Practice Makes Perfect (Completed)

Chapter 7

Anastasia was furious.

In fact, she had never been more furious in all of her life.

Some disabled toddler and arrogant stunt double had stolen her title. Her right fully earned title.

And the worst part was, she couldn't even work off the anger by dancing, because she was stuck in the stupid chair.

"Calm down Anastasia."

Instead, she decided to kick her wheelchair with her bad foot. She was sure it would have hurt if she hadn't still been mostly numb from the lidocaine.

Without asking her permission, her coach wheeled her out of the theater. Her helplessness just made her even more angry.

"How could they give it to them? I thought you said they sucked!"

She started to push herself out of the wheelchair, but her coach grabbed her shoulder and pushed her back down.

"You need to calm down."

"Calm down? She's ruining my plan!"

"This isn't the end of the  world. We'll sign you up for some qualifying match, and you'll make the state meet, no problem."

"And how will I do at the qualifying meet with my leg all wrapped up in a cast?" Anastasia held out her bad leg to demonstrate, then in another moment of anger, whacked it against the chair again.

"You'll be fine. Even if you don't make it to states, it'll be alright. Ballet isn't everythign you know."

And then, Anastasia couldn't stop herself from crying. To her, ballet was everything, and the cripple was taking that away from her. Some stupid, pitying judges had chosen the ego of some little girl over the integrity of the sport, and over Anastasia herself, and she couldn't take it. She had sacrificed too much to let it all be ruined by a little girl who decided to put on a tutu for five minutes and play the part of a ballerina.

Her coach had never seen her cry before, and just stood by awkwardly as she tried to wipe away the tears.

"Do you know what you said earlier about my parents?" she asked.

The coach nodded.

"They've never been around that much, and I just thought...I just thought that maybe if I could show them..."

The coach looked awkward as Anastasia blubbered through her sentences.

"Maybe if I could show them I was goo enough, they would pay attention."

And then Anastasia was crying even more, because she realized how stupid and pathetic she sounded. The awards ceremony was coming close to the end, and people were starting to sneak out the back, each on walking past her with the same look of uncomfortable pity. Anastasia hated to be looked at with pity. She wanted to be looked at with fear, with awe, with admiration. Never with pity.

"This won't be your last chance to show them."

"Won't it? With this leg I'll never qualify for states, and then I won't even have a chance at nationals. No one who misses nationals ever gets noticed."

"Maybe, but--"

"Just stop." Anastasia wiped her tears away with the back of her hand. "Just leave me alone."

Anastasia rolled away, leaving behind the theater and her lifelong coach.