Ivy and Bean_ Books 4,5,6 - Annie Barrows [26]
Madame Joy smiled. “As many of you know, we end each session with a lovely recital. A recital, girls, is a chance for you to dance before your friends and family so that they can see what you’ve learned.”
Ivy coughed.
Madame Joy leaned forward eagerly. “Most of our recitals are held here at the school, but this time we have been invited to participate in The World of Dance! Isn’t that wonderful?”
Several girls said, “Oooooooh!”
Bean was getting a not-so-good feeling. “What’s The World of Dance?” she asked.
Madame Joy’s smile grew. “The World of Dance is a gathering of many different dance schools from all over town—tap dancers, jazz dancers, hip-hop dancers. We will be representing the ballet. Each group gets a chance to perform, just as in a regular recital, but we’ll be performing on a real stage in a real theater!”
“Oooooooh!” repeated the same girls.
Bean was sick of hearing that.
Ivy’s hand shot into the air. “Can we do Giselle?”
“Giselle?” Madame Joy looked surprised. “No. Goodness, no. We will be doing a lovely piece called ‘Wedding Beneath the Sea.’”
“Wedding Beneath the Sea”? Bean didn’t care if she was rude. She yelled, “What are Ivy and me?”
Madame Joy raised her eyebrows. “I was planning to discuss parts next, but if you must know, you and Ivy will be the two friendly squids.”
Nobody said, “Oooooooh.” Squids? Ivy and Bean looked at each other. We have made a really terrible mistake.
On the drive home, Bean and Ivy were quiet. That was because of the no-complaining rule.
Quietly, they got out of the car and went into Bean’s backyard. Quietly, they stuffed themselves into Bean’s tiny playhouse and slumped against the walls.
“Squids. Who ever heard of squids?” said Bean. “I don’t even know what squids are.”
“I’m not totally sure,” said Ivy, “but I think they’re ugly, and I think people eat them.”
“Oh, great,” moaned Bean. “I can’t believe that stupid Dulcie gets to be the mermaid, and we’re squids.”
“I believe it,” said Ivy. “We’re awful.”
“We’re not awful—” began Bean.
“Oh yes we are,” said Ivy. “I’m worse than you, but you’re pretty bad, too.”
“That’s because we hate it. If we liked it, we’d be better at it.”
“I thought I’d like it,” said Ivy sadly.
“So did I,” said Bean. “I thought we’d be kicking some heads off. I didn’t know about the positions and pliés and all that.”
“You know, they can’t make us do it,” said Ivy.
Bean thought about that. “Yes, they can,” she said.
Ivy sighed. “It was mean of them to make us promise not to complain,” she said.
“Yeah,” said Bean. “They knew all along how horrible it would be.”
“We’re going to have to be squids in front of everybody,” said Ivy. “That’s the most horrible thing of all.”
“They’ll probably laugh at us,” said Bean, imagining it.
“They can’t. They’re parents,” Ivy said.
“Remember? It’s friends, too. There might even be someone from school there,” Bean said gloomily.
“If only we could quit,” Ivy moaned.
“But we can’t,” said Bean.
Ivy frowned. That meant she was getting determined. “There has to be a way,” she said, determinedly. “Nothing is impossible.”
Bean stared at her. “It’s impossible for us to be good at ballet.”
“Well, that, sure,” said Ivy. “But it’s not impossible for us to break our arms.”
SQUIDS IN A FIX
“What?” said Bean.
“We can’t be squids if we break our arms,” said Ivy. “Remember what Madame Joy said? We’re supposed to wave our tentacles gently on the passing tide. No way can we do that if we’ve got broken arms. Right?”
That was true. But. Broken arms. That could be going too far. Bean pictured her arm cracked in half.
“I saw a picture of a guy who broke his arm, and his bone poked out of his skin,” she said.
Ivy made an ouch face.
“Yeah, I know,” said Bean. “Maybe we don’t have to break them. Maybe we can just sprain them instead.” She didn’t really know what a sprain was, but she knew that it didn’t involve bones poking out of your skin.
“Okay. Sure. We can’t be squids with sprained arms either,” said Ivy. “No way.”
“No how,” agreed Bean. They looked at each other.