“I’m going to forget you said that. Didn’t happen. Because you really have been showing me a lot of effort.” Gina turned and walked away.
Devane stared after Gina until she disappeared from sight, then she lowered her eyes to the torn banner on the ground. What did you just do? she asked herself.
The answer was crystal. Devane had just taken all the work she’d done to get off probation and flushed it. All of it.
CHAPTER 8
A basketball came flying at Sammi. She automatically reached out and caught it. “Wanna play Horse?” Ky asked. “There’s a hoop around back.”
“I’m going to head in,” Sophie said. “I want to see if ill papi’s around. Just to make sure everything’s okay with him.”
“See you in there,” Sammi told her sister. Shouldn’t Sammi be going in, too? She was worried about ill papi. She definitely wanted to know what was up with him. But . . . it was actually kind of nice to hang with a boy who wanted to hang with her.
“I’ll take it easy on you,” Ky told her. “I might even let you win. You seem like a girl who likes to win.”
“What’s wrong with that? Don’t tell me you don’t care about winning.” Sammi threw the ball back at him.
Ky laughed as he started dribbling the ball down the sidewalk. Sammi hesitated a moment, then trotted after him, following him around the building to the hoop. Class was starting up in, like, fifteen. She’d see ill papi then. It would be good for him to wonder where she was for a change.
If he even will. Ever.
The thought startled Sammi. She was used to getting what she wanted. Not that she was spoiled or anything. She put in the time and the effort and the energy. That’s why things happened for her.
And it’s not like ill papi was one of those guys who was too shy or whatever to even want to deal with girls. Ill papi talked to Sophie all the time. If Sophie could get him laughing and talking, Sammi should be able to do it, too. She just had to find a way in.
But she’d already tried a lot of things. She’d tried finding out what he liked and liking it, too—or at least acting like she liked it. She’d done the casual arm touch to signal she was interested. She’d tried going completely bold and invited him to the movies. And she’d tried Ky’s jealousy plan. Nothing was working for her.
“Four, three, two—” Ky said.
“What?” Sammi asked.
“I already told you. If I get to zero before you make the shot, I’m giving you an ‘H,’” Ky told her.
“Why don’t you just go first?”
“I did. You were too busy thinking about—huh, what could you have been thinking about? Your face was kind of like this.” Ky put a dopey smile on his face that made him look like he’d had half his brain removed. “So I’m guessing it was ill papi.”
Sammi spotted the basketball lying on the ground near her feet. She picked it up. “Where am I supposed to shoot from?”
“Right here where I’m standing,” Ky told her. He gave her one of his I’m-king-of-the-world grins as she walked over to his spot almost under the basket. “Aren’t you going to tell me I’m right?” he asked when she was toe to toe with him. “You were thinking about your papi, admit it.” He didn’t back away.
“You don’t need to hear you’re right. Your head is too big already.” Sammi gave him a little push, lined up her shot. Swish. All net. “Oh, yeah!” she cried.
“Oh, yeah!” he squealed in a Minnie Mouse voice. As if she sounded like that. “I made a basket from two feet away from the hoop!”
“You’re the one who chose that spot,” Sammi reminded him.
Ky snagged the ball and backed up as far as he could until his shoulders were pressed against the wall of the Hip Hop Kidz building. Sammi shook her head at him. “Be real. No one could make that shot.”
“I am so real,” Ky answered. “I’m only stopping because I have to.” He slapped the cement wall.
He bounced the ball once. Twice. For a second, Sammi could see him on a court, surrounded by fans. He must miss it so much.
Ky’s face went serious. She wondered if he was thinking about how it used to be for him—before he wrecked his wrist. Was that why he looked so solemn all of a sudden?
Sammi started stomping her feet, getting into cheerleader mode. “It won’t, it won’t, it won’t go in.” Ky’s usual grin reappeared. Sammi kept on going, clapping rhythmically. “It’ll roll around the rim, but it won’t go in!”
