part 5

I rewrote the last paragraph from the last post, since it's been so long, and then here's part 5. 

Bobby and I rarely saw each other on a regular basis anyway, we were both pretty busy. Between teaching dance, taking dance and working I stayed pretty busy, not to mention all the time I spent with Jess while Alex worked double shifts to get enough money together to make a down payment on a house. She was only a month and a half along, but I thought I could already see a small belly starting to show. She had been small to begin with, so any change was pretty noticeable on her. I was glad that she had chosen to keep the baby, but it wasn’t going to be easy, and a part of me, a selfish part, wished that she had never gotten pregnant to begin with and would still be dancing by my side. I could tell that Jess was sad too, she missed dancing and she missed Alex now that he worked all the time, but she was stubborn and refused to show it, choosing instead to throw herself into planning for the baby and taking a summer English class so she could graduate early.

This routine of working, running, dancing, and spending time with Jess was how most of the summer passed. Before we knew it we were facing the end of July and the ultrasound appointment where Jess would find out the gender of her baby. Alex was going to try to get home from work in time to go, but we all knew that it was a long shot, so I had traded with Rachel at the restaurant and had Caitlin cover our afternoon class at the studio.

When we arrived at the office for the ultrasound I quickly realized why Jess hadn’t wanted to come alone. Aside from the obvious reason that this was a special moment, the office was so uncomfortable. Her parents had good insurance, so the office was nice, and most of the women there were much older than us, holding hands with their husbands, looking so excited about their pregnancy, while Jess was there with me, wearing a sweatshirt in July to cover her emerging belly, and holding her English Lit textbook to get some studying done while we waited. Aside from the office staff, no one spoke to us, and it seemed like everyone was quick to look away. I was used to the reaction, for years people had looked at me like that, a quick glance at the girl who had lost her mother, but I knew that this was new to Jess.

“Alex isn’t coming,” she whispered quietly after we’d been waiting for about 15 minutes. “He can’t get out of work.”

“Well, we knew it was a long shot,” I replied. “It’s okay, we’re here together. And we can come up with a fun way to tell him about the gender afterwards.”

“You’re right,” Jess said. “We can do this.”

They called us back a few minutes later, but no matter how prepared we thought we were and how much we thought we “had this”, neither Jess nor I were prepared for the news she was given.

“Jessica,” the tech said softly. “The good news is that you are healthy, but the other news is, you’re not just having one girl, you’re having two.”

“What?” Jess and I said at the same time.

“Twins,” the tech said. “You’re having twins.”

The rest of the appointment passed in a blur. The doctor gave Jess more information on having twins, we scheduled more appointments now that her pregnancy was considered “high risk”, and we walked out to the car.

“Maddie I don’t think I can do this,” she said softly once I had started driving. “One baby was going to be hard enough, but two? I haven’t even told my parents about one baby. How do I tell them about two?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “That’s one thing I can’t help you with. You know I love you and I love your parents, but I have no idea how you should tell them about this. Maybe you and Alex should handle that together.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Jess said. “I just can’t even think about this right now. I need to figure out how to tell Alex that we’re having two babies. How am I supposed to tell him that all the hard work he’s doing might not even be enough because now we’re having twice the number of babies that we thought we were?”

“You guys have made it this far,” I said. “You can get through this part too. I promise. Now let’s go get some ice cream, think of some cute twin names, and then we can worry about everything else.”

“Twin names are fun!” Jess said, starting to smile a little bit. “Although I won’t let them have names like those twins in elementary school. What was it again?”

“Annmarie and Annamary?” I questioned.

“Yes!” she cried. “Ridiculous! I mean, sorry, but ridiculous. I’m thinking of something that will go together, but not be the exact same.”

So we spent the next hour sitting at the ice cream stand on some picnic tables discussing twin names and how she should tell her parents (soon, and with Alex) and how lucky she was that he was a decent guy. Finally we headed home, and I waited with her at her parents until Alex came over, and then I waited in her room while she told him about the twins. They came inside a few minutes later.

“Twins!” Alex said with a tired smile on his face when he saw me. “I can’t believe it. But thank you so much for going to the appointment today Maddie. I’m so sorry I wasn’t there.”

“You’re welcome,” I said. “I guess the double shifts aren’t going to stop anytime soon.”

“No, I guess not,” he said. “Probably not for a few years. But it will be worth it. But hey, we’re going to go get some dinner, do you want to come along?”

“I can’t,” I said. “I have to work on this new dance that I’ve been developing for auditions, and it’s really been kicking my ass lately.”

“Alright, well, you know you’re always invited to come along with us,” Alex said. “We’re lucky to have you around, Maddie.”

“Thanks, Alex,” I said. “I appreciate the offer, but I really have to get home and get to work.”

part 4

Again, i repeat my plea, let me know what you think! I'd love to hear opinions...criticism, praise, advice, whatever you've got. And let me know what you're writing, I'd love to read that as well. I hope you enjoy. I think its finally getting good. 

When I arrived at work no one was outside and I thought I’d finally caught a break. I grabbed my work clothes and tried to make it to the employee bathroom without being seen, but unfortunately, it was occupied. I stood outside, tapping my foot until Jackson came out.

