Broken Charms

Falling Apart in Montreal: Part One

“A man in debt is so far a slave.”

― Ralph Waldo Emerson

---Astrid---

I was sure that somebody hated me. There was no other explanation why everything was falling apart right now, when everything was going so well.  My solo in the shows had become the highlight of the evening and Harry and I were better than ever. We had agreed not to let anything break us apart and we were trying o keep our promise to one another. Thing were going so well and now this. I could never believe something like that could ever happen to me. I must have been cursed or extremely hated.

Anne had food poisoning and couldn’t perform in tonight’s show. Everyone was gathered in the huge backstage area and was arguing about a solution but I was the one who had to figure something out. I was the leader of the crew I had to find a way for tonight’s show to go on. Damn! I was locked up in a small room trying to change the formations of the routines without confusing everyone. We were currently in Montreal and Anne’s sickness was so out of nowhere that I couldn’t call the Academy and ask for a replacement like I had done with Jenny. What the hell should I do?

I tried and tried to find a way but all I managed to do was to make a mess of drawn lines in my notebook trying to find a formation good enough for the night, but nothing came into my mind. I was so pressure to figure out a way to solve everything that my good idea had gone out of the window. Everyone was screaming and shouting from outside. The chaos that was taking place outside wasn’t helping my cause either.

I sighed and tore the page I was writing apart. I almost screamed out of frustration. Damn! Damn! Damn! Why did something like that have to happen right now? A soft knock on the door distracted me from my pessimistic thoughts. Elena came in. Oh! Great! What the hell did she want?

“Hey, Astrid! I hope I didn’t interrupt your train of thought.” She said glancing on the floor where there were a lot of torn up pages.

“No, what do you want?” I replied hostilely trying to get her to leave as soon as possible.

“Well, I have something to suggest solving the situation.” She said.

“I’m glad you’re offering to help but I’m sure I’ll…”

“Why don’t you dance in her place?” she said firmly ignoring me.

“What?”

“Well, since you know all the routines you could dance in her place.” she said. She knew I couldn’t that. Anne’s part of the routines was specifically made for her. She was the only one in the dancing crew that had a hip-hop major. No one could do all the twists and the flips she was doing. For me, she was kind of like the firework of the routine. She would a crazy flip every once in a while the crowd would go wild from excitement. Anne and I had designed her part together putting all of our imagination into this twists and flips. She was the only one who could do those things.

“You know I can’t do that. I don’t have the ability to do all those flips.” I said

“It’s true you don’t but you owe me a favor.”

“What are you trying to say exactly?”

“Dance tonight and the pictures of you and Harry will be erased of my cell phone. Don’t dance and tomorrow everyone will know about you two.”

“Elena, you could not possibly be asking me something like that. You know that I out of all people could not do Anne’s part. Doing this could get me injured or worse.” I said stating the obvious. I didn’t have the training or the guidelines to do something like that.