Head to Head (On Pointe Book 2)

by Penelope Freed

  Head to Head

  Copyright © 2021 by Penelope Freed

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.)

  Editing by Caitlin Fitzgerald and Saxony Gray

  Cover design by Vanilla Lily Designs

  Interior design by Stephanie Anderson, Alt 19 Creative

  ISBN 978-1-7364893-1-4

  For everyone who ever heard the words

  “that’s not a real job.”

  Yes it is.

  Contents

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Lisa

  Hannah

  Katy

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Hannah

  “You’re crazy, you know that, right?” Katy blurts out. “It’s Spring Break, don’t you want, you know, a break?”

  “And you’d be there for the entire week?” I ask, eyeing Lisa from across Katy’s bed. “So, we wouldn’t see you at all? What about rehearsals for the June recital?”

  “Do you really think they’ll let you go? I know we all—” Olivia waves at the four of us in the room, “—get why being accepted to the Pacific Sound Ballet summer intensive is a big deal, but do your parents?” Olivia folds herself over her legs, stretching out her hamstrings. “Besides, there’s deadlines and shit, plus you’d have to buy plane tickets and everything. Are you going to get an answer from them in time?”

  “This is the only way my parents will consider letting me go to PSB instead of sending me to cram school in Osaka for a month. Yes, it’s all day, every day of Spring Break, plus I’d still have Japanese school on Sunday. But Saturday I’ll be at dance, promise.” Just listening to Lisa talk about it is exhausting.

  “I already talked to my dad.” Lisa doesn’t mention her mom, which isn’t surprising. Lisa’s mom is a little...intense when it comes to school. “He said that if I go to this SAT camp over Spring Break and prove that I can dance without letting it affect my grades, he’ll talk to my mom about letting me go.”

  Looking around Katy’s bedroom, I never would have thought that the four of us would be sitting here, hanging out just like old times. When Olivia started dating Tyler Stanley back in January, I swore I would never forgive her for stealing my crush out from under me. It’s been a long and bumpy road but I finally realized that 1) Tyler is perfect for Olivia and 2) just because Olivia and I aren’t best friends anymore, doesn’t mean we have to be enemies.

  A series of shouts makes us all jump. “Hang on,” Katy says, hopping up from next to me on her bed. “Jack! Hunter! Shut it!” she bellows down the stairs to where her twin older brothers are playing video games with some of the guys from school.

  “Oh my god, Katy. You should be on the squad with those lungs.” Olivia laughs as Katy slams the door and flops back on the bed with me.

  “Ha. Ha. Never going to happen. I’ve seen too many cat fights in my backyard, no way am I going to purposefully subject myself to that.” Katy had invited Lisa and I over after dance today, not knowing that her brothers had invited their athlete friends and some of the cheer squad, including Olivia, to do the same thing.

  It’s been an interesting afternoon. I’m avoiding going downstairs again after an awkward experiment in flirtation with one Andrew Park involving an intense game called Quinn Ball and a stereotypical mean girl moment that I never want to relive. It’s all a bit surreal, but I’m doing my best to enjoy the time with my friends.

  “Anyway, I’ll figure it out,” Lisa assures us, interrupting the stare down happening between Katy and Olivia. “I think I might die from all the studying, but I’m determined to do this. I don’t want to go to Japan for a month, I want to dance.”

  “You know we’ll help, right?” Katy points out. “Just say the word.”

  “Yeah. I mean, we can’t exactly help you study since you’re the smartest one here.” I laugh. “But you know, if you need help with anything other than AP Chem or Calculus let us know, okay?”

  We all laugh at this, knowing that Lisa is the only one in this room who would ever take such a difficult class. Her parents petitioned the school to let her take it as a sophomore, usually only juniors or seniors are allowed to take it since you have to have passed Algebra 2/Trig to be eligible. But as far back as I can remember Lisa has been taking advanced math classes. She was going to the high school to take Algebra and Geometry while the rest of us were struggling through seventh and eighth grade math classes.

  “Since we’re too dumb to help Lisa, I suggest we focus on something we can help with.” Olivia declares once we catch our breaths. “Hannah Banana O’Brian, you owe us an update on what’s happening with Trevor.”

  I groan and flop back on the bed next to Katy. “Nothing. Nothing is happening,” I tell the ceiling.

  “Do you want there to be something happening?” Olivia asks.

  “I don’t know! I don’t have time for boys. I have plans.”

  “Yes, yes, we all know you have plans.” Olivia dismisses me with a wave of her hand. “But sometimes it just happens. I mean, he lives in Seattle and you’re about to go spend half your summer there, right? Or are you going to New York?”

  “Six weeks, to be precise. I haven’t decided yet. It’s The Classical Ballet School, how many people have a chance to train there? Going to New York, going to CBS, that was always my dream. I know that logically it makes more sense to go to PSB. Seattle is so much closer and I have the full scholarship there. But…” I pause, I know I must sound so entitled. Oh no, poor Hannah got into both her top choice schools, with scholarships to both. What a terrible burden it must be to have to pick between them. But it is hard. “Don’t hate me for saying this,” I start, not sure how to tell my friends this without hurting their feelings, especially Lisa.

