My Seventh-Grade Life in Tights (24 page)

“That was amazing, Sarah,” Kassie said. “The dance, I mean.”

Sarah never got a word out, because Black-Haired Barbie stepped forward with a smirk that had
nasty
written all over it. “Too bad you all won’t get a chance to follow it.”

“Actually, they go on after the next routine,” DeMarcus said, his voice calm with a side of
in your face.

“You sure?” Red-Haired Barbie jumped in. “Kinda hard to dance when you don’t have your music.”

“The judges already have it,” I said. “We gave it to that girl when we registered.”

“Oh yeah, we know,” Black-Haired Barbie said. “That phone she had looked a lot like mine. So I told her someone must’ve stolen it. Thanks for turning it in for me.”

“What?” Kassie snapped. “That wasn’t your phone!”

“Oops. My bad,” Black-Haired Barbie said, shrugging. She gave Sarah one last glare of pure evil and walked off with her red-haired twin. I looked at my crew. Doomed. With a capital
D.
No music meant no routine.

“That was a sucky move, Sarah. Even for you,” DeMarcus said.

“I had nothing to do with that, I swear,” she said, getting a loud
Shhh!
from the backstage volunteer.

“I can spot bad acting from a mile away,” Austin said, his eyes narrowed. “She’s telling the truth.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Carson said, throwing his arms up and letting them fall. “We can’t compete.”

“We can just give them my phone,” I said. “We’ll just use a new song.”

Sarah shook her head. “Music can’t be turned in after the routines start. It says so in the—wait.” She grabbed backstage guy’s arm. “They can have someone sing, right?”

“Yeah, but you would’ve had to notify the judges beforehand,” the guy said.

“They don’t have time for that! Just give them a mike!”

“Sorry, but—”

“Look!” Sarah snapped into full bossy mode, hip cocked out, arms crossed, one eyebrow up. “My dad’s very good friends with the people who run this event and he can make sure you never set foot in the HDC ever again. So go do your job and get them a microphone.”

“Um, yes, ma’am,” the guy said with a bug-eyed expression smacked onto his face.

Carson nodded. “Not bad.”

“Hold on a second. Who’s going to sing?” Kassie asked.

Austin threw his hands out in front of him. “Not it.”

“You are.” Sarah was looking at DeMarcus.

He took a step back. “Wait, no. I can’t.”

“Yes! This is perfect!” I put my hands on his shoulders as Kassie scribbled
083
on the back of her program. “At the theater. You were awesome.”

“But—but that was just for fun. I can’t go out and do that onstage.”

“Yes, you can. Remember what you told me? Find out who you are and go for it. Maybe this is your chance to do that. Maybe this is your chance to get unstuck.”

I could feel him shaking under my hands. He looked at each of us and then took a deep breath. “Okay. I’ll do it.”

We let out a collective sigh of relief.

“He sings, too?” Carson said to me, fanning his shirt. “This is so unfair.”

“So what am I singing?” DeMarcus asked as Sarah pinned the number on his shirt.

“I think I know the perfect song,” I said.

DeMarcus smiled, seeming to know exactly what I was thinking. “ ‘We Will Rock You.’ Nice.”

“Okay, Freekz. Looks like we’re improvising this one,” Kassie said, clapping her hands together.

Carson straightened his arms over his head and popped out a perfect spin. “We were born to freestyle.”

“
Ninja
-freestyle,” I added.

“All we need is a story to tell,” Kassie said.

Austin pushed his glasses up his nose. “Step back, ladies and gentlemen. Let the director work his magic.”

I
was going deaf.

The muffled roar of blood pumping through my head was drowning out everything.

I just hoped DeMarcus’s mic would be able to break through it. The lights overhead softened, spreading a thin shadow behind Kassie. She glanced over her shoulder at me and Carson.

A nod.

