Lucy Schraan is Gay

chapter six

playlist of the right-now: somebody get footloose

Gym class. Ohhh, gym class.

The locker rooms are heavily unused at our school. We don't really have many athletic kids here. Our school is the kind of place that's more likely to have a devout cricket team than a functioning football team.

I hate dressing out for gym. I own athletic gear, kinda, because I like athleisure wear sometimes and it's useful for dance-intensive rehearsals. I'm not trying to sweat in my Target-bought skinny jeans, after all. Still, whenever I change into my ridiculous track shorts that show off the cellulite and chub of my thighs, or squeeze into the leggings I've had since the eighth grade, I feel this small thrill of anxiety. I hate gym. And not just because of the exercise part.

I am—pardon my French—clumsy as fuck. It's not cute, it's just sad. I've been spraining my ankle every class since the sixth grade. I was able to escape the gym hellscape for the past two years, but not this year.

At least today, we don't have to dress out. Because, as Gene reminded me last night over Snap, today is the start of the dancing unit.

End me. Please.

The dancing unit is infamous at our school for ending the semester in gym. I've never seen the movie Fame, but I've seen clips in video essays about theatre kids, and I really wish it was more like what I think it is—just a bunch of nerdy people being cool and nerdy and not sweating any more than they want to. I'm not a great dancer, but hell, I would take the beginning dance sequence from A Chorus Line over the gym class dancing unit.

Gene is late to class. I'm sitting on the edge of the bleachers, eyeing all the overeager freshmen. Half of them are going to audition for the spring musical ensemble and want to show how well they can knock out a box step. (Even though they're theatre virgins.) The other half are complaining about how useless gym is.

Our gym teacher, Ms. Talley, just stares out at all of us with dead, unappreciative eyes. She was new this year. We completely destroyed her will to teach. I feel kind of bad.

The bell rings, and Gene hustles in, wearing a T-shirt that his biceps strain against in a surprisingly nice way. I usually don't like the whole too-casual basketball shorts and, what is that, a robotics camp T-shirt look, but the closer he gets, the more I find my heart pounding strangely. I've always thought Gene was cute, but in this whole "look at that person over there, they're objectively cute" way. But that stupid winky face is doing strange things to my brain. I think.

We're in choir together, and I look at his hair a lot. It looks super soft, which I know I probably wouldn't notice normally. It's just that soft-looking. Today, it's squashed under a ball cap. I can't make out the exact design on the front of the cap, but it's giving very much Dipper Pines/Tadashi Hamada energy.

He heads straight for me, all smiles and squinted eyes. "Hey," he whispers when he sits down, "what's up, partner?"

Okay like, this is fine, but he's sitting very close to me, and he sent me winky faces yesterday, and I think I might be an easily flustered person because I am so very, very flustered right now. "Hi," I whisper back, not looking at him because 1. Ms. Talley already looks done with the whole class and 2. Gene seriously smells good, and I don't want to think about that.

Damn coming out. Damn Izzy and Alistair and oh god, damn good boy smell.

"Sorry I'm late. I was naming my robot."

"You name your robots?" That is way too Never Have I Ever. Why am I thinking about so many shows and movies today?

"Not usually. But this one is Tobor."