Authors: Dean Murray
Jackson
was the shining exception in the group. Miss Winters had eventually
selected five other guys, two per pyramid, but it was Jackson who was
already taking the lead in practices. He was even talking about
getting the other guys into the weight rooms a few times a week so
that they could bulk up.
I
tried to stop before running into Jackson, but I was moving too fast.
If it had been one of the other girls I would have knocked them flat,
but Jackson simply put his hands around my waist before I collided
into him, and then picked me up so that I was looking down at him
with my feet pointing straight up in the air.
I'd
seen Jackson practice this particular lift with a couple of the
other, smaller girls but I'd never expected to find myself performing
it with him. My hands found his shoulders out of reflexes I didn't
even know I had, and I pushed against him in an effort to take some
of my weight off of his arms.
I
had a split second to feel my stomach knot up from being so high up
in the air, and then I felt my skirt slide down towards my stomach,
revealing the tight little shorts that were part of the skirt. Cindi
was a flyer, and she had a good point that it wasn't like anyone was
actually seeing our underwear, but the shorts were still more
revealing than anything I normally wore.
As
Jackson brought me gently back down to the ground I could feel a
blush breaking out all over my face, and I honestly wasn't sure
whether it was because of my skirt having slid down or because I was
making a spectacle of myself in other ways. He'd just saved me from
the humiliation of bouncing off of him and falling down, but the last
thing I wanted to be doing right now was to be performing the kinds
of tricks that would make people notice me.
"Sorry,
Adri. It was the only thing I could think of to make it look like
you'd planned on running the opposite direction from everyone else."
My
cheeks got even hotter as I realized he was right. Somehow I'd gotten
turned around and I'd been headed towards the visitor's side of the
field. I'd almost been doubly embarrassed and only quick thinking on
Jackson's part had saved me from looking like a complete idiot.
"Thanks,
Jackson. I guess I'm even more nervous than I realized."
I
got a smile in response as we both ran to our assigned spots and
started into the first cheer. The game went by more quickly than I'd
expected it to. We yelled and jumped and kicked and almost faster
than I could believe it, I looked up to find that there was less than
a minute left in the first half.
My
nerves had settled down during the first half of the game, I'd even
pretty much forgotten about my near miss with Jackson earlier. I was
just starting to worry about our halftime routine when I heard
screams of outrage from the fans on our side of the field.
A
couple of the other girls were disciplined enough not to turn and
look, but I wasn't one of them, not that it did me a lot of good. The
only thing I could see was a group of blue and white uniforms
gathered around someone else, also in our uniform, who was on the
ground curled up in pain.
I
looked at some of the other cheerleaders, hoping for a clue as to
what was going on, but all I could tell was that most of them looked
really worried. Our coach and a couple of EMT's hauled our guy off of
the field on a stretcher a few seconds later, and then the last few
seconds of the clock ran down and it was halftime.
The
butterflies in my stomach seemed to have put on a couple of pounds
each. Somebody I knew had just been hurt, maybe seriously, and I was
about to go out and do a dance that I'd only actually practiced in
real life five or six times. I wanted to puke, but instead I just
forced my face back into the squad-approved smile and ran back out
onto the field with the rest of the girls.
I'd
been doing my best not to notice anyone in the crowd, but this time I
was looking slightly more to the right and I saw my dad sitting on
the third row up.
Once
again my smile transformed into something more genuine. Our team was
actually pretty good and the bleachers usually filled up more than
half an hour before the game even started. For Dad to have garnered a
spot that close to the front he had to have arrived nearly an hour
before the game was scheduled to start.
Dad
hated football. The only reason he was here was to see my first game,
just like he'd made sure to see Cindi's first game when she made it
on the squad. I knew that Dad had hours of work still that needed to
be done tonight, but he didn't look like he was resentful at having
to be at the game rather than at home working. He was drumming his
fingers against his legs like maybe he wasn't sure what to do without
a keyboard in front of him, but he was smiling, and when he saw that
I was smiling back at him his grin got even wider.
A
second later the music for the routine started up and I threw myself
into the dance with even more abandon than normal. It didn't matter
whether I messed this performance up. The other girls on the squad
and all of the kids at school would probably make me miserable if I
did, but that just didn't seem important against the fact that my dad
cared enough about me to come watch in spite of all of the other
things he was supposed to be doing.
As
luck would have it, everything went smoothly and five minutes later
we were all running back off of the field to make way for the drill
team. Cindi was one of our best dancers so she was at the front of
the squad and was one of the first to make it back to where Miss
Winters was waiting for us. She handed me my water bottle as I made
it over to our end of the bleachers.
"Good
job out there, Adri."
"Thanks,
Cindi. I kept expecting to screw up."
She
smiled and shook her head. "I knew you would do just fine. Did
you see Dad up in the stands?"
"Yes.
Not until halftime, but I saw him then. I take it that Mom didn't
come?"
Cindi's
mouth compressed to a disapproving line. "No. At least I haven't
seen her yet tonight. It's not like it's a surprise though."
It
seemed for a second like Cindi was going to say something else, but
then Miss Winters clapped twice to get everyone's attention and we
all gathered around to get our marching orders for the second half of
the game.
I'd
barely been able to keep up with what
I
was supposed to be
doing out on the sidelines, I hadn't had any time or attention to
keep up with the game, but apparently the game was a mix of good and
bad. Miss Winters double-checked that we were all there and then took
a deep breath.
"Okay,
girls, as you all know we're up by two touchdowns, but this has been
a high-scoring game and now that Victor Stalking is out with an
injury, things could get ugly. I want you all to give it everything
you've got. Hopefully if we can get the crowd really excited it will
help the backup quarterback score some points."
