Flirty Dancing

by Jenny McLachlan

  ‘Oh,’ I say in a little voice. Until this moment, I was so distracted by their dancing that I’d forgotten about Starwars. The word ‘partner’ means ‘boy’, which means my ability to behave like a normal human being will vanish.

  Lulu reads my thoughts. ‘Don’t worry. I promise he’ll be nice. He has to be . . . He’s my brother. I’ll beat him up if he isn’t perfectly lovely to you.’ I hear the door at the back of the hall open. ‘Here he is now!’

  We all turn round and watch as a boy-shaped silhouette walks in. Gradually, this silhouette steps out of the shadows and turns into . . . The Hug!

  ‘Ollie,’ I whisper, in shock. This is awful . . . this is amazing . . . but most of all, for me, this is terrifying.

  ‘Hi, Bean,’ he says, dropping his rucksack and pulling out his earphones.

  ‘You know who I am!’ Now that was supposed to stay in my head.

  ‘Well, we go to the same school, get the same bus . . . Plus, I saved your Barbie’s life.’ At the mention of the word ‘Barbie’, Emma begins to scream, ‘Barbiebarbiebarbiebarbie!’ like an ambulance siren, gradually changing it to ‘Bra-Bea, bra-Bea, bra-Bea!’ She obviously hasn’t forgiven me for taking it off her. Luckily, Nan decides this is a good moment to take her off to buy some chocolate buttons.

  ‘Come on,’ says Lulu. ‘You two have got some work to do. Ollie knows a bit so we’ll spend today helping Bea catch up. Right, Bea, stand here and, Ollie, stand opposite. Now, hold hands.’

  No. Way.

  What if my hands feel dry? Or, worse, sweaty? What if they just feel weird? Could I have weird hands? The more I think about my hands the weirder they seem. Could I . . . could I possibly have man-hands? I begin to feel sweat squeezing out of my big manly fingertips. Then I think about something more prominent than my hands: my face. Ollie will be staring at my face and he’ll see that spot I found this morning on my chin, one of those painful stealth-spots that sits there under your skin, secretly changing the shape of your face until the next time you look in the mirror you’ve developed a bum-chin. Oh, God, any minute now, Ollie Matthews will be holding hands with a bum-chinned, sweaty, man-handed freak . . . and, what’s worse, he has to because his sister made him.

  ‘Bum-chin,’ I whisper.

  ‘What?’ he asks.

  Then I realise I’m already holding hands with Ollie Matthews and he hasn’t screamed or run out of the room. In fact, he’s doing what I should be doing: watching Ray and Lulu show us our first move. But for some reason I can’t make my eyes behave and they keep sliding, out of control, back to Ollie’s as I try to work out what he’s doing in this dingy church hall holding hands with Bea ‘The Wrong Shape’ Hogg.

  ‘Concentrate, Bean,’ he whispers. Just then, Lulu starts issuing complex instructions about ‘kangaroo hands’ and ‘push turns’ and that’s the moment I forget who Ollie Matthews is, and start to jive.

  And guess what . . . I can do it. Each move seems natural and simple. I don’t have to screw up my face in concentration and my hands and feet know what they’re doing before Lulu even speaks. I can dance. Or, at least, I can jive and as far as I’m concerned, as of today, jive is dance.

  Our lesson lasts two hours, but it feels like twenty minutes. Lulu and Ray show us a move, we copy it, then Ray puts on some music for us to practise to.

  By the end of the lesson, I can:

  1. spin

  2. spin under Ollie’s arm

  3. spin round Ollie’s arm

  4. spin away from Ollie’s arm

  5. make eye contact with Ollie’s arm and, occasionally, even his face!

  It may not sound like much, but, when you put it all together, it feels incredible . . . especially the last one.

  ‘Right, you two. That’s enough for today. We’ll finish with a practice dance. What do you think, Ray? Is “Zoom Zoom Zoom” too fast?’ asks Lulu.

  ‘I reckon they’ll cope.’

  And it is fast. Lulu doesn’t tell us what to do, Ollie leads and I follow. For the first time that afternoon, it doesn’t feel as if we’re learning to dance – it feels as if we are dancing. Then, almost as soon as it’s begun, the music stops. Nan and Emma, who must have crept in, give us a clap. We’re gasping for breath and, as we let go of each other’s hands, Ollie falls laughing to the floor. ‘She’s killed me!’

