Best Friends (Until Someone Better Comes Along) (17 page)

With a quick glance at Ava, I pushed play. My music—the song I'd been practicing dancing to with Ava and Bailey all summer—vibrated out of the speakers. I'd decided to use the same song as Ava, since I was so familiar with it. I didn't think she'd mind. Lots of people used the same songs.

On trembling legs, I moved my body as best I could. I tried so hard to zone out and do the routine I'd practiced
with my mom the night before. But it was hard to concentrate on my dance when I could feel the whole world watching me make a total fool of myself! My body went on autopilot, and I blanked out as I felt my body doing
something
. I was sweating more than a normal person should sweat in sixty seconds of dancing, and my hair was stuck in my lip gloss.

I made the fatal error of looking up into the bleachers about halfway through my dance, and I could see that Bailey was whispering something to the girl sitting next to her. Was she talking about me? I focused on staring at nothing instead, but I was obsessing over what people were thinking. I knew I was no Jennifer Lopez, but I seriously hoped I didn't look like one of the really bad audition-round losers on
So You Think You Can Dance
.

When I finished, everyone clapped. Heidi and Sylvie were both smiling in a genuine way, and not a single person was laughing at me.

“So maybe it wasn't
as
terrible as I thought it would be,” I whispered to Heidi, when I returned to my seat in the stands. Sylvie had already made her way down to the gym floor to get her music set up. I looked around nervously, trying to gauge what people thought. No one was laughing, so that was a good sign.

“You were fine!” Heidi promised. “That was a fun routine.”

“Ava gave me a lot of tips this summer,” I said, smiling with relief. I was so glad Bailey and Ava had been willing to teach me some stuff this summer, or I would have looked like a total idiot. “She taught me pretty much everything I know about dancing.”

Heidi rolled her eyes, obviously still unimpressed by my summer experience. I'd already come to terms with the fact that maybe Heidi, Sylvie, Bailey, Ava, and I were never going to all be best friends together, but I hoped that in time, Heidi and Sylvie would understand that they were
my
friends, and really great people no matter what.

Everyone quieted down as Sylvie's music started. She looked poised and polished—and super-pretty—but her routine was sort of wooden and a little boring. She was obviously really nervous. But still, she did an okay job. After Sylvie went, it was Heidi's turn. Heidi was adorable in her cute shorts and an even cuter headband, but all of her choreography was sort of off time with the music.

By the time Ava went up to the center of the stage, there hadn't really been anyone who stuck out as a total shoo-in. I really hoped Ava would do as well as I knew she could—if
she did, I was almost positive she'd get a spot on the team. Because I knew what she was capable of, I was sure Ava must be one of the best dancers at our school.

She put her CD in—Ava didn't have a phone of her own yet—and pushed play. When the music started, Heidi leaned over and whispered, “Isn't this your music?”

“Yeah,” I said, watching Ava start her dance. “I used Ava's song, since it's the only one I've ever really danced to. I figured there'd be a lot of overlap in music.”

Sylvie wrapped her arm through mine and nudged me with her knee. “Her routine looks a lot like yours. . . .”

I tried to ignore them, so I could focus on sending Ava good dance vibes. She looked amazing, totally in control of her movements, and her timing was perfect. The end of her routine, the part I'd been trying to figure out all summer, had her landing in a full splits. I knew she was nervous about that part, but she completely nailed it. When she finished, I stood up and cheered louder than anyone.

As I sat back down, Skylar—who was sitting at the judges' table in front of us—turned around and looked at me. She lifted her eyebrows and gave me another weird look. I smiled back, trying to show her how incredible I thought Ava had done.

Suddenly, though, I realized people around me were all whispering about something. Ava, who had been smiling when she finished her routine, now looked totally depressed as she made her way past the judges back to her seat in the bleachers. I watched as she slumped down in her seat. Her usual post-dance flush was missing, and she looked pale and awkward.

“That's so not classy,” Heidi muttered—loudly—to the girls who were sitting next to us.

