by Joanna Wiebe
As if to lighten the darkly romantic ambiance, a trio of freshmen boys, obviously putting aside the Big V competition for the night, walk by, dressed in enormous white diapers and holding arrows; one of them whistles at me, making Teddy scowl and giving me a nice boost of confidence. Those boys seem to be the only Cupids here. All the other guys, I notice as I stop to take everything in, are dressed as various interpretations of Death. The usual black cloak and scythe—dozens of those guys. Some interesting Deaths, like an empty pill bottle and a puffy tornado with little trailers in it. One guy is dressed as an old-school cartoon bomb with Acme stamped on it, while, standing next to him, another is costumed as a glowing ball with spikes coming out of it.
“A virus,” I say with a laugh and point him out to Teddy.
“Childish,” he replies as a George W. Bush walks by and beams at me.
“He can’t be sitting well with Little Miss Texas.”
“Annie!” Pilot screams across the dance floor. His voice carries over the band. Heads turn.
“Remember, you’re with me tonight,” Teddy sneers, putting his arm around me.
Balking, I shove him off. “I’m not here with you, Teddy.”
“It’s my role as your Guardian! Your second shadow. Grading you all night long.”
“Don’t ever touch me again,” I snap, biting hard on the end of each word as it leaves my lips.
Teddy’s eyes narrow, his sneer stays put, but he storms off. Just as Pilot arrives, panting. Golden candlelight glimmers in his eyes as he takes my hands. Shaking off the memory of Teddy’s vile touch, I do my best not to turn five shades of red while Pilot looks me up and down.
“Wow, nice mask. You look effing fierce,” he says with a broad smile.
“Thanks,” I breathe. In my heels, I’m much taller than he is. “You look decent yourself.”
“Decent?” His eyebrows hit his hairline, but I just smile and shrug. He wears a suit—the conservative suit of a politician’s son—and carries a bright red scythe. “Okay, I’ll take it. Come sit? I’m sorry I couldn’t come pick you up, but Teddy was adamant that he had to walk you here.”
“Just count yourself lucky that you don’t have a Guardian.”
Around the perimeter of the room, the faculty watches us. Between them, those freaky secretaries, the lunch ladies, and a sprinkling of women I’ve never seen—presumably housemothers from the dorms—all stand, staring at everyone with what I’m starting to recognize as the mask of the Guardian: a deadpan gawp. There must be a hundred adults here, one for every junior and senior, plus a few extras to monitor the sophies and freshmen who aren’t yet being graded for the Big V. They’re all a reminder, a walking, talking, pen-scratching, clipboard-reading reminder, that this is no ordinary dance. Clipped to their boards are charts for grading our clothing, composure, conversation. They know our PTs by heart, which will factor into our grading. To drive home the point that tonight is still very much part of the Big V competition, at the back of the castle, standing in a small, dim balcony a dozen feet above us, is Villicus; the silvery lights on the beams near his narrow skull reflect off his pupils, transforming him into a golden-eyed shadow, a leering rat atop a pillar of black onyx. It’s hard to tell, but it looks like he’s watching me with Pilot.
Shuddering, I turn toward the band, which is comprised of five kids from a music club, with surprisingly cool lead vocals by Plum. Those are the only people I recognize, though. The girls on the dance floor are all masked. And most of the guys wear makeup.
“Getting dressed up makes the night easier,” Pilot explains, walking me to a table. “The costumes. The anonymity.”
“But they’re grading us, so nothing’s different,” I say, glancing again at Teddy, who’s prowling the room with his eyes on me. Feels like I’m being stalked by a skinny, horny cougar. “Competition as usual.”
“We can pretend, though.” Pilot grips my hand. “I mean, we’re still teenagers in high school. We still wanna…”
“Knock boots?” I laugh, doing my best Harper impersonation. “You know what I’ve wondered? I get the whole junior—senior competition, but why don’t the younger kids hang out? They don’t have Guardians yet. They’re not being graded.”
“Well, they have parents,” Pilot says, walking me to a table in the corner where a few others are seated. “Their parents are already pressuring them. So, yeah, they’re as deep in this competition as any of us, even if no Guardian is keeping score.”
