Dedication: To Riley Wolf, for inspiring those who knew her even after she passed. We dance for Riley.
The Nutcracker march begins to play from the orchestra pit at my feet and the lights go up, illuminating the stage and those on it. I exhale as my fellow cast members and I come to life, glowing with the mood of a Christmas party. I bow my head and bend my knees, shaping my back foot in it's hard shoe, curtsying to the young boy in front of me playing my younger brother. We rise and I finally get to glance at the audience as I pan the scene in search for the older man playing my magical Uncle Drosselmeyer. The darkness of the theater contrasts the bright stage lights but I am still able to make out many of the faces watching my every move, many of those faces being small girls younger than me. I hear the musical cue which tells me to notice Drosselmeyer, so my face lights up with excitement at his appearance and I run to him, him lifting me off my feet. The party continues and I keep an excited smile on my face the whole time, living the role of Clara. Soon comes the end of the party, which means I have about twenty seconds to run off stage, change into my nightgown, and run back on. When I do, I realize this is the one moment I am on stage all by myself, and with that comes the realization that every single eye in this room is trained on me. But that doesn't make me nervous, it only excites me. This is what it feels like to be the star of a ballet, to be a principal dancer in a big-name company. This is who I want to be.
The ballet is over much faster than I wish, even though I have two more shows just today. I wait in the wings to bow with my Nutcracker Prince, a handsome man in his early twenties who definitely looks a bit older than myself - fourteen-year-old Clara - but the audience will just have to imagine. The performers in front of me bow, and I take my cue to run out of the wings, pause at the clearing at the center of the stage to join hands with my Nutcracker Prince, and run to the edge of the stage. I am overjoyed as I slowly curtsy to the audience in thanks, soaking in the fact that all of the applause I am hearing is for me. Not for a group of dancers which happens to include me, but for me. And it feels like warmth is flooding into my heart as my smile grows more than I thought possible, especially after smiling constantly for the past two hours. I turn and gesture to the Prince standing next to me and he acknowledges the audience with a slight bow of his head. We walk to our place in the crowd of dancers and I stand next to Riley in her Chinese Soloist costume. We take one more bow together, led by the Sugarplum Fairy, and as the curtain begins to close on the last of the applause echoing through the theater, I realize I get to do this five more times this weekend.
But it will never be enough.
~Monday, January 3rd~
"I don't know, I just feel like I want it a little shorter, but I'm scared that if I cut it it will be too short when I curl it. You know?" Olivia speculates about her gorgeous golden locks. She's seriously beautiful, and I'm really not sure how we came to be best friends when in my opinion she's the prettiest girl at this school, and I'm just... average. I'm not ugly, my long brown hair and soft green eyes pairing with my slim but short frame, but Olivia is just another level of perfect. We've been best friends for as long as I can remember though, and little kids don't normally care about looks, more about who has the sparkliest pink toy pony.
"Yeah, I see where you're coming from. I wish I could cut my hair really short so it's easier to manage, but then I wouldn't be able to put it in a proper bun," I reply.
"You and your dancer problems," Olivia says jokingly, making me laugh lightly.
"Good morning, girls." Immediately my pleasant mood deflates at the addition of Andrew to our conversation.
"Good morning, how was your vacation?" I say as kindly as I can, trying to give him all the chances I can even though he's run out.
"Not too bad, though I had to spend all my time with my family in New Hampshire, especially my annoying little cousins," he says with a playful eye roll. I catch a not-so-playful eye roll from Olivia and stifle back a laugh.
"That's too bad," Olivia says, not trying to cover her boredom.
"Anyway, I was hoping I could talk to you alone, Theresa?" He says with a wink. Gross. I sigh, knowing exactly what's coming.
"Anything you want to say to me you can say to Olivia too," I say stubbornly, refusing to let him put me through the awkward conversation ahead alone. Andrew lets out a breath.
"Theresa, you know how I feel about you. Please, let me take you out, maybe you have feelings for me that you just haven't realized yet," Andrew pleads.
"I'm sorry Andrew, I just don't feel for you that way. You're a great friend, we've known each other for forever and I know I can trust you, but I could never like you that way. I'm sorry," I say for about the millionth time since freshman year. Andrew's expression immediately turns cold.
"God Theresa, can't you just give me a chance?"
"I have before Andrew. I'm sorry, the feeling is just not mutual." Andrew scoffs before storming off. But I know he'll be back, even though I wish he wouldn't. I let out a low groan.
