A Wright Christmas - K.A. Linde Page 0,14

dancing with my family back at New York City Ballet, but I fit in just fine.

Thankfully, most of my role was the solo “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy” and my pas de deux with the Cavalier. Both were the traditional Balanchine choreography, which I had danced hundreds of times. So, the most important part had been extra hours in the studio with my partner, Reginald, to perfect the duet.

Cassidy, the production manager, tittered energetically in the wings. She was a longtime feature in the studio. When I had been dancing at LBC with her daughter, Beth, she had just been a stage mom, but she had worked her way up over the years. She ushered about the high school students, moving them into formation. Kathy waddled after her to talk to the lot. I could see their nerves from here.

Reginald came to my side with a smile. He was fair-skinned with dark hair and eyes. Not as good as the men I was used to performing with, but he was solid. His girlfriend was also in the company, and I knew she was sad that she hadn’t been given the role of Sugar Plum Fairy beside him. Ah, the challenges of dating in a company.

“Ten minutes,” Kathy announced to the crowd of dancers. “They’re all filing into the auditorium now. Places, everyone.”

I bustled into the wings beside Reginald.

“Good luck,” he whispered.

I almost laughed. This wasn’t a real performance, of course. Just a staged rehearsal, but the exhilaration right before getting onstage hit me all the same. “You too!”

I pranced up and down on the box of my toe shoes, stretching out my arches and calves, rolling through the hard shank on the bottom of the slipper that held to the shape of my foot. This was my twenty-eighth year of dancing in The Nutcracker. I had started as young as Aly and continued every single year in my career. It was the cornerstone of my dance performances. I didn’t know a single dancer who had performed the same dances more than in The Nutcracker. During performance weeks, when we were doing two-a-day shows, I would still hear “Waltz of the Flowers” in my dreams.

The curtain rose, lights flickered to life, and Kathy stepped onto the marley floor to a round of applause. A minute later, she was introducing us. I held my arms in front of me as I gracefully ran out onto the stage along with the other dancers. I took my mark on stage right and waited beside Reginald.

Kathy moved us through what would appear to be a regular rehearsal schedule, focusing first on the difficulty we were having with the Arabian couple.

“One more time through, Amanda,” Kathy said evenly. “Use your whole body in the lift this time. Let Mateo guide you rather than forcing it.”

Amanda nodded along with Kathy and then tried it again. I was glad that I was onstage and couldn’t cringe because it was definitely worse the second time. They were going to get it by opening night, but they weren’t quite there yet.

“Peyton,” Kathy said after Amanda was on the ground once more, “do the pas de deux lift with Reginald. Everyone, watch her form to see what I mean.”

I stepped into position, too used to being an example to feel flustered, even here in front of the eyes of an audience. Kathy counted us in on a five, six, seven, eight, and then I was moving. My limbs an extension of my body. I knew Reginald would be there for the leap, and I launched effortlessly into the air. He lifted me with my arms overhead, legs in a split.

“See how Peyton appears to be light as air? Look at the placement of her hands, the strength of her point, the tilt of her head. Every aspect of her is incorporated into that movement. She isn’t fighting Reginald on the lift. He’s the base, the support. She trusts him and herself.”

I landed back on my feet to a spatter of applause. She made Amanda go one more time, and this time, she was better. Not quite there, but she’d gotten the dynamics back into place. I’d seen them perform it better in studio than they were today. They just needed to get the kinks out before they went onstage.

“Okay, places, everyone. Let’s run through ‘Entry of the Parents’ in Act I.”

I wasn’t actually in “Entry of the Parents,” but we’d practiced it this week with Reginald and me included in