Up to This Pointe (15 page)

And that, in a group of girls all dressed alike, dancing all the same steps around Kate—he saw
me.

And he listens. Doesn't say anything for a long time. We sit. Knees touching.

“You really wouldn't want to teach?”

“No.”

“That Willa kid seems to think you're really good at it.”

I nod.

“Free trip to England, at least?”

“No.”

He picks my hand up in both of his.

In the midst of this sadness—butterflies.

“You'd never know, with these perfect hands, that your poor feet were so abused.” Not exactly holding hands, but he's pressing the warmth of his into the chill of mine.

“You know what?” he says. “Maybe Simone's on glue. And those Oakland people, those auditions—because I know I don't know anything about ballet, but oh my
God.
You are amazing.”

I shake my head.

“You know why I wanted to come see you? You understand I came to the show to see
you,
right?”

My heart thumps.
“Why?”

“My parents are real big on people having a hard-core work ethic. Like, obsessively. Luke would talk about his family, about
you
—everything you do to pay for classes, the teaching and babysitting on top of rehearsing and performing and graduating early with honors—by comparison, my entire family seems super lazy.”

“I have a Plan.”

“I know. That's what I'm saying. I like that.”

A seagull strolls to us, cocks its head, and studies us. Owen smiles at it.

“I have to go home,” I say.

“Okay.”

He walks beside me to the bus stop. The wind is cold.

“Luke is in love with Kate,” I say.

“Is he?”

“Did you ask her before you knew?”

He frowns. “I already told you, she asked me.”

“You said no. To Kate.”

He stops walking. “Harper. Of course I did.” He takes my hand and holds it.

I hold his back, and we walk to the bus shelter. He waits with me.

“No one else knows,” I say.

“Knows what?”

“Anything. Any of this. Not my parents, not Luke. They don't know, because I haven't told them, and I've been wanting so badly to tell someone….” My throat's tight again.

He's looking so intently at my eyes, so close. “You told me.”

“I've needed…Thank you so much. For listening.”

“Thank
you.
”

The bus is approaching. We step out of the shelter stop to the curb.

The doors open. He lets go of my hand.

“Harper.”

“What?”

“Can I call you Harp instead?”

“What?”

“Everyone else does!”

I climb the steps.

“Hey, Harp—call Kate. Text, email,
something.
”

“Why?”

“You miss her. And I bet she needs you. I don't blame her; I've spent maybe three cumulative hours with you, and I'm pretty sure I've never known a better person.”

I stop on the top step, my hands tingly, and say to the driver, “Hold on just one second. Please.”

Owen sees me lean out the door, he moves close to meet me, and I do not think, I do not tell him the words ricocheting around my head, my thumping heart:
No one has ever said anything so kind to me, ever.

I hold on to the bus and my pointe shoes with one hand, his shoulder with the other, and kiss him. For one moment he seems stunned, nearly as stunned as me—then his hands move to my hair. He pulls me even closer and kisses me back, takes over, seawater salt on his lips. I'm light-headed, and he keeps kissing me until I pull away, until the
bus
is pulling away.

Dazed and ignoring laughter from the other passengers, I stumble to a window seat. I watch Owen stand on the curb, breathing hard, staring after the retreating bus until I can't see him anymore.

And I do not text Kate. I call her.

I have fearless hair, and it is dragging the rest of me
,
kicking and screaming, into fearlessness. Starting with reading the emails that have been piling up since the day I left home.

I take a breath and begin with Willa's.

>>>
Dear Harper,

I am saying this letter and Mom is typing it. I am almost seven, but she says if I type it, you will be home before I get done, so I wish I could type it. Please come home. I'm sorry you were so sad you had to go to Antarctica. Lindsay teaches Saturday and she uses boring music. Also, we are at the barre for almost the whole time! [Note from Hannah: She wanted ten exclamation points. I'm keeping it simple. I love you, Harp.] We never get to turn or jump or anything fun! Mom says if I clean a litter box, we will get a kitten, but I have to show I can do it first, but if I don't have a poop box to clean, then how can I show her? [That's not happening, BTW.] If I do get a kitten, I want gray stripes and to call it Foggy, or if it is a girl, I will name it Harper. Because for you. I love you. I miss you so much I am typing this part this is me please come home please don't be mad at Madame Simone she loves you too I miss you SO SO SO SO SO much I love you.