“Pitiful,” Sylvie added, with a flip of her hair.

“What?” I asked, confused about why anyone thought Ava's dance was anything other than perfect.

“Come on, Iz,” Sylvie said, leaning forward so she could glare at Ava. “She totally stole your routine.”

“That's just so sad,” Heidi added. “She was good and everything, but it's obvious she just wants to be you. She must have spent all last month watching you.”

“No—” I protested. “Her dance was different from mine. I came up with a new one.”

Sylvie lifted her eyebrows and said, “Um, Iz? She totally lifted your routine. The whole thing was pretty much exactly like yours.”

I gasped. Suddenly, I realized that when my body had
gone on autopilot, I'd accidentally started dancing the second half of Ava's routine instead of my own. I'd performed the dance she'd been working on all summer—the one that she'd taught me.

My cheeks went red as the full impact of what had happened hit me. When I got up in front of everyone, my mind had gone so blank that I must have forgotten the dance I'd choreographed myself. I had obviously performed way more of the one I'd been dancing with Ava all summer instead. I'd planned to use
pieces
of her routine all along—but not enough that anyone should have ever noticed. “It was her routine,” I said, my eyes wide. “She didn't steal it from me—”

Heidi cut me off by laughing loudly, putting on enough of a show that everyone would hear her. I'm sure to everyone else in the gym, it seemed like we were sitting there laughing at Ava. Even though
I
wasn't laughing about
anything
, everyone knew I was usually the ringleader when it came to making fun of people. Heidi stopped laughing long enough to say, “Izzy, it's obvious what happened. You don't have to defend her. She's just desperate. It's really sad, actually.”

I was beginning to panic. “No—” I spluttered. This wasn't what I'd planned at all. Unfortunately, the more I protested,
the angrier and more certain my friends became. They were sure I'd somehow made Ava look like a copycat on purpose, and they were really enjoying watching the fallout.

Because gossip moved at the speed of light, it already seemed like the whole gym was buzzing about how Ava Young had performed a stolen dance. And the whole mess was completely my fault.

M
rs. Sills shushed us so we
could move on with the tryouts. There were still about twenty people who needed to dance, but everyone was totally distracted and fidgety. Everyone was staring at Ava—Heidi and Sylvie had started a trend to glare at her. It was amazing how quickly people could forget that Ava had rocked her dance and remember only that there were way too many pieces of her routine that were suspiciously similar to my choreography. And it wasn't even
my
choreography!
My
choreography was just a bad version of
Ava's
choreography.

I was relieved when Mrs. Sills told us that tryouts would be canceled and no one would make the team if we couldn't calm down. At least then people were forced to stop talking
about Ava. But even though no one was talking about it anymore, I didn't like that I had to sit quietly and just let people think what they were thinking about her. She hadn't copied me!

I told Heidi and Sylvie over and over again that they had it all wrong, but for some reason everyone found that impossible to believe. Once rumors and gossip started, it was almost impossible to keep it from snowballing into a giant avalanche.

When the last dancer finished her routine, Skylar announced that they'd be posting the team list in the morning before school. “The returning dance team members will be gathering at my house tonight to discuss the auditions. We need to figure out who will be an asset on our team for this year and who will need to try again next year. But just know, you were all incredible,” she said, insincerely. “I love the amount of originality we saw in this year's routines.” Then she looked around and I saw her catch Ava's eye in the crowd. Ava looked down, then rushed toward the doors as people began to stand up to leave.

I chased after her. “Ava!” I yelled, hoping she'd hear me over the din of activity in the gym. “Ava, wait!”

But Ava didn't wait—she just twisted through the groups
of girls (and a few guys) who were crowding the door of the gym and made her way outside. I ran through the gym doors and pushed through the crowds into the front hall. Bailey hustled past me, also trying to catch Ava as she fled.

“Bailey!” I grabbed Bailey's arm as she passed. She would understand. If I told her my plan, my stupid
stupid
plan, she'd get it. She had to.

