Replacing Richelle

4. I definitely regret it

Noah's POV:

We've just finished our duet and Richelle got asked to critique and praise us. She doesn't say anything to me. She just goes on and on about how good Amy is. I can't believe this. As Emily starts speaking again, I walk out.
"Sorry, Emily." I can't do this. Richelle was my best friend. She was the only one I could completely count on. Now, she will barely even say two words to me and I'm pretty sure it's because of Jacquie. She's jealous. She would never be jealous. Would she?

Jacquie comes up to me and giggles at something someone said. I have no idea what, but whatever it was didn't seem that funny to anyone else. I would ask her why she's laughing, but I can't care. Not today. Honestly, I'm not even sure why I'm with her at this point. She got me out of my slump when I'd just broke up with Amanda, but I thought that would just be a summer fling. Being together now is different. I want to only be focused on dance, but she makes it so hard to be. We have to be together on a date of some sort at least once a week. I'm exhausted of doing this now. But I can't call it off because that would break her and I don't want to hurt her. As much as I don't know why I'm still with her, I don't want to hurt her.
"You okay? You seem a little distant?" I sigh. I know I'm being unfair on Jacquie, but losing my best friend is a lot harder than shutting her out.
"Yeah. Sorry, I'm just not in the right headspace." I take my drink and head to studio 1. I may as well go back in there, there's nowhere else for me to go.

"So glad you decided to come back and join us, Noah." Emily says through gritted teeth. Richelle is chatting with Amy, I'm assuming about the duet, when I walk in. As I get closer, I hear some random terms being said.
"Yes, and you can either do a back handspring or a layout." Amy looks slightly confused, but I wouldn't put anything past that girl. She always looks confused.
"Okay. I'll try a layout and see how it goes." Richelle smiles and I can't help but know that it's real. It's the most real smile I've seen from her in months. Maybe she has been smiling more. Maybe I just haven't noticed.
"Noah? Can we try it from the tumble section. I want to try round-off layout instead this time. Richelle said to." She gives me that look, but I don't care. I just walk to my position.

We do our tumbling and I lift her over my head. She comes down and Emily shouts that it looks better like that. We carry on marking the routine and I do my famous turning straddle jump and then she runs and I lift her. She comes down and looks at me. Then we sway, she runs the other way and that's my cue to run after her. I wrap my arms around her and she continues walking off.
"Amy! If I can't perform, you're going to win the competition." I want to ask why she can't perform, but I think that might be personal. So I don't. I definitely regret it.

A/N: Noah's first POV! Honestly, this was quite the challenge to write because (as you may've noticed) I don't like Noacquie or whatever their ship name is. I want Richelle and Noah to be a couple, but with him always trying to replace her... I don't know.
We'll just have to see what happens.