Popular Meets Unpopular

Tension-21

Here I was again.

At the studio.

I did what I did best. I danced until I forget about everything bad that's happening to Grant that he doesn't deserve.

I was lost in my own world, doing what I loved best when Robin appeared in front of me.

"Woah," I breathed out. "You scared me."

She chuckles. "Yeah, I knew I would find you here and you weren't answering your phone so..."

I pick up my towel that I set on the barre, wiping my forehead and say sheepishly, "I'm sorry but what's up?"

She walks over to the mirror and sits down, leaning against it. "I kissed Kane today."

I almost choke on air. I immediately sit down next to her and say with wide eyes, "What?"

She nods. I could tell in her face that she was going back to the moment it happened. "Yeah, I ran away and now I'm here." She groans and puts her hands up to her cheeks. "What do I do? I didn't even give him time to say anything. I just immediately left because I was so embarrassed."

I frown at the realization that I didn't even know she liked him. "Wow, I didn't even know you liked him. I've been so caught up with everything that's going on with Grant and I, I haven't even asked what's going on with your love life."

She waves me off. "It's fine. By the way, I like Kane. And it's really my fault that you didn't know. I've had a feeling that I've liked him for a while now. I was just too afraid to admit it to myself."

I rub her arm, comfortingly. "So, what now?"

"I don't even know. Now,--"

She's interrupted by my phone ringing.

I look down at my phone to see the caller ID and I make a face when I see it's Kane. I pick up my phone and face it towards Robin. Her eyes widen. "Don't answer it."

"Why not?"

"B-because!" She utters out.

I stand up. "I'm answering it."

Before she could reject or stand up to stop me, I slide the answer button. "Hello?"

"Hey, Julianne, have you seen Robin?"

I act confused. "Have I seen Robin?" I look over at Robin and she mouths a 'no' with wide eyes. I roll my eyes but oblige. "No, why, what's up?"

"Well..." he trails off. "she...she kissed me."

I gasp in fake shock. "Really?"

"Yeah, I'm just trying to find her and talk about it. She's not answering any of my messages."

I pull the phone away and put him on mute so he can't hear me. I give Robin a look. "Robin, he wants to talk to you about it. Give him a chance."

"Why? So he can tell me to never do it again and reject me? I'm good."

I roll my eyes. "He's not gonna reject you. And how will you know if you don't talk to him?"

She crosses her arms and stands there in silence for a moment before she sighs and says, "Fine, okay. I'll talk to him."

I beam. "Good." I unmute him. "Okay, she'll talk to you."

"Wait, how do you know? Is she actually with you?"

I chuckle. "Yeah, she is and she's," I look at Robin. "heading to your house right now."

Robin rolls her eyes and sticks her tongue out at me before she heads for the door. She stops once she gets at the door and turns around to mouth 'thank you' and blows a kiss at me before she walks out.

"Really? Ooo, you're sneaky. Okay, I gotta get ready. Thank you, Julianne."

I smile. "No problem. Bye, Kane."

-

In cheer practice we were going extra hard today because we had to. We had a competition this Saturday and our coach did not joke about our competition. Our only competition but still.

"Megan! Sharper on your moves, you look like a jellyfish!" Coach shouts at one of my team mates.

I continued to push harder through the routine in fear of getting called out. It was embarrassing and I know Megan was beating herself up about it.

"Okay," Coach shouts once the routine has ended. "that's enough for today. You guys did good but I expect better from some of you tomorrow, got it?"

"Got it." the whole team replies.

She smiles in satisfaction and nods. "Good, now go home."

We all head to the locker room to get our bags. I walk in and head straight to my bag and open it, putting my poms inside. As I was doing that, I look up and end up making eye contact with Sarah. My eyebrows scrunch when she doesn't look away from being caught staring at me. I look away and quickly throw the strap on my shoulder from my bag.

I start to make my to the door but then slow down my pace when I start to think about Sarah. We haven't spoken in such a long time but when we were friends we had such good times. We really were best friends at one point and it's sad that she would do what she did to me. But I think we both need to move on.

I turn back around and make my way towards Sarah. When I approach her, she looks confused. "Can we talk?"

She nods, hesitantly. "Yeah, sure."

I guide her outside of the locker room so we could have privacy. I stop walking and face her. I just stare at her for a while because I can't believe our friendship is over because she was jealous of me. But I don't want to be mad at her anymore. I want us to part on a good note because we can't go back to being friends.

Sarah looks down, crossing her arms. "Look, if you brought me out here to remind me of the terrible thing I did, I--"

"No, Sarah, that's not it." I sigh, pushing my hair behind my ear. "I brought you out here to say I forgive you."

She quickly looks up at me. "Really?" She looked at me like she was analyzing if I was telling the truth or not and when I guess she saw what she was looking for, a smile appeared on her face. "Julianne, thank you so much. You don't know--"

She was getting the wrong idea. "I'm not trying to become friends again."

Her smile fades and she sighs sadly. "Oh, okay, I understand."

I look up to refrain the tears from coming to my eyes. I look back down at her. "So, I just wanted to say I forgive you and I want us to end on a good note because I don't want this to be a burden I think about a lot. We were good friends once, very good friends and sometimes, things and people aren't meant to stay friends or together and we both have to be okay with that, alright?"

She nods and sniffs. "Yeah, yeah, I get it. You're right. And it's my fault, anyways. We both have to move on from what happened."

I smile at her understanding. I walk up to her and embrace her to which she hugs me back. I close my eyes during the hug, letting go of this once was friendship and the tension between us. I pull away, holding onto her shoulders. "Thank you for understanding and I wish you well, Sarah."

She smiles, nodding. "No problem and yeah, you too."

We say bye to each other and I walk off feeling a sense of relief. That was definitely the mature thing to do and I feel very happy that I did it.

A/N:

No more tension :)