  ‘Don’t be silly, Ollie,’ says Lulu, pulling him up. ‘I want you both back here same time tomorrow and basically every night after school until the first round of the competition next week.’ I glance over at Ollie. Surely he must want to get out of this? Didn’t he only come along in the first place as some weird favour for his sister?

  ‘OK,’ he says, shrugging.

  ‘Really?’ I ask.

  ‘If we don’t practise, then Thursday will be a disaster.’

  ‘No, I mean, I don’t mind coming, but do you want to practise tomorrow?’

  ‘Yeah, well, you can’t do it without me, can you?’

  ‘No, I suppose not –’

  ‘Right, I’ve got to go. Mum’s picking me up.’ And with that he grabs his bag, pulls a face at Emma (to be fair, she is pulling one at him) and leaves the hall.

  A few minutes later, we leave too.

  ‘Who that rude man?’ asks Emma.

  As Nan drives us home, I think over the last two hours. One moment, I’m stupidly happy, the next I’m filled with shame. It wasn’t as terrifying as I thought it would be, but that was mainly because of Ollie, who, as Nan says, ‘is clearly a gentleman’. There’s one particular thing about him that I can’t stop thinking about – the shape of his shoulders and arms in his T-shirt. There was something just so, well, right about the way it looked.

  What’s the matter with me? Do I suddenly have a shoulder fetish? When Kat asks me if I think some singer has a ‘godly bod’, I say yes to keep her happy . . . and because I know that any normal fourteen-year-old girl should think he’s got a godly bod. Really, I feel nothing . . . and this kind of worries me. Kat’s lush actors and singers look plastic to me, like Emma’s paddling pool, all inflated and horrible to touch. Even my ‘I fancy Robert Pattinson’ thing is invented.

  But Ollie in that T-shirt . . . I’d like to rest my head on his shoulder and shut my eyes. I blush at the thought and instead have to rest my burning cheek on the cold window. ‘Lulu says that tomorrow she’s going to teach you the close hold,’ says Nan.

  Whoa. ‘What’s that?’ I ask in a faint voice.

  ‘Well, it’s what that name suggests: a close hold. You rest your arm on your partner’s shoulder and he puts his hand on the small of your back. Then you hold hands. It looks a bit like a waltz, but it’s much, much closer. Really, your whole bodies are touching from your chest down to your thighs. You just melt together.’

  Oh. My. God.

  I allow myself a secret, amazed smile.

  Out of the window, I watch houses flash past, their orange windows glowing in the evening light, and I glow too. I glow from the magic of the past two hours and from knowing that tomorrow I will be melting in Ollie Matthews’ arms.

  3

  When I wake up, my glow has vanished and all I’m left with is tummy-knotting fear.

  I’m certain that when Ollie sees me on the bus, in the cold light of day, surrounded by his rugby mates, he’ll be filled with horror. I held hands with her? Getting dressed in the dark, trying not to wake Nan, I even consider telling Mum I’m ill. The thought of seeing him makes me so embarrassed that when I walk into the kitchen I’m already blushing.

  ‘Bea red,’ says Emma from her position on the potty. She says it, sings it and then writes it in magnets on the fridge. Mum has to help with this.

  Trying to build up a bit of confidence, I do something different with my hair. Emma gave me this giant daisy hair grip for Christmas. I love it because she chose it and it looks like something a Mr Man would wear. Usually, I clip it in my hair, look in the mirror, wear it round the house, but then put it away. But today I need to do something
brave. So instead of spending half an hour straightening my hair and tying it back, I let it go ‘au naturel’ (my hair is so curly that, left to its own devices, it goes beyond natural and slips into the supernatural). I push the daisy hair grip behind my ear into a tangle of curls.

  ‘Ohhh,’ says Emma as I leave the house. ‘Bea pretty!’

  When I get on the bus, Kat isn’t there and in a panic I sit next to Bus Kelly. She’s this teeny Year Seven girl who is so desperate for friends she’s frightened everyone off. Usually she sits on her own . . . but not today. She grins and I quickly ring Kat before she speaks to me.

  No answer. This is so strange. How could Kat abandon me in my hour of need? When I got in last night, I texted her with the most amazing gossip of my life: Hey K guess what? am entering comp with ollie matthews OLLIE MATTHEWS!!! omgomgomg :-D Bean xx But she didn’t text or ring back like I was expecting.