As if to help Pilot make his point, a sophomore boy in a black cloak rips the mask off a freshman girl and throws it down. As he stomps on it, the girl shrieks and, tearing his scythe from his hand, jabs him in the gut.
Ben is nowhere to be seen. In a way, I’m relieved. But that relief switches to irritation when, arriving at the table, I see that Harper, Tallulah, and Agniezska are here, watching me from behind their flashy masks. Harper’s in an orange mask meant to look like the Texas Longhorns emblem. Tallulah’s mask must have cost serious money if the jewels on it are real. Taking home the skanky award is Agniezska, whose mask is transparent with tiny white diamonds on it—just like her skintight dress, under which she does not wear pasties or anything to cover the darker areas of her naked body. If I were Teddy, I’d ask to swap with whoever her Guardian is. No challenge there. All three girls smile at Pilot, as do the guys sitting around the table. In fact, everyone in the room is totally accepting of Pilot because he’s the only one they’re never in competition with.
“Anne, long time no see,” shouts Jack, who’s exchanged his usual Goth kid gear for a pimp-style red suit with white, feathery angel wings. A blend of Cupid and Death.
“I think you mean Fainting Fanny,” Harper snickers.
“Right. Because I fainted once,” I deadpan. “Clever.”
“Yeah, that’s so obvious, Harper,” Jack adds. “Your insecurities are really showing.”
“God, can we please get along tonight?” Pilot begs.
“What’re you talking about?” Jack asks. “That’s impossible. It’s obvious these girls are in full competition mode. I just can’t believe all four of you have the same PT.”
Four of them? Plum’s onstage, so Harper, Tallulah, and Agniezska make three. Whirling in her chair, Harper glares at Pilot. And then at me. And then at Pilot again.
“What is Jack talking about?” she demands. “I thought you said her PT was to act like Inspector Gadget or some bullshit?”
When did Pilot talk to Harper about my PT? That’s private. I told him that in confidence.
“Sorry, Jack,” I say, “but I don’t think we do.”
“So, wait,” Jack says with a confused look on his face. Then he leans back and claps his hands together, grinning broadly. “Wait, wait, wait. Anne, are you saying you’re not even trying to be sexy tonight? That’s not even your PT?” He guffaws. “And you’re kicking their asses!”
I turn red. Bright red. Tomato red.
Cheers on the dance floor distract us all, and everyone around the table leaps to their feet. The song has changed to an even louder, faster one, a twist on a Beyoncé song I half-recognize, sending the crowd into an absolute frenzy of joy, a craze I hadn’t even considered these normally uptight, bitter kids could produce. Flailing arms. Shaking, jumping bodies. Hoots, hollers, bellows. Laughter and screaming—good screaming—like I haven’t heard in ages. It’s my first dance. And, Harper and Guardians aside, it’s already so much better than the ones I’ve seen in eighties movies, which just so happen to be the ones I’ve based my expectations on: boys leaning against one wall, girls against the other. This dance is night-club fabulous. Way too fabulous for me to even consider sitting down. As much as Pilot obviously wants to avoid the dance floor, I can’t. Not when I want to do much more than observe, not when dancing is the one thing that makes me feel normal…cool, even.
“What do you think?” I ask him. He just shakes his head. The longer I stand, my shoulders bouncing, my toes tapping, gazing out over the rapidly fil
ling floor, over the manic crowd, the paler his complexion grows.
“Annie, please,” he begs, frozen, as others pair off to dance and groups form on the floor. A smile creeps across my face. “No, really. I’m the worst.” Still, I say nothing but dance up to him. He cringes. “I love the music. Hate the dancing.”
When he sees I’m not about to give in, he reluctantly pushes my still-empty chair back in. I grin and tug at his hand, hauling him smack into the middle of the dance floor.
Brilliant that everyone’s masked! Anyone with reservations about dancing publicly must go to a masque. Overcome by a sense of liberation like nothing I’ve felt in years, I let loose. Fully. And completely.
“I love this song!” I shout over the music to him.
He laughs nervously, but, the more I move, the more he opens up to the idea of dancing. Soon, his side-to-side step gets a bit freer, looser—cooler. Laughing, I pull out my California street-dancing swagger, which is insanely tough in this dress and heels, but I can’t help myself. This song is begging for some boom-pop, and I am all over that.
