Prologue #2
“I needed water.”
“The fountain is outside.”
I unlocked the stall before she could continue interrogating me through the door.
Ashley leaned against the sink, still breathing hard from rehearsal.
She was a junior and moved with a precision I studied whenever I thought she wasn’t watching.
Her turns were clean, her grades were better than mine, and she never looked as though she’d forgotten why she entered a room.
She folded her arms. “What happened?”
“I missed a transition.”
“I was there.”
“Then the mystery has been solved.”
Her mouth moved as though she wanted to smile, but concern held it back. “Coach has corrected you all week.”
“I know.”
“Are you sleeping?”
“Some.”
“How much is some?”
“I had schoolwork.”
“You always have schoolwork.”
“My father checks my grades every day.”
Ashley rolled her eyes. “That sounds exhausting.”
“He’s involved.”
“He’s terrifying.”
“He’s successful.”
“Those aren’t the same thing.”
I moved to the mirror and checked the mascara beneath my lashes.
The girl staring back looked pale and frightened.
Her mother thought her hips required discipline.
Her father thought two hours of studying proved she lacked commitment.
Her coach thought one missed transition meant she’d failed the entire line.
I turned sideways.
The skirt pulled differently from that angle. My fingers moved toward the waistband before I caught myself and flattened my hand against the counter.
“What are you doing?” Ashley asked.
“Nothing.”
“You’ve turned around three times.”
“I’m checking the uniform.”
“It fits.”
“My mother thinks it’s tight.”
Ashley stared at my reflection. “Your mother also owns throw pillows that probably cost more than my car. I don’t trust her judgment about normal things.”
“She danced when she was younger.”
“That doesn’t mean she gets to make you weird about your body.”
“I’m not weird about my body.”
“Then stop staring at your hips.”
I faced forward again, but the reflection no longer returned to what it had been before my mother touched my waist. The problem remained visible even when I stopped looking directly at it.
Ashley came closer and rested her hands on my shoulders. “You missed one transition.”
“I keep missing things.”
“You’re distracted.”
“My father thinks I don’t apply myself.”
“Your father thinks everyone should wake up planning a corporate takeover.”
“Charlie never had problems focusing.”
Ashley’s hands fell away. “Charlie isn’t here.”
The words hit with enough force that I spun toward her.
“I know that.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“I know exactly where my brother is.”
“I’m sorry.”
The apology was immediate and genuine, but rage had already pushed through the grief.
“You don’t get to talk about him.”
“I know.”
“My father compares me because Charlie was brilliant.”
“You’re brilliant too.”
“You don’t have to say that because you feel bad.”
“I’m saying it because I watched you design half our competition costumes when the school couldn’t afford new ones. You remembered every measurement without writing them down.”
“That isn’t algebra.”
“No, it’s something you’re good at.”
I looked away. Being good at one thing had never stopped my father from identifying where I fell short somewhere else. Success only created another expectation. Nothing I achieved allowed me to rest because the next mistake might prove the achievement had been luck.
Music started again beyond the wall.
Ashley squeezed my hand. “Come back out. If you miss it, you miss it. No one is going to die.”
The phrase entered the room before either of us could stop it. Her face changed immediately.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
“It isn’t.”
“We need to go.”
I fixed my ribbon, wiped beneath my eyes, and practiced my smile in the mirror. The first attempt looked too fragile. I softened my mouth and tried again until my expression became pleasant enough to keep anyone from asking what happened.
Ashley watched me do it. “That’s creepy.”
“What is?”
“You looked like you were about to cry, and now you don’t.”
“I fixed it.”
“You can’t fix being sad with your face.”
“I’m not sad.”
“You’re doing it again.”
“Doing what?”
“Lying like it becomes true if you look pretty enough.”
The accusation followed me back into the gym.
I returned to my place and ran the transition until my body obeyed. I watched Ashley from the edge of my vision, counted every beat beneath my breath, and refused to let algebra, Charlie, or the pressure of my waistband enter the music.
Coach lowered her clipboard. “Better.”
One word was all it took.
Relief spread through me so quickly that I almost laughed. I had corrected the failure. Whatever Coach saw during the first run no longer mattered because I replaced it with something better.
That relief taught me more than the correction did. Mistakes could be survived if I erased them quickly enough. Disappointment could be replaced with praise. The frightened girl in the bathroom didn’t matter once the polished one returned to the floor and performed correctly.
