Chapter 327 - Don’t Drag Us With You

Chapter 327: Chapter 327 - Don’t Drag Us With You

The words hit Roxie harder than she expected.

For the past hour, the semifinal had stayed somewhere ahead of them, something she could prepare for while pretending there was still plenty of time before she had to walk onto the floor. She could stretch, fix her hair, check her shoes, listen to Karen complain about how cold the holding area was, and convince herself that she was fine.

Now the team ahead of them was already finishing.

Through the curtain, Roxie could hear the final section of their music and the crowd rising with it. The sound pushed through the walls in heavy waves, followed by the announcer and another roar from the arena.

Beside her, Angela rubbed her palms together while Karen rolled her shoulders. Ava bounced lightly on the balls of her feet, looking almost like she was preparing for a fight.

Maybe it was the same in some ways.

Nobody around Roxie looked relaxed, and strangely, that helped. At least she was surrounded by girls whose stomachs were probably twisting just as badly as hers.

Coach Miller stepped in front of them.

For once, he had left the clipboard somewhere else.

He looked across the team before speaking.

"This is it. Go out there and show them what Briarwick is."

Roxie inhaled slowly.

Show them.

The words made the hair along her arms rise.

Her mind immediately tried to turn them into something personal. Show them what? The girl from the videos? The girl from the blurry bathroom picture? The girl strangers seemed to have already judged before they knew her?

She hated how easily her thoughts went there now.

She knew Coach Miller meant the team. She knew he was talking about Briarwick, about the girls standing around her and everything they had worked for. Knowing that and feeling it were apparently two different things.

Weeks of practice had ended with sore wrists, aching shoulders, bruised thighs, and Coach Miller making them repeat the same transition because one person landed half a count late.

That was what they were here to show.

Roxie forced herself to hold onto that.

Coach Miller stepped closer. "Trust the routine. Trust the person beside you. If something goes wrong, fix it and keep moving. You already know how."

Some of the pressure inside Roxie’s chest loosened.

He was right.

Whatever happened out there, they had trained for it. Roxie might be struggling to trust herself completely right now, but she trusted Karen. She trusted Angela. She trusted every girl who had spent the past weeks catching her, lifting her, falling with her, getting back up, and doing it again.

Damn. When it came to cheer, she even trusted Kendall with her life.

Kendall put her hand into the center.

Karen followed, then Angela, Ava, and the rest of the team.

Roxie placed hers on top.

"Briarwick," Kendall said.

"Fight!"

Their hands dropped together.

A staff member pulled the curtain farther open.

"Go."

They ran.

The arena seemed even bigger once Roxie stepped onto the competition floor.

Lights flooded the mat from above, and giant screens on both sides of the arena showed Briarwick moving into position. Beyond the bright competition floor, the stands climbed into darkness, packed with people Roxie could barely make out.

Somewhere among them were Cynthia, Jayson, and Mr. Robinson.

Zac was there too with his friends.

The thought steadied her.

There were people in that crowd who knew her beyond a phone screen. People who wanted her to succeed simply because they cared about her.

Roxie almost searched for them.

Then she stopped herself.

Her opening mark waited beneath her feet.

Karen moved into position behind her. Angela settled to the left. Kendall crossed toward the opposite side of the formation.

Roxie drew in one slow breath.

Five, six, seven, eight.

The music hit.

Her body answered.

Her arms snapped into the opening high V with the rest of the team, shoulders tight as the formation shifted around her. She turned through the next count, planted her foot, and hit the following motion so closely with everyone else that the clap of their hands sounded like one sharp crack across the floor.

That sound gave her a rush of confidence.

They were together.

The floor opened for the first tumbling sequence.

Five, six, seven, eight.

Roxie ran.

She planted both hands into the roundoff and drove her legs overhead, snapping her feet together beneath her. The landing barely lasted before she threw herself backward into the handspring. Her palms struck the mat, shoulders pushing hard as her legs passed above her, and the moment her feet returned to the floor, she used the rebound to launch into the tuck.

Her knees pulled toward her chest as the arena turned around her.

Then the mat came back beneath her.

Roxie landed on both feet with her chest high.

The crowd reacted immediately.

Their opening had hit exactly the way they wanted.

Relief rushed through her, but the formation was already changing.

One, two, three, four.

Travel.

Five, six, seven, eight.

