Up to This Pointe by Jennifer Longo

I’ll just be game testing! Part time.”
    Mom nearly faints with relief.
    “But so…,” Dad says, “you’re…leaving the bakery?”
    “Well. I mean…”
    “I can tell you that even part time he’ll be salaried,” Owen pipes up. “And he’s eligible for our health insurance, which is insanely good. If that makes a difference.”
    What is this guy, some kind of parental maneuvering wizard?
    “Kind of does,” Mom says.
    “You know how to…test things?”
    “Dad,” I sigh. “He’s spent fifteen years sitting around in his boxer shorts, playing
Halo.
I’m sure he can test the hell out of a game.”
    Again, Owen laughs.
    I suppress a smile.
    Kate gazes at him.
    Luke shrugs. “True.”
    “Huh,” Dad says. “That’s…” He wipes his eyes with his napkin.
    “Dad,” Luke says. “Are you crying?”
    “No! I’m…No one sculpts fondant like you. I’m just thinking about how everyone’s going to miss your Yule logs, is all. Christmas.”
    This is not a play for sympathy—the man is sincerely the mushiest, most full of often-embarrassment-inducing love any of us has ever met. Mom’s a close second.
    Kate, Mom, Luke, and I, even Owen, all breathe a collective and honest “Awwww!” and I lose my mind for a second and smile at Owen, then pretend it was meant for Mom, and then I’m back to staring into my nearly empty oatmeal bowl.
    Will this meal never end?
    “I don’t start for a month,” Luke says. “I’ll be at the bakery all through New Year. I can’t even move in till, like, the middle of January.”
    “Move in?” Mom says.
    “Oh. I mean…” Luke shifts in his seat, messes with the grapes on his plate. “Owen shares a house with some other Lucas guys. In the Presidio—they
walk
to work! One of the roommates is moving out in a few weeks.”
    Now Mom wads a napkin up on her face.
    “You guys! I’m nineteen years old. I can’t live at home forever!”
    “Nineteen isn’t old!” Mom sniffs.
    The Nutcracker
overture plinks from my phone. Thank God.
    “That’s us!” I say. “Classes to teach, choreography to perfect!” I toss back the rest of my water while Kate grabs our bags and puts her plate and my bowl in the sink.
    “You have to go?” Luke whimpers.
    “Don’t be a baby,” I say close to his ear.
    “Thanks for breakfast, Dad,” Kate says. She hugs him and Mom and holds the back door open for me while I refill our water bottles at the sink.
    “Leave everything. I’ll do the dishes when I get back,” I tell Dad, who will rinse and stack everything even though it’s my turn.
    “Bye, Kate,” Luke says, well-rehearsed casual.
    “Later, Luke. Nice meeting you, Owen!” Kate calls, leaning also way too casually, but still gorgeously, in the doorway.
    “You too.” Owen smiles.
    “Oh, Harp, wait!” Dad says, jumping up and running to the freezer. “Here.” He tosses me a bag of ice. “Put that on your butt!”
    I shove the ice in my bag, turn Kate, and steer her out the door.
    “Nice to meet you, Harper!” Owen calls.
    Humiliation: complete.
    - - -
    We drink water and walk through the fog, hips turned out, arms strong, necks stretched, long strides up and down the house- and tree-lined streets, to the steps of Simone’s West Portal Ballet. Our second home. I love this studio more than any place on Earth; floor-to-ceiling windows look out over West Portal Avenue and the houses and hills beyond. The floor is gorgeous, spring-loaded wood, and polished monthly. Barres line the side and window walls; an upright piano sits in the corner. Fog rolls past the windows and reflects in the opposite wall of mirrors, which Simone covers with sheets when she feels like we’re “gazing at ourselves too much.”
    On the top step, I give Kate my bag and sit on the porch to stretch. “I’m waiting here….Want to watch my class?”
    “Not today.” She yawns. “Think I’ll nap in the dressing room and dream about my husband.”
    “Cool. And who would this be?”
    “My