Over the summer, I’d stuffed them all in a shoe box at the back of my closet. When Mom and Dad saw what I’d done, they’d shared the tense, worried look I’d grown used to. I expected some kind of talk to come from it, but the next morning when I went downstairs, all my ballet pictures were gone. From the mantel, from the fridge, from everywhere. In their place were school portraits and candids from my birthdays and Christmas. No one said a word about it.

It was like I’d never done ballet. Like it had all just been a dream.

I jumped when my phone buzzed and Colleen’s name flashed across the screen.

Kira made us do THREE adagios today. My theory: She hit the vodka hard last night and slow music was better for her hangover. No one believes me.

I took a breath and slowly let it out. Colleen and I kept hanging out for a while after my injury. But when she came over last July after finishing the Boston Ballet summer intensive, all lovely and whole and strong, it was just… too much. I couldn’t look at her and not see ballet. Not be consumed by jealousy. After that, I texted her to say I couldn’t talk to her for a while.

She wrote back that she understood but asked if she could still talk to me.

You don’t have to text back, she wrote, and we don’t have to see each other for now. Text no if you don’t want that. Don’t text anything if it’s ok.

I hadn’t responded, so I got messages from Colleen a couple of times a week. She’d text about random stuff—her pit bull, Ferdinand; Kira, of course; and Juliet and Spencer, the girls in our level who always got the best roles.

I read Colleen’s text again, hearing her bright, bubbly voice in my head. Of course no one believed her hangover theory. Colleen had floated a lot of unbelievable theories over the years: that Kira used to dance burlesque. That the rehearsal pianist, Darcio, was an exiled Belgian prince. That Khloé Kardashian was a secret genius. I knew Colleen didn’t 100 percent believe in her own theories. She just liked the idea of them being true.

I put my phone on my nightstand, trying to ignore the tightness in my stomach. I was so glad Colleen hadn’t disappeared entirely, like my pictures had. Still, every time I didn’t reply, I felt this horrible gut punch. Because Colleen was my best friend, and I hadn’t talked to her in four months. Which probably meant she wasn’t my best friend anymore.

I fell back onto my soft pink comforter and tried to zone out.