He turns around and gives me a look, the kind of look that says, “please don’t be a terribly selfish human being.”

Atara walks dramatically toward me, on pointe, as I enter the studio. She’s already dressed for class, thick hair swept into a topknot, and I’m still in my Bais Yaakov uniform. Typical.

I watch her for a second; she looks so elegant, and while my pointe shoes feel like a second skin, sometimes, late at night, I stare in the full-length mirror behind my door and think I don’t look graceful enough to be a ballerina.

It’s crazy talk, I know. I’m a wonderful dancer, and ballet is about dancing with your heart, not about your hair or bone structure. But it’s just hard, when some people just look like typical ballerinas and others don’t.

I shake off my insecurities and grab the lavender-colored flyer Atara is now waving in my face.

“What,” I say, shrugging off my backpack, “is that?”

Atara steps down hard, rolls her neck, and says, “That is our new Sunday activity.”

I squint at the flyer as I kick off my Todds — major find in Century 21, and I only had to beg Mommy for like three weeks before she bought them for me — and read aloud:

Pouf! Hair Course by Fraidy Steinberg

Sundays at 10

Six weeks

Learn hair styling, cutting, extensions, etc

Wig course: Extra three weeks.

I stare at Atara blankly. “Um, why are we doing a hair course?”

Atara grabs the flyer back and sighs. “Oh, Bella. Because, uh, hello, seminary is like in three years and then shidduchim, and it’s never too early to learn how to make our hair and future wigs look ah-mazing. Besides, it’s Fraidy Steinberg. Like, The Fraidy Steinberg.”

Fraidy Steinberg is huge, she’s booked like years in advance and has the hugest following.

I turn to look in one of the millions of mirrors the studio is adorned with and finger my thick, straight hair. I would love to figure out how to put some oomph in it….

“Okay, you convinced me.”