At breakfast, the team crowded around folding tables covered with fruit, eggs, pancakes, and pastries. I picked up a plate and stood at the end of the line while girls discussed rehearsal, homework, and the party someone’s older brother was hosting that night.
The pancakes smelled sweet and warm. I reached for the tongs, but my mother’s fingers returned to my waist.
More discipline on your end.
I chose strawberries instead, then added eggs. I took one piece of toast because Ashley stood beside me watching, but when she turned to argue with Paige about music, I slipped it beneath my napkin.
We sat on the floor near the bleachers. I ate the strawberries slowly, cutting each one into smaller pieces with the side of my fork. Making each bite smaller made the plate last longer and gave me something to do while everyone else ate without appearing to think about it.
Ashley glanced at my plate. “That’s all you’re eating?”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You complained about being starving twenty minutes ago.”
“The feeling passed.”
“It doesn’t work like that.”
“I have afternoon rehearsal. I don’t want to feel heavy.”
Ashley looked toward my hips before catching herself.
The movement confirmed everything my mother had said. If there were nothing wrong with my body, Ashley wouldn’t have looked.
I set down my fork.
“You don’t look heavy,” she said.
“I never said I did.”
“You didn’t have to.”
My stomach tightened, and the food on my plate suddenly felt like something everyone could see me doing wrong.
I folded the napkin over the untouched eggs. “I need to study.”
“You forgot your notebook.”
“I’ll borrow paper.”
“You can eat and study.”
“I said I’m not hungry.”
The sharpness in my voice ended the conversation. I carried the plate to the trash and threw it away before anyone could watch how little had disappeared.
Hunger returned during algebra review. It became a hollow ache beneath my ribs while I worked through practice problems on borrowed paper. Every time my attention drifted, I forced it back by writing the equation again.
By the end of the session, the page held three versions of each problem. I rewrote every number until the columns aligned perfectly and each answer looked deliberate enough to prove I understood it.
The teacher paused beside my desk. “You only need to solve each one once, Charm.”
“I wanted to make sure.”
“Your first answers were correct.”
Pride warmed me for half a second before I noticed the red mark beside the final problem.
“What did I do wrong?”
“You changed the sign here.” She tapped the paper with one fingernail. “It’s a small mistake.”
“I knew that.”
“I’m sure you did.”
“Can I fix it?”
“It’s practice. That’s what the review is for.”
“But I know how to do it.”
She moved toward the next desk before I finished. The red mark remained, one mistake among eleven correct answers, and it became the only thing on the page I could see.
I stayed after the review ended and rewrote the problem on a clean sheet. Then I rewrote the entire set so the final page contained no corrections, eraser marks, or evidence that I’d ever answered anything incorrectly.
The clean copy went into my bag.
I folded the first one and buried it beneath other papers in the trash.
By the time I returned home, hunger had sharpened enough to make me light-headed. My mother was in the sitting room reviewing flower samples for an upcoming Harlen Foundation dinner. White roses, white lilies, and ivory peonies covered the table in small arrangements that appeared nearly identical.
She glanced up as I entered. “How was rehearsal?”
“Fine.”
“No corrections?”
“Coach said the second run was better.”
Her smile softened. “Good. You always perform beautifully once you settle yourself.”
I waited for the praise to feel complete, but the word once remained inside it. I was beautiful after I settled myself. I performed correctly after I fixed whatever had gone wrong.
“What did you eat at breakfast?” she asked.
“Fruit and eggs.”
“Good girl.”
The words filled the empty place instantly. My mother returned to the flowers without knowing the eggs had gone into the trash.
“The skirt looked much smoother when you left,” she said. “Standing correctly makes an enormous difference.”
I looked down at my body. The uniform still felt tight, but her approval made the hunger beneath it feel connected to something I had done right.
“May I go study?”
“Your father wants to review the algebra material with you after dinner.”
“I already attended the review.”
“He knows. He wants to be certain you understood it.”
“I did.”
My mother’s expression changed slightly. It wasn’t anger. Concern arranged itself carefully enough to make resistance look like evidence that she had reason to worry.
“Then showing him shouldn’t be difficult.”
“No.”
“Exactly.”
I went upstairs.
My algebra notebook remained open on my desk where I’d left it. I sat, pulled out the clean practice sheet, and studied until every problem became familiar enough to solve without pausing.
Hunger moved beneath everything.