Everything Will Be Absolutely Fine
"So, what exactly are we going to do? With school and everything I mean? If we get caught..." I ask Robb, and he sighs, brushing my hair behind my shoulders.
"Honestly, Faith, I don't know. I suppose... We either stop seeing each other outside of school, and everything goes back to normal, or we keep seeing each other like this, and we stop seeing each other at school," Robb explains, and I bite my lip nervously.
"But what about volunteering? I need to help out otherwise I'll have nothing to put on my resumé," I remind Robb, and he sighs. "I suppose we could spend less time together..."
"But the competition is this weekend too," Robb points out, and this time we both sigh. I giggle a little at our mirrored actions, and Robb smiles, pressing his lips to mine for a brief kiss.
"We'll just have to pretend we don't know each other then, I guess," I suggest, and Rob smiles. I pick up my drink and finish the last of it. I catch a glimpse at the watch on my arm and realise it's getting late.
"Would you like another?" Robb offers, and I realise I haven't paid for anything all evening. Instantly I feel guilty, but then I remember I only have ten pounds in my purse and that would barely buy a single round in a place as fancy as this.
"No, I think we'd better get going, I didn't realise how late it was," I say, beginning to get to my feet. Picking up my bag, I notice the leg of my jeans sticking out of the top and I hurriedly shove it back into the bag before Robb sees.
"I really wish I could drive you home," Robb says, taking my hand, and I blush a little at what he's implying. It makes me chuckle when I see realisation hit his face. "Oh, God, no, not like that, not at all, I just meant-!"
"I know," I reassure him with a laugh, stopping to place a kiss on his cheek. I linger and whisper in his ear. "But if it was the other implication, that would be alright too."
Robb gives me a wolfish grin, and he escorts me back up the stairs. "It's a shame, it's a bit too risky to kiss you goodbye properly, someone might see us."
"You can give me a good luck kiss at the competition on Saturday instead," I say, and we make our way out of the building into the car park.
Coincidentally, we'd managed to park only two cars away from each other. "I guess I'll see you Saturday then," Robb smiles, and I can see in his gorgeous brown eyes a tint of sadness. I wish he could kiss me goodbye properly too.
"I'm really glad you're going to be there. At the competition, I mean," I blush, avoiding his eyes. "It'll be really nice to have a friendly face in the audience cheering me on."
"Yes, I imagine Origami gets stressful," Robb teases, and my heart flutters momentarily at the idea that he might have realised the truth. But he doesn't proceed, so I relax.
"Yeah, something like that..." I smile. "Anyways, I'll see you on Saturday. Goodnight."
I turn to walk towards my car, but Robb catches me and presses a chaste kiss to my lips. "Goodnight," he murmurs back, and a smile spreads across my face.
Heading towards my car, I turn to have one last glance at Robb, only to find he's looking at me too. I slip into my car and begin unpacking my clothes from my bag.
I pull the jeans up under my skirt, and fasten them, then slip the straps of my dress down. I then pull my t-shirt over my head, and somehow manage to wiggle the dress over my head without pulling my shirt up.
Grinning at my own achievement, I shove everything into my bag, kicking my heels off and putting them in too, putting my trainers on instead.
Soon enough, I'm pulling up in the drive. All the lights are out downstairs, and I realise that Mum must have gone to bed. I manage to sneak into the house and upstairs to my room without disturbing anyone.
I climb into bed, still tasting Robb and the cocktails on my lips. His scent is lingering all over me like a blanket, and I breathe him in. I have to admit I love it.
***
"I can see your butt," Grace announces, pointing to amplify her point. Cringing, I pull the leotard down again, but it doesn't seem to cover anything.
"Is that better?" I ask desperately, and Grace begins sniggering, shaking her head. I tug down on the fabric again, but it doesn't seem to be giving me any more coverage.
"Not at all," Grace replies, and I groan. It's Friday night, and the pole competition is tomorrow. We have no time or resources to get another costume.
Because I'm doing one of Dixie's old routines, she loaned me her old costume. It's a black velour bodysuit with a silver diamante floral design across one shoulder.
It's a beautiful costume, and would be great, except for the fact Dixie must have been four years younger than me when she first wore it, because it's tiny, and I'm worried it's not covering enough.
"Well there's nothing we can do about it now," I sigh, sitting down on the bed. Grace turns to me, her legs crossed, and pokes me in the arm.
"Are you nervous for tomorrow?" Grace asks me, and I shrug. "I would be if I were you. All those people, staring at me. The pressure, because you have to win, otherwise there won't be a club anymore-!"
"That's not really helpful, Grace," I say, and begin drumming my fingers on the side of the bed. "Maybe I should run the routine before Mum gets home from work."
"I would if I were you," Grace replies chirpily, and I wish I had never gone to the pole club in the first place. Instantly I regret thinking that, because I love Milo and Dixie almost as much as I love Grace, even though I haven't known them that long.
