Firebird

Chapter 5- Show Off

Chapter 5- Show Off

“Again, again.”

   I rolled my shoulders, determined to make it up the ribbon. Every muscle and bone in me ached and screamed for me to quit. I twisted my wrists in the silk and lifted myself up.

   Ryo watched me carefully, constantly critiquing my work. She would make me do things over and over to get them exactly right because she planned for me to perform in the next city.

  I thought it odd that it wasn’t Chalavar’s job to ensure his performers were good enough to begin. When I asked Ryo of this she only shrugged and said, “If you were really bad he might check up on you more often. You must be up to his standards.”

   I was halfway up. My arms shook violently. Beads of sweat trailed down my face and hands. I wrapped my right foot around in the silk then tucked my other leg around the upper half. I gently and slowly let myself fall backwards. I reached my arm back and grabbed the ribbon where my foot was.

   I did it.

   I finally did an actual stunt on the ribbons. I unrolled and dropped down to the floor. I was beaming. If light shined from me when I was happy, I would’ve been blinding. Ryo wasn’t one to compliment but I could see in her eyes she was proud of me. She gave me a slight nod.      

“Good. We’re done for today. Meet back tomorrow and we’ll try to move on through the routine.”

   I snatched up my bag of my clothes, rosins and such and headed out of the tent. I paused and turned back. She was already up the ribbon and doing a sort of aerial split.

   “Thank you.” I said. My voice echoed slightly through the nearly empty tent.

   Without looking she answered, “For what?”

   “Helping me. I know I’ve been a burden-“

   She turned toward me, clutching the ribbons in one hand. “No. Not at all.” She smiled slightly and continued practicing.

   Sometimes she was hard to read. She always was absentminded and somewhat standoffish. But beneath that, there was so much more to her than I knew.

   I walked out and headed to the dressing trailer to change from my sweaty practice suit. It was cool outside but not quite what would be considered cold. The sky was grey. I was so tired of grey. My hometown was almost always dreary much like Farplane.

   I changed into a loose shirt and pants. It felt much better after the body hugging suit I’d worn all day. I stood in the mirror and took the pin out of my hair letting it fall over my shoulders. I didn’t like the way it looked when it was down. It was tangled and knotted. My bangs were too long and tucked behind my slightly pointed ears. It made my pointed nose and dull green eyes less noticeable though.

   The door to the trailer suddenly burst open and Astley hopped inside. “Come Bella! We must hurry! No time to waste-“

   “What’s wrong?” I asked, worriedly. It wasn’t until I looked into his sparkling blue eyes that I realized nothing was wrong at all. “You know this is the girls’ trailer?”

   He grinned and looked around at the frilly pink decor. “Yes, I know. Smells much nicer in here than the men’s. Now come! Let’s go!”

   I took his hand and we ran across the sharp, grassy field to the camp. It was hard to keep up with him, for his legs were much longer than mine. I could tell he ran a bit slower than he normally would because of this.

   There was a small group of red haired jugglers in the middle of the camp. They tossed flaming torches and huge knives at each other without flinching. But the strangest thing was, they were wearing blindfolds.