Katie, Zerbrowski, and both their children were in the living room with the furniture pushed back against the walls so that the hardwood floor was clear and gleaming under the overhead lights.
Nathaniel had taken his shoes off, and said, “Kaitlin and I have already stretched.” He held his hand out.
Kaitlin Zerbrowski had changed into tights, ballet shoes, and a gauzy overskirt. She’d put her long brown hair, so like her mother’s, up in a high, tight ponytail. She looked taller, leaner, in the outfit and moved gracefully to take Nathaniel’s hand.
Zerbrowski used a remote to turn on the sound system that went with the big-screen TV, but worked just fine with the speakers scattered throughout the room, too. Ballet music that I didn’t recognize was suddenly everywhere in gorgeous surround sound.
Nathaniel and Kaitlin began to dance. He had partnered some of the older girls at the ballet school where he took lessons, and I knew that he and Kaitlin had come up with some simple choreography. I was betting this was recital music she was already practicing to, and Nathaniel was a quick study. He held her hand while she went up on pointe. He went down on one knee so she could do a beautiful arabesque. He stood and helped her balance for pirouettes. All the while he moved gracefully beside her, and at the end he lifted her overhead, one armed. Kaitlin held her body in perfect position while he did it, which showed that she had core strength that didn’t show in her slender frame. He walked carefully, easily in a small circle around the room, before spilling her through his arms so that she came back to pointe on the floor again.
The music stopped and everyone applauded. We had quite an audience by that time. Kaitlin was smiling as big as I’d ever seen her, glowing with it. Nathaniel went down on his knees so she could hug him, then she ran to her mother. “Mommy, I told you I could do it! I told you, if I had someone to hold me I could do it just like a real dancer!”
Zerbrowski shook Nathaniel’s hand and did that one-armed guy hug. “I know this is a dastardly plan to win our bet, but it’s worth it to see her that happy.”
Nathaniel grinned at him. Matthew was sitting on the floor struggling with his double-tied Spider-Man tennis shoes. Micah helped him take them off, and when he was barefoot he ran to Nathaniel. He picked him up and then said, “Whoever wants to dance has to stretch out.”
The little girls ran en masse toward them. The boys held back. It was Jeannette of the blonde curls who grabbed one of the boys and pulled him into the group. Kaitlin went through the boys between eight and teens and looked them over like she was at a used car dealership. She declared, “You look in good enough shape.” Or, “You think you’re strong enough to do this?” I was betting that Nathaniel had coached her in the social verbiage as much as the dancing. Greg Zerbrowski got some of the oldest boys on the floor. I couldn’t hear what he said to them, but they gave covert looks to some of the older girls who had walked onto the floor in graceful, laughing groups. Learn to dance, and you can hold girls close without anyone getting mad at you.
They coaxed, bullied, and embarrassed a surprising number of the boys onto the floor. Among them was Cyrus, who Jeannette had dragged onto the floor personally, which meant to me that she knew exactly the effect she had on the little boy. It made me wonder if she’d kissed Matthew to start the fight. Surely not. She couldn’t be that aware this early, could she?
Nathaniel and Kaitlin led the stretching and limbering. One of the oldest boys, about fourteen, said, “This is some of the stuff we do before baseball practice.”
Nathaniel said, “Dancing is athletic and you want to stretch out just like you do for baseball, or any other sport.”
The stretching reminded the boys of a lot of their sports practices and seemed to put them more at ease. Zerbrowski put on more music and this time Nathaniel and Kaitlin helped Matthew and Becky through a short dance. He braced Becky while she went up on tiptoes, one arm trying to form that round, half circle of arm movement that is one of the first things you learn in ballet, or try to learn. Matthew did his part as the guy half of a ballet couple, which meant he was mostly a prop for the girl, but he did it to the best of his ability, face serious.
Jeannette wanted her turn next with Matthew. She was a little more graceful than Becky, but she was also taller, so it was harder for Matthew to partner her. Nathaniel picked the taller, beefier Cyrus out of the watching boys.
“I can’t do this,” Cyrus said.
“You’re a better height for Jeannette, and you’ve watched Matthew do it, just try and Kaitlin and I will spot you.”
It was Jeannette coming and taking his hand that persuaded Cyrus to try. Nathaniel helped Cyrus figure out how to stand, how to hold his ballet partner, and Cyrus gave it the same serious-faced concentration that Matthew had. He was actually able to go down on one knee and brace her while she went up on that classic one-legged stance. She was only on tiptoe, not pointe, but the lines of her body were all there. I wondered how long she’d been taking lessons.
Kaitlin showed some of the younger boys some basic moves, while Nathaniel paired off the older kids. Greg Zerbrowski managed to magically appear beside a tall, leggy girl who was probably three years older, but most of the older boys were still making fun of it all, so he was the tallest one willing to come forward.
The girl went up on pointe even without the special shoes to make it happen. You could see the muscles in her thighs and calves like magic under her shorts. Greg held her, braced her, and his body damn near vibrated with the effort to hold on, to give every ounce of strength he had to staying with her. He didn’t have a dance background so he couldn’t “dance” with her, but by God he was a good prop for her to show how well she danced.
Greg was sweating and out of breath by the time they took their bows, but the girl hugged him tight and said, “That was great, if you took lessons you could dance with us!”
He blushed, and looked so like his father that it made me grin. One of the oldest boys there that night, sixteen and bulked from weight lifting, probably football, or wrestling for his sport, stepped up next. He had the strength that Greg hadn’t grown into yet, and he held his ballerina easily, though he was less fluid; he definitely didn’t dance, but he was great at holding, bracing, and helping her dance. At the end his ballerina asked if Nathaniel could lift her, because she’d never had anyone strong enough to do it before.
The boy had said, “Can you show me?” So Nathaniel lifted the girl first, her fall of nearly black hair spilling down his arm as she bowed above him, holding the pose and proving just how strong she was, because holding your body in space like that is one of the hardest things you can do. Then he helped the ballerina and her partner do the move.
He spotted them, so that if she got dropped she wouldn’t get hurt. The first few times the move wasn’t quite right, so they kept practicing until the lift was strong and sure, and he could hold her almost as steady as Nathaniel had.
When they were done and he helped his ballerina to her feet, the kid said, “My arms feel like they do after lifting heavy weights. That was a serious workout.”
“You’re lifting a whole person above your head, and making it look graceful and fluid while you do it,” Nathaniel said.
“Wow, is all I can say. I can feel my arm muscles twitching.”
“That means you gave it your all,” Nathaniel said.
The dark-haired ballerina laid a kiss on the kid’s cheek. “Thank you so much, I wish we had guys in our school that were as strong as you.”