I stand to my feet and begin walking through the pole routine. Thankfully, most of it is just twirling and elegant dancing, but there are a few moves in there that worry me (including the one that made me fall flat on my face), made worse by the fact I don't have a pole to rehearse them on.
"You're doing that wrong. You're meant to twirl to the left," Grace points out, and I groan, re-doing the last couple of steps. I'm annoyed to find it does makes more sense going to the left.
I keep going, and Grace finds about four more flaws in the routine. "This is it. I'm going to fail. I need to call Milo and tell him that I can't do this," I begin, reaching for my phone, but Grace slaps it out of my hand.
"You're being such a baby. You'll be absolutely fine," Grace informs me, and I reach down to pick my phone up. I realise there's a message from Rob, and I quickly place the phone screen down on my dressing table.
"You're right. I'll get up early tomorrow and start practicing," I agree, and Grace gets up from the bed. She wraps her arms around my waist, the top of her head barely brushing my shoulders. "You're still short."
"At least I'm still growing," Grace grumbles, letting me go. "Good luck tomorrow. Don't mess it up, okay?"
"Okay," I agree, and she leaves my room. When I'm sure she's closed the door, I pick my phone up, and read the message from Robb.
It simply says: Good luck. I can't wait to see you x
Blushing, I simply reply with a kiss. So far, we've managed to keep our messages pretty vague. Even the ones arranging our date could have really been about anything.
I smile and put the phone onto one side. There's about another hour before Mum gets home, giving me another hour to try and rehearse the pole routine the best I can.
Hopefully, a miracle will happen and I'll manage to pull this off.
***
The pole competition is far bigger than I thought it was going to be.
The room itself is massive. It's a hotel conference room where they've constructed a stage, complete with two large silver poles that I've been informed by Dixie can be put in static or spinning mode.
I'm thrown by the fact there are two poles. Which one am I meant to use? Or am I meant to use them both?
The judges, three of them, are sitting behind a table right at the front, where they can see everything on stage. There's no way of hiding errors.
Behind them, in the rest of the room, there are several circular tables, with far more chairs than I'd like surrounding them. Every chair equals a person, sitting on that chair, watching the stage, watching me.
I'm also surprised by how many schools there are competing. When Dixie said we were aiming for first I thought it would be out of about six teams, a small competition, but this has well over ten teams participating.
"I'm not sure I can do this," I whisper to Milo, watching as Mia and Dixie walk toward the check in desk to register our team. "I still don't have the routine down properly."
"Relax, Faith, honestly. We'll be absolutely fine. We have about an hour before you need to be on stage-!"
"An hour?! You know that's no time at all!"
"-And it's a two-minute routine, Faith," Milo chuckles. "You'll honestly be absolutely fine, we're all here supporting you."
"Speaking of all here," Dixie begins, walking over to us, "where is Mr Peters? I thought he'd be here by now... Unless, I don't know, something happened to have held him up."
I roll my eyes at Dixie, who simply gives me a cocky look. "He doesn't have to be here supervising us, so he'll probably just show up to watch," Milo informs Dixie, and Mia arrives, papers clutched in her hand.
"Right, we're all checked in for the competition, and in the hotel room, so why don't we head upstairs and start getting ready? I'd like to get you all in your costumes in time to run through your routines," Mia explains, a bright smile on her face.
Mia leads us through the hotel, and we follow her. Dixie has a small suitcase and a large bag of things, Milo has a bulging backpack, Mia an oversized handbag and I have a single carrier bag with my costume inside.
I feel it represents how I'm somewhat unprepared for this.
We check into our hotel room, which we're relieved to find is ample sized despite only having a single bed and being intended for solo use. Dixie immediately sets up camp near the makeup mirrors, and Milo begins stretching out.
"Okay, Faith we'll start with you, go get your costume on and pull your joggers and zip up hoodie on over the top so you don't ruin your hair or your makeup," Dixie instructs, and I realise in her large bag she has a whole arsenal of makeup gear.
"I need to do my hair and makeup?" I ask nervously. I haven't brought anything. No-one told me to bring anything.
"No, dummy, I'm going to do it," Dixie explains, rolling her eyes. Nodding, I do as instructed, and emerge from the bathroom two minutes later, dressed as requested.
Dixie gestures for me to sit on the stool, and she takes a seat at on the end of the bed, facing me. She instructs me to close my eyes and begins applying my makeup.
I feel her doing the foundation on my face, and then she seems to spend an awfully long time blending my eyeshadow. When it comes to applying my lipstick, I sneak a peek, and realise Dixie is coming towards me with a shade of black.
"Wait!" I yelp, and Dixie pauses, the lipstick wand hovering in mid-air. "Isn't that going to be far too dark?"