“Are you wearing a leotard?” he asked. “And tights?”

“What?” I asked, pretending that I hadn’t heard him, as I tried to duck around him to the bathroom.

“A leotard?” he asked again, blocking my path.

“I had dance class,” I answered.

“So that’s why you never hang out,” he said. “And here I thought you were just avoiding me because I’m Bobby’s friend.”

“Jackson, its pretty impossible to avoid you,” I said. “You are always at my house with Bobby. How do you not know that I dance?”

“Bobby and I don’t really talk about you,” he said. “And you’re always in your room when I come over. I figured you were avoiding us.”

“That’s where my studio is,” I replied. “And sometimes I’m at class. I’m not avoiding you.”

“Bobby said you had class a lot,” Jackson said. “I just didn’t think he meant dance class.”

“It’s always dance class,” I said, starting to get impatient. “Are you going to let me into the bathroom to change or not?”

Jackson stepped aside and let me into the sweltering hot bathroom. The restaurant was air conditioned in the dining room, but in the summer the kitchen got unbearably hot, especially in the bathroom where there was not ventilation.

Bobby and Jackson had been friends for their whole lives, but while Bobby had joined the acting crowd in high school and then again in college, Jackson was a jock turned pre-med student. They were both two years older than me and we’d all gone to the same public school so I’d seen the transformation firsthand. Bobby was also a pre-med student, but he’d been focused since high school, while Jackson had been famous for his position on the football team.

Although Jackson and I had not been friends when he was in high school, in fact, I barely even knew who he was aside from his football accomplishments, since Bobby and I had become stepsibilngs Jackson and I had become friendly. And of course, I still owed him for helping to get me the job.

Jess texted me three times during my shift, asking me what had happened at dance. I didn’t know what to tell her. She was my friend, my best friend, so I couldn’t lie, but I also didn’t want to upset her by telling her the truth. I debated the whole way home, before deciding to tell her the truth, in person. I knew she would rather hear it from me than anyone else in our dance class.

“I didn’t want to do it,” she said after I finished telling her about Madame’s rant. “I didn’t want to quit. I just didn’t really have a choice.”

“I know,” I said, as we systematically sorted through the DVDs on her bedroom floor. “Comedy? Or action?”

“Comedy,” she said. “I need a laugh. Do you think everyone knows what’s going on?”

“Caitlin does,” I said. “She pulled me aside. No one else said anything, so I’m not really sure.”

She nodded, taking it all it.

“What do you think?” she asked. “Do you think I’m wrong?”

“No,” I said. “I don’t know what the right choice is. But I don’t think you’re wrong. I just don’t know what is right.”

“There is no right,” she said. “Alex is panicked. He just keeps saying that he will stand by me, but I don’t even know what that means anymore.”

But at that moment, I knew what it meant because as I watched her take a deep breath and look through the stack of comedies I had selected she started to absentmindedly rub her belly. You couldn’t tell she was pregnant at all, but the rubbing and the look on her face told me all that I needed to know. She was in love with the baby and she would keep it. I knew then that she would come to the same realization, so I just listened as she talked to me, with the movie remaining on the menu screen for two hours.

We eventually started the movie, but Jess fell asleep about ten minutes in. I was still too worked up to sleep, so I finished the movie and then slipped out. When I got home Jackson’s car was in the driveway. It was almost midnight, but he and Bobby seemed to be pulling an all-nighter. I tried to get into my room without making any noise, but just as I was closing my door Bobby poked his head out of his bedroom.

“Hey!” he said. “What are you up to?”

“Not much,” I said. “Just coming home. How are you?”

“I’m okay,” he said. “Jackson and I were just studying.”

“Oh,” I said. “Sounds fun. Sorry I bothered you.”

“You didn’t bother us,” Jackson chimed in, also poking his head out of the bedroom. “We’re kind of looking for any excuse not to study. We’ve been studying for hours. Days.”

“Years,” Bobby added. “Decades. Eons.”

“You do need a break,” I said. “I’m afraid I’m not really that much fun though.”

“You’re more fun than him,” Jackson said, indicating Bobby. “And more fun than our books.”

“So, basically, you’re desperate,” I said with a small smile. “It really has nothing to do with me, more with desperation. That makes me feel great.”

In reality, I didn’t care if they were only talking to me because they were desperately in need of a study break. I was equally desperate for a distraction from thinking about Jess.

“No, its not like that,” Jackson said, attempting to back track.

“Don’t worry,” I said, laughing. “So what are you studying for?”

“Organic chemistry,” Bobby said, opening the door to his room to let me in.

The bedroom had been completely taken over by their studying. Several textbooks lay open on the desk, with various papers and notes scattered on the bed, floor and bookcase. Models of some kind in various colors were also dispersed throughout the room with spare parts littering the floor. The trashcan was overflowing with crumbled paper and a whiteboard was precariously balanced in front of the television with some kind of writing on it that made little sense to me.

“Wow,” I said. “You guys are intense.”

“If only we were as smart as we look,” Bobby said. “But obviously, we still make a huge mess. Come on up to the kitchen, we were about to get some food anyway.”