Love, Willa Emaline Moore Jr. Esq. MD PhD DDS

[She's been reading the phone book for fun and is fascinated by acronyms lately. Love you and miss you. Call your parents more, okay? XOX Hannah]

I stupidly, wrongly assumed that out of everything in my crowded in-box, Willa's email would have the least chance of breaking me. What was I thinking? When did she become a dentist and a doctor, and what the hell is an esquire? And why is Lindsay not letting them do floor work? They'll lose their center of gravity if she doesn't let them use it—they can stretch on the floor, for Pete's sake—let the kids spin a little!

Gah. This is exactly why I cannot read any more. I close the laptop.

My tenth Sunday on The Ice, and I have become a woman. A banner day, one worth journaling. May 10:
Wore a bra today. Because I had to.

Cinnamon rolls, butter on my bread, and no ballet have made remarkably rapid changes to my body. There is a softness in my shoulders, my hip bones are not so sharp, and I no longer use a pillow to cushion my knees when I sleep. I'm regretting owning only two bras. I'm in for a lot of hand-washing of delicates in the sink.

I would be losing my mind over the weight were I at home, and not being told by Aiden that these curves are
so beautiful,
spoken low, into the nape of my neck. He sometimes comes over after work to visit—when Vivian's nice enough to be out at the library or the lab.

It took us twenty minutes to move everything Vivian brought to The Ice into my room, where she claimed half the drawer space and sleeps on the second bed, and still we barely speak. Kate and I never had to try; we fell into each other's lives and stayed. I am failing with Vivian. Charlotte's hope of cultivating our lifelong friendship has ended before it began, it seems, though Aiden still holds fast to his own hopes and dreams for the situation; from day one he's asked repeatedly if each night will be “Tickle Fight in Panties Night.”

“It's been postponed for hair-braiding and ear-piercing time, but keep asking, perv,” Vivian snaps. When she is in the room, she's reading, earbuds firmly in place.

But she's very nice about my vow to keep the Christmas lights lit until the sun returns. So except for when we're together in the dining hall, Aiden and I know each other's faces only in dim, twinkling shadows. I may have cellulite. I can't bear to check, even in the shower. If it's there, good for it. Welcome to my ass, Fat.

Aiden still believes I'm mourning the loss of a horrible boyfriend. “ ‘We would rather be ruined than changed,' ” he says, lying beside me (fully clothed, of course) against the threadbare cotton McMurdo pillowcases. “ ‘We would rather die in our dread than climb the cross of the moment and let our illusions die.' ”

I smile in the dark against his shoulder. He's sometimes a little Irish-Rover-over-the-top—this from a person who obsesses over poems about San Francisco—but sometimes I wonder if Aiden's Googling poetry specific to my current situation? Does he get points for that, or is it charm in the place of sincerity?

“W. H. Auden,” he says.

I nod, as if I knew.

Would
I rather be ruined than changed?

I still dream about ballet.

When I swing in the greenhouse hammock, Allison's classical music takes me straight to rehearsal. Shackleton's not been back—maybe I'm getting better? I close my eyes and feel my muscles stretch and lengthen, my feet arch, arms strong, pulling me up and around, pirouette after pirouette, jumps and turns….In the most secret part of my heart, do I think Simone is wrong? Are the directors of every company I auditioned for wrong?

The truth is really, really hard to admit. Hurts still.

I miss San Francisco. I miss the ocean and the bakery and Golden Gate Park. I miss Kate and class and rehearsal. I miss my babies in their leotards and skirts. I miss Simone. I do. I miss Willa. My parents. I miss Luke. I miss my hair sometimes.

I miss Owen.

I open the last of the video audition rejection emails from ballet companies in Oregon, Wyoming, and New Hampshire. The end. I don't delete them. I put them in a folder marked
T
3
.

And there is still the unread actual letter from Owen, hidden at the bottom of my unmentionables drawer. He's unmentionable.

“Aren't you too warm?” Aiden says. “Do you need three T-shirts?”

I'm not giving The Ice
everything.

Amazingly, Aiden doesn't seem to mind my ironclad limits. Each rebuked attempt to take just one more layer of clothing off me, off himself, let his hands wander the unexplored frozen continent of my new body, only seems to make him like me more.

“Hey. Sunday. Should we go to church?” he asks.

“Should
you
? Are you Catholic?”

“Cafeteria Catholic. My family picks and chooses the parts they like—mainly the celebrating holidays and drinking wine and judging people parts.”

“Super.”

“Do you have a church?” he asks.

In my mind, beams of foggy sunlight through the windows of Simone's studio make patterns on the wood floor. Every day. Religiously.

“Not anymore” is all I offer.

“You are a mystery, Harper Scott,” Aiden says.

“Not really.” I kiss him and try hard to forget everything. Everyone. San Francisco. Home—Owen. All of it. For a little while.

