Jeannie was a ballerina and I was only 8.
Mum’s pinky finger rested on the indicator and waited for the cars to let us by to the leisure centre car park, and I tried to wink each eye to the sound of it. Mum’s car was a Ford Galaxy, and it had an analogue clock on top of the CD player. We were learning to tell the time at school and I was quite good so far; the big hand was nearly one whole pizza slice, and the little hand was at four; it was a quarter past four, take away a few minutes. So, ten minutes past four. Jeannie was singing along to the Pop Princesses CD. Mum was let in and waved hello to the driver who had stopped - it must have been Mark or Debbie.
Mum was in a big rush and her work shoes clacked around while she got our PE bags out of the back. “Leave your bookbag…lunchbox too, come on!” I made sure to zip up my bookbag. In the footwell, there were apple cores and wrappers from our after school activities. Yesterday - swimming - and last week - piano. If they touched my book it would get all sticky.
Mum held my hand and we all walked through to the studio and mum said a bad word under her breath when we got to the glass door. Everyone was already there. “Girls, slippers on, we are only warming up. Don’t worry Liz see you later…and now anti-clockwise…other way Katie..” My class were holding hands and skipping sideways. Jeannie and I put our P.E. bags and school coats on the hooks. Our school shoes looked funny with the pink tights so it was nice to put the ballet shoes on. They were soft and pretty, and if I moved my foot up and down I could feel the lines of each panel of the wooden floor. Last week Jeannie had told me that mum’s back would get cracked if I did that, but Mum had seemed fine, just in a rush. I was fiddling with the knot in my P.E. bag when Jeannie finished with her ribbons - my shoes just had elastic - and she grabbed my hand and scolded me “leave your P.E. bag”. She held my hand to take me to join Miss Taylor’s class. Jeannie was in the mirror and her special see through skirt floated on her way to the other end of the studio, Miss Murray’s class, where all the older girls had their lesson.
“Eloise, take her hand…” Eloise’s hand was all slippery but I was glad I could come into the circle and I skipped with everyone else. The warm up worked because I wished quite badly that I wasn’t wearing tights as well as the leotard. Miss Taylor gave us some more things to do in the circle, where we would rush in and out. Tom, who was the only boy, hit heads with Georgie and he was always doing it deliberately. It was annoying because Georgie nearly always cried and we had to stop for a while every time while Miss Taylor patted Georgie’s back and sat her down by the hooks. Georgie used her cardigan to dry her face and then we started again. This time we went to the bar and did all the positions we’d learned so far, while Miss Taylor was walking up and down clapping in time to the piano music: “first, now second position…very good Katie..”. Miss Taylor showed us how to do a move called a Plee A. Charlotte who came to my birthday party was behind me and whispered way too loudly in my ear that I was doing a Pee A, not a Plee A and it made me laugh a lot. We both got told off by Miss Taylor but it wasn’t really fair because Charlotte had made the joke and I couldn’t help laughing. Miss Taylor was usually kind and had brown hair that was always in a bun. Sometimes she would wear jogging suits, like Dad’s, but much tighter and pink.
We had to hold hands to make a circle again and I was glad because sometimes in the mirror I wanted to put on my cardigan, it was soft and pink and then my tummy wasn’t as big. Charlotte was crabby because of the telling-off, and wouldn’t hold my hand to make the circle. Miss Taylor split us up and I had to hold Eloise’s wet hand again. I never like the end of the class because we join with Miss Murray’s class and have to show something we learned.
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