We made our way to the kitchen where Bobby put on a fresh pot of coffee. I pulled three mugs out of the cupboard and asked if anyone wanted cream or sugar.

“You know this isn’t decaf,” Bobby said. “And its midnight.”

“I’ll be fine,” I said. “Don’t worry.”

I wasn’t a huge coffee drinker, I liked the smell and taste and definitely felt perked up in the morning with a fresh cup of coffee, but the caffeine didn’t affect me that much, I was used to going without sleep or caffeine, and when I finally did sleep I was usually so tired that nothing could stop me.

As we waited for the coffee to brew, however, things fell into an awkward silence. It was as though for those moments downstairs we had all forgotten the strange situation we were in. She was Bobby’s mother, so I figured that Bobby wasn’t a big fan of me, I knew that Bobby and my dad didn’t particularly get along, as my dad had edged out Bobby as man of the house, and Jackson was Bobby’s friend, not mine. They made sandwiches and chatted about how hard they expected this test to be while I sat there, slowly cutting up and eating an apple, without any useful input. When the coffee finished brewing I poured three cups and started to take mine downstairs.

“Leaving us so soon?” Bobby asked. “I’m sorry we’re so boring.”

“Its okay,” I said. “I just figured I’d let you two get back to studying. I have some things to do anyway. I’ll see you later.”

In all honesty, I didn’t have anything better to do, I just wanted to get out of that kitchen. I took my coffee to my room and sat at my desk for a few minutes, but that gave me too much time to think, so I changed into some workout clothes and started stretching. Before I knew it, I had danced my way to two a.m. I knew then that I needed to go to sleep, but I still wasn’t quite ready, so I went out for a run.

Running at two a.m. is not particularly safe, but at least my neighborhood had the added benefits of sidewalks and streetlights, so I had been running in the middle of the night for years. This night was no different. When I got back home at three, I was finally exhausted and fell asleep almost immediately. The dancing and running had done their job, temporarily purging my head of all thoughts and allowing me peaceful sleep.

When I woke up at seven I could hear the so-called family in full force. The younger boys seemed to be chasing each other around while screaming and she was yelling at them to be quiet, but it was having no effect. I closed my eyes and tried to imagine that they weren’t there. In the days before this crazy family had become mine, mornings at my house were quiet. The only sound was often from the coffee grinder as my dad prepared our daily cups of coffee, and occasionally the sound of NPR as he got ready for his day, but even the NPR was not a constant. We preferred silence. I still did. I liked to run with some music, and occasionally when I drove I would turn on the radio, but most of the time I lived my life with silence. I guess by this point I was used to it, so the noise from above seemed even worse.

Since I couldn’t ignore the noise, I just pulled myself out of bed and started my normal morning stretching routine. I didn’t have dance class until noon, but Madam opened the studio at eight every morning for the higher level dancers. I didn’t always go, but I was hoping that Madam would ask me to help teach the summer classes, so I needed to be in her good graces.

My good idea paid off. Two weeks later, after daily visits to her open studio time, Madam made the announcement in class that she had chosen me and Caitlin to help teach her summer classes. This was a high honor, it not only meant that Madam had noticed my talent, but also that she had respect for me as a person and could trust me.

“I can’t believe I got chosen!” Caitlin cried, running up to give me a hug after class. “I mean, I knew you would get picked, you’re the best dancer, but I didn’t know if Madam respected me enough! I’m so excited this is going to be so fun, and now you know Madam will help us with our college and company auditions! This summer is going to be great! And I’m so excited I’m with you, Maddie, we’ll have so much fun together.”

Although I didn’t have quite the same level of enthusiasm as Caitlin did, I was pretty excited to be chosen as well. I was just worried about how to tell Jess. We had always planned that we would get the job together, or at the very least that we would be competing against one another for it, but now she was deciding whether or not to keep a baby and I was dancing with Caitlin.

“You’re thinking about Jess, aren’t you?” Caitlin asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m just worried about how to tell her. Its just…not what we expected.”

“Its not what anyone expected,” Caitlin said. “But its not your fault. Anyway, just be happy for now. You’ve worked hard for this. You’re the best dancer here. You deserve this.”

“Thanks,” I said. “I guess you’re right. So I’ll see you tomorrow at class then.”

I didn’t talk to Jess for a few days, when she called me to tell me that she had made a decision about the baby. I rushed over to her house so she could tell me in person.

“I’m keeping the baby,” Jess said. “For sure. I’m keeping the baby, and Alex and I are going to raise it together. I’m going to be a mom.”

“Congratulations!” I cried. “I know this isn’t what you expected, but I’m happy for you anyway, Jess. And I’ll be here through it all. It won’t be just you and Alex. I’ll be here too.”

“Thanks Maddie,” she said. “I know you will be.”

“Have you told your parents yet?” I asked.

“No,” she said. “Not exactly.”
            “Not exactly?” I asked. “What does that mean?”
            “It means no,” she said. “I haven’t told them. I’m going to though. I promise. But speaking of telling things…when were you going to tell me that you got chosen to teach the summer classes? I had to hear it through Alex who heard it from Dave who heard from Caitlin.”

