𝑯𝑨𝑵𝑮𝑰𝑵𝑮 𝑯𝑨𝑻𝑺 ♥︎ 𝑶𝒓𝒍𝒂 𝑻𝒂𝒚𝒍𝒐𝒓 (The Next Step)

𝑳𝒆𝒂𝒗𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑵𝒆𝒙𝒕 𝑺𝒕𝒆𝒑

Dear Miss Taylor,

I hope this letter finds you well. I would like to thank you, on behalf of all of us here, for your application and interview, and I am very pleased to tell you that you have been admitted to spend the next academic year here.

With this letter we have enclosed a started package complete with a map of the campus so you can start to familiarise yourself with it.

We hope to see you attending.

She had got it a week ago.

She had announced she was leaving six days ago.

She had called Miss Kate five days ago.

She had had many thank you gifts and cards four days ago.

And for the past three days, she had been at the studio, trying not to move around.

Today was her last day.

She had been there the whole day, from around six, organising things and sorting paperwork.

There had been a party that day, celebrating Orla and all she had done.

Pictures of her with her friends at two years old onwards had been pulled up, and there had been a cake with a still from her and James' Internationals duet on it.

James.

He had been there since the beginning, that annoying, arrogant, irritating but so darn cute boy. Her rival first. Then her friend. Then her best friend. Then her boyfriend. Then the love of her life. Her soulmate. Her ride or die.

And James had been supportive of her when she told him she was leaving. He had been beyond happy that she had been accepted into uni, and even more so that it was close enough for him to visit.

But enough about James. Emily was another. They had been been bitter enemies, and the best of friends, but they always knew where they stood with each other.

But Orla knew they would never be enemies again.

Because they were always going to be best friends.

But still, the party had been great, and the team had really pulled through, being sad to see Orla go, but happy that she was following her dreams.

The celebration had ended at around eight.

But yet there Orla was, sitting in the office. It was now just past ten.

Suddenly, she didn't think she could do it.

Who was she kidding? She couldn't leave.

She looked out at the partially dark studio from where she was sitting. No one was there. She was driving Noah home, but he was in a sulk after his recent break up with Amanda, and was in the cafe right now, getting a drink.

It was just her, looking at the studio she had danced in for her whole life.

And she hated to even think about leaving it, especially after the Regionals win, but she... she wanted to go to college.

She made the impromptu decision to head out into the studio, standing in the centre of it.

She looked up at her face in the mirror.

She could still remember the day that tiny, two year old Orla Taylor stood in front of that exact mirror for the first time.

God, had she changed since then.

She was now eighteen, and had spent a solid sixteen years at TNS.

And it had been the best time of her life.