Hexed by Michelle Krys
1
Exactly twelve minutes into cheerleading practice, and I already wish I were dead.
Sweat collects along my hairline. Blood fills my head, and a hammering pulse pounds in my neck. I can’t be the first to fall, but my arms quiver under the weight of my body until, finally, they buckle and I collapse onto the cold blue mat of the school’s gymnasium.
“What the hell was that, Indie? My grandma could do a better handstand.” Bianca Cavanaugh, Fairfield High’s resident slave-driver cheer captain (and my best friend), marches up to me with her hands on her hips.
Julia tosses her peroxide-blond head back and laughs. So of course the rest of the squad erupts into giggles. Even Thea, the little Chinese girl Bianca treats like crap because she can barely speak English and only keeps on the team because she weighs ten pounds and makes a great flier. Bunch of traitors.
Gritting my teeth, I push myself up onto my elbows. Most people would assume that the coach not being able to make it to practice would mean we’d get to slack off for an hour and a half. Nope. When Coach Jenkins is absent (read: every second practice, due to her various commitments to French manicures and online dating), Bianca uses her power to practice medieval torture methods on the squad. Which, okay, I’ll admit it, didn’t bother me too much until she turned on me too—coincidentally around the same time I started dating Devon.
“Well?” Bianca says. “What do you have to say for yourself?” She shifts her weight to her other foot.
I almost spit out my standard apology. Almost. “I guess I just fail to see the point of a two-minute handstand, unless your plan is to bore the opposition to death.” Titters from the squad bolster my confidence. “And if Granny is so much better than me, why not ask her to join the squad?”
Bianca takes one step closer and stares down her ski-slope nose at me, eyes narrowed to slits. A casual observer might call it a death stare, but after nine years of friendship I know better; it’s an “embarrass me in front of the squad again and you’ll come to regret the day you were born” stare. Big difference. Still, I decide to back off.
“Sorry,” I say. “I’ll try not to suck so much next time.”
Bianca cocks her head.
I sigh. “And your grandma’s actually aging really well. I bet she’d look hot in spankies.”
Bianca rolls her eyes, then twirls on her heels to face the rest of the squad. “The point of a two-minute handstand isn’t to bore the opposition to death or even to flash them our awesome asses. It’s to improve our balance and stability.” She claps her hands so hard a few girls startle. “Now get on your feet, losers. Three minutes this time.” And with a pointed look at me she adds, “That includes you, Blackwood.”
Exactly fourteen minutes into practice and I decide I’d rather Bianca were dead. I get through the rest of practice by imagining thirty-two ways I’d like to kill her.
When the clock strikes five and the basketball team charges into the gym to boot us out, the break in tension is practically palpable. The squad stops just short of celebrating, in light of the fact that Bianca hates complainers, and limps off toward the locker room for scalding-hot showers. It's only September. It's going to be a long year.
“Hey, bitches, I need help taking these mats back,” Bianca says. By “help” she means do it for her.
Pretending not to hear her, I hightail it to the locker room, strip out of my practice T-shirt and shorts, and escape into the first shower stall available.
I turn the tap to the hottest temperature possible and let the burning spray massage the tense muscles in my neck, watching the water circle the drain. I’m in love with this shower. I’d like to make out with this shower. If I could move into this shower, with its gloriously strong water pressure and hell-hot spray, I would. But Mom will kill me if I’m late for work again.
I turn off the tap and reach for the towel hanging on the hook on the other side of the curtain.
Bianca whips the curtain open. “ ’Bout time.”
“Mind?” I scramble to cover myself with the towel.
“Relax. No one cares what your tits look like. Right, girls?”
“Right,” twenty girls confirm in unison. Crazy how it can appear as if they’re going about their own business—toweling off, getting dressed, fighting for a spot in front of the mirror to apply their makeup and blow-dry their hair—but really be watching every move Bianca makes.
Bianca perches on the bench outside my stall and starts passing a brush through her thick blond hair. “So listen, sorry if I was a little hard on you today.”
I snort. “A little?”