Chapter 15 Nutcracker #4
“There they are,” Debra told Becca. Richard and Heather were standing in the back. She waved until at last they saw her. Then slowly they made their way down the aisle.
“Holy shit,” Becca whispered to Debra. “How many months is she?”
“Shh.” Debra shook her head as Richard approached.
He sat next to Debra with two bouquets of roses, and Heather eased herself into her seat on the aisle.
“Nice flowers,” Debra told Richard.
“And lastly,” said Nastia, “photography and filming is strictly forbidden. I want to thank my husband for help and support including filming today’s performance. Order forms are in your programs. Thank you very much.”
The theater went dark, heavenly music played, and infinitesimally small angels paraded across the stage.
The four-year-olds wore white with silver haloes.
Aww, breathed parents, straining to see.
The Nutcracker did not usually begin with angels, but Nastia liked to get the littlest dancers out of the way.
As soon as the angels filed off, a dozen slightly bigger girls pranced out to dance with painted Nutcrackers, and they were followed by three boys marching and jumping with precision as toy soldiers.
Candy canes bounded on with hoops, and marzipans in little hats, and three girls dressed as Chinese dolls—or were they jumping jacks? Or little red silk cats? “Is that a tiny bit racist?” Becca asked during the applause.
There was no story in this Nutcracker. Nastia staged the ballet in scenes.
Instead of a Christmas tree growing taller, the dancers grew before the audience’s eyes as the youngest children yielded to tweens and teens.
Here was the French Dance with girls in lilac and one careful boy, standing in the middle.
Here were fairies—and suddenly, the Spanish Dance!
“There she is!” Disillusioned though she was, disgusted with ballet and all it stood for, Debra gripped Richard’s arm—and he was smiling. They both were, because that was Lily in a red tutu and black lace, a red flower pinned to her blond hair.
Lily’s eyes were huge and dark; her head tilted.
Her body was a flame. She turned and spun and flew about the stage and she was theirs.
She was their own child—but she was also something else.
Something magic, self-aware and brave. It wasn’t just her steps or her precision; it was her style.
Anxious at school, afraid of the dark and fireworks and death, she opened like a flower under the lights.
“She kills it every time,” said Richard, during the applause.
“I know,” said Debra, as the Spanish dancers curtsied.
Lily ran off into the wings and she was still a Spanish lady holding out her arms and flicking up her skirts. “Wow,” said Becca. “She’s the one you have to worry about.”
Anxious, and delighted, Debra wanted to hear more, but the flowers were waltzing now.
Was it just Debra’s imagination? Emma’s Dewdrop was not compelling.
Admittedly, the part was hard, but Emma’s cha?nés were not quite as fast as Debra had seen them in rehearsal.
Had Nastia ruined her confidence, or was something really lacking?
In her pale pink tutu, Emma danced with just a touch of fear.
Joy’s daughter, Fiona, cleaned up as Sugar Plum, along with a Cavalier Nastia had imported from the city.
The Cavalier partnered decorously but Fiona attacked and sparkled as she turned.
“She’s good,” said Becca.
But now the snowflakes ran in from the wings, their waltz filled the stage, and Debra’s mom said, “Is that one Sophie?” Because at first it was hard to tell. There were so many girls in white.
“That’s her,” said Debra. And her heart was pounding. Sophie was dancing with such care. She was lovely, but she was soft, and her body really was round, her face dimpled, her waist thick. She danced modestly, and while her steps were clean, they were not crystalline.
“I loved that!” Cindy told Debra as the curtain tumbled down and “Sleigh Ride” started playing.
“Lily was something,” Becca said.
“Sophie was too,” said Ed, who praised equally, no matter what.
“Where’s Heather?” Debra asked Richard.
“She stepped out because her back was hurting.”
Oh God, Debra thought, and she told Richard, “Go check on her.”
But nothing was wrong. They found Heather in the lobby taking pictures of the costumed girls. There was Lily’s teacher, Gwen, and there was the tall patient woman who taught the little kids. Only Joshua was missing. The girls’ jazz teacher never came to Nutcracker.
“You were both so beautiful!” Cindy told the girls.
Richard presented the bouquets. “I know it wasn’t easy.”
“But it was so fun,” said Lily.
Meanwhile, Debra asked Heather, “Hanging in there?”
She nodded. “I’m okay!”
“Let me take one of you and the girls.” Debra took a photo of Heather with Sophie on one side and Lily on the other and they were both pointing to her belly as Nastia swept by.
“Better in rehearsal,” she told Sophie. “Timing.”
Sophie nodded humbly.
“But you!” Nastia told Lily. “A star!”
That’s it, Debra thought, watching Sophie’s face, resigned, anguished, jealous.
We’re out of here. Just you wait, she told Nastia silently.
Just wait till I pull these girls. I’ll save them from you.
Break your spell. If looks could kill. But Nastia did not notice Debra glaring.
“Next time you will listen to the music, yes?” Nastia told Sophie.
“Yes!” said Sophie, eager as a little soldier.
“You see what I mean about their teacher,” Debra told Becca as they waited for the girls to change.
“Yeah, she’s a bitch.”
Debra fumed. “One kid isn’t better than the other!”
“Well,” Becca hedged.
“What?” Debra demanded.
“Lily is really good.”
“Becca!” Debra chided, because how could she say that? How could her body-positive, movement-therapist sister talk that way?
“Sorry!” Becca threw up her hands. “She’s got it. She’s a natural.”
“That isn’t fair,” said Debra.
“Yeah, I know.”
“I’m not doing this anymore,” Debra declared.
“Good luck.”
The girls were reemerging in their clothes and coats.
They were carrying their roses, and their faces were glowing with lipstick and mascara and rouge.
Sophie’s eyes were framed with long false lashes.
You can be anything you want to be! Debra told her silently.
Go on! Become an astronaut. A research scientist. A doctor.
And yet she looked so lovely with her flowers.
Hopeful, innocent, determined. How could Debra pull her from the studio?
Richard ran out to bring the car around for Heather. He said he had to get her home and Debra said no kidding.
The crowds dispersed. Debra and the girls and all the other dancers and their parents and siblings adjourned to the parking lot.
A snowflake named Olivia called out for Sophie and gave her a Secret Santa gift which was a little plush ballerina bear.
Lily danced ahead with Audrey, Maddy, and Scarlett.
It was bitter cold, but the girls didn’t seem to notice.
They had another performance that night.
There would always be another—until when?
Until they woke up? Until they outgrew the music and these lights?
Even then, how difficult it was to break away.
You loved the floating skirts and jeweled bodices, arched feet, quick turns.
You couldn’t help it. That was the scary part.
The spells still worked when you became a mother.