  “Okay, just let me talk this out. I know I sound like a brat but… I know that PSB makes the most sense. It’s the logical choice. It’s closer to home, we’d be staying on a college campus, in supervised dorms. I have a full scholarship. The training will be amazing, I mean… Marco Bethelo.” We all stop and sigh for a moment over the extremely attractive, newly retired dancer who is taking over running the PSB school. “But dancing at the Classical Ballet School has been my dream since I was seven. I would be dancing in the same studios that half the dancers we follow on Instagram trained in. It’s like being invited backstage at the Oscars or something,” My hands fly up to cover my face, my cheeks burning. “Ugh, okay, I know how ridiculous I sound,” I say through my fingers at Olivia and Katy’s chuckles
. “I’m serious, you guys. I don’t know what to do.”

  Always the logical one, Lisa sits up and at least pretends to take me seriously. “Katy, can I have some paper? We’re making a pros and cons list.”

  “Wait, wait! Get one for me too please.” Olivia adds. At Katy’s quizzical expression Olivia grins. “Lisa can make a pro and con list for summer intensives. I’m making a pro and con list for Trevor.” She waggles her eyebrows suggestively at this, which cracks us all up.

  “Which list are we making first?” Lisa asks, pen poised over paper.

  Olivia sits next to her, mimicking Lisa’s posture. “Pros, always better to start with the good.”

  “But which one?” Lisa looks at me, waiting for me to speak up. My mouth opens and closes a few times, but nothing comes out. I know this is just for fun, but I’m paralyzed by the million thoughts running through my head.

  “How about both?” Katy suggests. “Here, we can each take a subject.” She pulls out a piece of paper for herself and sits next to Lisa. “Just say any good thing you can think of, we’ll write it down.”

  “Good idea,” Olivia says. “Ready? Hannah? Go!”

  “Ummm… full scholarship to PSB,” I say, pointing at Lisa.

  “Keep going,” Olivia goads me. “Give me one,” she adds with a wink.

  “Funny?”

  “Amazing teachers at CBS.” I point at Katy. “I guess that has to go on your list too, Lisa.”

  Olivia waves her pen at me, urging me to keep going. I can do this, my thoughts starting to organize themselves in my mind as I speak.

  “Half scholarship to CBS,” I tell Katy.

  I point to Lisa, “Fingers crossed, you’ll be at PSB too.”

  “He’s cute.” That one sends heat rushing back up my cheeks as I point at Olivia.

  “Keep going, Han, this is good.” Lisa encourages me. I take a breath and start throwing more thoughts out for my friends to write down.

  “Staying in dorms at PSB means my parents won’t worry so much. If I choose CBS, I could see New York City when I’m not dancing, maybe even go see Broadway shows.” I pause to think. “Seattle is closer, no jet lag and easier to get there.” Olivia catches my eye and waggles her eyebrows again, making me laugh and giving me something else to add to Trevor’s list of pros. “He sends me funny memes when I have a bad day.”

  “I heard that at CBS you only get three classes a day and at PSB we’d get more like five or six.” I’d heard that too, so I nod at Lisa to write it down.

  I keep going, more thoughts coming to me as I speak. “The CBS end of workshop performance has agents and other company directors come watch, I could get offered something. Also, CBS is famous for having up-and-coming choreographers practice on the workshop students.”

  “Not to be a Debbie-Downer, but that’s only good if you get cast in a good part. Not going to do you any good if you’re standing in the back row waving a flower back and forth,” Katy adds. “I’ll write both down, the pro and the con.”

  I nod, then point at Olivia. “It’s both a pro and a con that Trevor lives in Seattle. Pro because he’s less of a distraction and doesn’t take up my time like he would if he was here. But con because you know, Seattle is, like, a thousand miles away.”

  “Makes kissing someone kinda hard, not gonna lie,” Olivia adds as she writes. Lisa and Katy are looking over her shoulder, then dissolve into giggles as she flourishes whatever she just wrote.

  “Oh my God, Olivia what did you just write?” I reach out to snatch the paper from her, but she’s already scooting back on the floor, keeping the paper just out of reach. “Livvy, what did you write?”

  “I only wrote down the truth!” Olivia gets out between fits of laughter. I lunge off the bed and wrestle the list from her limp fingers. Smoothing out the wrinkles in the paper so I can read what she wrote, I hold my laughter in for a second, my eyes watering at the effort, until I give in and join in the giggles coming from my three friends still rolling on the floor.

  Making out with your phone is unsanitary

  “You’re ridiculous.” I stick my tongue out at Olivia, which just makes her laugh harder.

  “You know you love it,” she tosses back at me. “Give me more things for my list, Lisa and Katy have twice as many things as me.”

  “Fine. What do you have so far?”

  “Funny, cute, sends memes when you have a bad day, and lives in Seattle so you don’t get distracted by his cute face on a daily basis.”

  “That’s not what I said.”

  “It’s what you meant.”

  I roll my eyes, but I can’t deny it. “Fine. He’s smart. He could probably help me with my homework.” Lisa makes a noise of protest at this and I throw a pillow at her. “Lisa, you’re a terrible tutor in math. You’re too smart.”