"Oh no, it goes with the whole theme of the routine: the makeup is the cherry on top of the costume and music," Dixie enthuses and I nod a little hesitantly, letting her put the lipstick on me. Maybe she went lighter on the eyeshadow.
Before I know it, Dixie is pulling my hair out of its ponytail and she begins scraping it back onto my head. I nearly choke on the vast amount of hairspray she sprays.
"Hold still! I'm nearly done!" Dixie orders as I'm coughing violently, wishing I could taste anything but hairspray right now. I feel Dixie slide something into what is I assume a bun on the top of my head and I yelp as it tugs my hair. "We're done!"
Finally, able to look, I spin around on the stool and look into the mirror. Instantly my eyes widen. Up until now, I've always trusted Dixie's judgement, but right now I'm not sure this was the best idea.
My eyes are hidden amongst dark, black eyeshadow, smoked out in dramatic wings almost to my ears. My usually blonde eyebrows are hidden in black arches, making me look like I'm a floating emotion between angry and surprised.
The black lipstick makes my pale skin look more deathly than usual, and sharply contrasts my face. Dixie's even contoured my cheeks with a pale grey colour.
My hair has been scraped back into a uniform ballerina bun, with the hairspray giving my blonde hair a strange grey glint to it. Dixie has fastened in a glittering silver hair accessory, matching my costume.
On Dixie, the whole ensemble would be beautifully sultry, gorgeous on her. On me, it looks like I've turned up to a Halloween party last minute pretending to be a Goth. It isn't me at all.
"Jesus Dixie, we asked for Bratz doll smoky eye not Black Swan meets Corpse Bride," Milo points out, squinting at my face. "She looks terrifying, and terrified."
"She looks exactly the same I did when I placed first with the routine," Dixie reminds him, shooing me off of the stool so she can begin doing her own makeup. "And it'll have to do. It's a two minute routine, it'll be absolutely fine."
I notice this seems to be a repeated phrase today. Absolutely fine. Not just it'll be okay or a little bit fine, but everything will go according to plan and nothing could possibly go wrong.
It seems a bit daunting.
Not for the first time today, I wish Grace were here. She was heartbroken when I dropped her off at Grandad's this morning, begging to come and watch me.
Grace would know exactly what to say, the right comment to make, the right voice to say it in, to encourage me to go out onto the stage.
I'm lost in my thoughts when I realise Mia is calling for us to head downstairs, as the competition is about to start. I feel like I might vomit but Dixie has already grabbed my arm and is pulling me out of the hotel room.
"Just remember, it's two minutes of your life. You know the steps, you know the music, and just try your best," Dixie says, and suddenly I feel uplifted, maybe even a little motivated. "Because we need to place, otherwise we don't have a club. So, no pressure, okay?"
"Okay," I say meekly, swallowing. We make our way back into the large room, and we're taken back stage. Dixie makes me strip off so she can pin my number to me, and it turns out I'm contestant number (un)lucky thirteen.
I try not to take it as an omen.
"Oh, Mr Peters is here! And God, he looks good today!" Milo announces, closing the stage curtains just moments ago he'd had his head poking through.
This knowledge makes me even more nervous. I try and cover myself with my now removed zip up hoodie, but Dixie pulls it off of me.
I see a few of the other contestants, the vast majority female, eyeing me sceptically. It makes me nervous to see most of them are slim and athletic looking. According to Grace, I'm still carrying that little bit of extra weight, which isn't the most reassuring thing to be told when I'm in a costume that doesn't cover as much as I'd like it to.
"Stop fidgeting!" Dixie orders. "You'll be-!"
"Absolutely fine, I know," I repeat, and Dixie nods. Suddenly the stage lights are illuminated and the curtains are being drawn back. I feel her hands, pushing me forward into the line of contestants.
"Also, we found out that routines here are capped at 90 seconds, because there's so many people and it's a qualifying round, so just take thirty seconds off of your routine! Good luck!" Dixie tells me, and before I have a chance to ask her any more questions she's gone.
Take thirty seconds off of my routine? Where from? The beginning, or the end, or maybe somewhere in the middle. I need to have a minimum of four moves in there, I know that much.
Before I can even wrap my head around how I'm meant to change the routine, the first performer is exiting the stage. I have even less time than I thought. Trembling, I try and pull myself together.
"Everything will be absolutely fine," I whisper to myself.
************************************
Hello my lovely readers! Sorry this chapter wasn't posted yesterday, it just wasn't where I wanted it to be, but I'm happy with it now! Sorry for the delay!
What will happen at the competition? What will Mr Peters do when he finds out the truth? How will the group fare at their competition? Find out next week!
As always, thank you so much for reading! Please vote, comment and follow, and let me know if you enjoyed this chapter in the comments below! See you all next week!
Love, Elizabeth<3