That wasn’t how I had expected for Jess to find out, and I could tell that I had hurt her, but I was also glad that she knew.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want to make you feel bad that you didn’t get to compete for it.”

“I figured,” she said. “But don’t feel bad. This is my choice. I made my decisions. I’ll be fine.”

“You’re going to have to tell your parents though,” I said. “Its July. You’re going to start showing eventually. This isn’t going to stay hidden. Don’t they wonder why you don’t go to dance anymore?”

“I didn’t tell them about that either,” she said.

“Jess!” I cried. “You need to do that!”

“I will,” she said. “Don’t worry, I will.”

I stayed at her house for the rest of the afternoon, until I had to go to work. It reminded me of old times, our Saturday afternoons of talking about dance and boys except this time we made lists of baby names, talked about where Jess would raise the baby and even talked about her and Alex getting married. I think we were both glad to know that as much as our lives had changed the two of us had not, we would always have each other.

That night after work I couldn’t sleep, as usual, and I could hear Bobby and Jackson talking in Bobby’s room so I decided to go for a run rather than dance. I needed to run anyway, I’d been doing a lot of dancing lately between the open studio times, the classes I was teaching and the class I was taking, as well as my late night dancing, and I had been slacking on my other training. My goal was to run the five mile loop at a seven minute mile pace, so I set my watch and started off down the street. I was a good runner, but five miles at this pace was hard and I was so focused on my running that I didn’t even hear a car come up behind me and slow down to keep my pace.

“Maddie!” someone yelled. “Maddie stop!”

I slowed down, but I didn’t stop running as I looked around to see who was calling my name. I figured out that it was coming from the car but I was contemplating running away as fast as I could when I realized it was Jackson in the car.

“What are you doing?” I asked. “You scared me!”

“I was just leaving your house,” he said. “And I saw you running. Its like one a.m. What are you doing?”

“Running,” I said.

“I can tell that,” he said. “I mean, why?”

“I can’t sleep,” I said. “And I need to stay in shape.”

“Right,” Jackson said. “Because that’s what I do when I can’t sleep, I go for a run by myself at one in the morning.”

“I’m on the sidewalk,” I said. “Its fine. Just don’t tell Bobby.”

“If its fine why is it a secret?” Jackson asked.

“I just don’t need my business spread around,” I said. “Just promise me you won’t tell.”

“I’ll see you at work,” he said, and drove off.

I finished the last quarter mile of my run and danced for another hour before heading to bed, but even that didn’t put me to sleep. Somehow, my whole life seemed to be spinning out of control, a lot faster than I had ever imagined. Normally I didn’t let myself stop and think, but now that I had started it was hard to stop. I found myself really missing my mom that night as I lay in bed thinking about Jess and Jackson and Bobby and everything that had happened.

I couldn’t help but think that if she were here everything would be perfect. She would know what to say to me, how to help me, everything. I knew that wasn’t true. More than likely if she were here we would fight just like most girls my age fought with their moms, but I could still pretend that she was perfect, because that’s all I could remember.

Chapter 2

Although Jackson hadn’t promised not to tell Bobby about finding me running at one a.m., I was still hoping that he wouldn’t tell, but a week later Bobby mentioned it to me in the kitchen as we were both getting coffee.

“So Jackson tells me that he saw you running in the middle of the night last week,” he said. “You do know that’s really not safe, right?”

“Umm,” I said, caught off guard. “I guess. Its fine though. I can’t believe he even said anything. I was on the sidewalk.”
            “Its not safe,” Bobby said. “You could get hurt.”

“I’m fine,” I said.

“Look, its not really my business,” Bobby began. “But I just think—“

“Then don’t make it your business,” I interjected.

“I just think its dangerous and there are a lot of crazy people out there,” he continued, ignoring my comment. “Look, Maddie, I’m not judging you, okay, I work two jobs that pay minimum wage to stay out of the house and I’m taking summer classes. I get that you don’t want to be here and you can run all night and sleep and dance all day, but just be safe, okay?”

“So this isn’t exactly your favorite place to be either then?” I asked. “I thought I was the only one.”

“Not by a long shot,” he said. “Its crazy here, I know it, but college will be better, I promise. If you want to run, run, I’m just asking you to be safe, okay?”

I nodded, realizing that this was the closest Bobby and I had ever come to really talking about the situation that had brought us together, but just as quickly as the moment had begun, it ended. Bobby, in his typical fashion, packed up his thermos of coffee and was out the door. It seemed that he felt as awkward about our near heart to heart as I did, which made me wonder if we couldn’t actually become friends after all.

Bobby and I rarely saw each other on a regular basis anyway, we were both pretty busy. Between teaching dance, taking dance and working I stayed pretty busy, not to mention all the time I spent with Jess while Alex worked double shifts to get enough money together to make a down payment on a house. She was only a month and a half along, but I thought I could already see a small belly starting to show. She had been small to begin with, so any change was pretty noticeable on her. I was glad that she had chosen to keep the baby, but it wasn’t going to be easy. She missed Alex now that he worked all the time, but she was stubborn and refused to show it. 

part 3

So here goes another part. I hope you're enjoying this so far, I'm enjoying writing. I'm hoping to keep up some kind of pace, but it is hard when school gets really busy, so just bear with me and don't give up. Also, for anyone who is reading, leave me a comment with a link to something you've written. I'd love to read it! Or leave me a comment with what you really think of this. I've written a lot before, but I'm always too nervous to really put it out there. Thanks! And happy reading! 

