February and March
Random little snippets
Anala realized she was dreaming as soon as she started doing pointe. The white sand under her feet and utter blackness surrounding her helped a little, but the main thing that caught her attention was that she was doing pointe. Miss Ellen had told her, time and again, that she wasn’t ready for it, something about bones still growing and sheer inexperience. She didn’t quite get it. But she followed her teacher’s instructions to the letter anyway...except in her dreams, apparently. She tried not to worry about it; she was having fun.
-+-
Tian was still dancing well, but there was something odd about her movements. Anala watched as Tian worked her way across the floor, puzzling over it. Ah--there. And there. A slight stiffness, mostly in her legs. Anala blinked. Did Tian hurt herself or something? She didn’t think the girl would dance on an injury--Ellen was serious about her girl’s health, and she wouldn’t let Tian do anything to make herself worse. Huh.
-+-
Anala slipped, one foot sliding forward and one sliding back until--
“Ow!”
A wave of giggles. “Nice split, Firefly,” one girl said, a hand over her mouth. “Very smooth.”
Anala winced, bracing herself against the floor as she inched out of her split. She looked up with a pained grin. "Right. Thanks. A little help, please?'
-+-
“Anala, may I have a word with you?”
“Yes?”
“You got into a fight again, didn’t you? Anala, sweetie, if you keep this up, you’ll get injured--seriously injured. What if something happens, and you can’t dance anymore?”
“If I don’t do anything, they’ll just keep bothering Tian and me. Am I supposed to let them roll all over us?”
“Anala--”
“Anyway, I’ll be fine. I can take care of myself.”
-+-
Singing wasn’t her strong point, and her voice was nowhere near a match for her sister’s. But she could do it and did, from time to time. Listening to the rain patter against the windows and roof, Anala danced in the empty classroom and sang quietly to herself.
-+-
Anala grinned as Andrae flushed and sputtered, losing his usual cool. Between them lay a half-finished card in pink and white, a little something the boy had been too slow to hide.
-+-
The paper flowers were as uncharacteristic as they were unexpected. If Kazuki hadn’t summarily managed to tick off every person within a ten foot radius, Anala would have worried something was wrong with him.
-+-
If Kazuki had a dollar for every time a girl got mad at him, he’d be a rich little bird-boy. He took a running leap into the air, laughing, staying just out of reach of a drenched, indignant Anala.
-+-
Anala glanced back at her apartment every so often, enough that Asher had to ask:
“What are you waiting for?”
“Huh?”
“You keep looking over like you’re expecting something. What’s up?”
“Well...”
The fire alarm went off, followed by a chorus of very familiar yelps.
“Alek’s trying to cook.”
-+-
Anala had forgotten it was her birthday. Holding up the necklace and dress that were her birthday presents, Anala blinked, then threw herself across the table in an attempt to hug all three of her brothers at the same time.
-+-
Sometimes Anala felt as though her ballet classes were full of poetry. Not that her classmates were literary geniuses or wits, though some probably were. That wasn’t what she meant, exactly. Just that all the other girls (and boys) could probably be compared to flowers and birds in a heartbeat, and no one would laugh, really, because it’d be kind of true. Raven hair, the grace of a swan, stuff like that.
-+-
Ben, Anala found, knew a lot of things, even if half of what he said sounded rather like nonsense. Although he shared headspace with her, he seemed strangely reluctant to elaborate on how, exactly, he came to be there, and often changed the subject. He was no figment of her imagination at least, he assured her.
-+-
Anala dreamed more and more, occasionally of things that happened or not, mostly of dancing. It wasn’t all ballet either--ballroom dances, Latin dances, folk dances of all kinds. She was pretty sure she’d never heard of some of the stuff she dreamed, but she didn’t mind it that much.
-+-
When Tian punched her tormentor, everyone froze. Tian, thankfully, didn’t, and the scuffle was over quickly enough.