  Yesterday, I didn’t pay much attention because I was on a jive-high, showing Mum films of Lulu and Ray on YouTube and getting Nan to do a demo with me to ‘Jailhouse Rock’. Swinging under Nan’s arm was difficult because she has the dimensions of a jacket potato – small and round – but Mum got the idea. In the end, all four of us were dancing around the living room with Emma yelling, ‘Watch me chive! Watch me chive!’

  I’m brought out of my jive-dream by Bus Kelly tugging my sleeve. ‘You’re Bea, aren’t you?’ she says. I nod. ‘You look funny. What’s wrong?’

  ‘I feel sick.’ Can I ask Bus Kelly to look down the bus and see if Ollie is there? I really need Kat and her little mirror. Where is she?

  The bus pulls up at the stop before school and a load of Year Tens pile off. They push down the aisle and that’s when I hear Ollie talking to his mates. ‘Seriously,’ he says, ‘they taste good. Try one.’ I start to panic. I must appear occupied. In a moment of desperation I ask Bus Kelly who her favourite teacher is. Just as she turns and gives me a confused look, Ollie is standing next to me, saying, ‘One for Bea,’ shoving a packet of sweets under my nose, ‘and don’t let the name put you off.’

  Obediently, I take a sweet and glance at the packet. I read ‘Sick ’n’ mix’.

  ‘Carrot chunk,’ I say as I stick the lurid orange sweet in my mouth.

  He carries on down the bus, passing out his gross sweets and that’s it. Mission accomplished. I spoke to Ollie. He spoke to me! Admittedly, all I said was ‘carrot chunk’ but, hey, it’s a start. I sit there smiling, thinking, It’s going to be alright . . . It’s all going to be alright!

  Whack! A bag smacks me on the back of my head and I fly forward, hitting my forehead on the seat in front. My hair’s messed up and the daisy clip falls to the floor. I look up. Pearl is standing there, holding up the queue.

  Not taking her eyes off me, she moves her face close to mine and whispers, ‘Bitch.’ Her breath is an odd combination of cigarettes and mint. My stomach melts and the little kids around me gasp, getting ready for a fight, but Pearl just pushes past everyone.

  Bus Kelly tugs at my blazer. ‘You’re dead, Bea.’

  I know it.

  It’s only when I get off the bus at school that I realise something amazing has happened. I didn’t cry. Yes, the scariest girl in the school thinks I’m a bitch, but I didn’t cry.

  As I walk into tutor time, I finally hear from Kat: Soz not on bus. Bton 4 dentists lol!! Whenever Kat’s mum wants to take her shopping in Brighton, she says Kat’s got a dentist appointment. Kat’s had five ‘dentist’ appointments so far this year.

  Realising I’m friendless, I sit down next to Betty. ‘Hello, bitch,’ she says, cheerfully.

  ‘Good news travels fast.’

  ‘Amber’s brother was sitting behind you on the bus. What did you do?’

  ‘Well, Pearl’s not told me, but I guess it’s got something to do with me entering Starwars with Ollie Matthews.’

  Betty’s mouth drops open. ‘No. Way. Seriously? NO WAY!’ She slams her hand down on the desk and roars with laughter. ‘Charlie, Amber!’ The girls have just walked in. ‘Get ready for the most bizarre news ever: our very own, little, lovely, quiet Bea Hogg is entering Starwars with . . . you’re never going to believe this . . . Ollie McFittie Matthews!’

  ‘No!’ says Charlie.

  ‘That’s mad,’ says Amber. ‘How come?’

  They gather round me and I explain as quietly as I possibly can. Pearl has come in and is now staring coldly at me, but the girls keep asking me questions and laughing and gasping and asking more questions and then more questions.

  ‘Ah! You’re going to be jive bunnies. That’s so cool,’ says Charlie. ‘Seriously, Bea, he’s nice. My brother’s mates with him and he’s always round at our place.’

  ‘And, like, not to forget how he’s completely and utterly Beautimus Maximus,’ adds Betty. ‘Did you see him when they did that rugby thing in assembly? He has a seriously gorgeous –’

  ‘Shut up,’ says Charlie, clamping her hand over Betty’s mouth. ‘You’re embarrassing her.’

  And then I can’t resist sharing my born-again jiviness with them. I go into more and more detail about the arm jive (I can do it) and the judo flip (I can’t) and I don’t care that they’re laughing because I’m laughing too. As I’m explaining the intimacy levels of ‘the yoyo’ using two mobile phones, I make the mistake of glancing up and I momentarily lock eyes with Pearl.

