The Queerest [🗸]

my first dance lesson with riya khatri

I'm hyperventilating.

Seated at the dining table, all the events from the week fly through my mind. Detention. Ryder, Cath, and Ella. Riya. Glitter. Riya's wink. Riya's smile. A caramel latte. It's flying through my mind in snippets, making it nearly impossible for me to slow down and breathe.

My fork clatters to the table, my eyes widening when it dawns on me that my first session with Riya Khatri is tomorrow after school. I exhale a curse. Tomorrow. Somehow, when I made that deal with Riya, I was thinking more about how warm her hands felt in mine, or how her hair smelt like peppermint, and I wasn't sure how she got that scent.

It didn't really register with me that she was actually coming over. As in, this is not a drill, Riya Khatri is actually coming over to the studio. To take dances. With me. One on one.

I have some sort of vague lesson in mind, but nothing too tangible. I specialize in contemporary dance and ballet. Riya seems like she'd be more interested in the former. Where do I even start? 

Fuck, one smile and my mind stopped working.

To be fair, she bought me a latte. A caramel latte. No one has ever done that for me before. Especially not Ryder. To be fair, he has bought me things. A black coffee. Once. He doesn't know that I don't like them, and I don't have the heart to tell him.

Either way, drinks aside, I need to organize the mess that is screwing with my mind before Riya comes over to the studio for lessons.

"Evelyn?"

My eyes flicker back to the present, to Dad who raises his eyebrows at me from across the table, gaze inquisitive. Shaking my head, I return back to the current situation. I'm at the dining table, both parents across from me, staring at me with confused glances.

"Estas bien?" Dad finally asks, shaking a head of curls that both Mom and I share, Mom's tightly wound and a deep black, framing her face as her features echo Dad's question.

Shaking my head, I nod. "No, yeah. Of course." Another nod. "Si." Giving both of my parents a wide grin, hoping to conceal the chaos inside, I clear our plates from the table. "I just need to organize one of my dance schedules and prepare everything."