She
looked down at her clipboard and then rattled off a string of
formations that she wanted us to work into the last half of the game.
We all nodded and each put a pom-pom into the middle of the group. I
screamed "Go Wolves" with everyone else as I double-checked
that the board with the cheers on it was still resting
inconspicuously against our end of the bleachers.
Miss
Winters knew that nobody would be able to remember all of the cheers
she'd just queued up for us, so she used the white board to remind us
all during the actual game. I'd sort of expected more of a pep talk
from Miss Winters, but the drill team looked like they were almost
done with their number and it turned out that Cindi and a few of the
other girls had been assigned to go help the mascots throw t-shirts
into the crowd.
Just
before Cindi rushed out on the field she grabbed my arm. "You've
got about five minutes before our next routine. It would be a good
idea to stretch out anything that's feeling tight. You don't want to
start cooling down and then pull something, it happened to a couple
of girls at the start of the season."
A
stubborn piece of me thought about trying to go find my dad, but I
knew that even if I did find him I wouldn't really have enough time
to talk to him. Besides, Cindi was just trying to help out and it
would be stupid of me to ruin how well things were going between us
now. She wasn't actually being bossy, she just knew more about what
was going on than I did.
I
grabbed Cindi's yoga mat and rolled it out on the grass so that I
wouldn't get my uniform dirty. A couple of the other girls were doing
the same thing, but nobody said hello or even smiled at me. I'd
pretty much expected to be ignored by everyone but Cindi and Sheree
for the first few weeks at least, but that didn't make it any easier.
I
looked around, hoping to find Sheree so that I could walk over and
talk to her once I was done stretching, but she was standing over
behind Miss Winters. She was talking to Jackson again.
I
took a deep breath in place of the sigh of disappointment that I
otherwise would have let slip out, and closed my eyes as I wrapped my
hands around my ankles and leaned forward to stretch out my
hamstrings.
"Do
you want me to put a little pressure on your back so that you get a
deeper stretch?"
I
recognized Jackson's voice even before I opened my eyes to confirm
that it was him, and that he was really talking to me instead of
someone else.
"Um,
thanks, but I'm going to pass. Miss Winters seems pretty against
assisted stretching like that. It's not that I don't trust you, but
I'm such a klutz that I'd probably end up injuring myself somehow and
have to sit out the next three games."
Jackson's
shrug was so laid-back that I was pretty sure I hadn't offended him.
"I don't think you're giving yourself enough credit. You're
really not any more klutzy than any of the other girls, but that's
okay. Do you mind if I join you?"
I
realized he had a mat in his left hand, which I hadn't noticed before
because I'd been too busy staring at his face while trying not to
look like I was staring. I nodded and he unrolled his mat and sat
down next to me. About the time he started stretching out his quads I
managed to process what he'd just said.
"That's
nice of you to say, but I am the girl who just about ran over you
earlier tonight. Thanks, by the way, for figuring out a way to make
me look like less of an idiot."
He
waved away my thanks. "Don't worry about it. It was actually
kind of fun to stunt with you. You're pretty good considering that
you haven't done any of that kind of stuff before. You tensed up the
right amount without getting so tense that you forgot to help me out.
We should practice that kind of stuff together. I'm stuck with
whomever Miss Winters assigns me to for the pyramids and the like,
but nobody said that we can't do some stunting together at other
times, like we did today."
It
was like there was a little fairy somewhere who was trying to make my
life more difficult than it had to be. I'd never been even the
slightest bit interested in any other boys before now, but there was
something about Jackson that changed all of that for me. I wanted to
get to know him, I
really
wanted to get to know him. If he'd
asked me if I wanted to go to dinner and a movie I would have said
yes in a heartbeat, but this was something else entirely.
Just
agreeing to join the cheer squad had been a stretch for me. Stunting
was way beyond anything that I was comfortable with. I much preferred
to keep my feet safely on the ground, but as scared as I was of
putting myself so completely in his hands, the physical danger wasn't
even as worrisome as the social consequences.
I
looked around to confirm that we were far enough away from everyone
else that nobody was likely to overhear and then shrugged.
"That
sounds both terrifying and fun, but I'm not sure it's a very good
idea. Most of the other girls already resent me for getting Janessa
kicked off of the squad and then taking her place. It doesn't matter
to them that I didn't plan for any of this to happen; they still
think that I'm basically pond scum."
Jackson
shook his head. "I don't think any of them would call you pond
scum…"
"Right,
but only because they'd be calling me something worse. If I start
stunting with you then everyone is going to think that I'm gunning to
take over as a flyer. That has trouble written all over it."
"What
if I told you that you'd make a better flyer than one of the other
girls?"
"Sorry,
as much as I think that stunting with you could be fun, assuming I
can get past the sheer terror of it all, I still wouldn't be
interested in taking someone else's spot."
Jackson
brought his right arm across his chest, stretching out his shoulder
and back, and it was all I could do to tear my eyes away from the way
that his white uniform hugged the muscles along his side. He
practically had wings and the material of his shirt was thin enough
for me to see just how much definition all of that muscle had.
"You're
very unusual for a cheerleader, Adri. Do you know that?"
"If
by unusual you mean that I don't belong here in the slightest, then
yes, I knew that. Even if I hadn't known that coming in, I would have
figured it out pretty quickly given the way that all of the other
girls on the squad are treating me."
Jackson
rolled his eyes at me. "That wasn't what I was talking about.
How many of the girls on the team do you think would show you the
same kind of consideration you're so determined to show them?"
"I
don't know—half maybe?"
"Not
even close. Sheree definitely, and maybe Cindi, but if you weren't
her sister there wouldn't be any kind of guarantee there with her
either."