Dance Till You Drop

Chapter 5

It was a few weeks before we were good enough friends that he gave me his number and we started meeting up outside of dancing. During that time, Dad fell into a pattern of weekly drinking and weekly apologizing. Jake listened to me every Thursday at ballet, and occasionally brought me a coffee to get me through the sleepless nights. I didn't have a lot of time on my hands most days, what with learning the dances, schoolwork, and now Dad's weekly trips to the bar, but I made time for Jake - and for Ella, my fabulous best friend.

Ella was little, lithe, and scary. She looked for all the world like a twelve-year-old, but say that to her face and you were getting beaten up. She was also a dancer, and we'd been going to the same classes since before I can remember, though she went to a different school. She was the one who was lifted high into the air by the guys, because she wasn't much heavier than a feather. In cheer-leading, she was a flier and I was a base. But despite our differences, all blondes need a brunette best friend, and I wouldn't give her up for all of the former British Empire. Often after the final night of our shows, I'd crash at her house, just because it was closer, and there was no way I could be bothered to spend 20 minutes in the car just to have to wake up and go inside when I could walk less than 50 feet down the street to Ella's.

Ella liked Jake as much as I did, and was constantly torn between wanting to date him herself and shipping him with me. Since I wasn't sure I wanted either of these things to happen, I laughed about it and hoped she would stop soon.

Have you ever wondered about something so much that it blew it all out of proportion, until you're sure you're seeing things that aren't there, and you must be reading to much into this? Because for all I told myself and Ella there was nothing going on between us, I felt like maybe, just maybe, he liked me. I didn't know how I felt about this, but I'd done it before, which was why I suspected it was just my brain making assumptions. But if it was, was that because it wanted these things to be true?

Why is this so complicated?

Oh well.