Page 72 of The Unraveling

I nod. “Thank you.”

“It’s nothing, don’t worry about it,” she says.

I breathe in deeply again. She does it with me a few times.

“I’m actually from Louisiana,” I say, like that would explain my breakdown. “I think just hearing you bring up Louisiana triggered something.” I go on, feeling stupid now. “It’s where I’m from. And it’s where my mother died. It wasn’t that long ago.”

“Wow. It’s a bit like fate.”

I suddenly can’t stop. “Even the fact that she’s broke—I grew up completely without money, just trying to find success in ballet. To be honest, I think…I think this ballet has always been a little too close to home. Hearing you talk about it in the company meeting really awakened something I’ve been suppressing. Because in a weird way, even though it freaks me out, this ballet has always been a dream of mine to perform. I was with NAB in New York for six years, but it was never in the repertoire to perform it. I remember the first time I saw it live here in London four years ago, it really spoke to me. I know I’m a mess right now. I shouldn’t even be saying any of this and it’s probably going to make my chances worse, but I know I’m made for this part. I am Manon.” I finally take a breath. And then, “Oh god, I’m sorry for dumping on you.”

She takes in what I’m saying, her eyes looking even more observant than before. Then she smiles and says, “You’re a strong girl. I can tell.”

This makes me ache. I want to hug her. I want to fall asleep beside her like a lapdog while she drinks tea and reads Proust or whatever it is she probably does.

God, I am so fucked up right now. I’m like the bird in that old book running around pecking everyone on the head and asking, Are you my mother?

Talk about Mommy issues.

“I’m going to give you some space. I’m running downstairs to meet Charles. I believe class just started, but maybe breathe a minute and then do your own warm-up class today?”

She pats me gently on the arm, and then drifts out of the bathroom.

I decide to not take her advice, and head back to the studio to join company class. I notice that no one will look at me. But it’s fine, because I really don’t want to look at them either.

Chapter Twenty-One

NINE YEARS AGO

Icrept through the house, careful to avoid all the creaking floorboards and squeaky hinges. It was a sweltering August night, which meant that the house was noisy with the sound of deafening box fans. The perfect cover-up for a sixteen-year-old girl determined to sneak out but who knew she’d be murdered if she got caught.

It was just after midnight, but my mom had worked the brunch shift at her bar that day and she had to work the same shift in the morning, so she was definitely asleep.

I stepped lightly past her door, my gait gentle and silent from the years of ballet. I basically had to jeté over the loudest of the wooden floorboards, but I landed as quietly as a cat.

I paused for a full minute to make sure the small sound didn’t wake her, resolving to simply say I was getting a glass of water if she did come out.

My ears strained for the hint of every sound, my gaze locked on a spot in the dark living room as I waited.

When I heard nothing, I moved toward the door, which I opened as soundlessly as possible. I pushed open the squeaking screen door, then urged it closed, trying to prevent the rusty metallic hinge from doing the loud boing-click sound it sometimes made, since it barely worked anymore.

But this time, it obliged me. Even the house was on my side.

Nick had been my boyfriend for almost a year. My mom knew and she didn’t approve. Not because she was trying to keep me pure or anything; she was not weird in that particular way. It was actually that she objected to the relationship side of things. She must have told me a hundred times to stay out of serious relationships while I was young. She preached endlessly about how long-term relationships were pointless in high school, how they were designed to be painful and were doomed to fail. She told me that men were bad enough, but to catch them while they were in puberty and try to wrangle any sort of commitment out of them or to have any expectations from their underdeveloped brains was just stupid.

But I knew that Nick was different.

He had floppy brown hair and a smattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose. He had brown eyes, but they were a pretty, chestnut brown. He played baseball, so he understood my commitment to ballet. He’d also been in piano lessons since he was a kid, so he had a sensitive side to him, too. One time I snuck over to his house in the middle of the night like this, but his parents were out of town. We lit candles like we’d seen in movies, and he played old music on the piano for me while I watched his hands.

He was one of the good ones. I knew he was.

I walked quickly down the street from my house. There was a soundtrack of cicadas in the trees and frogs in the swampy ponds nearby, and it met with the electric buzzing of the streetlights that cast pools of golden light onto the hot asphalt below.

Once I was far enough away, I broke into a run, the rubber of my Goodwill Nike sneakers padding on the pavement, the zipper pulls of my backpack rattling. My heart was pounding, not from the cardio, I was beyond used to that, but because I was going to see Nick.

Almost a year, and I still felt excited to see him. I knew enough to know that was unusual. Most of my friends who’d had boyfriends or girlfriends broke up after like three months, seven months max. But we were more in love than ever.

And tonight, I was going to do it. Do it, do it. For the first time.

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