Joe's PoV:
School was positively dragging today. Maths had been a bore, English I'd almost fallen asleep, I'd spent the majority of RE staring out the window and even Art had been slow. I just have to remember this is my final year of GCSEs before I can drop those boring subjects. Also, I have PE next with Neil, and we were doing dance, so it wasn't all bad.
"My favourite class," I smile as we get changed into our PE kits.
"I mean, yeah, but we just go straight home then back out to real dance," Neil points out.
"This is like baby ballet, it's like a good warm up," I say. I always like to see the positive in every situation. Neil usually did too, but I suppose he's just tired today. Understandable.
We walk into the gym, but to our complete surprise, the girls are sat there too.
"Boys, come in, we're waiting on a few others," one of the PE teachers, Miss Lamb, says.
"Why are the girls here?" Neil asks.
"We're going to be doing duets to the song MMMBop," Miss Lamb smiles. "Boys and girls, although if you really want to you may pair up with another boy."
I seriously consider pairing up with Neil, but if we're doing ballroom dancing then I know full well I'd end up being the girl. I'm shorter than him by about three inches. The only other girls I'd like to be paired with are Zoe, Sophia or Cinzia. However, Jack immediately goes up to Cinzia and Neil nods to Zoe, so I guess I'm left with Sophia.
"Omg this is gonna be so fun!" Sophia grins. "Obviously Neil and Zoe are gonna be the best because they're both on A Troupe, but we're both still amazing dancers and I reckon we'll outdance Jack and Cinzia."
"I don't think it's a competition, Soph," I laugh.
"Everything's a competition to me," Sophia claps her hands.
However, shortly into our rehearsals, Miss Lamb notices how well some of us are dancing compared to others, and immediately separates us all.
"What, why?" Zoe moans.
"Because you can teach the others," Miss Lamb says calmly.
"But Miss, this will be so much better with people who don't have two left feet," Sophia complains.
"Yeah, can't we just demonstrate?" Neil asks.
"No," Miss Lamb replies, sounding rather agitated now.
"We're representing our region at Nationals," I say. "Can't we work on our group routine?"
"All of you?" Miss Lamb asks.
"No," Zoe says, "just me, Neil, Joe and Jack."
Miss Lamb pauses, but then nods. "Fine, you can work together, but I still want to see duets! Sophia and Cinzia, you may pair up with each other or find another male partner. I'm sure many of them would be delighted to have you."
"Ugh," Sophia grunts, marching off to Brad, an extremely, extremely annoying guy in our year. Cinzia shrugs and wanders off to find another partner.
"Shotgun Zoe," Neil says.
"What?!" Jack moans. "I don't wanna dance with Joe."
"Tough," Neil smiles, and drags Zoe off, leaving Jack and I standing there.
"Why do we have to do MMMBop?" Jack sighs. "It's ancient."
"Shut up, it's a great childhood throwback," I laugh. "Plus, we don't have to do ballroom or some shit, lets do hip hop."
Jack's eyes suddenly light up. He clearly hadn't thought of doing anything but ballroom or latin. I actually feel quite disappointed in him.
The lesson goes extremely fast after that, with our dance looking absolutely fabulous if I do say so myself.
"Okay, times up!" Miss Lamb shouts. "We'll continue these next week. I suggest you rehearse what you have so you don't forget it. You'll be performing them to the class next week."
I smile. I love performing. A few others groan, but I don't care.
We go back to the changing rooms where I check my phone for messages. None. I sigh. I decided not to text Dianne throughout the day in case she thought it was annoying. I still don't know what I'd done to offend her and make her leave so quick yesterday.
"Zoe and I have the best samba," Neil says smugly as we walk out the changing rooms.
"It really is awesome," Zoe nods, catching us as she walks out the girls changing room.
"Ours is better," Jack says simply.
"You're doing a samba?" Neil laughs.
"No," Jack says crossly. "We're doing a hip hop routine and it looks wonderful."
"Ah, showing off your technique I see," Neil says sarcastically.
"Shut up," I roll my eyes and shove him. "It's school PE, they'll be impressed with some flips more than technique."
"True," Neil muses.
Non-dancers seemed to find more entertainment in flips than a technical piece. Sophia and Cinzia once did a pointe routine in our end of year talent show, and a few of the boys actually fell asleep.
