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didn’t give me a clothing allowance. Unable to fathom an adolescent girl who didn’t live to shop, Vi fled to her family’s cabin in Parry Sound.
    At the end of my stay, Dad finally made time for me, and we raced around the city, packing in Science World, the CNE, the Shakespeare play in High Park, and Sunnyside Beach. He took two rolls of film in three days. Vi must have conveyed her shock about my wardrobe to Dad because he also took me shopping at the Eaton Centre on Yonge Street and bought me so much stuff it wouldn’t fit into my suitcase; I had to ship a parcel. When Paige saw the photos and the clothes, she wanted the same chance to hog Dad’s attention. So, this year Paige will visit that cabin on Parry Sound with Dad and Vi—they’ll canoe and swim and maybe water ski.
    I’ll just have to make the best of it here. Mom might go to a resort with her friend Marine in August. They’ll haul a crate of novels each, I imagine. They’ll need a wheelbarrow to move them into the cabin. Mom said Marine invited both of us, but I don’t want to be stuck out in the middle of nowhere with not one but two middle-aged bookworms. So I might be living here on my own for a week. Maybe Sasha could stay with me. If we’re still friends, that is.
    I wonder if Kevin will call me before he leaves town.
    Monday, July 5th
    Sasha and Jamie were basking in a lozenge of sunlight on the wooden floor of the dance studio when I arrived for the first day of the summer intensive. Sasha looked at me and darted her eyes away without smiling. She snuck another look at me in the mirror. Had Kevin blabbed to her about the date? Was she already thinking of me as “Gina the Second, Traitor”?
    I wanted to approach her, but she wasn’t making it easy. She reached for her toes and all I saw was the curve of her back and her hair in its tidy bun. She was wearing a new, eggplant-colored leotard. As I moved closer, Sasha and Jamie burst out laughing. My intestines shriveled as I watched Sasha’s profile and Jamie’s face. The two of them have perfect complexions. My nose was starting to shine and my upper lip prickled with sweat.
    Thankfully, Ms. Kelly flung open the door to the studio at that moment and strode in. “Good morning, girls! Find a place on the floor. Natalie, don’t stand there like a blue heron stalking minnows. There’s a spot down front.”
    I settled in next to the junior girls. Lisa slipped into the studio at the last minute. Outside the window, gravel crunched under the wheels of her boyfriend’s blue pickup truck. He used to honk as he pulled away, until Ms. Kelly put a stop to it. As Stretch and Conditioning class began, it occurred to me (for the millionth time) that Ms. Kelly should have been a drill sergeant. She makes us do push-ups and sit-ups, and she yells at the people who slow down, rest, or groan. In the center work, she stands beside each of us with a ruler held level with the tops of our heads and makes us kick it. Anyone who doesn’t reach it, she sentences to fifteen minutes of extra hamstring stretches and splits per day. Sometimes she prods us with that ruler—“Pull up your knees! … Turn out from the tops of your thighs!” Poke, poke.
    When she choreographs, Ms. Kelly cleans each set of eight counts before she continues. She says that learning the whole piece before starting to clean creates lazy dancers with bad habits. So, in jazz class today, we repeated the first few bars of the piece ad nauseam : “Stretch your lines! Are those hands on the ends of your arms, or dead fish? Energy in the fingertips! … Point your feet! … Synchronize your movement! Natalie, this is not a solo!”
    Sash and I didn’t talk all day. She was avoiding me, I think.
    Kevin should leave to go tree planting soon. Then things can get back to normal.
    Wednesday, July 7th
    We thrust our hips from side to side. We rippled our