“Man, you’ve got soul! You’re awesome!” Pilot shouts. “You even make me look good.” Then, with a laugh, he throws down some Running Man, and I try to follow, but my dress is so tight around my thighs that I just end up laughing and falling into a side swipe—which, shockingly, Pilot mirrors.
“I thought you hated dancing!” I holler at him.
He shrugs. “I used to have a massive crush on Julia Stiles! Watched Save the Last Dance, like, ninety times.” Then he throws his head back and hoots. “Did I just admit that?”
As I pull out some pretty simple b-boy breaking, I can’t help but notice that the floor is clearing out around us—but the others aren’t leaving; they’re backing into a circle. To watch us and cheer us on. Kudos to Pilot for not freaking out, for working out a valiant attempt at popping and locking that inspires me to do the same. A few kids clap, and Pilot and I exchange wide grins.
Until.
Until I see that Harper, Tallulah, and Agniezska are watching from the sidelines, staring from behind their flashy masks. Inch by inch, Harper pulls her longhorns down from her eyes, revealing a glare that is like no other I’ve ever received. Enough to stop me in my tracks—if I wasn’t having such an awesome time.
Unfortunately, the song finally comes to an end and switches to something slow. Jack strides our way, clapping along with a few other people; at the same time, Harper, fuming, storms right at us.
“Nice moves, Merchant!” Jack laughs as Pilot and I grin and pretend not to notice a seething Harper. “Bod. Brains. Bustin’ it. Thank God they’re grading you, but too bad for your competition.”
“Pilot,” Harper interrupts angrily, “dance with me. Now.”
She whirls in a huff—a gorgeous, shimmery, irritated huff that gets more frantic the more Jack laughs at her. Pilot has been holding my hand, but, to my surprise, he drops it and follows Harper.
“You’re going?” I mouth after him. But he just looks sorry. I guess I can’t blame him. Harper’s crazy-looking enough right now that if she told anyone to dance with her, they would—anything to wash that freaky look off her face. She probably bullied Pilot into telling her my PT, too.
“Classic! Well, then,” Jack says, smirking as he saunters to my side, “if your date’s dumb enough to leave you all by yourself, dance with me?”
Hearing that, Harper stops in her tracks. She and Pilot turn back.
“No way,” she says. “That’s not how it works, Jack.”
But I’m already taking Jack’s hand. “You don’t make the rules,” I remind her. “It’s a dance.”
“It’s a dance at Cania Christy, Fat Fanny,” Harper hisses. “I’m sure back in public school, you’d dance with anyone, spike your punch, and have threesomes in the bathroom.” Says the girl who screws teachers in the woods! “But this is the Cupid and Death Dance.”
“So what?”
“You shouldn’t even have danced with Pilot! You can only dance with people who can’t stand you—like the story for the old masque goes.”
I remember Molly’s comment about Cupid and Death exchanging arrows, but nothing about this.
“That leaves you free to dance with pretty much anyone. Except Pilot. And, I guess, Jack, since he seems to have a thing for you.”
“Hold up. If those are the rules, and if you two hate each other,” Jack begins, looking slyly from me to Harper, “can we watch you dance together? Maybe with a little less clothing.”
Harper snorts at him. “Why don’t you find a corner and dance with your right hand, Jack?”
“Happily. Just know I won’t be thinking of you when I do it,” he replies. Then he turns his grin on me, bounces his eyebrows, and strolls away.
“And me?” I ask. “I should just stand here?”
“Why do you even care about dancing? You suck.”
“You’re wasting the whole song!” I cry, rolling my eyes. “Assign me my detestable partner already, Harper.”
“You are so useless!” She grabs Augusto by the arm as he wanders by. “Dance with Augusto. Go clump around those Amazon feet over there with him.”
With a small smile, Augusto drags me into that boring high-school box step: forward-side-together, backward-side-together. What a joy. Minutes pass in silence. From time to time, I think I spy Ben—but it’s never him. I won’t see him tonight. Here I’m all dressed up, and there’s no one to impress. And now that Jack’s gone and taken his compliments with him, a part of me just wants to go home. Quit while I’m ahead.
