The Things We Hide

Twelve

Sunday

"One, two, three, four..." Toni counted us through the routine one last time before we went on stage.

There were two more teams ahead of us, but since making last minute changes to the routine, the acting captain, Toni, wanted to run through it a few more times. We were in the dressing room provided by the venue, making sure everything was perfect. "You girls looked really good." She smiled as we finished up. There was a laugh from behind her. We all looked to see where the voice was coming from. Lisa was standing in the doorway, arms crossed and a smirk plastered on her face, "You call that good?" she questioned, walking into the dressing room. She gave Toni the up down before rolling her eyes, "I see someone made changes to my routine, can't say it was for the better though."

"What are you doing here?" Toni asked, crossing her arms.

"School suspension doesn't exist off school grounds." She looked around the room, her eyes landing on mine, "As captain, I wanted to see my team off to victory. But with all the changes, I'm afraid I came here for nothing."

As if on cue, there was applause from the crowd outside,

"I would say you should practice more, but I think you guys are out of time." With that, she turned to go, "Good luck." She said, her back to us.

"That bitch." Celeste said, shaking her head.

"Don't listen to her." Toni spoke, "You guys look amazing, and the mix that I made is going to blow the crowd away."

"What a pest." Sasha mumbled to me as we went to the mirrors to check our make-up and hair.

We went soft glam and a half up, half down look for today's performance.

I shrugged, but didn't say anything, my mind was occupied thinking about other things. Happier things.

When I didn't participate in Lisa slander, Sasha looked over at me. "Are you passing up a chance to bad mouth Lisa?" She asked, "What's up with you?'

I looked over at her, unable to contain my smile.

"Now that I think about it, you have been rocking that hard core smile since we arrived here." Her eyes combed over my body, "What's going on?"

Just as I was about to tell her my news, one of the crew entered our dressing room, "The current team is almost finished, you guys are up next."

"I'll tell you later." I told her as I followed the other girls out of the room. We set ourselves off to the side of the stage, where we could gauge the crowd. This was a pretty big turn out. Not exactly surprising considering this was a competition between all the teams within the district.

My eyes scoured over the crowd. I saw My mom and dad, they'd finally taken a break from work to be here. Kory sat there next to them, wearing face paint and one of those styrofoam fingers that said "#1".

Next to him was Eli.

My heart fluttered at the sight of him, and images of last night made their way into my mind.

Just like that night at the football game, he looked like a fish out of water. I was grateful he was here for me though.

Next to Eli was Xia, and Zac, and Mya...

His entire family was here.

Altogether, they took up an entire bleacher row.

He brought them here to support me?

"Is that Eli?" Sasha questioned, taking me away from my thoughts.

I nodded, "And his entire family."