FUMP!
The sound crashed through the speakers as DeMarcus turned the microphone on. He breathed into the mike and paused. Other than a quiet cough from someone in the crowd, it was dead silent. But not for long.

DeMarcus pulled his knee up and brought it back down to start the beat.

Stomp, stomp, CLAP!

Stomp, stomp, CLAP!

It didn’t take long for some of the crowd to join in.

For the first part of the song, we just stood there, and every stomp, every clap, became the fuel for our routine. The tension was so thick I could have danced on it. And then just when the audience was about to fall off the edges of their seats, DeMarcus lifted the mike and sang, sending out a shockwave of awesome through the auditorium.

Kassie moved first. She stepped forward and banged out a triple layout. She landed in a front split, right on a big downbeat. Carson was next. He jumped, pulling off a flawless double spin. As soon as he landed, he flew sideways into a cartwheel that ended with him facing Kassie with his arms outstretched, fingers wiggling in full creepy mode.

Time to unleash the Kung Fu Kid.

I let my shoulders fall. My head opened up as every inch of my body soaked in the vocal perfection that poured out of DeMarcus’s mouth.

Deep breath.

I felt the music.

I became the music.

The lid snapped shut.

And I was off.

My legs were carrying me toward Kassie at breakneck speed. I jumped over her, clearing her head by a good thirty feet. Or at least that’s what it felt like. When I hit the ground, she popped right up and I fell to one knee. Carson jumped toward me.
Punch punch!
I matched every beat with a karate move that would’ve torn the heads off any villain that got in my way. We were human dance styles, fighting for the dancer in the middle.

I spun on my knees to the right, glancing at Kassie as I did. She whipped her arms through the air, turning, leaping—never the same move twice. Her face was agony, desperation. She sold her part like a pro. I sprang to my feet. Carson’s leg stuck out behind him. He brought it down and we exchanged a pair of jabs and kicks.

It was perfect. His pointed-toed, straight-legged, long-necked moves against my lightning-fast flurry of less-than-perfect technique.

He pushed me across the stage. What good’s a hero story if the hero doesn’t get his butt kicked somewhere? I rolled to the side, crouched. I buried my head in my hands. Hurt. Broken.

Kassie reached out for me. Carson grabbed her arm, pulling her back. She stood in the middle of the stage, busting out a mind-blowing series of breakdance moves while Carson danced around her. His face was angry. Evil. Amazing. If the crowd wasn’t loving this, then they were a bunch of robots.

The stage shook with the stomps and claps pouring from the crowd. It was epic, cramming power into every second of our routine. I imagined it charging my nearly destroyed body as I slowly rose to my feet. A dance phoenix back from the ashes.

I broke into my best hip-hop slide, popping and locking across the stage. Carson spotted me and leaped over, ready to finish the battle.

We tore each other apart. It was a dance to the death. He swirled his arms and legs, looking like a blond-haired ribbon. And I was the ninja sword that’d cut him into shreds. Every spin, every jump, every move I made was pumped full of my favorite martial arts goodness. We fought forever, it seemed, and even almost actually hit each other a couple of times. But in the end, he was defeated. He jumped back, dropping to the floor to dance out his last move—a death scene that would’ve made any Hollywood actor jealous.

I’d won. The Kung Fu Kid was victorious.

I looked up at Kassie. Our eyes met. Don’t ask me how, because I wouldn’t be able to tell you, but we spoke. Without saying a word, we spoke to each other. She said,
This is it,
and I replied,
Bring it on.

I turned, the superhero returning to his lair. Every nerve in my body was on full alert. Like I could feel her running toward me. She came closer. And when it was time, she didn’t signal me. No yelling—I just knew.

I spun around. She was airborne. Time hit a wall that slowed it down like it was backflipping through maple syrup. There wasn’t a single detail of Kassie I didn’t see.

Her eyes with the white speckles of the spotlight reflecting in them.

Her hair flying out behind her, trying to catch up.

Her arms outstretched toward me.

