Ryder the Love Expert | Protector 2.1

Chapter 18

The video attached is of:
1) The song Ryder uses for his solo
2) Myles and Briar (aka Ryder and Mae) dancing, so I thought I'd show that. But I'm not sure if you can view it on a mobile device because of copyright issues, even though they had permission to use the song.

Chapter 18

       "Nervous?" Mae asked me as I watched the current dancer on the stage.

       "Me? Nervous?" I asked, followed by a scoff. "....Yeah, a bit. I have to keep my spot as the Male Soloist here and everyone here is so talented."

       Mae rested a hand on my shoulder. "Ryder, you'll do great. No, you'll do better than great. You'll do amazing."

       I sighed. "I don't know."

       Mae raised an eyebrow. "What is this? Is Ryder Tony Prince doubting himself? Where are your arrogant comments? Where's the 'I know I'll do amazing' or 'These people can suck it'?"

       Stupid Nonpareil approached us, every single one of them with a smirk on their face. "Aww, is Ryder scared?" Raphael asked.

       "No," I said. Scared and nervous were to different things.

       However, most of my nervousness seemed to have disappeared just by looking at their smirks. I, admit, was a bit too competitive at times, but these guys were going down again.

       "I'm not letting go of the title," I said, crossing my arms over my chest. "If I won lost year, and the year before that, and a bunch of other years, what makes you think I'm going to lost to you for once?"

       "Because I am not going down without a fight," Raphael said. "I am going to dance my hardest, because I will win that title."

       "Good luck with that," I said.

       Raphael gave me another smirk before the team walked passed my, bumping my shoulders purposefully. I sighed and turned my attention back to the stage as the current dancer just finished, the audience applauding.

       "Up next is Raphael from Nonpareil," the MC announced. Raphael walked onto the stage, looking overly-confident. The music started playing and he started dancing. I had to admit, he was trying his best. I honestly hadn't seen him dance this good before, which said something, because I always knew he was a good dancer.

       But that didn't mean I was going to admit defeat. I hadn't even danced yet and I was not letting him take my title. I wasn't doing it just for me, I was doing it for my team. D.A.N.C.E., although winning small competitions here and there, had always been looked down on, even though I think we were one of the best studios. 

       And even though I had been the Male Soloist for a while, we were still looked down on. So I was going to prove all those naysayers wrong. Because not only were we going to win a lot of the small competitions, we were going to place first in the Sector Competition.

       When Raphael finished, the crowd went crazy.

       "Whoa," Isla said. "That was....Whoa."

       "Ryder can do better than that," Dempsey said. "....Right?"

       I didn't reply as Raphael walked off the stage. "Beat that, Ryder."

       "I will," I said.

       "Up next is Ryder from D.A.N.C.E."

       Mae wrapped her arms around me and kissed my cheek. "Good luck, Ryder," she said.