Gia showed up and we started working, trying to get our minds off of the bad news. She tooke the first hour doing group in the one studio, then once the second hours started, she ran solos in one studio, while the other girls ran group with one girl missing. When Gia called me in for my solo, she showed me a picture on her phone. "We don't want anyone knowing Abby did your solo, so we're changing the music and the costume. Your new song is called "Money Makes the World Go 'Round" from cabaret, and your new solo costume is this.
The photo pulled up on her phone was of my new costume, a sparkly silver leotard with a scrunch in the middle, with a sparkly black high-low verst and a black belt. It came with a little headpiece too.
I nodded my head and ran my solo. Gia didn't talk much, only to give small corrections like "Watch your feet here" and "Straighten your leg there". After I ran my solo, everyone gathered their stuff and we went upstairs. The moms were watching tv together, and we slowly trickled out of the Ziegler's house. I climbed into my car in the driveway and fell asleep, happy to get some rest.
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The next few days went by as normal, school then dance then homework then home. It wasn't too much, thinking about Abby, but you could tell it affected Maddie and I's dancing the most. Mainly Maddie. You watched her perform her solo, it was like she wasn't even there. She had stellar technique, and her leaps were still high, but it just wasn't on point for Maddie. Her face was blank the whole time. Thursday night, before I went to bed, I was texting her. She was getting really sad because nobody was telling us what was wrong with Abby, and she knew it was affecting her dancing.
[text conversation]
m- I can just tell that I'm not doing as well as I normally do.
k- It's not your fault, you just need to channel the feelings you have in real life into the story.
m- that's the thing. abby never got around to telling me the story....
k- then how did you learn the whole solo?
m-she wanted me to go over it at home, then come back the next day and guess what it was about. then we show up the next day and she isn't even there. Gia doesn't know what it's about either.
k- well what do you think it's about?
m- id on't really know. It's hard. the song is mainly instrumental, but the parts where she does sing say things about like painting pictures and dreaming about the stars, then the last part is the lady singing a capella and she says After I wake up, I see the stars are gone, and my canvas is empty, I realize that I am enough. Like shouldn't she be realizing she's not enough? I don't really know.
k- I have an idea...
m-what?
k-I'm gonna make up the story for your song and you'll be able to emote it perfectly.
m-okay....
k-just trust me.
m-well hurry up, the competition is tomorrow.
k-one sec.
k-okay, SOOO... the story is about a dance teacher. She basically ends up having to leave without telling her students why. You're one of the students. and when you dream at night, you dream of all the dances you used to do with her, and how happy you were. And even though when you wake up, she's gone, you still remember that you were once having so much fun. And now even though you feel abandoned, you know you are enough to make it by yourself, because that's what she prepared you for. She's still with you anyways, just in your dreams.
I saw Maddie read the text, but she didn't reply. Not until the next morning.
Author's Note: The picture in the side bar is of Kendall's new costume! :)
