muni shelter near the Presidio. My mom loves her.”

“Does
she
dance?”

“My mom? Oh God, no.” He laughs. “She just likes that Yuan is Chinese.”

“Oh.”

We eat.

“She became a ballerina on the flip of a coin,” I tell him. “She was a little girl and she loved ballet, but her dad wanted her to be a doctor. Her mom was okay with her dancing. So they flipped a coin.”

“Huh. What is
up
with Chinese dads and the doctor pushing?”

I smile. A little.

Ship bells ring. Tourists and bikers get off the Sausalito Ferry; another group boards. The ferry backs out, chugs toward Alcatraz.

“You and Kate in a fight or something?”

I sigh. “Or something.”

“What's the audition for?”

I swing my feet. “San Francisco Ballet. January third.”

“Oh, wow, with Yuan! So the shoes really are lucky.”

“I hope.”

“You auditioning alone?”

I nod.

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Huh.” He tosses our trash into a can, sits back beside me. Moves closer. “I'm sorry,” he says. “It sucks. You seem lonely.”

I nod.

“You miss her.”

“Yes.”

“So call her! Say you're sorry and she will, too.”

“I'm not sorry.”

“Say it anyway.”

“I can't.”

“Really? So you're fine never seeing your best friend again, ever? I just watched you balance all your weight, which, granted, is not a lot, but still, your entire body held up by one sad, thrashed toe, and it didn't even hurt—but you can't call your best friend and say two words? Just text her, then.”

“Okay, Dr. Phil, you don't even…” I can't finish my half-assed attempt at pithy. My throat swells, and weeks of missing Kate unleash their misery. So I tell him. Everything. The Plan, Kate, Simone, the failed auditions. The New Plan. All of it. This guy I don't know except that he's best friends with Luke.