by Ann Bryant
That made me even happier. Jasmine and I were the only two in the whole class to have been mentioned so far. I don’t know if I stopped concentrating for a second because I was so happy but, next thing I knew, Miss Coralie was moving my arm and then my hand. “You look like a wooden soldier, Poppy. Curve it gently…” I really tried to make it curve, but I knew it wasn’t working. Miss Coralie got hold of my hand and flapped my arm. “What’s this old chicken wing? Hmm?”
I heard a little snigger from behind me and tried to stop my face going pink. Then I lifted my elbow and dropped my shoulder and… “Lovely, Poppy, three and four and…”
Phew!
By the end of the barre work, I felt really tired because I’d been focusing so hard on trying to get everything exactly right. I’m never normally tired in ballet lessons. In fact, the only time I ever feel tired in my whole life is in the morning when Mum wakes me up!
For the centre work, away from the barre, we always stand in rows. Miss Coralie tells you which row she wants you in. She put me in the third one, and Jasmine in the second. First we did port de bras, which are the arm movements. This is my favourite bit of the whole lesson. The music reminds me of slow motion skiing on silver snow with a golden sky.
I was in my own little world, so it gave me a shock when the door suddenly opened. It’s such an unusual thing to happen in the middle of a class that we all stopped what we were doing to turn round and stare. Even Mrs. Marsden stopped playing the piano.
“Ah, Rose,” said Miss Coralie.
3 Please Let It Be Me
I nearly gasped out loud. It was the Rose Bedford from my school. Only you could hardly recognize her with her hair all scraped back under her hairband. The trouble was, she’d got the hairband too far forwards, so it pressed her eyebrows downwards. And that made her look as though she was really scowling. Her leotard was all wrinkly around her tummy because it was too big for her, and her legs looked strange too, but I couldn’t think why that was at first.
I looked at Jasmine to see what she was thinking and realized straight away what was wrong with Rose’s legs. It was the way she was standing, with her knees locked right back, and her feet pointing straight ahead, which is the very last way you’re supposed to stand when you do ballet. Two girls in the row behind me were smiling like mad and nearly giggling. Everyone else just seemed to be staring.
It felt like ages before Miss Coralie spoke, but it must have only been about two seconds really. “Hello, Rose. We have actually started.”
Rose just nodded and took a couple of steps forward.
Miss Coralie used her brisk voice. “Is your mother with you?”
“She’s gone now. Her car was on a double yellow, you see.”
Miss Coralie smiled then. “Oh, I see. Is that why you’re late? Did your mother have trouble parking?”
“Not really – it just took ages to do my hair and everything.”
I was surprised when Rose said that. It didn’t look as though she’d brushed her hair at all. She’d got nobbly bits sticking out of the top.
Miss Coralie’s eyes widened. “Right. Well, let’s get on, now you’re here,” she said rather snappily. “Pop yourself in the third row, Rose. Next to Poppy Vernon.”
I moved along a bit to leave a space and that’s when Rose noticed me.
“Hiya!” She grinned.
“Hi,” I said in a whisper.
“Do you know Poppy, Rose?” asked Miss Coralie.
I could feel everyone’s eyes on me now.
“She goes to my school,” said Rose, bending her knees and pulling at the bottom of her leotard.
Someone did a little smirky noise behind me and I felt a bit sorry for Rose because it was obvious her pants were uncomfortable and she was trying to put them straight.
“What?” said Rose, turning round and giving the girl behind a cross look.
“Nothing,” said the girl quickly.
“Can we get on, please?” said Miss Coralie, her eyes flashing. “Rose, I know you haven’t done ballet before, but in your audition I had the feeling that you could be very good if you work hard. That’s the only reason I let you come into this class. So you need to concentrate really hard from now on. We don’t have talking in class because there isn’t time for it. Just keep an eye on me or one of the girls in front of you, and you’ll start to pick things up. It’ll take quite some time and, as I told you before, you’ll have to do some practice at home. All right?”