  “It’s not my fault! I didn’t know you hadn’t learned the quadratic equation yet,” Lisa objects, arms crossed over her chest.

  “We were in seventh grade Lisa. It’s still the only math test I’ve ever gotten an F on,” I add. I give her a hard time about this at least once a year, every time I complain about whatever math problem I’m struggling with that day.

  “Focus, Hannah!” Olivia throws the pillow I tossed at Katy back at me.

  “Ummmm, I don’t know. I can’t think of anything else. Isn’t that good enough?”

  “I guess it’ll do for now. I’m adding that he has family here, so it’s guaranteed he’ll be back in town to visit. And with that, my work here is done.” Olivia stands up, handing her list to me.

  “What about the cons?” Katy asks.

  “For Trevor? There are none.” Olivia winks. “I should go, my dad said I had to be home by ten and I still need to drag Tyler away from your brothers. It’s the first time he’s let me out on a weekend, I can’t be late.” With a little wave, she skips out the door. Olivia’s dad caught her lying about where she was when she was going out with Tyler, she’s been grounded for the last few weeks. She calls to Tyler and says her goodbyes downstairs before Katy reaches up a hand to push the door closed.

  “So… I guess you and Olivia are okay now?” she asks in the suddenly quiet room.

  I shrug. “Yeah. We talked tonight. I mean, she’s never going to be my best friend again, but that’s okay.”

  “As long as it means dance goes back to normal,” Katy says. “It’s been torture with you two fighting.”

  I cringe, guilt for having made class uncomfortable for my friends eating at me. But I didn’t know how else to deal with my hurt feelings except keeping to myself. “I promise, we’ll be normal. Besides, with my drama over we have to concentrate on getting Lisa’s parents to let her go.”

  “I’m making it happen, Hannah. It’s not an if.” I catch a flash of uncertainty in Lisa’s eyes, but she quickly replaces it with a look of fierce determination. “I’m going to PSB if it kills me. I mean, it might. Just pack my corpse in an extra suitcase and take it with you, okay?”

  “No way, all my suitcase space is for extra pointe shoes and protein bars,” I deadpan. “I’ll ship you to the dorms ahead of time.”

  Chapter Two

  Lisa

  I wake with a start when my head hits the kitchen table. The house is dark and quiet, the only light coming from the chandelier hanging above my head. Blinking my tired eyes, I focus on the clock on the wall opposite me until I can make out the time. I remember my parents saying goodnight as I was reading ahead for tomorrow, but I must have fallen asleep as I was reading, stray pen marks on the page evidence of my weakness.

  I might as well go to bed. Gathering up my things, I creep upstairs to my room, my house slippers silent on the carpet.

  It’s halfway through Spring Break, and while my friends are enjoying lazy mornings in bed, I have to be ready and waiting at the door by six so my dad can drop me off at Wedgewood
Prep in Malibu on his way to his office over in Hawthorne. I check my phone as I crawl under the covers.

  Hannah: Class tonight sucked without you. We didn’t even rehearse since almost everyone was gone. *cough* Katy *cough*

  Katy: It’s spring break Hannah, you knew this was going to happen. Ms. Parker canceled rehearsal last week, remember?

  Hannah: I realize that people are out of town for spring break. But you’re not, where were you?

  Katy: I may have fallen asleep.

  Katy: Lisa, can we trade brothers please? I’ll take Ray if you keep Hunter for the week. He keeps getting up super early and it wakes me up every time his stupid truck pulls out of the garage.

  Do I tell Katy I know why her brother keeps leaving so early?

  Me: I hate missing class this week. But at least my blisters have a chance to heal.

  Me: Your brothers smell, Katy. At least mine is clean, even if he’s a brat.

  Despite it being almost one in the morning, I send them each a quick reply before turning off my light, my brain already shutting down.

  “What are you doing here?” I’d blurted out on Monday morning as Hunter waltzed in the door, coffee cup in hand.

  “SAT prep, obviously. What are you doing here? Aren’t you a sophomore?” he’d shot back, sliding into the seat next to me.

  “I made a deal with my parents. It was this, or go stay with my grandma in Japan for a month this summer.”

  “Japan sounds pretty awesome to me.” Hunter had replied, pulling a notebook and some pens out of his backpack. “I’d be happy to ditch my siblings for a month. Why don’t you want to go?”

  “If I go to Japan, I won’t get to dance. I want to go to Pacific Sound Ballet’s summer intensive.”

  “Oh, Katy mentioned something about it. It’s like a training camp for ballet, right? Ballet all day long?” Hunter smiled as more high schoolers stumbled sleepily into the room, finding seats before the class started.

  This morning he slid into the seat next to me for the third day in a row, regarding me for a long minute before handing me the steaming paper cup in his hand. “What time do you get here? Are you driving yourself?” Even though he’s in my AP Chem class and I’ve known him for years, we’ve never hung out. I always assumed he lumped me in as one of Katy’s ballet friends, that I was just background noise, the same way everyone else at school sees me. The way he’s been paying attention to me this week is unsettling.