"Alfie's waiting for me, so I gotta dash, but I'll see you all later!" Zoe waves and bounces off towards the car park.
"It's like a fifteen minute walk back to your house," Neil says. "Why does she get a lift? Where is the logic? This is what's causing global warming. She's to blame."
"I mean, you can't blame one person for global warming, but yes she's not helping the environment," I laugh.
I check my phone again, and still no messages. Dianne should be out of school by now. In fact, I know she is, because Neil is texting Katya. I sigh, and shove my phone back in my pocket. Two seconds later, it pings. Excited, I grab it out my pocket, but echo my sigh as I realise it's only Sophia.
Sophia: we still good for lessons before class today??xx
I have to admit, I'd totally forgotten about that.
Joe: sorry sophia, I'm so tired today, I don't think I can - you could ask Zoe?
Sophia: I really wanted you :( but okay, I'll ask her xxx
She was so weird. I'm fairly certain she's always had a crush on me, and it's always been annoying, but if I kept giving her private classes I'd end up spending more time with her than with my girlfriend, which wasn't what I wanted at all.
I decide to text Dianne instead of waiting for her to text me. Maybe she's waiting for me like I'm waiting for her.
Joe: Hey gorgeous, how was school?xx
I shove my phone back in my blazer pocket. She won't reply straight away, or I doubt she will anyway.
———
I'm more energised by the time I get to rehearsals which is a good thing. I've got mine and Dianne's duet and two group routines to be getting on with, but first we have gymnastics and trampolining. I'm not sure exactly why we do trampolining, but all of us do two and a half hours of gymnastics and half an hour of trampolining every Wednesday. I don't particularly mind, because trampolining is really fun and is almost like a break from dance. Gymnastics isn't, because we tend to just learn the floor stuff. Obviously we work on beam for balance, bars to help our circus skills and vault for muscle strength, but it was mostly floor work, which sometimes got boring and repetitive. However, I'd made the mistake of skipping a gymnastics class once, and it was the one time we did predominantly bar, beam and vault. I suddenly found myself very behind in those areas.
"Hi guys!" our gymnastics coach, Holly, smiles at us as we sit down on the mats. "Welcome back to your first gym class of the season. Are we excited?"
"Hell yes," Anna claps her hands. Anna is an acro dancer, so gymnastics is probably her favourite class of the week. Some, however *cough* Neil *cough* hate the gymnastics aspect of dance. For some bizarre reason, he has a huge mind block about tumbling backwards, which one would assume he'd be over now that he can do as much as he can, but he's still got this unreasonable fear. I understood it in beginner and intermediate gymnasts, but as an advanced or elite gymnast, a mind block is really something you should've overcome. I overcame my mind block once I'd got my round off back handspring tuck. Alas, Neil was still stuck, bless his heart.
———
Three hours later, we finally start Nationals rehearsals. We're all definitely warmed up and at our most flexible after gym, so it's easy to jump straight into it.
"Let's start with our semi-finals routine," Alesha says as we take sips of water before coming together. "There's no point creating a stellar finals routine if we don't even make it past the semi-finals."
We all nod. We usually start with the finals routine, but this seems logical. Plus, our semi-finals routine is still a bit of a mess.
"Who is everyone again?" Lola asks. "I forgot. I know I'm Loki, Jordan is Captain America, Joe is Iron Man and Dianne is Black Widow."
"I'm Hawkeye," Neil smiles. "Jack is Hulk and Zoe was Thor, yeah?"
"Yeah, we're going for female Thor like from the comics," I nod.
"The rest of us were Loki's minions," Ellie says.
"Can I say something?" AJ asks.
"Sure," I reply.
"I think we should change the song choice," he said.
"What, why?" Zoe asks. "Run Boy Run fits the theme so well."
"Why not the Avengers theme though?" AJ asks. "Run Boy Run is just so overplayed."
"Playing the Avengers theme to an Avengers themed dance is the most cliché thing ever," Neil says.
"Run Boy Run is an annoying song," AJ says. "It's overused by like, everyone."
"Well what else do you propose?" Chloe asks.
"What?" Amy says. "No, we're not changing the song now, we've got choreography to Run Boy Run already!"
"We can put it to another song," AJ replies.
"To be fair it's not too late to change it," Dianne points out.
