Dreams of America

Los Angeles School of the Arts

When I'd arrived at LAX, Ricky greeted me with a black mini that my Mum had paid for, so the next morning I jumped in it and drove to Los Angeles School of the Arts (LAA). Finally arriving at the school I pulled into the parking lot. The school itself was grand; like an old victorian building it had turrets and must have been at least three floors, it took up at least 300 metres in every direction. The car park was just the usual tarmac grey and ha a few trees. I was guessing by the number of parking spaces that there would've been a lot of students arriving.
In my acceptance pack, it gave me options to pick four other subjects that I would study on top of dance. I picked History, Geography, Biology and Chemistry. Also included in the acceptance pack was homework that I was required to complete before I came. It wasn't much but I carried it around in folders that would soon also contain my school work. On top of that, I was lugging around a bag full of all my dance wear; tights, more tights, about three leotards, ballet shoes, jazz shoes, tap shoes, hair stuff, deodorant, emergency snacks and finally a water bottle.

So as you can imagine when I stepped out of my car and a boy about the same age as me knocked me right off my feet and scalded my skin with the hot coffee he was holding, I was not happy.

"Watch where you're going jerk!". I screamed as I was sprawled on the floor.

To my surprise he burst out laughing. "So sorry babe."

Within a few seconds he was joined by a boy that looked identical to him, minus a little dot on his nose. Immediately the other boy crouched down next to me. "Sorry about my brother, he's a twat, are you okay?".
"I'm still here you know." The nose-dot boy said.

"Not really my jumpers all stained now." I muttered, more to myself then anyone.

"Well I'm Jai and I happen to have a spare jumper you can wear." He smiled at me.

I looked up at him into his dark chocolate brown eyes - there was no kidding myself, this boy Jai was beautiful. His hair was curly at the top and I could just imagine my hands running through them. His muscles were almost bursting out of the flannel shirt he had on and the black skinny jeans he was wearing complimented the shape of his legs perfectly.

Slowly I got up, my legs hurting from where I fell. "Thank you so much, are you sure its okay if I wear it?."

"Couldn't leave a beautiful girl such as yourself with a coffee stained jumper all because of Lame Luke now could I?". He winked as he walked away leaving me and 'Lame Luke' to ourselves.

I was expecting the boy to say sorry but he didn't he was just staring at his phone scrolling through. I recognised these two boys but I couldn't quite put my finger on why.

"Here you go." Jai said as he returned from the car with a grey jumper that had a pig design on it. I had a vest top on so I decided to just swap tops in front of them. In the middle of changing, I suddenly remembered the red lines I had down my arms. I hoped Jai wouldn't notice (Luke was on his phone anyway) but he did. He stared at them and then looked at me in disbelief. Anxiety started rising through me as it so often did and I began to feel sick. I promised myself I wouldn't do it to myself again but a few days ago I just lost it.

"Erm, thanks for the jumper. See you around." I picked up my stuff and scurried away, ignoring Jai's shouts for me to wait.

Thankfully after timetables and lockers and all that jazz were sorted out, my first lesson was dance. It felt so good to be back in a studio doing what I love. Letting the music flow through me and fill up my body controlling it. The teacher was nice and she explained how every half-term we would swap dance genres. This half-term it was contemporary; me second favourite only to ballet.

"You're such a beautiful dancer." I turned around and was greeted by a girl smaller than me (which I thought was impossible). She had chocolate brown hair, similar to my own but bright ocean blue eyes.

"Thank you, so are you!". We were in the locker room after class and I was getting changed ready for Geography.

"No I mean it! You don't just dance" she almost looked at me in awe which embaressed me, "you really feel it."

"Thank you sweetie." I smiled at her, she seemed like such a lovely girl. "I'm Leila."

"I'm Destiny, but everyone calls me Ditsy because I'm a bit...you know, Ditsy." She shrugged her shoulders in a care free way which made me giggle. "You're new here right?".

"Yeah, I've just moved over here from London."

"Here's my number, we should totally meet up and go for a coffee." She squealed excitedly. She blew me a kiss as she sauntered away with the rest of her friends.

Back home she would've been the exact type of girly girl I would have avoided but she seemed so nice and I needed all the friends I could get.
Geography was good however the boy with the dot on his nose, Luke, was in it. Thankfully he didn't notice me. At lunch I called Destiny and asked to sit with her and she said yes so I went to go and find her.

Unfortunately when I reached the table, I saw that Jai and Luke were also here. Luke had his arm draped around a tanned girl with black hair and big beautiful eyes. When she saw me she turned to Destiny and said: "Ditsy! You told me she danced beautiful but you didn't tell me how beautiful she actually was!". This girl looked me up and down beaming. "Oh my I've been so rude!" She stepped away from Luke and came up to me. "I'm Kiana, and you must be Leila."

"Hey, yeah I am." I smiled although I was a bit taken aback.

Jai and I met eyes and he gave me a look. I knew what it meant, we were going to talk about the marks later.

"Luke I think its time you properly say sorry." Jai said winking at Luke.

"What why? What did he do?!" Kiana spluttered.

"This douche knocked Leila here off her feet earlier." Kiana's mouth dropped in shock. "That's why she's got the dirty pig jumper on."

Dirty pig?

Kiana walked around the table and smacked Luke on the head. "You idiot. Say sorry now."

"Calm down Ki! You may be my girlfriend but you don't have to go around slapping me all the time." Luke looked me deep in the eyes. "Sorry for spilling coffee down you but I think you should thank me. I'm pretty sure you're happy you got to wear Jai's jumper."

He smirked.

I blushed in deep embarrassment and Luke was rewarded from another slap around the head by Kiana.

There was another girl sat next to Jai, a little too closely I might add. Jai didn't seem to notice but I did. The girl was giving be the evils. She had bleach blonde hair and it looked like she'd had her lips plumped, a bit too much.

"This is Alexa, but everyone calls her Lexi." Destiny said.

"Nice to meet you." I smiled.
She just nodded at me, rude little bitch.

Later on another girl came and joined the table; Lucy. She was from London to and we got on really well. Lucy was going out with Jai and Luke's friend Daniel.

Lucy and Kiana were at the school for singing. Kiana had been at LAA for a year and started when she was 16, Lucy had also been here for a year but started when she was 18. That was the same as Luke and Jai. Luke was here for photography and Jai was here for art. That didn't surprise me, he seemed like the exact type of boy who would do art. Lexi also did art but had been here since she was 16. She was now 18 and in the same year as me. Ditsy had been here for two years to.

Lunch went quick enough and besides the constant evils Alexa was giving me, I actually enjoyed myself. Everyone at the table had their own personalities but they all seemed to mould together well. When the bell sounded, I reached for the timetable in my bag and before I got a chance to read it, a husky voice from behind startled me: "Looks like we have Chemistry together."