Free I Was a Non-Blonde Cheerleader by Kieran Scott

hands on hips, skin-busting grin in place. I made eye contact with each of the five judges, none of whom were my teachers. Coach Holmes was in the room, but no other cheerleaders were present. (Big relief.) Daniel Healy was there, however, front and center and surrounded by at least twenty guys in varsity jackets. He flashed me a thumbs-up.
    “You can begin whenever you like,” Coach Holmes said.
    And so I did.

    An hour later, it was over. Everyone had done the routine and we were all sitting on the floor in the gym, waiting for the verdict. I felt oddly calm while Mindy sat next to me, chewing her nails into oblivion. I had done the best I could. And I had nailed the back tuck. Now it was just up to the numbers.
    Performing for the judges was a lot easier than performing for the squad. And Daniel and the rest of the guys had at least responded to the cheer. All of them except one big, lumberjack type that I had pegged as Bethany’s brother, and therefore Tara’s boyfriend. He had just sat there with a bored expression. At one point, he’d even yawned.
    “Okay, as far as I can tell, there are only three people who might have scored higher than us,” Mindy whispered.
    I looked around the room furtively, wondering if anyone had heard. It didn’t matter, however. There were little clusters of whispering girls all around us, undoubtedly hypothesizing about the same thing.
    “I’ll bite. Who?” I asked.
    “Wendy Stewart? The girl with the wavy hair and the super-white teeth?” Mindy said, tilting her head in Wendy’s direction.
    “Yeah. She’s pretty good,” I said, recalling her performance from the day before.
    “Then there’s Shira Citron and Ally Stevenson,” Mindy said. “I think they almost made the squad last year.”
    “What about that girl with the thick hair and the freckles?” I asked. “She was pretty good.”
    “Trista McCarthy?” Mindy said, biting her lip as she pondered the possibility. “I don’t know. She seems kind of without energy.”
    “Maybe,” I said. “We’re definitely above that chick in the spandex. She was all left feet.”
    “Christy? Yeah. I feel bad for her. I think her mom wants her to be on the squad. She’d rather be in the library, writing romance novels,” Mindy said.
    I glanced at Christy from across the gym. She was sitting by herself, her nose buried in a book called
Hearts Aflame.
    The sound of the gym door opening was like a nuclear bomb blast. Everyone sat up straight and there was an intake of air that could have created a black hole. Coach Holmes walked in, clipboard in hand, followed by the rest of the squad. I stared at Tara and Sage, trying to read their faces. Did they know anything?
    “Okay, everyone, I want to thank you all again for your hard work,” Coach Holmes said, standing at the front of the room. “Many of you had incredibly high scores, but only two of you could make the team. I’m not one for dramatics, so those two people are—”
    I reached out and clasped Mindy’s hand.
    “Mindy McMahon and Annisa Gobrowski.”
    She said my name! And wait! She said Mindy’s name! We both jumped up and screeched and hugged like the little cheerleaders we were. I couldn’t believe it. We’d beaten the stupid odds! We’d both made the team!
    Then I realized we weren’t the only ones shouting.
    “Her!?
She’s
on the team!?” Tara Timothy screamed. “She’s the one who narced on Kristen and Danielle! We wouldn’t have even had to go through this whole thing if it wasn’t for her!”
    Mindy and I stopped jumping up and down and looked at Tara. The rest of the squad was standing back near the wall, avoiding eye contact with anyone.
    “Tara, Kristen and Danielle made their own beds,” Coach Holmes told her. “No one is to blame for their behavior but themselves.”
    “Oh,
please!
” Tara screeched, in complete tantrum mode. “The girl broke my nose. I’m gonna look like the Elephant Man for regionals because of her. And besides,