"He's such a jerk. Can't he just take a hint? This has been going on for years and he just won't get it through his thick skull that you don't like him," Olivia begins as we continue walking towards her locker. "You should just stop talking to him all together, push him out of your life to show him what happens when he doesn't even consider the reality of the situation."
"You know I can't do that, even if I should. He's still my friend, and when he's not hitting on me we get along really well. Life would feel weird without Andrew in it, even if he's completely obnoxious," I argue as we approach Olivia's locker.
"You've gotta stop letting him step all over you though. Sure, you denied a date with him, but we need to get him to understand that you don't like him," Olivia says as she spins the lock on her locker.
"I'm sure he'll figure it out soon enough," I sigh.
"It's been three years!" Olivia says, violently opening her locker, causing the top corner to jam into the back of whoever is standing next to us's head.
"What the hell?" A masculine voice exclaims. My mouth opens slightly in shock and Olivia's face pales. She quickly shuts her locker door back up and we both turn to see two of our school's star football players towering over us, the one nearest to us rubbing the back of his head with murder in his eyes.
Noah Thompson. Not only the school's most popular jock, but also the most intimidating guy in the senior class, not to mention being a player. Dark hair, bright blue eyes, over six feet, and muscular, staring down at my best friend like she just killed his dog. Next to him, Cameron Stevenson, Noah's right-hand man and partner in crime. He stands almost as tall as Noah, his hair slightly lighter and eyes medium brown, a similarly muscular frame. Unlike Noah, his expression screams here we go again. Noah is known for having a bit of a temper, and Cameron is the only one brave enough to step in front of him when he is about to start a fight.
"I'm sorry, it was an accident-" Olivia starts before I cut her off.
"It was my fault, I pushed her and she bumped into her locker door, we didn't even see you there," I say while my head screams what on earth are you thinking? However, Noah's glare turns from Olivia to myself, taking the attention off of her. She widens her eyes at me, shocked that I would lie so bluntly to the two towers of rage before us.
"You are so going to pay for that," he says before taking a threatening step forward, having to look down to meet my eyes.
"It was an accident, we said we were sorry. I don't need to pay for anything, and neither does Olivia." I surprise myself with how controlled and confident my voice sounds while on the inside I'm melting down. Did I forget to mention how attractive Noah is? Bright eyes accentuated by long, dark, enviable eyelashes, a perfectly shaped jaw-line, and clear skin make him candy for the eyes. The intimidating look he's giving me now just makes him hotter.
"Don't talk back to me," he says, taking yet another step towards me so that we are less than six inches apart and I can feel his harsh breath on my face.
"Okay, let's go now Noah," Cameron cuts in, pressing on his friend's shoulders to push him away from me as the warning bell rings. Olivia and I take this opportunity as our escape and turn down the hallway. Once we put a few feet of distance between us and them I risk a look behind me, immediately regretting it when I find Noah's gaze already trained on me, no anger having faded yet. I quickly turn back around and pick up my pace, feeling the same as I do when I turn off the lights upstairs and have to run to get into my bed before an imaginary monster comes out of the shadows.
"Oh no," I say as realization hits me. "Noah's in my calculus class. I'm gonna get murdered."
"Oh please, there will be too many witnesses for that. Just don't talk to him alone," Olivia says with a jokeful smile. "Thank's for saving me though, that would've been so embarrassing. It still was, but it would've been much worse if they had known it was all my fault."
"No problem, that's what friends are for: saving each other's butts," I say before turning into my classroom, Olivia calling out a goodbye over her shoulder as she continues the walk to her classroom.
What a great way to start the last semester of senior year.
~~~~~
Written 7/6/17, Published 8/27/17
I highly suggest you watch a YouTube video of the ballet Giselle before reading this story *wink wink, nudge nudge*! It is a two hour ballet so I understand if you don't want to watch the whole thing, so there will be an explanation of the plot of the ballet later in this story as well!
Just in case you were confused, there is a three-year time gap between the two parts of this chapter!
Yay, the first chapter is up! I've been working really hard on this story, from watching different versions of Giselle on YouTube to planning out every chapter, so I hope you will like it! All of my chapters in the future will be this long or longer; I like stories with long chapters so I hope to do that as well. Above is a wonderful picture of Dylan O'Brien (Noah), I will be including a picture of him in most of my chapters because Dylan is bae and I need everyone else to realize that too. I hope to be updating weekly - every Sunday - since I am pre-writing all of my chapters.
Thank you for reading! I'm so excited to finally get started with getting this story out there, sorry for how long it took!