Future

Throughout the novel, the author uses Maisie's relationship with ballet in order to explore the individual's relationship with her future. Because Maisie "started ballet lessons when [she] was four years old," she has always defined the future by dance (191). Over the years, she has convinced herself that she has not only "found [her] passion," but that she knows "exactly what" she wants to do with her life (163). She has taught herself that if she can “only continue to practice, to work hard and pour all [her] love into it," she will succeed and someday become a professional ballerina (163). Ever since tearing her ACL, however, Maisie's sense of the future has begun to fall apart. She fears that she will never dance again. If she never dances again, she fears that she will not have the future life she has spent her childhood dreaming of. These fears...