Ky shot. Clang! The ball hit the metal rim and bounced off. “That’s right!” Sammi yelled, finishing the cheer. She was actually impressed he’d even been able to hit the rim from all the way back there. “And that’s an ‘H’ for you, my friend.”
“Let’s see what you can do.” Ky retrieved the ball and brought it over to her.
Sammi bounced the ball once. Twice. She locked her eyes on the hoop.
Ky started stomping his feet. “Oh, you think you’re cute. And I guess you are. But—” He hesitated. “Wait. I’m thinking.” He snapped his fingers. “You aren’t gonna hit it from that far.”
Sammi laughed so hard, she dropped the ball. He was so goofy. And he was pretty cute himself. And nice.
I should like him, she told herself. I should be asking him out.
But she’d miss the zing-zap. And she only got that around ill papi.
“I never had my parents’ permission to join the group,” Emerson told Maddy and Gina. She looked back and forth between the two of them as they sat on the small sofa in Maddy’s office. She definitely didn’t want to look at her mother.
“I’m sorry I lied to you. To both of you.” She could almost feel the tension—tension and anger—in her mother’s body, even though they sat in separate chairs. “To all of you,” she added. She hadn’t meant to leave her mom out. It’s just that she’d already apologized to her parents so many times—and it hadn’t seemed to make any difference. They still looked at her like she was a worm or some other icky thing that had crawled into their perfect home.
“But I talked to you on the phone,” Maddy protested, turning to Emerson’s mom.
“Oh, I—Mom, I forgot to tell you that part.” Her mother probably didn’t believe that. Why would she believe anything Emerson said ever again? But Emerson really had forgotten. It was getting hard to keep track of all the little lies. “It was me on the phone,” she explained to Maddy.
Another lie. Sophie had asked Sammi to make the call to Maddy because Sammi sounded older—and because Sammi wasn’t in Hip Hop Kidz back then, so Maddy wouldn’t recognize Sammi’s voice. But Emerson wasn’t going to bring Sophie and Sammi into this. They’d only been trying to help her.
“I tried to change my voice so I’d sound older and so you wouldn’t know it was me,” Emerson continued. “I wanted to be in the group so badly. I just love it so much.” Tears stung her eyes, and she blinked quickly to make them disappear. Crying in Maddy’s office was only going to make Emerson feel worse. She hated to cry in front of people. It made her feel like a layer of her skin had been peeled away. Everything just hurt more.
“Emerson also signed the permission form for the Performance Group,” Emerson’s mother told Gina and Maddy. “So you can understand why—even if we’d agreed that she could be in the group in the first place—it would be impossible now.”
“Of course,” Maddy said.
“We hate to lose Emerson. She’s a talented dancer. And a great teammate,” Gina told Emerson’s mom. “But we completely understand.”
Emerson’s mother stood up. Emerson pulled in a deep, quavering breath and stood up beside her.
“We really appreciate you both coming in to talk to us in person,” Maddy said.
“It was the right thing to do,” Emerson’s mother answered. Emerson knew her mom was really talking to her, not Maddy. “Thank you for making time to see us.”
This was like one of her mother’s committee meetings. So formal. So calm. All business. She didn’t get that she was talking about
Emerson’s life here. That Hip Hop Kidz meant something to Emerson. Something huge.
Emerson had been pretty much perfect since her birth. This whole lying, sneaking-out, disobeying-her-parents behavior was new. So why didn’t they understand that her reason for doing all that bad stuff was important? She’d tried and tried to make them comprehend that, but they couldn’t get it through their heads. Or they just didn’t care.
Maddy opened the door to her office. She smiled at Emerson as she and her mother walked through. “Good-bye,” Gina called.
Emerson nodded. She didn’t think she could talk right then.
Her mother started for the main exit, high heels tapping on the linoleum. “Mom,” Emerson managed to say. “I want to—” She began again. “I’d like to go to the locker room for one minute. I’d like to say good-bye to my friend Sophie in person. Would that be all right?”
“Five minutes,” her mother answered. “I’ll be waiting in the car.”
“Thank you.” Emerson turned around and hurried into the girls’ locker room. Sophie was already at her locker. Max and Chloe were getting ready a few benches away from her.