Rose nodded, but I could tell that she wasn’t really listening. She was staring round the room and still fiddling with the bottom of her leotard.
The silver-snow music didn’t sound so magical after that, and I didn’t do the rest of the port de bras as well as usual because I kept on wondering what Rose was doing. When we turned to face the corner, I could see her shoulders all stiff and her legs a bit bent. Miss Coralie didn’t correct her at all because she was watching the rest of us so carefully.
Next it was the adage, which you pronounce add-arge. You have to have good balance for this section. Miss Coralie was going through the step with her back to us, so we could see exactly which leg we were supposed to use, when Rose suddenly started whizzing her arms round really fast like a windmill.
“I’m really stiff from all that slow stuff,” she whispered to me.
“You’re not supposed to talk,” I mouthed back.
Miss Coralie turned round at that moment and frowned at me. “Are you watching, Poppy?”
I nodded hard and tried not to go red. Inside my head, cross thoughts started jabbing and stabbing away, stopping me from concentrating properly. It wasn’t fair.
“Facing me…fifth position croisé… And…” Miss Coralie didn’t count this time. Just watched us hard. “I can’t see your face, Sophie. Lovely, Lottie. Tighten the supporting knee, Poppy.”
Rose turned round to look at my knee. Then she turned back and stuck her leg up really high at the back, only with a bent supporting leg and her shoulders all stiff. Miss Coralie corrected her and told her how to work at her arabesques at home. But I couldn’t imagine Rose ever practising at home. It just didn’t seem like a Rose thing to do.
After the adage section, we moved on to the jumps.
“I’m looking for pointed toes and no bending forwards!” said Miss Coralie briskly.
“Oh, goody,” said Rose.
One or two girls giggled, while Immy Pearson gave me a look as if to say: Haven’t you got a weird friend?
I wasn’t sure whether to give her the same look back, so I just looked the other way.
We did lots of jumps, but I don’t think I did them very well. The problem was that I could still see Rose out of the corner of my eye. She was putting me off by jumping really high. Her toes were pointed and her knees were straight but she wasn’t keeping her arms in the right position or anything. She was just trying to bounce as high as she could. I tried to make myself concentrate, but it was no good.
It was really strange that Rose had come to The Coralie Charlton School of Ballet at all. I couldn’t work out why she didn’t go to a modern class somewhere. I wondered if I’d dare to ask her afterwards, but I didn’t really want to talk to her because I kept remembering how scary she was at school, playing with boys and getting told off all the time.
She didn’t fit in at Miss Coralie’s though. And I know it’s horrible of me, but I didn’t want her here either.
After the jumps, it was the most difficult bit of the whole class. The steps. First we do the set steps, but after that Miss Coralie makes up a whole string of steps and puts them together in a sequence. It’s supposed to be good training for when we’re older. She gives us a new sequence of steps every two weeks. The first week, we learn the sequence and the second week we “polish it up” as she calls it.
I’m terrible at remembering a whole sequence of steps by myself. Usually it doesn’t matter, because I just go home and practise like mad. Then at least I’m quite good by the time it’s the n
ext lesson. But today was different. Today I wanted to get it right straight away. The biggest jitters of all went whizzing round my body because I knew that, to get picked for the exam, you have to be good at every single part of the lesson. I was glad Jasmine was in the row in front, so I could copy her.
Miss Coralie told us the steps slowly and carefully and I really tried my double best to remember them all. But while she was reeling off the long list of French words, all I could hear was Rose making little noises beside me. “Uh? Wah?”
“Right, I’m going to give you a minute to try out the whole sequence on your own, while I have a quick word with Mrs. Marsden. Then we’ll do it properly with the music. Rose, just do the best you can by copying the others.”
A minute! That wasn’t very long. I knew I had to work fast.
But Rose was hissing in my ear. “What’s she on about? Can you show me?”
“Actually, can you copy someone else?” I whispered back. “I’m not much good at steps.”
