Tumbler Queens

Ama

Ama POV

Hey! I am Ama Jones. (Am•uh) Yes, I have a weird name, but Ama is not my real name. My real name is Amanda. My family gave me the nickname Ama for short. In my opinion, I like Ama better. When people call me Amanda I just feel so formal. I am 15. I am a cheerleader/tumbler. If you don't know what tumbling means, it's a sport almost like gymnastics, only everything is on the floor. There is no equipment. In my opinion, I like tumbling better than gymnastics. I've been doing tumbling since I was six. Tumbling is my life. I would not give it up for anything.

*Beep Beep Beep Beep*

"Agh! Stop you stupid alarm!" I scream into my pillow. Like most girls, I do not go well with waking up in the morning. School just started a few days ago, and I am already mentally done with school. I know school is supposed to be good for you, but sometimes it just feels like a waste of time. I hit the snooze button on my alarm once again for the fifth time.

I don't want to get up...

Can I call in sick?

Yeah...yeah...that's what I'll do.

"Ama! Get up! You are so late!" My sister Josie scolded. Josie is younger than me, but she tries to act older than me. Like many siblings, she gets on my nerves "Tell mom I don't feel well." I mumbled.

"Do you need to call in sick? Last night you seemed perfectly fine!"

Geez! This chick!

"Are you my mom? Tell mom I don't feel well!" I mumbled.

Josie rolled her eyes and groaned. "Ugh! I am not your maid!"

"Then why did mom and dad have you?"

Gosh, really

The door slam shut.

Finally.

I thought she'd never leave.

Sadly. Yes, I had to get up and honestly, I felt like crap. I walked out of my room and into the bathroom me and my siblings shared. "Oh look who's up!" My dad exclaimed. My dad is an engineer. He works for himself and goes to plants all over the world.

"Oh... Hey dad." I mumbled before stepping into the bathroom. I looked in the mirror and saw a horrible mess. My dirty blonde hair is tangled it looked like it was teased. It looked like I had straight dreadlocks.

Oh, Mylanta.

I brushed my tangled hair and hopped into the shower. The warm water felt so good on my sore joints. Last night I had tumbling practice, and they pushed us hard. I finished my quick shower, wrapped a towel around me, and ran across the hallway into my bedroom.

I threw on a T-shirt that had our tumbling cheer name, the Georgia Falcons. I go to Georgia flyers tumbling. And each level has the name. I am on the Georgia Falcons. My sister is on the Georgia Seahawks and my baby sister, who is 6 is on the Georgia Seagulls. There is another level above me who is the Georgia Eagles. I throw on some Nike leggings and my converse. I fix my hair in a high ponytail and apply my lip balm. I don't wear much makeup. It feels too heavy on my face, but I will make exceptions.

I ran downstairs to eat my breakfast. My whole family was already seated at the table, and more than halfway done.

"Oh look someone is finally up!" My brother Dylan said. Dylan is 13. He is not as annoying as you would think he is. He's actually quite helpful. He listens to all my stupid rants, and he just listens in general. He's really a gentleman. If he wasn't my brother, I would probably have a crush on him...I swear I am not a creep!

"Yeah, yeah. I'm sorry I slept in." Everyone just smiled.

"Josie said you didn't feel well. Are you feeling right now?" Mom asked

"Yeah, I am doing fine," I replied while dishing up some pancakes on my plate. Sweet, sweet pancakes.

My mom was a stay-at-home mom. She was all that you could ask for in a mother. She was sweet, she was funny,  she was caring, she would listen to you, besides one of my friends, she is one of my best friends.

"Guys, you might want to hurry up. The bus is here." My mom said. I was a quick eater, so wasn't a trouble to eat fast. I probably looked like a greedy chipmunk stuffing his cheeks full of nuts.

All of us kids ran up to our rooms to get our backpacks and homework. Thankfully, I am a fairly smart student and I'm pretty great with time management when I want to be. The whole sloo of children ran downstairs and went one by one out the door while her mother said goodbye for the next few hours.

The bus ride was the same. Annoying kids, cool kids, regular kids, music kids, dance kids, gymnastics/tumbling kids, the mean kids, and the nerd kids. As you probably already know, I am the gymnastics/tumbling kids. Every school has a group of kids, sometimes the groups get along with each other, sometimes they don't. Well in our school, it's kind of both. Us tumblers get along with the dancers. But a lot of the other ones do not.

I sat in my regular seat in the middle of the bus, and put my earbuds in. I listen to all kinds of music, but at this point, I was listening to Ed Sheeran. It felt like we stopped 60 times until we reached the school. The flow of kids came out of the buses one by one.

Everyone ran to their lockers to put the books that they didn't need yet in. My first class was geography. I loved my geography teacher, she made everything seem fun. As IISuperwomanII (Lilly Singh) would put it, she would be a cool cat. "All right sit down, settle down. Thank you."

I took my notes and paid attention (for once). Some of my friends teased me about being a nerd. I am not a nerd. I just want to get good grades and get into a good college. I was trying to focus on my notes but my brain told me otherwise.

I wonder what is going to be in the cafeteria today. Wait, no, Ama you need to focus back on your notes. You can do this get good grades. But I hope that the cafeteria food will be good today. Good, grief Ama! This isn't like you! Focus back on your studies!

As the teacher drones on about Asia, I look around the room to see half of the class looking down at their laps. Of course, they were on their phones. Don't be a pervert. They were most likely on Snapchat, messaging other friends in different classrooms. I'll be honest, I've done it too, but I have gotten better.

We aren't even five minutes into the lecture and the class is completely zoning out.

Finally.

*RING RING RING*

Everyone gathered their books and went to the second period.

Same process and over again in chemistry. Only there is an addition, doing the experiments. I had a terrible lab partner. He was so lazy he told me to take the notes and do the whole experiments. He was just plain dumb. No, he was not a bad boy, he was just a dumb kid. He's that kind of kid who sleeps through class. Now I admit, one time when I was very little, I was really tired and I fell asleep during class. But this kid...really. "Take the notes for me, loser." I rolled my eyes. "Look. I'm going to take my own notes. You can copy off of mine. But I am not going to take yours too." "OK, calm down, Emma."  People mistake my name for Emma. And it annoys the fadoodle cakes out of me. "For the last time! My name is not Emma! My name is Ama!" This was our daily school conversation.

Thank goodness the classes seemed really quick today. My squad headed to the cafeteria after the bell rang. "Did you know I got a fake fingernail in my taco salad yesterday?" One of my friends said. There was a lady in the cafeteria who had a manicure every single day. A different one. Every single day. Yeah, I know. "Ewwww! Did you eat it?" Another girl asked "Oh goodness no! I would've never done that!" I swear every day our conversations get weirder and weirder.

The school day couldn't be more boring. After what seems like forever, the school finally passed. Now it was time to rally up all my siblings and go to tumble practice.