Page 2 of The Unraveling

I’ve never had the classic Christmas holiday, since I was raised by a woman who didn’t seem to understand the concept of childhood, much less indulge the idea of magic that’s necessary to keep an eight-year-old girl excited with visions of sugarplums. This year was the most festive I’ve ever been. On Christmas Eve, Jordan and I went to Jane’s house, where she and her partner, Emily, made an elaborate—and very English—meal of beef Wellington, roasted root vegetables, buttery potatoes, and trifle for dessert. Artie was there with his brand-new girlfriend, Julia, whom he has already dumped for being too intellectually plebian.

We went through about a case of wine and spent the night taking turns switching out the records on her vintage Victrola. It was a cozy scene of cashmere and pinot noir, and actually roasting chestnuts on a roaring fire. Something I’ve only heard in the song. I felt like I was in a Christmas movie for a few minutes.

Jordan and I woke up miraculously bright-eyed the next morning, if tired. He made pancakes and coffee, I made mimosas, and we curled up to watch The Shop Around the Corner. Later in the afternoon we went to a pub where a live Irish band was playing festive music and drinking as much as the rest of us. We drank pints of Guinness and ate fried food and—well, let’s just say I’m not surprised no one knows I’m a ballerina. I have packed on a healthy ten pounds. I look a little prettier, actually, the unfamiliar weight adding a softness to my features I’ve never seen. I’ve been about fifteen pounds underweight my entire life. For the holiday season, it feels nice to indulge and even to see myself this way, but I have a feeling that once the lights are taken down and Jordan starts talking about weekends in Mallorca, I’m going to feel differently about the new ratio between my waist and my hips.

“Can you imagine being a ballerina?” asks Artie. “I feel like your whole life just winds up being about sacrifice. I mean, life is for buttered bread and perfect crème brûlée! And wine as—as luscious as velvet. Life is not for anorexia and discipline. Maybe a little recreational anorexia, but ugh, discipline.”

“You poets drive me mental,” says Jane. “ ‘Wine as luscious as velvet.’ Jesus Christ.” She drags on her cigarette. “Not that I don’t agree, but what a pretentious fuck you are.”

I glance at her cigarette case and think she’s also a bit of a pretentious fuck. Not that I don’t like her. I do. But it’s sort of the Le Creuset pot calling the Alessi kettle hot.

Artie bumps her with his shoulder indulgently and takes a cigarette from her case.

I look at Jordan. His expression means You still haven’t told them about your old life?

I smile and give a slight shake of the head. He smiles back.

It’s true, I haven’t. I’ve artfully dodged any questions about my past, managing not to admit my seedy Louisiana upbringing, my gold-digging mother, or my lifetime in ballet slippers.

My phone buzzes in my clutch and I take it out to see a text from Sylvie and a missed call from an unsaved and unfamiliar number. I ignore the random call and focus on the text from Sylvie, my closest friend and the person with whom I’ve shared the most secrets and the most contention. If it weren’t for the fact that we’ve hooked up, I’d say she’s like a sister.

I open the message.

Happy New Year’s! Only a few more shows of Nutcracker! I wish you were here—the new principal they hired to replace you is insane. She’s such a diva. I swear she won’t last the year.

I laugh reading it and then put it away, saying to Jane and Artie, “You know, I used to be a ballerina.”

A gust of cold air.

“Shut up. When you were a kid?” asks Artie.

“Oh my god, of course you were, look at you with that absurd waifish body of yours.”

She should have seen me in New York.

“No, not only as a kid. I only left the ballet about five months ago.”

“Seven months,” corrects Jordan kindly.

“Seven?” I ask. “Huh.”

I take a drag of Jane’s cigarette.

She takes it back and says, “How do we not know this? We’ve all been attached at the hip ever since you two moved to London, and yet this didn’t come out? I feel betrayed.”

Artie is gaping at me. “I feel betrayed. And guilty for saying how much I hate the ballet.”

I laugh. “It’s fine.”

“Why did you quit?”

I feel Jordan’s protective energy waft over me. “She’s just on a break. I think she’ll go back when she’s ready.”

Artie and Jane have a hundred more questions as we walk down a cobblestone street lit by gas lamps, meandering in the lawless way we often do until we stumble upon some great little cocktail club or speakeasy.

Jane and I clutch each other and giggle as we try to stay upright in our stilettos. Since leaving the stage and joining the audience, I have learned that they always overpour—and overcharge for—wine at the theater. And then I drink way too much.

Tonight, it’s a cabaret that we find.

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