I couldn’t sleep that night after work either. I danced instead. I stretched and practiced different positions and moves for hours, then worked with the music I was hoping to use for some college auditions. At one point, around four a.m. I thought I heard my door close, but I shrugged it off, Bobby’s room was next to mine, and he seemed to be the only member of the family that kept stranger hours than I did, so I just assumed it was him and kept dancing. I lost track of time and ended up dancing until I heard the shower come on upstairs and realized that it was seven a.m. and everyone else in the house was getting up. The little boys had summer camp, my dad had work and she would eventually be going to work as well.

It wasn’t the first time that I’d danced through the night. I was more careful during the school year, but this was summer and I’d had a lot on my mind that I was trying to think through, although the dancing usually helped to keep my mind off of everything. I didn’t sleep much anyway, even when I tried, and usually it just resulted in my lying in bed for hours, unable to calm my mind.

This had all started when I was about twelve, four years after my mom had died. I wasn’t sleeping much to begin with, and then my dad started staying up late as well and began drinking. I was worried about him and wanted to keep an eye on him, so I started staying up later and later. The dancing was just to avoid boredom. Although I had no idea what had happened, something that year had caused him to escalate his drinking. I didn’t tell anyone, but a few mornings I had woken up to find him passed out on the sofa, cans lined up on the coffee table. Somehow, knowing that I was awake always kept him from drinking, and that was all that I cared about.

After a few months of this he began to sleep again and stopped drinking, but I never bothered. Sleep always brought me strange dreams about my mother, so I preferred to dance. I danced until I was sore, danced until I felt dead on my feet, and when I felt like I could no longer dance I would stretch and exercise. I did push-ups, jackknifes, and leg lifts before moving on to planks and then in high school I added a five mile run through the neighborhood. When I was younger I would only stay up a few nights a week, but the older I got it seemed to more I stayed awake. All of the late night dancing and running may have seemed too much for my body, but it had been good for me. I had become the best dancer in my class and I was already working on applying for a dance scholarship to college. I knew that I could use the money, although I had no idea where I wanted to go for college or what I wanted to study.

I knew I wanted to continue dancing, although the thought of dancing without Jess seemed a bit overwhelming. We had been dancing together since second grade, when we’d met and become friends, and having someone to dance with was very helpful. Dancing the way we did was difficult to understand if you did not do it. As dancer we pushed ourselves to our limits and it did not always pay off. I’d watched other girls dance at the same level that we did without getting a scholarship or membership in a company. We spend most of our waking time away from home, either at the gym, studio or at school. We had nearly zero body fat and neither of us remembered what chips or ice cream tasted like. We had more muscles than we knew what to do with, yet we were still both very thin, a size three in pants. It wasn’t just the physical aspects though, there was also the mental aspect. We were required to focus all the time, whether it was focus on dancing or focus on our diet, our workouts and school. The mental stress had made us both seem older than we were, although this was also partially due to our parents.

Neither of us had much of a childhood, mine stopped suddenly when my mom died and I had learned to take care of myself, and any hope of regaining that childhood had been extinguished when I was twelve and had started staying awake all night.

My thoughts were suddenly interrupted by Bobby, my oldest stepbrother.

“You’re up early!” he said cheerfully. “I heard you dancing at five.”

“Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“No, its okay,” Bobby said. “I was up and studying.”

“At five?” I asked. “In the summer?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” he said. “And Organic Chemistry is kind of kicking my ass.”

“Oh,” I said, pretending I even knew what organic chemistry was, I was smart but I took regular classes, no honors, no AP, just the general college prep curriculum, so organic chemistry was definitely out of my range.

“What were you doing up so early?” he asked. “Just dancing?”

“I needed to practice,” I said. “College auditions and scholarships are coming up soon.”

“From what I understand you’re pretty good,” he said. “I hear about you sometimes at the university. You’re not even in college and I hear you’re the best person there.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “And I can always get better.”

“If you say so,” he said. “Personally, I’d take my sleep over practice, but I guess if you’re that dedicated then good for you.”

“Thanks….I guess,” I replied.

“No problem,” he laughed. “Well I have to go, see you later!”

And he was gone. Bobby was like that. Here one minute, gone the next, always on the go. I was also always busy, but I only did three things, dance, school and work. Bobby had two jobs, took summer classes, was a member of the student government at the university, did research for his honors project for graduation and was part of the acting community. So far I’d seen him in four different plays at the university. Bobby was always busy, always moving. His blackberry never stopped vibrating and more than once I’d seen him pack two huge thermoses of coffee when he left for school. I knew I was not the poster child for a healthy lifestyle—the late nights took care of that—but at least I didn’t drink close to ten cups of coffee to start my morning.