“You didn’t see ill papi out there, did you?” Sophie asked when Emerson reached her. “I have something I need to talk to him about and—” She stopped suddenly and put her hand on Emerson’s shoulder. “Hey, what’s wrong?”
“I have to quit the group,” Emerson said.
“What? What are you talking about?” Sophie cried.
“I got caught. My parents found out everything. So they’re making me quit. I can’t even take classes here anymore.” Emerson couldn’t stop the tears this time. They came too fast, spilling down her cheeks, wet and burning. “I’m grounded forever. They didn’t even let me call and tell you what happened.”
“Oh, Em . . .” Sophie’s own eyes were glistening.
“You really have to leave?” Max asked. For once, she was standing completely still.
“Yeah,” Emerson answered.
Chloe walked over and handed her a Kleenex. “Thanks,” Emerson said.
“So what actually happened?” Chloe asked.
“My parents never wanted me in the group. So basically, I’ve been lying to them about it the whole time and they found out.” Emerson wiped her eyes, the tissue turning to a soggy mass in her fingers. “I just had to go tell Gina and Maddy that I’m quitting. My mom made me tell them the whole thing.”
Devane walked around the corner of the row of lockers and dropped her backpack. “Looks like I’m missing out on some drama,” she commented.
“This isn’t for your entertainment,” Sophie snapped.
Devane raised her eyebrows. “Am I holding any popcorn?”
Emerson stood up. “My mom only gave me five minutes. And she means it. Say bye for me to everyone.”
“Bye? Where are you going?” Devane asked.
“Emerson has to quit,” Max explained as Sophie gave Emerson a long, hard hug. “She got in trouble with her parents.”
“Call me, okay?” Sophie said.
“If I’m ever allowed to use the phone again,” Emerson promised. She gave a little wave to Max and Chloe. “Bye, you guys.” They hugged her, too. A double hug.
They released her. And that just left Devane. “Maybe this will get you that solo you wanted,” Emerson tried to joke. Devane’s eyes widened, and Emerson was afraid she’d hurt the other girl. “You deserve one,” she added.
“You deserved it, too,” Devane said. “You’re good, Ballerina.”
Emerson snorted. “Ballet is all I’m going to be doing from now on. My parents are only allowing me out of the house for ballet lessons. That’s it.”
“You gonna give up that easy?” Devane asked. “Lots of people do hip-hop without lessons. At least people where I come from. I know I’d dance no matter what. No legs? I’d still bring it.”
Emerson smiled a little. Her first smile in days. “Good point,” she told Devane. “Okay, I really have to go. You don’t want to see my mother come in here and get me.” She started for the door, and Sophie went with her. “No, you stay here, okay?” Emerson told her. “I don’t want to lose it again.”
And she walked out of the locker room, down the hall, and out of the Hip Hop Kidz building.
For the very last time.
“I can’t believe Emerson’s not going to be in the group anymore,” Becca said as they waited for class to start up. She twisted her long red hair into a knot at the back of her head.
Sophie couldn’t believe it, either. Maybe she shouldn’t have helped Em come up with a way to sneak out for the competition. Except if Emerson couldn’t perform with the group—she wouldn’t have been able to be in the group.
What was Emerson’s parents’ deal? Didn’t they get how awesome Emerson was at hip-hop?
Duh. They’d never seen her do her stuff. Even when Emerson had had permission to take classes here, her parents had never checked out one of the lessons through the observation window. Sophie’s dad liked to watch class sometimes when he was early to pick Sophie and Sammi up. A lot of the parents did.
“I keep thinking about what J-Bang said when he was talking about the different crews,” Rachel commented. “He mentioned ballet, remember? He said he and Joe O’Neal liked the ballet flavor. That was Emerson he was talking about. And we’re not going to have that ballet flavor to bring with us to the nationals.”
She covered her mouth with her hands. “That sounded like I don’t care about Em at all. Only about winning. Which isn’t true. But if the ballet thing was something the judges liked—how much is it going to hurt us to lose it?”
