Page 3 of Power Play

The realization followed me into rehearsal and settled behind every count. My father would receive the grade notification if I did poorly on the quiz. I needed to borrow paper for the review. Charlie wouldn’t have forgotten his notebook, and my mother had been right about the skirt.

Coach clapped her hands once. “From the transition. Full energy this time.”

Music filled the gym, sharp and bright against the squeak of shoes over polished wood. I took my position between my friend Ashley and a sophomore named Paige, squared my shoulders, and fixed my smile.

“Five, six, seven, eight.”

My arms reached the first position, my right foot crossed behind my left, and we turned together as our skirts flared around our thighs. I caught the next count before another thought pushed through it.

The notebook was on my desk. My father would know I forgot it. The skirt pulled across my hips when I turned. I needed paper. I needed to study. I needed to remember the next step.

Ashley’s shoulder clipped mine when I missed the direction change.

“Charm,” Coach called over the music.

I corrected too late and stepped into Paige’s path. The formation broke around me, three girls stumbling before Coach stopped the track. Silence rushed into the gym, and every face seemed to turn toward me at once.

“Everyone reset,” Coach said.

The other girls returned to their marks while I forced my breathing to remain even. Coach walked toward me with her clipboard held against her chest.

“You knew that transition yesterday.”

“I know.”

“Then why were you watching Ashley instead of trusting the count?”

“I lost it for a second.”

“You keep losing it for a second, and every second costs the whole line.” Her voice remained calm, which made the disappointment worse. “You have the ability, Charm. I need the focus.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I need more than an apology. Take five minutes, get some water, and come back ready.”

I nodded and walked toward the locker room before the tears pressing behind my eyes could escape beneath the gym lights.

The bathroom beside the lockers was empty. I shut myself inside the last stall, lowered the lid, and sat with my elbows resting on my knees. My hands trembled around the edge of my skirt as I tried to slow everything happening inside my head.

The choreography continued behind my thoughts. Algebra sat beside it. My mother’s fingers pressed against my hip again while my father’s voice reminded me that Charlie always studied early. Coach’s disappointment joined them until every correction began speaking at once.

My chest tightened. I drew in a breath that stopped before it reached the bottom of my lungs, then tried again with the same result. Heat gathered beneath my uniform while the bathroom seemed to become smaller around me.

Charlie had also been sixteen when his car crossed the center line on an icy road.

Death made him brilliant at everything.

His unfinished homework never appeared in the framed photographs lining our hallway. His bad grades, messy bedroom, and arguments with our parents had been polished out of the story until my brother became a standard no living person could reach.

He would never forget a notebook again. He would never miss a transition, disappoint my father, gain weight, choose the wrong college, or become anything less than the perfect son they remembered.

I pressed a tissue beneath my eyes before the mascara could run. My fingers shook hard enough that the paper scratched my skin.

The bathroom door opened.

“Charm?”

Ashley’s shoes appeared beneath the stall divider.