The stunt groups moved into place.

Karen and Angela crouched with their hands ready.

Roxie stepped into the load and felt their grips close around her foot. Their knees bent together, and on the count, they drove upward.

The force lifted Roxie fast.

She straightened through her standing leg as Karen and Angela extended their arms overhead, carrying her until she was high above them. Roxie found her center and pulled her free leg upward into the heel stretch, catching the bottom of her shoe and drawing the leg beside her head while her other arm reached high.

The crowd grew louder.

Roxie shouted with the music.

Her smile came naturally.

For those few seconds, she remembered why she loved this.

Being in the air demanded everything from her. Her balance, her strength, her trust. There was no space left for wondering what somebody in the stands thought about her when two girls beneath her were depending on Roxie to keep her body controlled.

Five, six.

Karen and Angela dipped.

Seven, eight.

Roxie released backward into the cradle.

The lights passed above her as she fell, then the familiar strength of their arms caught her across the back and legs.

Her feet barely touched the mat before they loaded again.

This time the stunt rotated as she rose.

Roxie felt her body turn with the lift, keeping her core tight until the rotation stopped and she locked into position at the top.

Across the floor, Ava reached her own stunt almost simultaneously.

Kendall caught Roxie’s eye from another group and grinned.

Roxie smiled back.

Everything was working.

They dropped cleanly into the transition, and the music shifted into the dance section.

Briarwick spread across the mat.

Roxie drove through the choreography with the others, snapping through the hip turn, dropping low with the beat, then rising into the next formation while Karen crossed behind her.

Her breathing had grown heavier, but it felt normal now. It was the breathlessness that came from working, from pushing her body through movements she knew.

For the first time since breakfast, Roxie felt as though her body belonged completely to her again.

She had worried that the comments, the picture, and the constant awareness of strangers would follow her onto the floor.

So far, they had stayed outside it.

The second tumbling section approached.

Roxie moved toward her corner while continuing the choreography. She could hear the count running inside her head almost as clearly as the music.

One, two, three, four.

Turn.

Five, six...

That was when she saw the phone.

It was somewhere beyond the barricade, lifted above someone’s head with the camera pointed toward the mat.

Roxie had seen hundreds of phones since arriving at Nationals.

This one should have meant nothing.

Her body reacted before her mind could make sense of it.

Her breath caught.

The muscles across her stomach tightened.

For a sudden, ugly moment, the screen in the crowd became the bathroom mirror from last night. Then another memory came with it, phones around Briarwick, people whispering, strangers deciding what had happened before Roxie even knew a picture existed.

Seven...

Roxie’s foot hesitated.

The count kept going without her.

Eight.

Fuck.

It could not have lasted longer than a second.

It felt enormous.

Karen crossed directly through her line of sight.

Roxie focused on her.

Karen.

Angela was already moving into the next position.

Kendall had reached her mark farther ahead.

Roxie was the one behind.

Her stomach dropped.

She had nearly missed it.

Five, six, seven, eight.

Roxie forced herself back into the rhythm and ran.

She drove into the roundoff, hands meeting the floor as her legs whipped overhead. Her feet struck together and immediately carried her into the first back handspring. Her palms hit again, shoulders pushing through the movement before she landed and threw herself into another.

The mat passed beneath her in quick flashes.

Then came the tuck.

Roxie launched higher.

At the top of the rotation, the arena opened around her for a fraction of a second.

Lights.

Rows of people.

Camera lenses.

Phones.

Her stomach tightened again, but this time the count stayed with her.

Five, six, seven, eight.

The floor rushed back.

Roxie opened her body and landed. Both feet stayed beneath her, her knees absorbed the impact, and she snapped into the next motion exactly when she was supposed to.

Relief hit so hard she almost laughed.

Jesus Christ.

She had almost lost it.

One second.

One stupid second staring into the crowd had almost pulled her out of a routine they had drilled into their bodies for weeks.

Roxie moved directly into the transition because she could think about that later. If she started replaying it now, she would make the mistake she had just managed to avoid.

The final stunt sequence was coming.

This was the section they had spent most of the past week perfecting because every movement depended on timing. One group arriving late would affect the transfer. One weak grip could throw off the entire pyramid.

Three stunt groups loaded together.

Five, six, seven, eight.

Roxie stepped into Karen and Angela’s hands and felt their grips close firmly around her foot.

