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Grandma tied Tatty’s hair on top of her head in a dancer’s bun.
“Ow, not so tight.”
“Please stop wriggling. You need dancer’s hair,” Grandma told her.
Tatty pulled on new pale pink ballet tights.
“Mind how you go Tatty, you’ll make a hole,” tutted Grandma.
Tatty stepped into her pale pink leotard.
Tatty’s ballet shoes had once belonged to her Mum. Dad helped her criss-cross the satin ribbons around her ankles.
“There you go, little Ballerina,” he said.
“Oh just look at you,” Grandma cooed.
Tatty looked in the mirror.
She went to her dress-up box, and added a sparkling beady necklace, and some feathers.
“That’s better,” said Tatty
“Ballerina’s don’t look like that,” tutted Grandma, as she shoo-ed Tatty out the door.
The ballet school smelt like the inside of Tatty's ward-robe. Grandma introduced Tatty to her teacher, Ms Margo.
Ms Margo was very loud. Tatty wanted to cover her ears when Ms Margo yelled Hello Florence to Grandma, and hollered Well, well, well! at Tatty, and then shrieked So, you are our little ballerina! Instead of covering her ears, Tatty wished she could go home.
But Tatty could not go home. Ms Margo showed her a small white cross on the floor.
“THIS IS WHERE YOU STAND!” she hollered. Tatty stood exactly on her cross, her feet carefully together. Other children, all wearing pale pink leotards and tights like Tatty’s stood on their crosses too.
Ms Margo clapped her hands, and everyone stopped talking. Tinkling piano music filled the air.
Very elegantly indeed, and in perfect time to the music, Ms Margo pointed a toe to the front, slid it to the side, and then to the back. Everyone copied her.
Everyone except Tatty.
Tatty touched the feathers at her neck for courage. She screwed her toes into a point, and slid her foot to the front.
But somehow she did not know what to do next.
Ms Margo’s arms swayed above her head like a graceful tree. Everyone moved their arms like breezy branches.
But not Tatty.
“Like THIS Tatty,” yelled Ms Margo, and she placed her hands around Tatty’s wrists.
But when Ms Margo let go, her breezy branches fell straight back to her sides.
Tatty wanted to go home even more than before. She did not want to be a ballerina after all.
Her eyes prickled with tears.
Then Ms Margo clapped her hands, and the music stopped.
“IT’S TAPPING TIME! Ballet shoes off, tapping shoes on!” she bellowed.
Grandma helped Tatty to take off her ballet shoes. “Don’t feel sad Tatty, it will be better next time.”
“No, I don’t think so,” whispered Tatty. “I don’t want to do ballet anymore.”
Tatty did not have any tap shoes because she was learning to be a ballerina.
Ms Margo whispered loudly in Grandma’s ear.
“I suppose so,” said Grandma.
Ms Margo went to an old wooden cupboard, painted with silver stars and moons. She opened the door with a creak, and took a black velvet bag tied with a silver ribbon from a shelf. “This is for you!” she told Tatty.
Tatty looked inside the velvet bag. A delicious smell, like raindrops on a warm road, floated out to her. Tatty breathed it in and reached in to something gleaming.
It was a pair of Tap Shoes.
The toes were scuffed, with flakes of silver paint missing. They were creased and bent. But on the worn soles Tatty felt the gleaming slivers of silver metal shiver with the memory of many thrilling, noisy dances.
“Oh!” whispered Tatty. “They are beautiful!”
“They need a good coat of paint,” tutted Grandma.
But Tatty thought they were just right. She slipped her feet into the shoes, and tied the ribbons. They moulded perfectly around her feet. Their silvery taps went clicky-clack on the polished wooden floor as Tatty joined the class.
Then she remembered, “But I can’t dance.”
“The shoes will know what to do Tatty. They are full of dancing,” said Ms Margo.
Tatty thought she felt something trembling in the shoes. Maybe Ms Margo was right.
Ms Margo clapped her hands. Wild, fiery music filled the room.
Ms Margo pointed her toe: Click.
Her foot slid to the side: Sw-i-i-ish.
She stamped her feet together: Clunk. Clunk.
Everyone copied her. Even Tatty.
Click. Sw-i-i-ish. Clunk. Clunk.
Click. Sw-i-i-ish. Clunk. Clunk.
Ms Margo waved her arms like a whole forest of trees in the wind, she clunketty-clunked and clicketty-clicked her feet in time to the rolling, rollicking music. And so did Tatty.
Click. Sw-i-i-ish. Clunk. Clunk.
Click. Sw-i-i-ish. Clunk. Clunk.
Clicketty, swishedy, clunketty, clunk!
Tatty danced faster and faster, her arms moving like the wind, and her feet glittering and roaring like two snapping dragons.
At the end of the dance the wild music stopped. Tatty was puffing and hot, but she had a big smile on her face. Ms Margo winked at her, as she curtsied gracefully to the class.
“Excellent work class. See you next week!” she bellowed, but she was looking right at Tatty. Tatty looked back at Ms Margo.
“SEE YOU NEXT WEEK MS MARGO!” everyone shouted. Even Tatty, and she felt her silvery tap shoes give a little snapping shiver of excitement on her feet.
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