Silence (Dance Moms Fanfic)

Chapter Three

Chapter Three

“How was school?” Kelly asked as Brooke opened the door to the passenger seat. Josh opened the back seat and climbed in himself. Kelly usually had the kids ride the bus, but she liked picking them up and dropping them off. With their busy schedules, they all needed a few minutes together. A ten minute ride home and a thirty minute ride to dance, and then Kelly had to take Josh to hockey or to a friend’s house. Everyone was always going somewhere, but luckily, Brooke would be getting her learners license that coming January when she turned sixteen. She’d have to wait another year before getting her real license, but Kelly was still looking forward to it. And Brooke was too.

“Fine.” Brooke replied, as she did every day after school. Even if it wasn’t fine, she still said fine. Sometimes she’d say good if she had a really great day, but Brooke never admitted to having a bad day. Not right away, at least. Kelly would find out, eventually. Sometimes, Brooke would call Kelly up to her room and talk about it. Like when Nolan broke up with her during her freshman year.

Brooke had been upset about it, but didn’t say anything. She went through a miserable afternoon at dance, getting hooted at by Nick and Brandon and Kevin, a guy who was competing with the studio for a week or two. She sat through a boring dinner with the little kids and then went home to do a butt load of homework. It must’ve been around midnight when Brooke called Kelly up into her room. She’d been helping Paige with her homework, poor girl was still awake, trying to figure out the last few of her math problems. Kelly came up and talked with Brooke for a few minutes. Reassuring her that nothing was wrong with her and that boys were stupid. Just a small talk like that meant a lot to Brooke. And to Kelly.

Kelly gave Brooke a small look. Brooke didn’t notice. She picked at her finger nails and ignored the seat belt strap that was raised a bit too high. Josh sat front seat that morning and readjusted it. Josh, in the back seat, stared out the window. Kelly turned back a bit, to look at her son. “Fine,” Josh said as he caught his mother’s gaze. One thing about Josh was that he never held anything back. By Josh saying that his day at school was fine meant something happened.

Kelly put her car in park and unbuckled her seat belt, turning and looking at the two oldest children, the only children in the car. “Okay, what happened?”

“I’ll tell you later….” Brooke said under her breath, her voice cracking. Josh hesitated before looking back out the window. “We picking Paige up?”

“No, she insisted on riding the bus home. Something about a boy…” Kelly said, buckling her seat belt and driving away from Franklin Regional Senior High School.

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Brooke sat on the floor in the bathroom. Her back against the hot pink wall and her knees brought to her chest. A wad of mascara-stained toilet paper was hidden away in her hands. Her unsteady breath filled the empty, echoing room. Brooke couldn’t believe that her best friend had said such rude things to her. Now that Brooke was aware of how Tori felt, she’d never forgive her. Brooke scrolled through Tori’s tweets, reading them and noticing which ones were about her. Including the, “Lol, you don’t even know this is about you,” tweet. That one hurt the most of all of them. Brooke grunted, her ten minute break had been over for at least fifteen minutes, if not more.

Pushing herself up off of the ground, Brooke threw her crumpled piece of tissue in the garbage. Her head was stuffy and her feet seemed a lot lighter than before. Brooke hated crying. She didn’t like to do it. Of all of the girls on her dance team, she was the girl who cried the most. It didn’t seem like that on the show. The cameras always seemed to be around when Kendall was crying or Chloe or Paige or Maddie. Kenzie rarely cried, and Brooke was generally a closet crier. She liked to hide when she cried. It was weird, but it made the most sense for a fifteen year old girl. As she looked over herself in the mirror, it was obvious she’d been crying. Whenever Brooke cried her face turned to a reddish-purple color and her eyes where ten times as bright blue as they usually were.