We Are Tidal

Chapter Sixteen - Closet Kisses

Chapter Sixteen

Winter Awakenings 

As the weeks passed by and the semester continued to roll toward Christmas, I maintained a promise I had made to myself and didn't go to the Heaver's house again, despite Gab's persistent invitations. He was kind enough not to mention that I had slept in Art's bed but didn't seem to understand that I wasn't willing to put myself in such a position again. As always, Gab was a boulder of positivity with no grasp of subtle emotions.

Damien and I had ignored our argument in the rain and I focused on my classes and dance with the kind of vigor that Dr. Poynton deemed unsustainable with a single stroke of his fountain pen. With a dappling of logic, I knew he was right. After all, it wasn't as if I was suddenly eating my five-a-day and meditating before bed. I was just keeping myself moving.

"It's easier to just be busy than to get really well," I whinge jokingly to Nicole as she walks with me across campus towards the dance gym. 

Winter has well and truly settled and we are both barely discernably as human beings under our thick layers of parka coats, cardigans, and scarves. Nicole still somehow manages to sip daintily from a frothy oat milk latte, whereas I wipe my runny nose and stiff between talking. 

Nicole laughs and nudges me hard with her shoulder and I almost slip in the margin of slushy snow that littered every pavement on campus since November arrived. 

"Well, just keep going and hey, dancing is helping, right?" Nicole asks, eternally positive - she should really be better friends with Gab. She, Ava and Willow had watched Gab and I practice our lyrical routine after classes some nights and seemed impressed, even though we were still marking some of the lifts that I was particularly nervous about. Gab had become seemingly drunk on their compliments and I was forced to remind him that my friends would be impressed if I got out of bed and brushed my hair on any given day, so not to get too excited. That hadn't stopped Gab's chest from swelling. 

"It is. I guess," I muse, biting my chapped lip as they sting against the cold wind. My mind was preoccupied with the feedback Caroline, our coach, had given us after seeing our last rehearsal. She was confident I was holding back and Gab agreed. Needless to say, my mood had been foul that night.

"Is all okay with Damien?" Nicole probes even further, pulling me from my reverie. 

One of the very dear reasons that I love Nicole is that she has always allowed my choices to be my own and hadn't judged me when I had begun to see Damien at the start of summer. 

"It's normal," I shrug. Mostly, we had just been hooking up rather than talking, but Nicole doesn't need to know that. 

Outside the gym, Gab hops out of his jeep and walks towards us, rubbing his hands together to shirk off the cold. I hug Nicole goodbye and she kisses my cheek, smelling familiarly of the frankincense and white sage incense she used in her dorm room. 

"Ready for some lifts, partner?" Gab grins, elaborately rolling out his wrists, never afraid of throwing me five feet in the air. 

"Once you catch me," I roll my eyes, smiling back and heading inside ready to stretch. Gab heads towards the male changing rooms to get ready and I plop onto the floor of the gym, grinning to the Caroline as she waves me in with a small smile that she reserves for her favourite dancers. 

Caroline, with her perfectly crisp bangs and steely expression, would never admit that after all, I had put her through with this team, I was still one of her best girls. 

I try to stretch as often as I can throughout the day, but for now, I keep my stretches ballistic and swing in and out of the positions with ease, trying to bring some buoyancy into my joints and shake off the cold from outside. I barely notice when a girl sits down next to me and extends her legs. Looking up, I recognise Cassie Reynolds. Her long black hair and strong build were unrecognisable as anyone else. Cassie was the kind of dance girl who always had two layers of tan on and looked at my bed-head hair and natural nails with contempt. Besides that, it couldn't be denied that Cassie was an incredible addition to the team - which was likely to become even more apparent when we started working on our team routine for Regionals and Nationals this week.