Dance

• Chloe Watts, Grade 4
• Short Story
• 2021

The warmth of the fire feels hot against my neck, I love the way the flams dance freely back and forth from left to right. Oh, What I would give to be a flame to dance freely without being judged by the way it moves or the colour of its flame.
The dance school I go to is all about perfection, from your looks and your hair to the point of your toes. Every day I feel the dread of getting out of bed at 5:00am every morning even on weekends to get to this stupid Paris dance school on time. My mum signed me up for it last summer because she thought that I’d be a good dancer, well if she’d been there to see me on stage the other week then maybe she would think differently about my dancing.
I’ve told her repeatedly that I hate the perfection and the high standers that I am supposed to reach.
Hi, I’m Holly and I’m 13 years old, I live with my mum in a little flat in Sceaux as you know I go to a Paris dance school that is all about perfection but for the weekend I am free, out in the wilderness sitting around a camp fire with my mum.
We have been out here for a day or so and the fresh air has already made me feel awesome and forget about what happened last week.
mum and I are watching the flames dance and twist wishing that I were a flame too. Oh all I can think about is dance! dance, dance, dance but dance is the reason what made me need to get away from the real world and come out here where I can forget about what happened last week.
I was dancing up on stage for the annual dance consent that is held in the dance school I go to. Only the best 5 dancers get to perform in it, and I was chosen! When my name was called for me to come out on stage I wasn’t nervous because I had been practicing all week to get it perfected, the point of my toes were perfect and the sway of my arms were in time, then music started and I moved with it. I close my eyes and let the music take control of the way I moved, but then I slipped and fell flat on my face. The laughter coming from the crowd was horrendous.
Me lying helplessly on the big stage being laughed at, I could see the anger building up in my teacher’s eyes, I knew I was in for a whooper of trouble when I got to my next lesson.
But I don’t need to worry about that now because I’m sitting around the fire that feels hot with not even thinking the slightest bit that it happened, but I know in my mind that it did, and I’ve got a big bruise to prove it.