A Nerd, a Tough Kid and the Wonder of Dance

Chapter 11: comp day

The competition ran for a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon; I think that there were about a dozen acts. The unknowns and lesser performers (which included Jena and myself) were on in the first session and then the better acts on after the interval. We had drawn the last spot before the interval - that seemed like a good omen to me.

Shit, we were nervous. I mean, Jena, fair enough, but why was I? Plenty of times during my sporting career I'd played/performed in front of much larger crowds than we had here today. I should have been cool.

But this seemed to be very important to me; I wanted us to go well.

We started badly - some awkwardness, a number of minor errors - but we hung in there and it came together. For our finale, I hurled Jena up into the air. She held herself erect, spinning around, her elbows out, her skirt swirling out and her ponytail flying.

There were gasps from the audience and terrific applause as I scooped her out of the air and spread her across my knee.

Offstage, Jena leaning against me, shaking and gasping for breath, "We started awful, babe. We must have looked horrible."

Shaking and gasping a bit myself. I put my arms around her, "We finished strong, Jen, really strong. They liked us in the end. Come on, we'd better go and see our folks."

Jena's parents were coming and so was my mother. We didn't take the time to change.

"You guys were great," Mrs Akerman gushed as she gave us both a kiss.

"We started shocking, Mum . . ."

"But that finish . . ."

Mr Akerman was shaking his head amusingly, "You are certainly a very strong lad, Garth, but don't you ever drop my daughter, you bugger."

"No way," I replied grinning and giving his shoulder a squeeze.

"He'll never drop me, Dad, never."

I looked around and spotted my mother . . . and lo and behold, my father. I went over, gave Mum a hug and said to my father, "Thanks for coming, Dad."

"Humph."

I gave a small laugh as I realised that I was still wearing my stage make-up. "You have to wear make-up on stage, Dad, otherwise you face looks washed out."

Another 'humph', milder this time. "Come and meet Jena and her folks."

Introductions, my father polite, but reserved. There was a lot of excited talk, then Jena and I went and got changed and joined our parents to watch some of the later performances.

During the rest of the year, Jena and I entered three more minor competitions. We did well and we could see that we were starting to be a force. Mrs Reinke was pleased with our development.

In the early half of the new year (which was I and Jena's final year of high school) we won two of the minor comps. Yeah, we were now a force.

We decided to go for a major comp to be held later in the year.