Jersey Tomatoes are the Best (36 page)

“So … did I tell you what Mom sent in the mail last week?” I shake my head. I’m still not used to hearing Eva refer to her mother as anything besides “Rhonda.” But part of her therapy has been to knock that off. “Too distancing. Objectifying,” Eva explained to me. “And we have some serious healing to do.” No kidding.

“Three guesses,” she prompts me.

“A case of Dinty Moore stew?” I suggest. Eva shrieks and slaps my arm.

“Jeez, Eva, I don’t know … Body lotion? A good book? Free weights?”

“My
pointe
shoes,” she says. My mind stutter-stops.

“For dancing?” I say, stupidly. Eva nods. She beams.

“They’ve been letting me dance again. One hour a day, in the exercise room. There’s no
barre
, so I use the window ledge. Mom sent the shoes so I can do some center work as well.”

I don’t know what to say. Ballet, and what it has meant to,
done
to, Eva, has been such a huge part of the discussion here. Even when her body returned to health, would she return to dance? On the one hand, she was dying to
move
again. On the other hand … she was so afraid of where it might take her.

“Is this … good?” I manage to ask. She nods, vigorously.

“Better than good. Amazing. I feel like a gift has been returned to me. You know why?” I shake my head.

“No mirror,” she says. “At some point I had stopped feeling my body when I danced and just kept looking at my body. I became obsessed with the reflection, with relying on the mirror to tell me whether I was doing it perfectly. And you know what? There’s no mirror on the stage. There’s no mirror during a performance. If you want to dance,
really
dance, you have to just cut loose and feel it. So the fact that there’s no
barre
here? No mirror? No Madame DuPres? Just me and the music coming from some crummy CD player? It’s been … pure.”

I reach over and squeeze her hand.

“Kind of like dancing in your basement playroom? With your best friend, the Mouse King?” I say. Eva smiles broadly.

“It’s exactly like dancing in my basement playroom!” she says excitedly. “Henry, I want to get well. I want to get out of here, so I can dance again.”

“You will,” I tell her quietly. She smiles at me, squeezes my hand back.

From the corner of my eye, I see a girl walking toward us from the parking lot. Long, determined steps. Yoly’s heels bite the sidewalk with every stride.

“Here comes Yoly,” I say. Eva follows my gaze and breaks into this bright laugh.

“Oh my god. It must be a tennis thing. She walks like you!” Eva jumps up and goes out to meet her halfway. I watch
her
walk: splay-footed, a bit ducklike. Years of working on her turnout have permanently twisted her limbs in a direction unimaginable to most humans. But it’s normal for her. Desirable. Joyful, even. Because it’s who she is: a dancer.

I stay put and treat myself to the sight of my two awesome friends meeting for the first time. It’s amazing. It’s a miracle, really. And I’m probably in for some really intense teasing today, as they combine forces. But I don’t care. Bring it on. Because if there’s one thing I know for sure, about the three of us?

We
own
this day.

A
lthough I am an avid tennis player as well as a great lover of ballet, I could not have brought Henry’s and Eva’s worlds to life without generous advice from: Cece Carey-Snow, who patiently answered the most mundane questions about ballet and told me things I never knew about dance; tennis pro Kevin Vincent of Maine Pines Racquet & Fitness in Brunswick, Maine; and Loretto Vella of the Evert Tennis Academy in Boca Raton, Florida, who gave me a firsthand look at a world-class tennis academy and also shared valuable insights about training young players.

My husband, Conrad Schneider, and daughter, Madsy Schneider, were encouraging, honest readers throughout the process of writing this book. My wonderful agent, Edite Kroll, who in another life must have been a lumberjack or a hairdresser, because she’s
that
fond of cutting, delivered tough but always spot-on criticism of my manuscript, and for that I heartily thank her. I am especially indebted to Edite for
introducing me to my editor at Knopf, Nancy Hinkel. I cannot imagine a more intelligent, insightful reader, and my books are always better because of her. Associate editor Allison Wortche and copy editor Janet Frick also offered excellent suggestions.

There are angels in this world, and we meet them unexpectedly. I believe one answers the phone at the Renfrew Center for eating disorders in Coconut Creek, Florida, where every day women’s and girls’ lives are saved by caring professionals. I am grateful for my chance encounter with her.

Maria Padian
is the author of
Brett McCarthy: Work in Progress
, which was chosen by the ALA and YALSA as one of the Best Books for Young Adults in 2009 and also received a Maine Literary Award and a Maine Lupine Honor Award. A graduate of Middlebury College and the University of Virginia, she has also attended Oxford University and the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. Born in New York but raised in New Jersey, she currently lives in Maine with her family and their Australian shepherd. To learn more about her, visit
mariapadian.com
.