“Winter is for hibernating,” Charlotte says, unhooking the top row of her button-fly jeans, “and for storing fat to survive in the cold.”

“Not when there's central heat,” Vivian says.

We eat rolls and drink hot tea every morning, and most days Charlotte's been adding whole milk to hers. She's getting more intent each day on finding conclusive data to support her thesis about the effects of the pollution on the Adélies. She wants to start writing before midwinter and finish before she's off The Ice in September, so we've been in the lab some weekends and a lot of late nights.

She looks up from her lab table one Friday, leans back, and pulls her head to the side, cracking the vertebrae in her neck.

“That's horrible for you,” I scold her.

“How're you feeling?” she asks, reaching for a handful of cheddar Goldfish from the bowl near her notes.

I shrug.

“I haven't said anything about it, because people do things for all kinds of reasons and it's none of my business and it was the least of my worries for you, but I feel like I can tell you now. I
love
your hair.”

I fidget with an Erlenmeyer flask. “Honestly?”

“Oh my God,
yes.
Viv, don't you love it?”

Vivian looks up, her own head featuring basically the same cut. “Seems like a lateral move.”

“Vivian, good grief,” Charlotte says. “We're used to how cute it is on you. This is brand-new for Harper!” She reaches to put her warm hands on my head and looks into my T3 eyes. “Seems better…little bit?”

“I think so.”

She smiles. “Well, the cut is gorgeous. If I had your eyes, I'd do it in a second.”

It
is
a little nuts how big my eyes suddenly became once the hair was gone. But Charlotte is crazy. Her meter is skewed; she herself is objectively gorgeous. She's an Antarctic twenty, mainland ten. Ick, why am I even thinking that? Guys can be such pigs.

“I can't feel your spine or your ribs when I hug you anymore. I like it.”

I nod. My phone alarm chimes. Greenhouse.

“That's what's done it!” She smiles. “I told you you'd love it.”

“I do,” I admit. It's so warm, so clean—I sleep better there than in my bed sometimes. “You should come with. There's always a free hammock. You would love it. Vivian, you too!” Earbuds. Vivian's not going anywhere.

“You go soak it in for all of us.” Charlotte hugs me, taking care to squeeze the softness of my arms and put her hands on my less-gaunt cheeks.

“Feels weird,” I admit, halfway out the door. “Not sure I like it. The weight.”

“Babe, first of all, there's no ‘weight'—you could easily use another ten pounds. I swear to God. You're still just this side of bony. Please let it be for a while. See how it feels. Okay? Promise? Look, I'm way ahead of you. I've got my annual Winter Over muffin top, and I'm all,
Welcome, friend!
I'm not saying let's get diabetic fat; I'm saying it's cold out, settle in. Okay? Please?” She massages a soft curve of skin at her waistband. “Well. Maybe not those damn cinnamon rolls every day, but you know. Sometimes.”

She takes such good care of us.

I nod and jog to the greenhouse before the tears fall.

The cold is no match for the ache of missing Mom and Dad.

Allison's got some Celtic pan flute something or other playing for the plants today, and her entire face is shining with a secret.

“Look,” she whispers as I lie back in my T3 hammock. “Don't tell anyone.” She opens her hand above my open palm and a tiny cherry tomato rolls in a circle.

“Oh my gosh!” It is a testament to my All-in-Antarctica attitude that this wee little fruit gives me a thrill. There's been no salad, no fresh fruit, for weeks. Allison's lettuce is being groomed for the Midwinter Formal, but tomatoes—those are precious. And unexpected.

“Go ahead,” she says.

I close my eyes and bite. It's barely ripe but good enough. It floods my entire brain with sweetness. Tastes like the sun. She tucks a blanket around my feet.

“Allison?”

“Yes, sweet pea?”

“Have you been to the pole?”

“A few times, yes.”

“A
few times
?”

“For projects, work, sure. Why?”

“What was it like?”

She smiles. “It was beautiful. Life-changing. Freezing cold. Worse than here, if you can believe it.”

“Are you going back?”

“Any chance I get. Close your eyes now.”

She mists the lettuce with a spray bottle, takes notes on a clipboard, replaces bulbs, fills water containers. Every sound familiar and reassuring and hypnotic.

I give up trying to shut down the dancing my brain launches into the moment I lie back. This music is lending itself to some grand jetés across an endless ice field. No slipperier than coconut snow, probably. Leaps and turns. My legs twitch, and I wish I could think of something—
any
thing—else. My breath is shallow from the stillness of my limbs, it's been so long….

“That was unexpected,” Shackleton says. “The hair stunt.”

Oh jeez. Back on his dumb pile of snow, feet propped on a jagged block of ice.