⎼⎼⎼ 𝖕𝖊𝖗𝖋𝖊𝖈𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓 ➵ 𝑏.𝑓.

041

mikki

last week was chaos.

two new kids. abby leaving. paris' breakdown. none of our solos placing in the top three. but at least we came first.

and of course, the first thing we meet on our way in is a giant, wrapped pink present. that can only spell one thing. drama.

"what's this?" stacey asked, reading the tag, "to the aldc moms. does it say who it's from?"

she pulled off the tissue paper. underneath was the biggest pile of fruit i had ever seen in my life. i glanced sideways at lilly and she gave a little squeal of excitement. i grinned back. maybe it wasn't so bad?

"it's from studio 19," ashley announced.

nevermind.

joanne read out the card addressed to sarah and michelle at top speed. "girls, go get ready," she concluded.

disappointed, we traipsed into the dancer's den to get changed.

"abby's gonna be so mad," gia sang. sarah sighed and pushed her hair out of her face.

"i know. she's going to blame it on me and my mom somehow."

we just sat there in the dancer's den, looking at each other, the voices of our moms outside, blaring. sarah stood up to go to the door. pressley put her hands on sarah's shoulder.

"come on, we're going back."

"no! i want to listen."

i shook my head. "sarah that's not going to do anyone good."

"they mean nothing, so just get them out of your head and dance dance good, because that's-" lilly began.

sarah cut through, "well i can't dance good if i get kicked out."

"don't say that sarah, none of us are going to get-"

"you're not going to get kicked-"

"sarah-"

"we won't let you get kicked out."

"you're moms couldn't care less about me!" sarah hissed.

"don't say that," lilly frowned, "my mom-"

"stop it," i hissed, "stop it. the more drama we create, the worse we dance! we know that! stop fighting. get over it. we're not three."

"studio 19 gets the worst out of us," brady piped up. "let's just move on."

sarah just shook her head. she pushed open the door, almost in tears.

"you can only control your own actions, and their the type of people," she took a breath, "that are not going to listen to you. they don't care and they're not good people. so anything she does is not going to fix it."

i tried to go up to sarah, but brady pulled me back. "mikki, don't get involved. you're not leaving again."

i relented and stood by his side. he didn't let go of my hand.

"take a deep breath," michelle said, "take deep breaths. go warm up with the team."

"what they're saying isn't true!" she choked.

"it's ok, honey."

i could see the shame on the other mom's faces. i looked up at brady, who looked back down at me. i lifted his our hands and he let go immediately, rushing off to the others. he was blushing.

kisha shrugged and took a stick of grapes and popped it in her mouth. i like her already.

when we walked into the studio, only gianna was there. abby was nowhere to be found.

"i'm not doing pyramid, don't worry," she called to the moms. we all felt such a strong rush of relief. pyramid was horror. "abby is coming, she's just not here yet. i don't know when she's coming, so i have to start the group rehearsal now. she hasn't said anything about solos yet.

"we have a sassy jazz, fosse-style musical number."

we all clapped and did a little 'eek-this-is-great' dance.

"do you think it will be competitive?" stacey asked.

stop it. let us have our moment...

"it's a specific style, it's not a bunch of kicks, it's not a bunch of turns. it's almost above dance competition stuff."

now that got me worried. we were good, we knew that, but dance competition 'stuff' was all we knew how to do. and when we were on a fragile winning streak, going into nationals, perhaps branching out wasn't the smartest idea.

gianna lectured us for a good 10 minutes about bob fosse, something we were told to read up on. we started off messily, but you could see the structure of the dance.

hopefully it's enough to win. and most importantly, beat studio 19.

brady gave me a quick smile.

what was i thinking again?

the author speaks:
kisha is a whole mood.