*can be read as a stand-alone; you won't have to read the rest of the series in order to understand most of this book*
*cover by justtoofabulous*
Rhys Prince has always felt stuck in both his dad's and his twin brother's shadow. Most people...
The national competition came pretty fast. D.A.N.C.E had been practicing as much as we could and before I knew it, we were in Madison, Wisconsin for the competition. It was going to be taken place over three days; the first day was the male solo, the second day was the female solo and group dance, and the final day was the duet, semi-finals and the finals.
We had to get there the day before the competition started for registration. We first went to the hotel right beside the venue to drop of our luggage before heading over to the venue, and we got there right as our mortal enemy, Nonpareil, showed up.
D.A.N.C.E and Nonpareil always had a feud. Before, it was only the dancers that had it but ever since their current head took over, the studio heads were arguing too.
"Well, well, well," the studio head of Nonpareil, Raphael, said. "If it isn't Ryder Prince? I was actually surprised when you're little team qualified to come to Nationals after you haven't for the past decade."
"We've been over this," Dad said. "I really don't care what you say. It gets boring going through the same thing with you over and over again. You think my team can't win, I know they can, you torment my team, they don't care. Seriously, grow up for once and move on."
Raphael completely ignored what Dad said and continued trying to tear down the team. "You know, I find it really funny how D.A.N.C.E were world champions, and then two years later, they completely fell off the map."
"Yes, I know, thank you for reminding me," Dad said. "Need I remind you that your team never once won Internationals."
"At least Nonpareil has been to Internationals more than your team has," Raphael said.
"Yes, we've gone twice and won both times," Dad said. "You've gone how many times and still never won? Quite frankly, I'd rather go twice and win both times than to go numerous times and not win at all."
"Well, I should wish your team luck," Raphael said. "They're really going to need it."
"They don't need luck when they have pure talent," Dad said. "They placed first in all of the qualifiers, so my hopes are nothing but high for them."
"Right," Raphael said before he walked over, followed by his team.
"I can't wait to win and wipe their smile off their stupid faces," Zayden said. "Except Desiree. Because she's....you know, not as annoying as the rest."
"Or because she's your not-so secret girlfriend," Kingsley said.
"Do you want me to tell everyone your secret?" Zayden said. "Because I will."
Kingsley shrugged. "I don't care. Cantaloupe already knows. I told her."
Zayden didn't even say anything about it, probably because Kingsley didn't care.
"I thought after we started dating, you would at least call my by my real name," Calliope said. "Are you ever going to stop calling me Cantaloupe?"
"Why would I do that?" Kingsley asked. "That's no fun."
Dad went to go register and while he did, yet another team came to talk to use. Well, try to tear us down that is. Like I said, Zayden was pretty well known in the dance world, even outside of our state when we hadn't gone as far as Nationals.
"Would you look at that?" someone on the team said, probably the captain, as she looked at Zayden. "It's Zayden Prince, the one dancer everyone knows about, yet his team can't get that far in the competition."
"I'm sorry, and you are?" Zayden asked. "Because I find it kind of sad everyone here knows me, but I have no clue who you are all."
The dancer crossed her arms over her chest. "We're the team that had been going to Internationals for the past five years?"
"And winning, or just participating?" Zayden asked.
"It's a tough competition," she said.
"Ah, participating," Zayden said. "Cute. Well, it will be fun beating you this year."
She snorted and raised her eyebrow. "Beating us? Yeah, right. You know, now I'm kind of hoping you'll make it as far as the duet, only to be wiped out by us. Nobody has ever scored as high as us in that round."
"Please, tell me how high you scored," Zayden said.
"Ninety-five."
"Aww, ninety-five? How cute." He then pulled his phone out of his pocket and opened a video before holding his phone out to the team to watch. The dance caption rolled her eyes before watching, and I listened to hear what they were watching.
It was the results of the duet round at the state competition, where Echo and I scored ninety-eight.
As soon as that numbered was announced, I could tell the dance captain was trying her best to hide her shocked expression. "Yeah, ninety-eight," Zayden said. "If I recall, that's three more points than ninety-five."
"So?" she asked. "That's in a different competition. This is Nationals."
"Still a dance competition, still the same dancers for the duet," Zayden said. "You can try to justify you soon-to-be losing all you want but in reality, you have no chance beating our duet, or any dance really. Now, it was nice of you to make us feel welcomed here but if you'll excuse me, we must go elsewhere so we don't lost any brain cells talking to you."
The other team was the one who walked away. "You really think we can beat them after they've gone to Internationals five years in a row?" Kingsley asked.
"Of course I do," Zayden said. "I mean, I'm always overly confident and it helps, but trust me. We aren't going to lose any rounds."
"If you say so," Kingsley said.
________________
Hello. It's me. I was wondering if after all these years you won't ignore me.
HINT HINT TO CERTAIN PEOPLE.
Anyway, I need to work on Spotlight because it's 12:17 am and I need to have it ready to go before I go to bed, so I'll end this with a gif:
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