Lie Until You Laugh

5- Making Enemies

"Heartless," Mason sighs.

"But so attractive," Brian mimics Stella and Mason with a roll of his blue eyes.

Stella nods with a giggle. "And you say you're not gay, Brian."

"Do you think if I pass out right now, he'll make me do the suicides still?" Mason wonders, panting into her water bottle.

"He'll probably just wake you up to make you pass out again, and then you'll have to do the suicides," I tease with a sweaty smile tugging at the corners of my lips.

"That sounds like him," She laughs with a shake of her head. "This all builds character though, right?"

"That's a positive way to look at it, Mase," Stella chirps. "Way to go."

"I try, I try," She sighs, leaning her head on Brian's shoulder and closing her eyes. "Another bright thought- only two and a half more months of this torture before it's over and we're on our way to Julliard. Well, after senior year, of course."

"I thought only the winner of the competition gets the scholarship," I pipe in confusion.

"Yeah, that's true, but just having this school on your application gives you a huge advantage," Brian explains. "You'll just have to figure out how to pay for it on your own without the scholarship."

I nod and start to say something, but I'm interrupted when the door swings open and Penn comes in. We all watch him silently as he sets up cones at intervals along the side of the room. The whole room goes silent just for him- he has that kind of effect on people, I notice.

"When you finish, you get to go to lunch. See that as your motivation to get this done," Penn the Petrifying announces, stepping to the side.

Lunch.

That's all I hear, and I want food so badly that I decide that I'll run my tush off in these suicides from one side of the room to the other and then I'll be able to eat. That's really all I want in this world. I follow everyone else as they group around the beginning of the cones and start running. I make it my goal to be at the front of the pack so that they don't get in my way and then I start running. My new sneakers squeak as I reach the first cone and I lean down, touching the ground parallel to that small neon cone and then I start the way I came, touching my fingers to the starting line just before sprinting to the second cone.

When I'm halfway through the cones, I notice that I'm ahead of everybody. I figure it's because they're pacing themselves and I'm stupid enough to just go all out and hurry to get it done before the leg-noodle symptoms start to set in. I assume that I'll get slower and everyone else will get faster and eventually, I'll be in the crowd again, but for now, I have to push myself. Do it for the pizza. It's waiting for me, calling my name. We are soul mates and I must reach him before he goes to somebody else who eats carbs with carelessness.

I'm at the other side of the studio, so I'm halfway through the suicides and the only person that is even near me is Anthony, and he's just a cone behind me. On my second cone away from the far wall, I stop myself with my right foot and touch the ground before sprinting towards the white cinder block wall.

"You're not going to beat me, Red," Anthony tells me as he passes me, going the opposite way.

I don't say anything to him, because I'm not even trying to beat him, I just want pizza. He's overly competitive, Anthony is, and I really wish he'd realize that I don't care about him or coming in first. I just care about pizza.

However, he takes it a bit far when I'm running back towards the cinder block wall for the third time and he comes up from behind me, pushing his left shoulder into my right. With a clumsy oomf!, I trip forward and my right side slams into the wall. Pain trickles into my shoulder and down into my elbow.