Everyone suddenly breaks out into an argument. Over song choice. I look at Jack and Ellie, the only two who aren't arguing. This isn't a team.
"Everyone calm down!" Alesha yells, but nobody listens.
Something has to be done. I pull Jack aside and go over to the stereo.
"What are you doing?" Jack asks.
"Dancing," I grin, and put MMMBop on at almost full volume. Everyone jumps and turns to look at us. You can't not dance to MMMBop. It's just one of those songs. Jack realises what I'm doing, and takes centre stage with me, starting our dance. Zoe and Neil are the first to realise what we're doing. Zoe rolls her eyes and Neil laughs. They begin to clap, and Jack and I keep dancing.
"MMMBOP!" everyone yells at the chorus. One by one, our team gets up and begins to dance. I made a mental note to thank Miss Lamb for the song choice next week. Everyone is laughing and dancing, and the song choice argument suddenly seems ridiculous.
The song ends, and we're all laughing.
"This is what dance is about," I say. "Not arguing over song choice! We're a team."
"Can we shotgun this song for our small group?" Lola asks.
"Yes!!" Anna exclaims.
"Go for it," I laugh.
"Good job, Joe," Alesha comes and pats me on the back. "It's times like this that remind me why you're dance captain."
"Thanks," I smile.
We take a vote on song choice, and settle on a mix of Archangel and Victory, both by Two Steps From Hell (my suggestion). It's gonna be awesome, and everyone knows it. It's like a steady middle between The Avengers and Run Boy Run. From there, the choreography just seems to flow so easily, and by the end of our three hour rehearsal, we've almost completely finished choreographing our semi-finals routine.
"Joe," Dianne came bouncing towards me at the end of rehearsals.
"Yeah?" I ask.
"Okay so firstly you were utterly amazing today," she grins. "Secondly, I think we should work on our duet. How long is the studio open for?"
"Another hour, but aren't you tired?" I look at her. "It's been a hell of a long day."
"Well yeah, but I want our duet to be amazing," she smiles.
"Okay, sure," I smile back. "It'll be nice to spend time with you. I feel like I've barely seen you today. I suggest you switch schools."
"Joe!" she laughs. "I can't just switch schools."
"I mean you can," I say.
"My parents would never allow it," she says. "Especially if the only reason for transferring was because of my boyfriend. I'd love to but I can't."
I sigh. "It was worth a try."
We head off to a practise studio, and set all our stuff down.
"We still good with the song?" I ask.
"Yeah, I really like the duet," Dianne smiles.
"Good," I smile. "Makes it easier to get started."
Dianne's PoV
I love working with Joe; and right now nothing felt more right. I'd had dumb concerns yesterday, but I trust Joe more than anyone in the world, and I know from the look in his eyes how much he loves me. It feels nice knowing someone loves you that much.
We carried on our duet until the studio shut, where we parted ways. I really wish I could go to Joe's school, but I know my parents will never allow it, especially if my reasoning for going is Joe, the boy I see every day at dance anyway. I also don't want to become an obsessive and clingy girlfriend. That would be awful. Maybe we need our space in order to see how much we miss and love each other. God that sounds so cliché.
"How was dance?" my mum asks when I get in.
"Good," I smile. "We've done loads today, and we even had time for a team building experience. Joe is literally the best dance captain."
"I'm so glad you're having fun," my mum smiles. "Friends at school yet?"
"One," I nod. "Most of my friends are at another school though...you don't suppose I could transfer?"
"Dianne!" my mum tuts. "You go to a wonderful private school. And I know the reason you want to change is because of Joe. You can't fool me! You'll make more friends, it's only been your third day."
"Okay," I sigh. I'd known the answer I would get, but it still hurt to hear it. I hope she's right. I could really do with a few new friends at school.
I check my phone one last time before I go to sleep, and see a text from Joe. I smile.
Joe: I love you, Di :) Goodnight, sleep well and I hope you have a really great day tomorrow. I love you more than Tony loves Pepper xxxx
I laugh softly. His MCU references are my favourite. I place my phone down on my bedside table and gently drift off to sleep.
Omg I'm so sorry for the lack of updates recently. I'm chaotic. I don't even have an excuse, because I've got a storyline and know where I'm going with the plot. I promise to try and update more!! B xx