Half of My Heart ✔️

05 | my number one

My nose almost touches the floor as I press my torso on top of my right leg. The muscles in my left thigh burn as I hold the split and I clench my hold on my calf, stretching myself further forward.

After what seems like forever in that position, I straighten my back and reach for the towels a few feet to my right. As far as I reach, my fingertips just barely graze them. I sigh in defeat and get ready to pull myself out of the split to retrieve the towels.

"Need help?" A voice to my left asks. I turn and see a pretty girl sitting on the ground a few feet away from me, unlacing her high top Vans. She nods to the towels I was reaching for and smiles.

"Yeah," I say, smiling back at her. "I was gonna work on my right oversplit before class started."

She gets up and picks up the towels, walking toward me. "I figured. I had both my oversplits last year but I lost them over the summer. I'm not looking forward to getting them back," she says, kneeling in front of me. Then she gently lifts my right leg and places two folded towels under my ankle for leverage.

"Just two?" she asks, holding up more towels. I shake my head, already feeling the burn of the small oversplit.

"Yeah, two is perfect. Thank you," I say. "I'm Scarlett, by the way."

"Mya," she says, sitting back down to put on her pointe shoes. "I've seen you practicing before. You're really good."

I blush as I press myself back over my leg. "Thanks, you too," I say honestly. After a few minutes, she joins me on the floor to stretch and we make small talk about the class, the instructor, and how long we've danced. It isn't long before the conversation turns to the auditions that are being held in a few months and I change the subject quickly.

"So do you go to UNC?" I ask as I pull myself up off the floor. Mya nods, rolling out her ankles, and I smile. "Well," I say, proud of myself for making a dance friend, "I have an extra ticket to the home opener basketball game against Syracuse tonight if you wanna come?"

She smiles. "Are you kidding? Hell yeah, I wanna come."

"Great," I say, trying to keep my cool. We agree to meet at the stadium. A second later, our instructor walks in -- this long-necked Russian lady with tremendous posture and a permanent scowl. We stop talking immediately and take our places for barre.

When I get back to my dorm after class, I collapse onto my bed with a groan. I can already feel the soreness in my calves from the relevés she made us do. It felt like we were doing them for hours.

Just before I'm about to drift off into a quick nap, my phone buzzes next to my head and I grasp at it, too tired to raise my head. But I immediately wake up when I see who it's from. I press Levi's message tentatively, wondering what the hell he could be messaging me about.

Just shared my character analysis
Are you gonna turn it in or do you want me to?

I sit up, remembering that our movie character analyses and synthesis are due at midnight. I sit down at my desk, realizing that I have less than an hour before the basketball game to merge our analyses and turn it in. I text him back.

I'll do it
Thanks

I'm halfway through merging and formatting our assignment when he texts back. As hard as I try to focus on the task at hand, I finally give in and pick it up. When I read the text, I wish I hadn't.

So did you like the band?

He doesn't say his band, but it's obvious which band he's talking about. I was hoping we could just forget the whole thing happened, but he apparently didn't get the memo. I consider acting stupid, then realize that I'm being childish. Yes, I saw his band. Yes, they were good. Did he necessarily have to know that? I decided not.