Authors: Ellen Hopkins
Tags: #Juvenile Fiction, #Social Issues, #Drugs; Alcohol; Substance Abuse, #Self-Esteem & Self-Reliance, #Dating & Sex
Turn. Turn. Pause. I think
I used to be better at this.
Where the hell did Duvall
go? He can’t be more talented
at something than I am, can he?
Because that just isn’t right.
Of course, if I didn’t have
to be so cautious, I could kick
his ass, on or off skis. Since
I don’t want broken bones
right now, however, I’ll pick
my way to the bottom of
this pine tree slalom course.
Finally it intersects a long
beginner run where I can pick
up enough speed to catch Duvall.
It isn’t hard, considering he’s
waiting for me at the fringe of
a small stand of cedars. He waves
rather frantically for me to join
him.
Check it out,
he says,
pointing into the trees.
Jesus,
O’Connell, you turned her, like,
gay.
What’s he talking about?
I lift my goggles, look hard
at where his finger is aimed.
Two girls on snowboards…
wait. What the fuck? It’s Cara,
for sure. She’s with that girl, the one
with spiky hair, now frosted
blue. They are chest to chest,
and they are kissing. Not just
kissing like friends do. Kissing
like people who are in love do.
Andre
People Who Are In Love
Expect certain things.
Time together, to learn
all there is to know about
each other. Falling in
love
can happen to complete
strangers. Staying in love
requires being best friends
and
that means accepting the person
beneath the veneer. What
complicates things is
sex.
Loveless, it’s easy. Insert
Tab A into Slot B. Enjoy what
happens naturally. But under
love’s influence, the directions
aren’t
quite so straightforward.
It is then, striving for perfection,
you realize that all Slot Bs are not
interchangeable.
When It Comes To Sex
I was kind of a late bloomer. Not that
I didn’t know what it
was, or think about maybe having it one
day. At eleven or twelve, I started having
all the problems young
guys do, waking up sticky and sometimes
turning into walking wood, wrong place,
wrong time. Embarrassing
stuff. My first actual encounter was with
an Oakland girl—one of Gramps’s neighbors.
She was a couple of years
older than me. Every guy should have an older
woman for his first. She taught me every
move in the Big Book
of Sex. Guess she liked playing teacher.
I was fifteen. After that, I kind of got a taste
for it, and let me just say,
private school girls aren’t exactly all prudes.
But none of them can come close to Jenna
when it comes to
doing the dirty. Part of it is because I love
her, and love really does put a whole
different spin on getting
naked together. But Jenna knows more
than that Oakland girl and my preppie
lays all rolled up into one.
Without carrying a single iota of shame.
I have no idea where she learned what
she knows. To tell
the truth, I really don’t want the details.
Enough to have her for my own, doing
those things to me.
Hopefully, we’ll be doing them tonight.
This Afternoon, Though
I’m helping Liana teach a dance workshop
for a bunch of underprivileged
kids. Some of them are really young—like four.
First, I want you to see how the body
is meant to move,
Liana tells the group, who are sitting
on the floor beneath the barre.
Andre,
will you please dance
the jazz routine—the one to Coltrane.
She fires up “While My Lady Sleeps,” superb
classic sax from one
of the greatest jazz musicians of all time.
Beat comes first, and it remains steady under
the sad song of the saxophone.
The music closes around me, and I draw
it inside, a flowing current that my muscles
float upon. Contract. Release.
I am the music, and the music is my body.
And when it stops, I come out of the trance
that is jazz dance. If there
is a God, he listens to John Coltrane.
The sound of clapping hands pulls me back
into the studio. Lots of
little hands. And some bigger ones too.
Shantell has appeared, like a backlit cloud
reflected on still
water. The look on her face is hard to read.
But then she smiles as Liana says,
Okay,
kids. Let’s break up into
groups. Shantell, Andre, help divide them
up, and each of you take a group of ten or so.
Today is all about movement.
Let the music tell you what to do, like Andre did.
Awesome Day
The kids are amazing, so eager to learn.
I never thought about
teaching before, but I really love working
with them. It makes me feel like I’ve got
something to give, and
I’m sorry it has to end. Guess we all have
places to go, though. There’s a chorus of
thank yous as they leave,
and when the studio has emptied, Shantell
comes over.