After Bobby left I tightened up my running shoes, reset the stopwatch on my favorite running watch and took off down the sidewalk, preparing myself for a three mile run, hoping to finish in twenty-one minutes, but knowing that after staying awake all night and drinking a cup of coffee I would be lucky to finish in twenty-six minutes. The trick for me was to focus on the time. If I focused on something-anything-other than running I didn’t think about how tired I felt or how much my muscles ached. This time though, my mind kept drifting to Jess, which didn’t really help.

When I got home my heart was pounding and all of my muscles were sore. I turned on the shower as cold as it would go and emptied the ice bin in the freezer into the bathtub for a short ice bath. Unfortunately, even the teeth chattering ice bath did not take my mind off of Jess. I just kept thinking that she must be wrong, she couldn’t actually be pregnant. All those years of dance were just gone. All of her muscles, her careful diets, her hours and hours of practice, all ruined. I knew that this eventually happened to most dancers, even I wanted children at some point, but not until I was much older. I’d worked too hard and too long to throw it all away.

The run and ice bath somehow made me tired enough to sleep, so I went into my windowless room, shut the lights off and slept until noon. The house was still empty when I woke up, the silence was a bit eerie compared to the usual chaos of lunchtime. I ate a quick lunch and starting getting ready for dance. Class was at one and I had to work right after, at five. Usually I was a very organized person, but as I tried to shove my work clothes into my dance bag I realized that it was so full I couldn’t get it closed. Unwashed tights and leotards filled up most of  the bag, along with discarded athletic tape, old hairspray cans and empty bottles of hydrogen peroxide which we used on our blisters.

Just as I was tossing all the trash into the can near my desk and putting the dirty clothes in the basket my phone vibrated. It was a text from Jess.

Not coming today, sorry.

This was the first class since seventh grade that we would not be attending together. That was just one more aspect of being a high level dancer. You didn’t miss class. Vacations were out of the question and sick days weren’t even considered a real thing. Part of me didn’t want to go to class without Jess, but I knew I didn’t really have a choice. Madame had already been kind enough to offer me a teaching position at the studio for the summer, and I knew I could use the money. Skipping class would be a sure way to lose the position. I also didn’t really know how to respond to Jess, so I took the easy way out and just ignored the message and drove to class. Unfortunately, things did not really improve at dance. Because of our advanced level we danced with the university during the school year, but in the summer Madame continued her classes at her private studio. This meant that in the summer our class was very small, and Jess’s absence was noticeable. Then Madame proceeded to give the same lecture that she gave every time someone quit dance, but I had never really listened until it was Jess that she was talking about.

“As you can see one of your classmates has left us,” she began. “But she did not leave us because she was bored or ready for another career or because she could not take the pressure, she left us because she was not careful with her body. She was careless. She gave herself away and now she must pay the price.”

Madame continued on, but I tried to tune it out. I tried to think about anything else, but before I knew it she was ordering us to begin class. I had no choice but to dance, but my heard wasn’t in it. As Madame led us through a series of moves I found myself stumbling on even the easiest turns. This, of course, did not go unnoticed. When we took our water break Caitlin pulled me aside. I’d been dancing with Caitlin almost as long as Jess and we were friends, although we weren’t particularly close.

“Hey, are you okay?” she asked. “You seem kind of off. This thing with Jess is really upsetting you, isn’t it?”

“I guess,” I said. “How do you know?”

“David told me,” she said.

David was Caitlin’s boyfriend, and a friend of Alex’s.

“I didn’t realize everyone knew,” I said. “I kind of thought it was a secret.”

“You know how fast news travels around here,” she said. “But don’t worry, I’m not telling anyone. I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

“I’m okay,” I said. “I just can’t believe it. I don’t know.”

“Yeah,” Caitlin said. “To come this far? And then just quit.”

“She might still come back,” I said. “At least that’s what she told me last night.”

“Yeah, David said they hadn’t decided what they were doing,” Caitlin said.

But our conversation was cut short by Madam calling us back to the floor. When class ended Madam also pulled me aside to discuss my dismal performance.

“I know she was your friend,” she said. “But you cannot let her leaving affect your dance. You have potential. You have a future. Don’t let her end your future as well as hers.”

I wanted to shout back that Jess wasn’t ending her future, she was just changing it, that this wasn’t the end of the world, just the end of Jess’s dancing, but I kept my mouth shut and just nodded.

“Do you understand what I’m saying?” she asked. “You can’t let her mistakes run your life.”

“I know,” I said. I wished she would just hurry up and finish her lecture. I was already cutting it close to make it to work on time, but I didn’t dare tell Madame that I had a job. Although there was no rule against it I knew that Madame would consider it a distraction from my dance. She continued to lecture me for another ten minutes, by which time my only chance of being on time to work involved me arriving in my dance clothes, something which I had hoped to avoid. I was good at changing while driving, but tights were beyond my skill level, so I just tried to drive as fast as I could. 

and for the next part

This is the next part. I hope no one is under the impression that this will be a short story, I guess I should have made that clear, its not exactly going to be epic novel length, hopefully it will end up around the length of the average young adult novel. At least thats the goal, happy reading!   