After that, I didn’t have time to see what Rose was doing. I was concentrating too hard on learning the sequence myself. Jasmine was working it out right in front of me, so I just kept my eye on her and tried to follow everything she did.
“See, you are good at it!” Rose whispered. She was giving me a big friendly smile. “How you do that jumping thing where you have to cross your feet over.”
I really wished she’d leave me alone because I hadn’t learned it properly yet.
“Right, everyone. Let’s try it with the music. We’ll start with the back row for a change.”
My heart thumped and the jitters started to make me feel sick. We were doing it a row at a time. There was no way I’d be able to do it without Jasmine or at least someone to copy.
“And one and two and three and four…”
The back row was really good. No wonder, they’d got Immy and Lottie.
“Hey, they’re better than us, aren’t they?” said Rose.
I nodded miserably.
“Well done, the back row! Now let’s have the third row, please.”
Jasmine gave me a thumbs-up as I walked on shaky legs to my place.
“And…”
I thought I’d be able to do the first part at least, but even that went wrong. It was because I could see Rose out of the corner of my eye and I knew she was trying to copy me, but she just looked like a grasshopper. And, as soon as I’d had that thought it really put me off. Then I heard Tamsyn giggling and I wasn’t sure if it was because of me or because of Rose. It was all right for Rose. She didn’t care. She wouldn’t be doing the exam anyway. But it was very important for me and now I’d completely messed it up and I’d gone red.
Watching Jasmine’s row and the front row made me even more miserable, because nearly everyone was better than me. I just had to hope that I’d done the barre work and the arms well enough to make up for the steps.
After the révérence, Miss Coralie said she was going to tell us who she’d chosen to do the exam. Everyone went to the front, but Jasmine and I stayed near the back of the group. Rose didn’t even bother to listen at all. She just wandered over to the barre and put her right leg up on it. Miss Coralie didn’t seem to mind. It was the end of the lesson, after all.
My heart was beating so hard it was making my top half go quivery. Please let it be me… Please let it be me… Please let it be me…
“Now, some of you might be disappointed not to be picked but, as you know, the more advanced you are at ballet, the harder it becomes, and I never let anyone go in for an exam unless I’m quite sure that they’ll get a good result.”
Everyone nodded and waited. My heart was thumping.
“There’s going to be an extra class on Fridays for those people doing the exam, because once a week won’t be enough…”
I stood as still as a statue waiting to hear who’d been chosen. But Jasmine was nudging me and jerking her head. She wanted me to look over at the barre. When I saw what Rose had done, I nearly gasped out loud. She was facing the barre standing on her left leg with the foot turned out. She’d slid her right ankle so far along the barre that she was almost in a kind of sideways splits. Even Tamsyn Waters wouldn’t be able to do that. It was incredible.
“So these are the people who will be doing the exam this term…”
My eyes shot back to Miss Coralie.
“…and if you’re not on the list, it simply means that you’ll be doing it next term or whenever you’re ready for it. It doesn’t mean you’re no good at ballet, or anything like that, because you’re all good in this class.”
She gave us a quick smile, then her eyes went down to her piece of paper and my eyes went down to the floor.
“Lottie Carroll, Immy Pearson…” I saw them clutch each other and do a little jump of happiness. “…Tamsyn Waters, Sophie James, Isobel Brooks and Jasmine Ayed.”
The floor seemed to have gone all blurry. I didn’t feel like looking up. Not ever again. Jasmine’s arm went round my shoulder. I knew she was only being kind, but I felt like shaking her off because I didn’t want her arm round me. My throat was hurting and I was scared that tears were going to come into my eyes. If only I could run away and find a dark little place where I could cry and cry, and nobody would know how heavy all my sadness felt.
Inside my head, a voice was saying: It’s all Rose’s fault. She put you off.
But then I suddenly realized something.
Miss Coralie had read the names off a list. That meant she’d already decided who was going to do the exam before the lesson had even started. So I couldn’t blame it on Rose. It was just me. I wasn’t good enough. I simply wasn’t good enough.