  ‘Freak,’ she says, before turning back to her friends and whispering something that makes them snigger. Suddenly, her phone vibrates. ‘It’s him,’ she says as she studies the screen. Then, looking at me, she smiles a cold, satisfied smile and my happiness dissolves.

  At that moment, I realise two things: (1) someone must have told her about me and Ollie and the likely candidate is Kat; and (2) ‘him’ is totally and obviously Ollie.

  ‘Come on, Bea. What does the Nokia do?’ asks Betty.

  ‘Oh, well, that’s it really,’ I say, passing the phones back.

  Pearl thinks she’s in competition with me. This is ridiculous! It’s like America declaring war on the Isle of Wight. And, just to clarify, Pearl is the world superpower and I’m the island selling cream teas.

  I finally catch up with Kat in French. Appropriately, her nails have a very professional-looking French polish and I’m fairly certain her shoes are new. ‘Regardez mes nouvelles chaussures!’ she whispers.

  Yep. I try to be cold, but that’s difficult because Mr Tweed produces a fruit bowl from under his desk and starts throwing oranges around the room, instruct­­­ing us to role-play fruit shopping with our partners. Kat’s my partner. I can’t ignore her because she keeps saying ‘Voulez-vous une pear?’ and juggling two big imaginary boobies.

  She does this continuously until I start to laugh. After an awkward pause, I relent and ask her how The Pink Ladies’ dance is coming along. She describes every detail of their hip-swivels and sassy krumps – which I initially mistake for some of her mum’s yummy Swedish biscuits – and then she moves on to telling me how friendly Pearl is, not evil like I think at all, just really fun and ordinary, just like in the Ladybird days. ‘So,’ she says finally, ‘you and Ollie Matthews!’

  ‘You got my text?’

  ‘Only this morning. I had my phone turned off last night and, oh, sorry about the bus. Mum just had to get to the French Connection sale and wanted an opinion on some harem pants,’ she babbles nervously, not making total sense. ‘My opinion was: totally puke, but I said they were awesome so she’d buy me the shoes. Anyways . . . you and Ollie, how did that happen?’

  I explain my nan’s plan and my surprise at the dance class. Finally, I have the courage to ask, ‘Did you hear what Pearl said on the bus?’ She nods. ‘Did you tell her about me and Ollie?’

  Kat does her silly-old-ditsy-old-me face that gets her out of most situations. ‘I just didn’t think it was a big deal, Bea. I was chatting on the phone about who was entering with who and it kind of slipped out.’

  I thought she’d turned her phone off? She had ti
me to talk to Pearl and gossip about Starwars, but couldn’t reply to my text? I feel slightly sick.

  ‘Bean,’ says Kat, ‘as your best friend, I’ve got to say I really don’t think you should dance with Ollie.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘He’s practically Pearl’s boyfriend and she’s mad at you. And, you know, she likes getting her own way.’ Kat smiles as though everything’s the same as usual and we’re just gossiping about what a nutter Pearl turned into.

  ‘Are they going out?’ I ask, putting as much casual nonchalance into my voice as I can.

  ‘Practically. She’s taking it slow. Doesn’t want to rush things.’ My heart sinks. ‘When’s your next rehearsal?’

  Looking down at my orange, I try to accept what Kat’s just told me. ‘We’re meeting straight after school.’

  ‘Right, you see, Pearl just told me she got a text from Ollie and he wants to meet her after school. I thought you should know. I don’t want you to feel bad when he doesn’t turn up.’ She squeezes my arm. ‘Maybe he’s not as great as we thought he was.’

  And then Mr Tweed starts to ask us questions about the colour of cars and I realise I may not have been concentrating a hundred per cent on the lesson.

  Throughout the rest of the day, I get little comments and cold stares whenever I see Pearl. I do my best to avoid her, walking elaborate routes to lessons and hiding in the library at lunchtime, but at the end of the day, when I’m stuffing some books in my locker, I look up to discover her leaning against the lockers, watching me. She’s alone.

  ‘I’m meeting my boyfriend here. Have you come to watch?’ She moves closer as I shut my locker. ‘I said, Have you come to watch?’ I try to step round her, but she keeps blocking my path until I’m doing this pathetic dance. On either side of us, students stand and stare.

  Suddenly, she stops moving and I squeeze past. Fighting the urge to run, I walk down the corridor, and above the sound of slamming lockers and cries of ‘bye’ I can still hear her laugh. The sound follows me as I rush down the stairs and out of school.