I really hate to say this, and
have it go to your head
and all, but you are an incredible dancer.
How long have you been training?
She
waits for an answer
she probably doesn’t want to hear.
“A little over a year. I started after we
moved here to Reno.”
As I suspected, she reacts with a scowl.
That’s
it
? What made you decide to take
lessons, then? Did you,
like, wake up from a dream, doing pliés?
God she’s funny. “Not exactly. Actually,
it was that TV show—
So You Think You Can Dance.
I’ve always
liked street dancing. Used to do it some
when we lived in the Bay
Area. I saw this b-boy picking up ballroom
and thought maybe if he could, I could.
I found Liana online,
and that was straight from heaven.
She tapped something inside me I might
not ever have found
without her. That’s my story. The end.”
But She’s Not Quite Finished
With me.
So what are you going to do
with all that talent?
Go pro? You could, you know. There are—
I stop her with a shake of my head. “No
way my parents are
going to let their only son make a living
onstage some place. It was always just for
fun. Dancers don’t make
the kind of money I need to be comfortable.”
Now she looks totally disgusted.
Money?
You can’t be serious.
Dance isn’t about money. It’s about heart.
If it isn’t, you damn well don’t deserve
the gift God gave you.
I can’t believe you’d let it go to waste!
She jumps up, stomps across the hardwood
floor. “Lots of talent goes
to waste.” My voice is lost in her footsteps.
Every Time
I’m around her, I like her more. Not
sure she could say
the same thing about me. In fact, pretty
sure not. Oh well. She doesn’t know
my parents, or that I’m
already a major disappointment to them.
Wonder how they’d feel about me teaching.
Other than the money thing.
Because teaching isn’t about money either.
As I start to head out, Liana gestures to
me to come closer.
Uh… I happened to overhear your
conversation. Shantell is right, you know.
You were destined to
dance. If you try to ignore that, you’ll be
completely miserable. A new TV dance show
is holding auditions in L.A.
next month. I hope you’ll consider trying out.
Me? On TV?
On the
Jeopardy! College Championship,
maybe. If I go to college,
that is. But on a dance show? That would
require letting the world know I dance. Which
means letting my parents
know I dance. Putting all that aside, however,
that kind of competition is for
real
dancers,
not a novice like me.
I tell Liana, “I’ll think about it, okay?”
Not for too long. We’ll want to come up
with something really
special for your audition. Call me tomorrow.
Tomorrow? No problem. I already know
what I’m going to say.
The Quattro takes me home. It must, because
I’m not thinking much about where to turn it.
I’m thinking about Shantell.
Dance isn’t about money. It’s about heart.
Is Dance My Heart?
I can’t say that it is. The only thing
that feels that way
right now is Jenna. She is an obsession,
really. Not sure why. She says she’s not
in love with me. Can never
be. Does soul-splitting love have to be
returned to make it real? If I had to give
her up, it would open
a black hole inside of me. But what about
dance? If I had to give it up… what? I park
my car, go inside to shower.
Run the water hot, make the bathroom steam.
Soap. Shampoo. Routine. Dance, I realize,
is my escape from ordinary.
If I had to give it up, I would lose something
integral. Why am I afraid to confess that?
I dance. Train. Work hard
to improve. Doesn’t that mean I’m a dancer?
Believing I Am
Should mean being proud that I am, which
means telling the world.
I’ll start with Jenna, work my way up.
We’re going to a party tonight. Always
an adventure with Jenna.
When she gets in the car, it’s obvious
her personal party has begun. “You drinking
already?” I think her condition
must be due to more than alcohol. But I’m not
stupid enough to say so.
Only a little.
I don’t want to pass
out before we even get there, you know?
I won’t comment on that. “So, hey. I want
to tell you something.…”
Tell her, quick, before the fire goes out.
Okay, but I have to tell you something first.
Your mom thinks Kendra
is anorexic.…
The flame extinguishes.
Cara
Fire
Some people say love is fire—
flame fanned into inferno. A
raging
that all too predictably burns
through the years, fades into
smoldering,
burns down into ash, soot
that cannot be rekindled.