Dance

• Michelle Sands, Grade 12, Brisbane State High School
• Short Story
• 2015

Excellence Award in the 'Read Write Repeat 2015' competition

“… and a one, two, three, one two three, one two three…”
The dance instructor’s voice, coupled with the soft, rich tune of an old grand piano, is drifting amicably through my apartment floor. Usually, the noise would be relaxing, but today? Today I have an English paper due at midday, the attention span of a goldfish, and a completely empty brain.
Every distraction is damning, so even though usually I’d welcome the sound of people learning to dance in the studio I live above, today all I want to do is scream at them.
I know this is silly – how dare anyone consider learning a new skill when I’m sitting here, rotting in the seventh circle of hell, desperately trying to squeeze ideas out of a brain that ran out years ago. It’s futile, and I know it, but I can’t just give up. I have a story to write. 5000 words of ideas I need to come up with.
By midday.
Looking at the clock would be an awful, awful mistake, so I resist the urge for as long as I possibly can – about 20 seconds. It’s 9am. I have 3 hours to write this story, print it off and hand it in for a grade. I do some mental arithmetic and figure out just how impossible it is – 28 words a minute and I’ll be done just in time. But first I need an idea, and I’ve got nothing. I’ve had nothing in my brain since this assignment was given out. My mind had been alternating back-and-forth between no motivation and no ideas in an elaborate dance for weeks now.
Thank god I can always count on last-minute panic to think of something – a girl! She dances, but only because her parents want her to. She’s trapped by responsibilities, never able to discover her real passion. This is a great idea!
Well, no, it’s not. But it’s the idea I have, and I really need to get started on writing this. The piano has picked up a livelier beat and as I’m writing I imagine the quick, rhythmic fingers dancing on the keys downstairs are my own. I’m tapping out a much more frantic beat, but it’s a nice illusion to keep me going. Maybe if the keys on my laptop made music when I pressed them I’d have more motivation to write.
Dancing, dancing, dancing. Dancing fingers, dancing tunes downstairs. The music stops but my fingers keep dancing and - when did it get to be 11:30?!?!?! I look at my word count – 4500. I might just make it by the deadline, but I need to hurry.
4899 words. Close enough. I snatch my story off the printer and sprint. I’m flying down the stairs, across campus, puffing. I’m dancing through the revolving doors blocking me from the submission spot and then finally it’s done. I’m finished. I can go home and sleep, barely even thinking about the qasi-masterpiece I just handed in.
The title?
Dance.