Free Belle of the Brawl by Lisi Harrison

between Ophelia and Tweety, Skye grinned with the joy of the dance, buoyed by the sensation of Triple dancing behind her, probably drilling a jealous hate-hole straight into her blond, bunned head.
    Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the elevator doors opening.
    Blinking her concentration back to center stage, Skye tried to focus on an arm-windmill sequence, not wanting to let herself get distracted by whoever it might be.
    “
Breathtaking
,” someone whispered from across the room.
    Uh-oh.
    Of course it was Syd. Who else would be clueless enough to interrupt Mimi’s class?
    With his dark jeans ripped at the knee and his navy blazer covered on one side with rock ’n’ roll pins, Syd looked half rocker-chic, half stalker-freak as he smiled at Skye.
    Skye’s glare stuck to him like a fresh blow-out to a MAC Lipglassed mouth. His gapped front teeth peeked out from under his deep-red lips, and as he waved, Skye noticed a small red envelope between his index and middle finger.
    Skye’s patience was already more frayed than the ankles of her oldest pair of J-Brands. She needed hand-delivered love notes from Syd the way Triple needed lessons in how to be annoying: not at all.
    Skye attempted to subtly motion to him to GET AWAY, but she missed a crucial step, which put her in Tweety’s line of movement. Suddenly, like a house of cards, all the dancers toppled, and Skye found herself on the bottom of a pileup of sweaty, Lycra’d limbs. She cringed as her fellow bun-heads fell one by one.
    “Ooof! Ow! Ugh!”
    Uh-oh.
Skye struggled to breathe and to not burst into tears underneath Tweety, Prue, Ophelia, and the rest of the bun-heads.
    “Ow,” Tweety whimpered, rolling off of Skye and rubbing her slender hip.
    “Not cool,” moaned Prue, wrapping her light brown hair back into a high bun.
    Skye staggered back onto her feet, her face burning with shame. “Sorry,” she murmured. “My fault.”
    “Music, off! We’re done for today,” said Mimi, raising one eyebrow at Skye before turning away to make some adjustments to the holographic playback machine.
    The girls dispersed, heading to the barre for a few cool-down stretches. As they sucked down spring water from their Alphas-emblazoned eco-friendly aluminum bottles, Skye refused to look in Syd’s direction, joining Ophelia at the barre.
    “Aren’t you going to see what he wants?” Ophelia whispered, running a gold towel along her sweaty forehead.
    Skye ignored her and threw her leg over the barre, leaning in for a deep quad stretch. Ophelia’s hazel-green eyes moved from her to Syd and back again. Skye grunted as she pulled her leg off the bar, and when she threw her left foot up to stretch the other side, Ophelia turned to the wall, stuck her tongue out, and approximated a loud fart noise with her lips.
    Tweety giggled, and Skye felt her face go crimson. Triple and Prue looked over and rolled their eyes. Then Skye lether eyes travel to Syd, who suddenly looked uncomfortable.
    Ohmuhgud, maybe this will work!
    “Again, Ophelia!” Skye whispered. “Keep ’em coming!”
    As Skye went from first position to second, Ophelia let out a series of raspberries. “Ohmuhgud!” Skye shouted, covering her face as if she was mortified and hiding her smile in the process. “I shouldn’t have had that burrito for lunch!” The bun-heads started laughing hysterically, and it was hard for Skye not to join them.
    But this was life-or-death—she had to get Syd off her back before he caused her to break a limb.
    Skye lunged into a grand plié and Ophelia let it rip again. Skye covered her mouth and opened her eyes wide, turning around to face Syd as the whole room erupted in laughter. But Syd wasn’t laughing. His face had gone white with embarrassment, or nausea, or both. He began pushing the button on the elevator. Hard.
    “How embarrassing!” Skye yelled merrily.
    But Syd had stepped into the elevator, and for once his green eyes weren’t glued to Skye. In fact,