    It wasn’t always like this. I had started dancing because of my mother, but I kept dancing even after she died because I loved it. I barely even remember her, but almost all of my memories included her dancing. She was not a ballerina, she was a nurse, but she had danced when she was younger. She died when I was eight, but my memories of that age are pretty fuzzy. I remember going to dance classes, taking vacations to the beach and school, but it was as though I was remembering someone else’s life and my parents were just blurry background images to a story that just happened to be mine.

            Her death was even more blurry. I remember the burial, but not the funeral and whenever I asked about what had happened my father told me that she’d been sick and the only elaboration that he’d give me was that she loved me and loved to watch me dance. So I kept dancing. I’d never pushed my dad for more information, it was just the kind of relationship that we had.

            We were not what most people would consider close, but for us it worked very well. My dad was not the talkative type, so we mostly left each other alone, but at the same time we protected each other. I couldn’t remember if he’d always been quiet or just after my mom had died. Hugs and I love yous were not a part of our relationship, but he was always there when I needed a ride to a friends house, or to and from dance practice, so it worked. I mostly took care of myself, I had learned from an early age that rides were about the only thing he was dependable for. I did most of the cooking, which we ate in silence or in front of a movie, and I also handled laundry and cleaning. It wasn’t a typical relationship, but we managed it, at least, until she came along.

            Before her my dad would occasionally yell when I let the house get too messy or didn’t call in time for a ride, but after her he yelled a lot. Nothing was the same. Not the hosue, not the cooking, not the movies, not the sounds. It all changed. And it didn’t change for the better. My dad had never made me feel particularly good about myself, but once she came along he started to make me feel bad about myself. It started small, he’d undermine me or correct me when we both knew I was right to beging with. But as time went on he started getting worse, yelling and calling me rude, stupid or embarrassing if I did anything that she didn’t like.

            Of course, that could be just about anything from parking crooked in the driveway to leaving too much lint in the dryer. I had no idea what my dad saw in her or, or why they had gotten married, but now I was stuck. I’d learned to handle the yelling, bracing myself much as one does for a physical confrontation, but it still hurt a little bit every time. The silence hadn’t been ideal, but I’d take it back any day over her.

            My best friend Jess said that maybe my dad had just been lonely and that she’d seemed like a good idea at the time and now he was filled with regret, but her parents were psychologists, so I knew that sometimes she just listened in while they talked therapy. We’d been best friends since about second grade when she moved to our town and started in my dance class. We were both feeling a little left out at the time, me because my mom had just died and her because she was the new girl. She was smarter than I was, but I was the better dancer. She had better hair, but I could hold a tan while her fair skin burned in about five minutes. She also had a serious boyfriend, while I simply had brothers.

In the end, I suppose, my brothers caused me few problems than her boyfriend did, because it was Jess who called me three days after school ended in the first week of June to tell me that she was pregnant, due sometime in February.

“Pregnant?” I asked. “Are you serious? You’re pregnant? What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I honestly have no idea. I mean, I guess there aren’t that many choices.”

“There’s three,” I said. “But still…that’s definitely not an easy choice. What did Alex say?”

Alex was Jess’s boyfriend. He was also from our small town, a year older than us and they had been dating since our sophomore year. As guys go, he was outstanding, he even tried to understand all of the dedication that went into Jess’s dancing, and he also became my friend. He let me be the constant third wheel on many of their dates, and even went so far as to purchase my movie tickets. He was enrolled to go to the local university in the fall, and in the meantime he was working in construction.

“Alex said it was my choice, and I know there’s only three choices,” she said. “But I don’t want to do any of them. I love babies, and I love babysitting, but I’m not ready to be a mom. I’m pro-choice but I don’t think I can actually have an abortion, and I mean, I guess I could go through adoption, but Maddie, I don’t know if I could do that either.”

“It sounds like you’ve made up your mind then,” I said. “And for the record, I think you’d make a great mom.”

“I’m not sure if I know that,” she said. “I just never thought this would happen. I really didn’t. And I know that I was having unprotected sex, and I know that I was being stupid, but this? This isn’t part of the plan.”

“I know,” I said. “I know.”

And I knew which plan she was talking about. It was the dancing plan. The dancing plan was kind of unspoken, but anyone who had been dancing as long as we had knew about it. You dance through elementary school and high school, then you go to college on a dance scholarship or you join a company straight out of high school. You take it seriously.

“What do I tell my parents?” she asked.

“Don’t tell them anything until you make your decision,” I said. “This is your choice, not theirs. I know they’re smart, but you have to decide this for yourself. This is your child, your life, and I’ll be there for you no matter what, so will your parents, and hopefully so will Alex.”

“Thanks, Maddie,” Jess said. “Just, thanks. Thanks for being here already.”

“Always,” I said, then I listened until she hung up the phone, before slumping down onto my bed.

Jess was smart, but her parents had always been very liberal with their parenting.  Jess was mature for her age, so they let her do what she wanted. Normally it worked out well for us, my dad also let me do what I wanted with very few rules, so we had always been free to enjoy ourselves together. Jess’s parents had also let her have Alex over whenever she wanted, which I guess was how she ended up pregnant, faced with the three terrible choices.