“Devane did kind of a ballet thing with Emerson that one time,” Max offered.
“That time I took a bite of her solo, you mean,” Devane said.
“Still,” M.J. said. “You two were on fire.”
“I hardly know any of Emerson’s ballet stuff, though. And I did it krumping style, not locking, so I didn’t have to be so precise with the moves. Maybe I could learn to do some of them Emerson-style. But she’s been doing ballet since birth.” Devane pulled in a deep breath. “And anyway, I’m still on probation.”
“Aren’t you pretty much off now?” Rachel asked. “You performed with the group at the regionals. You helped us win.”
Devane shook her head. “I only got to go on because ill papi was a no-show. Gina didn’t have any notice, so there wasn’t time for her to make any other kind of plan. It wasn’t an official thing.”
“No way!” M.J. burst out. “Gina and Maddy can’t be planning on sending us to the nationals without you.”
Devane shrugged.
Sophie noticed that Devane had lost most of her usual ’tude. She had been working really hard to get off probation. It had to be discouraging to be getting nowhere.
“So let me get this through my head. We might have to face down the other crews at the nationals without Emerson or you?” Max asked Devane.
“It’s up to Gina and Maddy when I get off probation,” Devane answered. “But it’s the middle of September. The nationals are in October. I don’t think you should count on me.”
“If we don’t have Devane or Emerson, then we gotta have ill papi,” Fridge said. “Where is the illin’? Has he called anybody or what?”
Sophie glanced around the room. Only “no’s” and head shakes.
“If he hasn’t called Gina by now, he’s going to be on probation for sure,” Chloe commented. She sat on the floor, the soles of her feet together. She pressed down on her knees with her elbows as she talked, stretching out her thighs.
“Don’t even say that!” M.J. begged. “You’ll curse us. Even my lucky competition socks won’t save us. There’s no way we can win the world without Emerson or Devane or ill papi.”
Sophie wondered if she should break out those moves she’d done for Sammi and her parents when they’d gotten home from the competition. The moves were actually from the first routine the group did at the competi
tion, but Sophie did them as different people. Like Napoleon Dynamite and Batman. It had the family ROFL. Even though her parents didn’t always completely get what Sophie was doing.
“If ill papi was going to come to class, wouldn’t he be here?” Rachel asked. “Do you think he decided to quit the group without telling anyone?”
Same thing Sophie was thinking. She was also wondering how much the strangeness with J-Bang had to do with ill papi’s disappearing act. He had started acting weird around the time Gina announced that J-Bang was judging the regionals.
Sophie decided not to attempt her Napoleon and Batman as b-boys routine. How could she be the Sophie who made people laugh when she didn’t feel anything like laughing herself?
It wasn’t as if a little of her silliness was going to make the crew forget that they might be going all the way to Los Angeles just to lose big.
Sammi and Ky raced into the room. Now everyone was there, waiting for Gina to come in. Everyone except ill papi.
“No ill papi?” Ky asked.
Gina came in before anyone could answer. “It looks like from your faces that you’ve already heard the news about Emerson,” Gina commented.
“Wait. We haven’t.” Sammi shot a concerned look at Sophie.
“I’m afraid Emerson has decided to resign from the group for personal reasons,” Gina said. “I know we’ll all miss her.”
“What happened?” Sammi mouthed to Sophie.
“Her parents found out,” Sophie mouthed back. And Sammi made an “ouch” face. Right then, it felt really good to have Sammi in the class with her. Sammi knew the whole Emerson story. And she knew what good friends Sophie and Em were. The thing with sisters was, you didn’t have to explain that much to them. They were pretty much always up to speed.
“Gina, what are we going to do?” M.J. asked. “How are we supposed to make it to the world championship when we have two of the best dancers out?” He jerked his chin toward Devane.
“Well, I have an announcement to make about one of the empty spots,” Gina said. Sophie noticed Devane’s body stiffen. “I’m very happy to tell you that Maddy and I have decided to make Sammi Qian a member of the Performance Group. Congratulations, Sammi!”
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