"So did Ms. Quinn totally catch you out for cheating?" Cora asked as she wrapped a ribbon around her high ponytail. The girls' changing room at West High was a heady mix of perfume and hair spray as the cheerleading squad prepared for their Tuesday night practice.
At practice, you could always tell the juniors and sophomores from the seniors, who were more meticulous about how much effort they had put into their appearance. The younger members of the squad would wear the standard uniform, often creased, and rarely tied their hair up for practice.
They wore the obligatory white Converse sneakers, but on weekdays, they would be scuffed. It was only the seniors who really took pride in their uniform for practices, as they knew they were drawing closer to the inevitable day when they'd cheer for the last time.
The seniors were trying to savor the experience while their younger teammates were still just taking it for granted, as they themselves had done when it had been them. "Yeah, totally." Dusty sighed, forcing herself to sound despondent.
"She's like a hot evil genius," Cora declared, checking her reflection in her handheld mirror as she slicked on some red lipstick. Dusty was in the middle of lacing up her shoes when her cell phone vibrated on the bench beside her.
Surprised, she checked it. The only person to usually text her during school hours was Cora, and she was standing right beside her. Dusty felt her heart flutter when she realized that she'd received a message from Valentine.
Without realizing, she turned crimson and tried to discreetly read the contents of the message.
Can you come to my office after practice? I have a surprise for you :) x
Dusty had no idea what the surprise could be, but she was giddy with excitement at the thought of finding out. "You texting a someone?" Cora asked with sudden interest when she spied the coy smile that had spread across Dusty's face.
"What?" Dusty looked up in shamed surprise.
"Or are you sexting them?" Cora continued to pry, her eyes wide with intrigue. "Come on, spill, who is it?"
Dusty could feel a number of eyes upon her as she sat on the bench, her cell phone gripped tightly in her hand. She knew that she had to say something or else she risked them snatching her phone and ruining everything. If there was one thing she had learned, it was that girls could be vicious in their pursuit of gossip.
"It's just someone I met." Dusty shrugged.
"Tell me more," Cora demanded.
"There isn't much to tell. She's a bit older, and I'm just getting to know her."
"Ooh—an older girl, I love it." Cora beamed.
"See, Cora, you're totally off the hook for getting with Justin since Dusty has already found herself a mystery person," Farah said spitefully from across the room, where she was covering herself in a mist of cheap perfume.
Cora looked pained by the comment and averted her eyes to the floor. "Hey, how are things with Justin?" Dusty asked, wanting to reassure her teammate that she was pleased about their blossoming romance.
"They're good." Cora nodded overenthusiastically. "He can just be a bit, you know, distant. But then, he's a guy, and guys are like that." Before Dusty could offer any words of comfort, the team began filing out of the changing room, ready for practice.
****
After an hour of jumps, shouts and splits, Dusty's hair was still immaculate; more a reflection of how much hair spray she used than anything else. The girls all filtered back into the changing room, but Dusty hung back.
A part of her wanted Valentine to see her in her uniform. After all, most people fantasized about being with a cheerleader. As dangerous as their flirtation was, she wanted Valentine to see her as alluring, not just a friend. She still wasn't sure exactly where they stood with one another.
"I'll be right back," Dusty called to her teammates as she began to backtrack towards the school. "I forgot my math book." She turned and ran before anyone could reply, into the school and the ghostly empty hallways. It always unnerved her how her footsteps echoed when the halls were empty.
It reminded her of the generic scenes in horror films, where the victim is helplessly running around, waiting to hear the ominous, methodical footsteps of the killer just inches behind her. Dusty burst into her math classroom, causing Valentine to look up from her desk in surprise.
She loitered momentarily by the door, wanting Valentine to take in the full view of her in her uniform, but disappointingly Valentine seemed disinterested. Valentine looked up from her laptop and smiled at Dusty . "Thanks for coming over. Is practice finished already?"
"It's only an hour," Dusty answered, struggling to catch her breath after her run over.
"Okay, well, I wanted to talk to you about something."
"Okay..." Dusty eyed her uneasily.
"Take a seat," Valentine instructed, and Dusty pulled herself behind a nearby desk as elegantly as she could.
"I wanted to discuss something." Valentine was in teacher mode. Her tone was formal and lacked warmth, which made Dusty feel panicked and on edge. "Oh?" Dusty braced herself.
"Don't be mad at me or say I'm out of line. I'm doing this because it's in your best interest," Valentine explained. Dusty tried to hide her despair. Valentine was going to tell her that they couldn't hang out together anymore. That there was too much risk involved.