But Bailey shrugged me off, then pushed my hand away. “I can't believe you did that,” she hissed. “You stole Ava's routine and intentionally humiliated her.”

“That's not what I was trying to do,” I said. “I promise.”

“Your promises are completely fake,” Bailey said. “You make a lot of promises, but then you just go back to the same old tricks.”

“With everyone staring at me, I blanked. I didn't plan to do the same dance.” I told Bailey the same thing I'd said to both Heidi and Sylvie a million times already. “But anyway, I'm a terrible dancer. Ava's amazing. Everything I did, she did a lot better.” Bailey narrowed her eyes at me and I barreled on. “Anyway, I didn't mean for this to happen. I wanted to—”

Bailey cut me off. “Unfortunately, Izzy, you got
exactly
what you wanted. You somehow managed to ruin Ava's most important day and make yourself look better. She spent all
summer practicing for this audition.” She stopped, choked up for a second. “You
know
how hard she worked for this, because you were there. But you totally backstabbed her. She taught you everything she knows, and you used it to your own advantage. That's just mean. You're just—”

Bailey almost looked like she was going to cry. I could tell she was angry, but I could also tell she was really hurt. But instead of crying, which would have probably been the normal thing to do, she pushed me. Hard.

I stumbled backward, then fell to the ground. As I toppled over, I knocked into a couple of girls' legs. Someone gasped, then I heard someone else say, “What a freak.” As Heidi and Sylvie ran up behind me, Bailey turned and fled. People stared after her, but Bailey just shoved through the crowds to escape. Ava was already long gone, and I knew she was going after her—to comfort her, to make her feel better after what I'd done.

Heidi ran up to me and held out her hand so I could stand up. I brushed off my shorts and bent down to massage my knee. It was really throbbing. Heidi's mouth hung open, staring off in the direction Bailey had gone. “I can't believe that psychopath just pushed you over. She's completely crazy.”

“Yeah,” Sylvie agreed. She went to work fixing my hair so I didn't look like someone who'd just spent the last few seconds on the nasty floor outside the gym. “That girl reminds me of one of those psycho stalkers, the ones who chase after celebrities and, like, try to sneak into their houses just so they can hurt them. You see stories about that stuff in magazines and on TMZ all the time. She's obviously so obsessed with you that she had to push you down.”

I listened to them talk about Bailey, wishing I could stop the horrible gossip train that was already zooming along, full speed ahead. I tried to find the words to convince them that they were totally mixed up, that
I
was the one who was becoming obsessed with Bailey and Ava, and that I loved hanging out with them. And that
I'd
been the one who'd stolen
Ava's
routine, that I'd auditioned just so I could convince her and Bailey that I was “relatable” and (maybe?) a worthwhile friend. My plan was obviously faulty, and it was becoming clear that no one would believe me, no matter what I said.

I had a reputation, and I was obviously living up to it.

I had no idea what I was going to have to do to prove that I hadn't meant to humiliate Ava. My knee throbbed, but I barely even felt it. All I felt was sad. As I stood in the hall, surrounded by a mess of people who were all cooing and
fretting over me, I wondered: Was it even possible to convince people I'd changed, or was I better off just giving up to play the mean girl forever?

* * *

It was in Heidi's mom's car, halfway to my house, that I thought of an idea. The idea was maybe a little crazy, but I figured it was worth it. I needed to fix what I'd done, and I'd never been the kind of girl who was happy to just sit around and whimper over a misunderstanding. And that's all this whole mess was . . . a misunderstanding. I had the power to change people's minds, and that's what I was going to do. Whether or not I'd succeed was a whole other matter, but at least I could
try
!

Because auditions had gone on for so long, it was almost seven o'clock when Heidi's mom dropped me off at my house. I knew I had to hurry if I wanted to have any hope of putting my plan into action. So I ran inside, changed into jeans and a black long-sleeved T-shirt, and found my dad. He was working in his study, but I hoped he'd take pity on me and help out. After all, it was his crappy advice that had gotten me into this mess . . . sort of.