I knew that all of Jess’s freedom would be over if she had a baby, but I was afraid that she would never be the same if she chose not to keep it. A small part of me even said a small, thankful prayer that I wasn’t Jess. I had spent so much of my life wishing that I had her life, two parents, nicer clothes, no need to get a job, but all that hadn’t prepared her for this, and for the first time I could remember, I was completely glad to be me.

After the phone call I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I went to work and folded over 200 boxes, but there was really nothing I could do to take my mind off of it. Everything she had worked for seemed like nothing now, all of her grades in school, all of her dance recitals and the hours we had spent practicing were ending in a pregnancy. The one end neither of us had pictured. 

introduction

This is the opening to my book. It does not yet have a title, nor does it have good chapter divisions, so I am dividing it up as best I can. I hope you enjoy it. 

I am a ballerina. I am a ballerina.

            I kept repeating this to myself, but it didn’t make any difference. I was still stuck at the only pizza place in my small town folding box after box and getting paid minimum wage to be a cashier. Unfortunately, since we were located in a small town we weren’t usually that busy, unless it was a Friday or Saturday night, and this was a Tuesday. I hadn’t even been working there for very long, but I’d already picked up on the pattern of business. I didn’t really like the job, but I’d been given the choice of quitting ballet or paying for it myself, so I chose to get a job. I already worked part time at my ballet studio in the summer teaching the Tiny Tots class, but it didn’t pay enough. The pizza place wasn’t all bad though, despite the boring part, folding boxes was somewhat therapeutic, it gave me time to think, since I wasn’t really paying much attention to what was going on around me anyway. Aside from a few loudly clanging pans and shouted profanities, not much was happening on a Tuesday.

            Today my mind wandered to how I had started this job to begin with. It had all started back when my dad had started dating her. Then, less than a year later they had gotten married and I went from being the only child to the second of six children, all five of hers boys. I was suddenly surrounded by testosterone and by much less money to go around than when it was just me and my dad. Dance lessons were expensive, so I was asked to get a job. It made sense, as her oldest son got a job to pay for college, but I still didn’t like it. I loved dance though, and I wasn’t ready to give it up just yet.

            His marriage also caused me to lose my bedroom, but that was more my choice. It was between my bedroom and my basement dance studio, which had been converted when I was eight. When he got married I just moved my bed and dresser and desk to one side of the studio and left the rest of it for my dancing. It was an unusual set up for a bedroom, but once again, I didn’t want to give up dancing. The set up also gave me a good excuse to stay in my room all the time and stay away from the rest of the new “family”. They weren’t exactly bad people, but I was used to quiet and they were certainly not quiet people. So I spent a lot of time dancing and studying and now I spent a lot of time at work.

            Unfortunately, just as I was contemplating why I didn’t want to ever venture upstairs anymore, someone rang the carryout bell and I was jerked out of my thoughts. After a small rush on pizzas I was back to box folding, all in all not a complicated task, although the perfectionist inside of me made me fold each box very carefully and align them in even stacks on the oven. I’d only been working there for a few months, but already I knew that I could fold at least 100 boxes on a busy night, 200 on a slow night, and 250 on a slow night when I was frustrated from dance. For some reason, frustration always made me fold the boxes a little faster.

            There was another cashier who worked on the nights that I was off, Rachel, but she rarely folded more than 50 boxes. I’d only met her a few times though, and from what I could tell she wasn’t exactly the smartest. We’d been trained together, but she took a lot longer to catch on to the cash register. I don’t claim to be brilliant, I’m an average student but I’m pretty mature for my age, and I also have common sense, something that Rachel evidently lacked.

            Finally, 103 boxes later, bringing my evening total up to 175, it was closing time. I shut off the register, gave the cash and receipts to my manager and grabbed my jacket to leave. It was April, but the air was still cool outside, and it was already dark.

            “Maddie!” someone called after me, just as I got out the door. “Hey! Maddie!”

            “What?” I said, turning around and expecting to see my manager there, asking me to do one last thing while he took a smoke break. Instead, it was Jackson, a friend of my stepbrother’s who had helped me get the job.

            “Hey…” he said, holding his hands up in mock surrender, “I was just wondering if you wanted to go out with us tonight. Its Friday! We’re heading to a party not too far away, I could bring you back to your car afterwards.”

            “I don’t think so,” I said.

            It was not the first time that I’d been invited out and I assumed it would not be the last. I just wasn’t really the partying type, and I had other ways to occupy my evenings, mainly dancing with an occasional side of running. I wasn’t anti-social, I was just focused, or at least that’s what I always told myself. I had a few friends, but that was about it, and they were mostly dance friends. I’d never even really been to a party, and I wasn’t about to start with the people from work.

            “You sure?” Jackson asked.

            “Positive,” I replied, ducking into my car and sliding the key into the ignition. Jackson was nice, but I barely knew him. He was two years older than me, friends with Bobby and went to the local university. Aside from that, he was an empty book, one that I didn’t care to fill. So instead, I drove home and danced until midnight. 

opening

so i have been working on my book for awhile and im hoping to get a little more exposure, or at least some feedback. its no where near finished yet, but im going to post some of the book here. i hope you like it.