Now, shes publishing her debut novel,which peels back the curtainonthe salacious secrets of the dance world.
First Positionfollows an ambitious young ballerina named Sylvie Carter, who dances with the American National Ballet.
To read what happens next, get a copy of the novel when its out in 2023.
I can hardly see.
Im hot and freezing all at once and I can already tell I wont remember a lot of tonight.
Im glad that I wont.
I am better than this.
Or at least I was.
I still am, right?
I sit with splayed legs for a second before looking at the zipped compartment in my suitcase.
I cant believe I even still hide my old diary.
Everyone knows whats in it.
I cant even believe Ivekeptit.
Its humiliating to revisit.
All these pages admitting to wishing I was famous, looking forward to it.
Believing in myselfandthe world around me so deeply, like life was going to be fair.
Im not a bitter old, jaded hag now or anything, but Im sure not that girl anymore.
I unzip the pocket and pull it out.
Whateverpossessed me to buy a pink diary?
On the first page, there are the rules.
Oh, the rules.
I read them carefully, though my eyes are seeing double.
Maybe its less reading and more viscerally, instantly remembering each and every one.
The Rules:
I laugh and shut the book.
Ive broken every single one.
I used to love the wordencore.
It meant I was good.
Too good to stop.
Encore meantI want more.Encore meantdont stop, keep going.
Encore meant,I dont want to say goodbyenot just yet.
Once upon a time I yearned to hear it.
Now the word fills me with dread.
Dianas voice screams the word.
I take my position and repeat the phrase for the hundredth time.
Sweat is running down my forehead from the exertion under the hot stage lights.
I can feel a blister beginning to swell and bloom on my heel.
Not becauseits all worth itor anything like that.
Diana is who yellsencoreuntil the word starts to feel like a whip through flesh.
Last rehearsal, Dianas command ofencoremeant doing apique arabesquefifty-seven times in a row.
My feet bled at the end.
No one cares when your feet bleed here.
The week before that,encoremeant doingechappeesuntil the entire bottom half of my body went numb.
If beauty is pain, then becoming art is torture.
Never-ending torture, too.
Usually its my thumb, jutting out just a bit too much.
I hate my thumb.
I hate it like its out to get me.
And in a way, it is.
Im supposed to have control of it and yet…I dont.
And, of course, it doesnt stop there.
I privately sneer or glare at every inch of my body.
Its not just me who does this.
We glare and find fault in the mirror and in each otherlike predators looking for weaknesses in prey.
I loathe the extra millimeter around my hipbones that forms when Im retaining water before my period.
The greyish-blue discoloration beneath my eyes from practicing too late into the night and waking again too early.
Copyright 2023 by Melanie Hamrick.
This article was originally published onNovember 16, 2022
