After her first year at Keaton being ended by being in a car accident, Talia Marlowe is solely focused on recovering so she can dance again. But when new boy Beckett Bradstreet joins the scene, will she be distracted or will he help her improve?
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Talia was feeling awful when she walked into Keaton. Against the advice from her family and the school, Talia still came into school just to get out of her headspace, although it wasn't quite working.
"Hey Tee! What's up?" Jenna came rushing up to the girl.
Her face was still, no expression at all, "They found him." She muttered out, "The guy that hit me. He's going to court. Might face up to 15 years in prison slash juvie."
When Jenna stopped walking in shock of the news, Talia didn't even notice. She carried on walking into Prima class where she stood on the side lines as she watched them perform the dance they were going to use in the CAMDA's that she helped choreograph.
"AGAIN!" She shouted as they all finished.
Carly breathed heavily, "Tee, you're killing us."
"I said again." Talia repeated, "Cassandra wants this perfect and I'll be damned if it's anything less."
"Come on, Tally-" Beckett started.
"Oh don't you start!" She cut him off before he could finish, "I thought you of all people would understand."
*Beckett furrowed his eyebrows, "What's she mean by that?"*
Before Talia could carry on, Cassandra walked into the room, having noticed how worked up Talia was, "Talia, why don't you go take a break?" Helsweel had been informed what had happened that morning.
Talia looked at all the people who almost looked scared of the raging midget. She angrily grabbed her dance bag off the bench.
"What's got her in such a twist?"
"I don't know but she's acting like a b-i-t-"
Before Carly could finish, Cassandra cut her off, "You know they found the guy that hit her this morning right?"
No one knew what to say. It was silent in the group of friends as they absorbed the information, Beckett too as he listened into the conversation.
"Right everyone, I'll be damned if this isn't perfect..." Cassandra started, prompting everyone to move again.
Talia was found by Helsweel working on her solo as CAMDA's was the next day, "Maybe you should take a break Miss Marlowe. It's lunch and you've been in here all day. I heard you even missed your Italian class."
"If you haven't noticed Miss Helsweel, I speak perfect Italian, yet my dance is still missing something. It's not right yet."
"Are you willing to show it to anyone yet? I haven't seen it yet, perhaps a fresh pair of eyes will do the trick." Talia hesitated as Helsweel's offer before nodding.
After finishing her dance, Helsweel nodded, "I don't see what's wrong with it, although I don't see what it's saying. What's the story?"
Talia shrugged, "I don't know."
"You do know. So tell me." Helsweel insisted.
The quietness might have been unnerving to anyone that walked into the room at the moment of time, but luckily for Talia and Helsweel, it was only broken when Talia finally knew what to say, "When I came back to Keaton after my... My accident, I lost a lot of confidence. But when I'm dancing, it just feels so right and I can't believe that I keep doubting myself. Dance is my life and this dance is me kind of finding myself through dance and gaining the confidence I lost."
"Well then." Helsweel stood up, "You need to show that confidence. Right now, it's like you're back to doubting yourself." She cleared her throat, "You should head to lunch Miss Marlowe. I'll let you miss my classes for the afternoon for practice."
"Thank you Ms Helsweel!" Talia called out as the teacher stepped out the room but the same as earlier that morning, she didn't listen to the advice given to her. Instead she stayed to practice her dance.
It was qualifiers and Talia just watched Cassandra completely screw Vee and Mindy by stealing their routine in the middle of the group which in turn made Talia angry, not only for that but also for not using the choreography she had put together for the dance. Mindy made it through her Junior solo using improv that made Vanessa proud.
"Senior dance soloists, please make your way backstage." The announcer told them as Vee and Cee stood by their friend.
"Good luck, Tee." They both said, "You got this."
Giving her a group hug, Talia untensed her shoulders and sighed, "You got this." She whispered to herself. Making her way to the stage, Talia was told she was first up as she was the youngest in the older category.
Walking onto the stage, she made eye contact with Beckett, who she hadn't spoken to since she practically yelled at him. Offering her a small smile, she sighed in relief before getting into position.
It was intense, finally performing the dance that had her worried for weeks on end. It was her coming out party, coming out of that part of her life that was filled with the negativity of the car accident and into something positive again. Dance could be the thing that saved her.
"That was incredible!" Jenna ran up to her, wrapping her hands around the girls waist as she panted for breath, "Hey, you okay?"
"Yea, just feel a bit light headed, that's all." She nodded, "I'll be fine." Jenna waved as she went to go get ready for her duet with Sasha.
Beckett came up, "Tally, that was great." He smiled at her.
"Thanks Beckett. Hey, I just want to apologise-"
"Already forgotten. Good luck on your trio." He waved goodbye to her as he went back into the dressing rooms.
Everyone was praising her as she made her way to get ready for hers, Cee's trio and now Mindy's trio as Jenna had an injury and Mindy had been watching all the practices anyway. It was hard to manoeuvre their way on stage at first due to their costumes, but when their dance started, everyone was starstruck.
It happened all a sudden to Talia. One minute she was fine, but towards the end of the dance, her vision started to go.