4 Balancing Tears
“Guess what I’ve made? Tuna pasta!” said Mum.
She was using her bright sparkly voice. The one she’d been using ever since Jasmine and I had got into the car and I’d told her I wasn’t doing the exam.
“Never mind,” she’d said. “Miss Coralie knows best.”
After that, I’d sunk down into the front seat and not said a single word because I was just too sad. It didn’t matter though because Mum was doing enough talking for about ten people.
“Do you like tuna pasta, Jasmine?” she said, lifting her chin so that her eyes could look in the driving mirror.
“Yes, lovely,” said Jasmine in a quiet voice. She’d been using her quiet voice ever since we’d left class.
“We’re just going to pick up Stevie from Mark Mason’s…”
That made me talk. “Oh, no! Mum, you said you weren’t picking up Stevie till later!”
“Well, Mark’s mum and dad have got to go out and they want to make sure Mark’s ready for bed before the baby-sitter arrives, so I said we’d pick Stevie up early.”
“Oh, Mum! He’ll only pester me and Jasmine all the time.”
“No, he won’t because I won’t let him,” said Mum, still in her bright voice. Then she suddenly sounded a bit tired. “Let’s put some music on, shall we?”
I think she was fed up of talking. She was probably fed up of me, too. But I couldn’t help being in such a bad mood. This was the worst day of my life, and now it was even worse because I was going to have to put up with my little brother hanging around when I’d got Jasmine for tea.
I sighed a great big silent sigh that made my shoulders go right up and back down again, then I sank even lower into my seat. It was going to be horrible next term with Jasmine in a different class and me stuck with Rose Bedford and her grasshopper jumps and silly grunty noises. If it hadn’t been for her, I would have done the step sequence much better, and then I might…
But I couldn’t blame Rose, could I? All I could do was sit there with a big lump in my throat, listening to Mum’s CD.
No one said another word till we got to Mark Mason’s.
“You two stay here. I won’t be a minute.”
As soon as Mum had got out of the car, Jasmine leaned forwards. “Hey, Poppy, Miss Coralie might change her
mind, you know… If you practise like mad and I help you with the steps… And we could tell her that it was Rose putting you off…”
“But it wasn’t just because of Rose…”
“Yes it was! You’re normally much better than you were today.”
“I wish she’d never joined our class. She made me do everything wrong.”
“I know. It’s not fair, is it? Does she act like that at school as well?”
“She’s always playing with the boys and forever getting told off. I don’t know why she’s coming to ballet.”
“Maybe her mum made her.”
I nodded miserably.
“But if you really really practise the sequence like mad and next week we tell Miss Coralie that you couldn’t concentrate properly because of Rose…”
“I’m not sure…”
At that moment, the back door was yanked open and my little brother got in the car.
“Hey, Mark’s got a baseball cap with a light on it and he can even read in the dark, only it wasn’t dark so we couldn’t really test it out.”
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t even turn round. My throat was hurting again. I just wanted to get home and go up to my room and carry on talking with Jasmine. I was glad she thought it was Rose’s fault though, and not mine. That made me feel a teensy bit better.
“So you had a good time then, Stevie,” laughed Mum, doing up her seat belt.
“Yeah, wicked!”
I don’t know if Stevie suddenly realized that I was being a bit quiet, but he leaned right forwards and peered round at my face. “Why is Poppy balancing tears, Mum?”
I stayed very still and tried really hard not to let any fall but it didn’t work, so then my throat was in agony because of trying not to make any crying noises.
“Seat belt, Stevie. Now!” said Mum.
Stevie made Jasmine play thumb war with him for the rest of the way home, so I didn’t have to speak, thank goodness. I could feel Mum looking sideways at me though. I managed to blink my tears away when she wasn’t looking and then I concentrated hard on what Jasmine had said. Maybe she was right. Perhaps Miss Coralie would change her mind.