All Valentine talks of helping her find her old self had been merely a lie. Dusty had lost the only person she'd ever trusted; she'd been foolish to believe she could trust another person again. "Just have a look, and let me know what you think." Valentine pulled a stack of papers from behind her and placed them on Dusty's desk. "And think before you say anything, I mean really think."
Glancing down, Dusty was shocked to see an application pack for Princeton. Her breath caught in her chest as she remembered how her father had dreamt of sending her there.
"One day I'll get to see my little girl go to Princeton," he had told her, smiling. "And that will be the proudest day of my life." Tears fell down Dusty's cheeks as the memory played out in her mind. She pushed the papers away without even looking through them.
"Dusty-Rose, please, at least think about it," Valentine pleaded. "You're such a talented student. I truly believe that you could get on the scholarship program. Going somewhere like Princeton would change your whole life."
Dusty was silent. The pain of losing her father was burning afresh within her, blurring her thoughts and making her lip tremble. It had always been his dream for her to attend Princeton, and so by default she had adopted the dream as her own. But like so many things, after his death it lost all meaning. She'd only ever wanted to attend Princeton to make him happy.
Now, without him here to see the achievement, what did it matter? What did anything matter? Dusty held her head in her hands.
"I know it's scary to go after something like this," Valentine said, sitting beside her desk so they were at eye level. "For so long you have denied yourself... you've denied your dreams and goals. And if you keep doing it, you're close to reaching the point where you won't be able to undo it all, and you'll be left with an uncertain future based on an adolescence of bad decisions. And you deserve better than that." Valentine gently nudged the application package back towards Dusty, and she lifted her eyes to glance at it.
Even the cover was impressive, bearing the Princeton logo and displaying the historic buildings on campus. It excited her to be so close to something related to the college. She hated to admit it, but she'd never stopped dreaming of going there, she had just resigned herself to the fact that it wouldn't happen.
She didn't want to raise her hopes about attending only to have them dashed by failure. Dusty feared rejection. She feared all negative experiences and had vowed to avoid them for the rest of her life, even if that meant living a life of mediocrity. It would be better than having to hurt again.
"I'd never get in," Dusty objected to the proposition with a lump in her throat.
"I think you could," Valentine told her, resting her hand upon Dusty. This time Dusty didn't shudder with desire at the connection; instead, she felt comforted.
"I've been too poor a student for too long," Dusty said dismally. "I've had terrible grades for the past four years, my GPA sucks. No decent college would ever take me."
"I admit that you wouldn't be their usual candidate." Valentine nodded. "But you've got four months to work hard, raise up all your grades, take the SATs, and prove your worth. With the right admission letter, you've got a great case on your hands."
"A pity case," Dusty snapped.
"So what it if it's a pity case?" Valentine countered. "Losing your father, especially like you did, was unbelievably dramatic and painful, and no one would begrudge you taking four years to find yourself and get over it all. And perhaps they would take you partly as a pity case, but so what? If it gets you into Princeton, then that's all that matters. Life is so often learning to play with the cards you've been dealt. You were given a bad hand, but in some situations you can use that to your advantage."
"You're suggesting I exploit my father's death for my own gain?" Dusty sounded repulsed by the suggestion.
"No, not at all," Valentine corrected her. "I'm suggesting you stop denying that it happened and start embracing your true self and your true reality. It's not too late to find the old Dusty and try to reach your true potential." Dusty was silent for a moment before she opened the application package and scanned the opening page.
There were an awful lot of requirements, and she felt momentarily daunted by the mountain that suddenly stood before her. She wondered if she even had the strength to climb it. "You really think I've got a chance?" she asked Valentine.
"Absolutely," she told her confidently, and she belief in her started to rub off as Dusty allowed herself to believe that she could actually achieve this. "It will be a lot of work," Valentine warned. "A lot of extracurricular work for all of your classes. You'd also need to see the school counselor and let other faculty members know your situation."
Dusty nodded along to all of this, feeling they were reasonable requirements. "And you'd need to quit cheerleading." Valentine dealt her the final blow.
"Quit cheerleading?" Dusty felt panicked by the prospect. Being a cheerleader defined her at West High. Without being head cheerleader, she would be nothing.
"You just won't have the time to practice or attend games," Valentine explained. Dusty glanced down at her uniform and wrapped her arms around herself protectively.
"You need to see the bigger picture," Valentine urged her. "I know how important you think it is to fit in right now, but in four months school will be over, you'll graduate, and no longer be a cheerleader but have nothing else waiting for you."
She was right. Dusty knew she was right. As much as it terrified her, Dusty knew it was time she put her costume away and finally looked after her real self. "Whatever I need to do, I'll do it," she told Valentine.
"You won't regret it." Valentine smiled at her.
"I hope not." Dusty sighed, looking at the cheerleading uniform that she would soon be retiring.