“You enjoyed sketching the naked teacher in our workshop?” Augusto finally asks, breaking the silence. I nod. “You fainted, though. I cannot blame you. There is much pressure in this place, but I did not think you were feeling it yet.”
“I didn’t faint because of any pressure. I was just feeling…off.”
Truth is, I don’t know why I fainted or why, every morning, I have to fight to keep from passing out.
He nods. “Then it’s because of what happened to Lotus. I felt off about that, too.”
“Lotus?” I repeat. “What are you talking about?”
“But, no, I’m wrong. She was not yet expelled that morning. So that could not be it.”
“Lotus was expelled?” I lean away from Augusto and look into his eyes. “You mean Lotus, that nice girl?”
“Yes, Lotus Featherly. She was expelled Tuesday after our workshop.” Augusto shrugs as the song finally ends. I realize I haven’t seen Lotus in class since Tuesday morning. “You are not paying much attention, are you?”
With that odd insult, Augusto bows and leaves me standing in the middle of the dance floor as Touch Myself begins. Confused, I’m about to return to the table to ask Pilot about Lotus—what such an angelic girl could possibly have done to be expelled—when Harper marches up to me and tries to stare me down. But she’s about three inches shorter than I am, even in heels, so it doesn’t quite work.
“You ready to take this on?” she asks. Not asks. Demands.
“Take what on?”
“This!” She runs her hands up and down her body. “Right here. Right now.”
“Wait. Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
She wants to battle. She wants a dance-off. For a moment, I’m stunned. But as everyone begins to take notice, as I spy Teddy scribbling frantically on his board and Villicus watching from above, as I feel a new wave of frustration with this place where even dances are graded and nice people like Lotus get expelled, my shock disappears. It’s replaced by something I much prefer: the will to win.
“If your PT really is to use your bod to get ahead,” she says, “dance like you mean it.”
With a short slide, I close the distance between us and peer down into the little slots in her crystal mask. Ever so coolly, channeling an inner seductress Teddy and Jack have convinced me I possess, I whisper to her, “That’s not my PT. But I’ll do it anyway. Just to destroy you.”
That’s how I find myself in the first real dance-off of my life. I start it off, beginning by sliding into and out of an exaggerated S-shape formed by sitting deep in my right hip, rolling up to my left, arching my back, and smoothly busting out my chest. To warm things up. I pause for good measure, making deep eye contact with guys in the crowd, who clap when I do. I’m not sure where this is coming from—these are not moves my mom ever taught me. It just feels natural.
When it’s Harper’s turn, she breaks quickly into bumping and grinding an unseen pole. Although she’s got almost no butt, she bounces it like she does. She dances like a cheerleader. Which is good. If you like cheerleaders. Her walk is perfectly timed—1,2,3,4—and her hip rolls are orchestrated. I respond with a smooth belly dancing–inspired gyration. She comes back with a drop to the floor and some strange chest-bouncing move that hurts my eyes.
I’m unimpressed, and it shows. Both she and the crowd notice my attitude—but while it gets under Harper’s skin, the crowd laps it up, begging me for more.
Growing irritated, Harper tries to get in my face, but she’s got no game. Finally, I wave my hand like you stink—steeped in swagger—and, as I step it up with a final sequence that my mom actually did choreograph way back when, the crowd erupts.
Tearing off her mask, Harper casts a fiery glare in my direction and storms off, followed closely behind by her gang.
I’m surrounded immediately by people patting my back. Teachers are nodding and scribbling on their clipboards. And, as I’m floating on euphoria, as everyone clears away, I see, across the room, just beyond the crowd, Ben. My heart stops the moment our eyes meet. Neither one of us moves; this moment is an almost identical replica of our brief encounter last night. But, unlike when we were separated by physical walls, there’s no reason now to keep our distance. There’s no reason for Ben not to approach me or, for that matter, me him. Still on a high, feeling as though I might be invincible, I decide to go for it. Smiling broadly, I take the first step toward him—but Pilot is suddenly at my side again. I glance away from Ben just long enough to know that, when I turn back, he’ll be gone. And, sure enough, he is. Sighing, I close my eyes and reluctantly open them to look at Pilot. My heart is pounding like mad.