The dip came with the count.

Then the lift.

Roxie rose above them as their arms extended.

The stunt continued immediately.

Secondary bases connected toward the center while another flyer climbed beside her. The structure changed beneath Roxie as hands shifted into new positions and the groups moved closer together.

Roxie transferred her weight carefully.

One set of hands released.

Another caught her.

For a moment she could feel the movement beneath her foot as the pyramid connected across the floor.

Angela rose on the opposite end.

Kendall climbed closer to the center.

The formation expanded until several flyers were elevated at once.

Roxie reached the top.

From there, she could see nearly the entire team beneath her.

Karen adjusted her stance.

Angela looked up.

Roxie could see the concentration in her face.

Her chest tightened again, but this time it had nothing to do with the crowd.

These girls were carrying her.

Literally.

Whatever happened inside Roxie’s head could become their problem in less than a second.

She had just proven that.

The realization scared her more than the phone had.

She locked her standing leg and forced herself back into the count.

Five, six.

Hold.

Seven, eight.

The transition came.

The bases dipped, and Roxie released.

Her body dropped before the group redirected her sideways. Hands caught her foot and waist as she traveled toward the next stunt group.

For an instant, Roxie felt completely unsupported.

Then another grip found her.

She landed high again.

The transfer hit clean.

The arena erupted.

Roxie barely registered the noise because she was already shifting into the next position. Her free leg extended behind her as she tipped her chest forward into the scale, arms reaching wide while the bases stabilized beneath her.

Her muscles burned as she held.

One, two.

Hold.

Three, four.

The group lowered her into the cradle.

Roxie landed against waiting arms, came back to her feet, and immediately reset for the final lift.

Her lungs were working harder. Sweat had gathered along her hairline and down the back of her neck, and her thighs felt heavier every time she bent through her knees.

Karen looked at her.

Roxie looked back.

There was something different in Karen’s expression now.

She had seen it too.

Roxie knew she had.

Karen gave the smallest nod.

Focus.

Roxie stepped into the load.

Five, six, seven, eight.

Karen and Angela dipped beneath her.

Roxie bent with them, then pushed hard through her legs as they drove upward.

She rose fast and Briarwick snapped into the ending pose together.

The music stopped.

Roxie held her position with a frozen smile on her face.

Her legs trembled slightly from the effort, and her chest rose quickly beneath the uniform, but she kept the smile on her face until the judges released them.

Then the team broke.

Angela screamed first.

Karen grabbed Roxie around the shoulders.

"We fucking did it!"

Roxie laughed as Angela crashed into them from the other side.

"We did."

The words barely made it out before somebody else grabbed her. The girls were hugging each other, laughing, talking over one another as the relief finally broke loose.

Roxie wanted to disappear into it with them.

Then she saw Kendall.

Kendall was celebrating too, but when her eyes landed on Roxie, the smile disappeared.

Roxie knew immediately.

She saw it.

Coach Miller was waving from the edge of the mat.

"Off the floor. Celebrate backstage."

They ran through the curtain together.

The moment Roxie crossed into the staging area, the strength seemed to leave her legs. She bent forward with both hands braced against her thighs and tried to catch her breath while laughter kept breaking through it.

Angela dropped onto the floor.

Ava was still crying.

"We did it," Ava said, wiping at her face. "Oh my God."

Karen leaned against Roxie’s shoulder, still breathing hard.

Then Kendall came toward them.

Roxie straightened.

Kendall stopped directly in front of her.

"I saw that."

The celebration around Roxie suddenly felt farther away.

She knew exactly what Kendall meant.

Roxie swallowed. "I know."

"You almost missed your count."

Karen looked between them. "Kendall."

"No." Kendall kept her eyes on Roxie. "I saw her stop."

"It was barely a second," Roxie said.

"That’s enough."

Roxie’s jaw tightened.

Kendall was still breathing heavily from the routine, her cheeks flushed and strands of hair beginning to escape around her face. She looked angry now, genuinely angry, and Roxie understood why before Kendall even continued.

"That next section was tumbling. What happens if you start a second late? What happens when it’s a stunt instead?"

Roxie had no answer.

Because that was exactly what had been sitting in her stomach since it happened.

Kendall stepped closer. "I don’t care what your issue is again." She lifted her brows, breathing hard. "But don’t you fucking dare drag us with you."