DeMarcus had to still be singing. But I didn’t hear anything. No song. No crowd. Just the pounding of my heart. I wondered if Kassie heard it, too.

Then the slow-motion effect sped back up and reality came crashing back into full speed. I wasn’t ready for it, because when Kassie slammed against my chest, my entire body rocked backward. I flung my arms around her as she wrapped both legs around my waist. My shoes barked out a loud screech. I tried to keep my balance. I spun, hoping that would keep me from falling.

Our faces were so close. They’d never been that close. Ever. I’d hugged Kassie a million times, but this was more than just a hug. She was holding me. Before I knew what I was doing, my lips puckered. I couldn’t stop them. It was like they’d torn themselves away from my brain. They were going in for a kiss and there was nothing I could do.

The smile on Kassie’s face faded. Her eyes bulged. I tried to reel my mouth back into non-fish-lips mode, but they were on a mission. A mission I didn’t even send them on. I was about to force an
I’m sorry!
out through them, but before I could, Kassie leaned forward.

Right into my kiss!

Her eyes closed just as mine popped open even wider.

Our lips touched. And on purpose. For a second all I could think was how there was no “How to Kiss a Girl” section of my dance tutorials. But in an instant that was gone. My brain exploded, fireworks shooting out of my ears and white doves flying out of the top of my head.

My elbow clipped the edge of the side curtain. I stepped back. Right onto my shoelace. There were stumbles. Lots of them. But only one fall. It only took one to completely ruin the Kiss. It only took one fall to totally destroy the lift that was going to win us that competition.

I never hit the ground, though. I should have. My first thought was that I was falling off the actual stage, but I wasn’t. Kassie had her feet shoved into the floor with her hands clamped around my wrists.

She caught me.

The crowd roared out a mixture of applause and cheers. But Kassie wasn’t smiling. Her face was stuck in panic mode. Carson ran over to us and a few seconds later DeMarcus was there, too. We scrambled offstage to meet Austin, laughing and all talking at once. Except for Kassie. Surely our moment hadn’t been that bad. I’d never win a trophy in a kissing contest, but I’d do better than coming in dead last.

“That was insane!” Carson yelled. “For a second I thought you two kissed! Oh my gosh, that would’ve been incredible. Can you image if you’d kissed her?”

Kassie and I glanced at each other. They’d missed it. Probably because I was in the middle of falling to my death at the time. Kassie rubbed the back of her neck, looking nervous. “Um, so the song—it sounded amazing, DeMarcus.”

“Dude, that was better than awesome! That was beast!” Austin added.

“Thanks, guys. Sorry I paused at the end. I thought you fell.”

“We did,” I said, laughing. But it was forced. My mind was somewhere else. Somewhere stuck between a pair of lips.

The next group trotted out onstage in perfect unison and we scooted farther back into the shadows of the backstage area. As everyone walked away, I pulled Kassie to the side.

“Hey, is everything okay?”

She pulled her arms up against her, crossing them tight against her stomach. “Yeah, um, I’m fine.”

Her eyes were everywhere except on mine. Something was wrong. It didn’t take a genius to put the pieces together, either.

“Look…” I took a deep breath. “Back there, during the lift. I didn’t mean to—”

“I know,” she interrupted. “I know you didn’t. I’m sorry. I really am.”

Her eyes dropped. My mind raced, wondering what she was sorry for. I was the one who’d messed up.

“It just sorta…happened.”

Kassie nodded. “We were just caught up in the story, I guess.”

“Guys, let’s go!” Carson said, running up to us. “The announcer said awards are next!” He grabbed Kassie’s wrist and they jogged off toward the wings, where the other dancers were gathering.

It took a second for my feet to get moving. I wanted to be back on that stage. With Kassie’s arms around me. With her lips touching mine.

Kassie was wrong. It wasn’t just part of the act. It wasn’t just part of the story.

It was real.