Tag Fight For Me

by Catherine Charles

  It was intense, passionate, longing, everything I knew it would be, and all wrong at the same time.

  It was my first kiss, but it also felt like the last time I would ever kiss him; the last moment we would ever share together.

  Jace had ruined everything.

  Not just with today, but he stole my naïveté.

  It had only been half an hour, but now I was reevaluating my entire life. The decisions I had made, the ones made for me unknowingly. What if I had done this instead of that.

  Was there ever a moment that I thought something might be going on, a bigger picture moment that I so naively just let pass me by?

  It no longer mattered.

  The anger I felt was nothing compared to the loneliness. But I would never let that show.

  * * *

  – Seven Months Later –

  Cora and I hadn’t spoken since Thanksgiving.

  She had avoided me both at home and at school.

  She started taking the bus both ways, and what I did hear about her, came from Emma.

  According to her, Cora had pretty much moved out of the house and hand turned a small corner of the studio into her bedroom.

  I knew she wasn’t sleeping because the lights never went out. I wasn’t sleeping either.

  I graduated last month, and everyone was there; except Cora.

  I was minutes way from making the twenty-seven hour drive up to Massachusetts to start the next phase of my life at the Berklee College of Music, but I couldn’t leave without trying one last time to see her.

  I knew I’d never get a kiss, a hug maybe, but if I could just see her, that would be enough for me. It would give me hope that maybe, someday, we could figure things out.

  As I approach the studio it’s quiet. The blinds on the windows are closed and the door is locked. Always locked. She was shutting out life.

  I knock and wait.

  “Cora, please open up.” Silence. “Cora, I know you’re in there. Please open the door.” Silence. “Come on Cora. It’s been months.” Silence. I bow my head and rest my forehead against the door. “Do you know how stubborn you can be?” I think I hear a faint giggle. “Cora, I’m leaving now, and I don’t know when I’ll be back. Please don’t do this to us.”

  Still nothing.

  I swallow the lump in my throat and place my hand on the cold steel. “Goodbye, Cora. I’ll always love you, Buttercup.”

  I turn and walk away from the studio, from her, from whatever could have been.

  * * *

  I listen to Jax as he begs on the other side of the door for me to open, but I’m held captive in a corner.

  I can’t see him. I can’t talk to him. The only thing I can do is cry profusely into my pillow and remind myself that this is what our parents wanted.

  They wanted him to grow up and experience normal guy things, not wait around for me to catch up.

  If I open the door, if I let him see me like this, I know he won't do what he’s supposed to. Emma’s tried to tell me where he’s going to school, but I plug my ears and act like a child. I don’t want to know. I don’t trust myself with knowing.

  As his last words vibrate through the door, it takes every fiber of my being to stay on my bed and not chase after him. He deserves someone better. Someone his own age. Someone who won't play games with him and make him wonder. And as much as I want to be that person, I’m just not.

  “I’ll always love you, Buttercup.”

  I scream into my pillow and try to stifle my cries. “I love you too, Jax. I’m so sorry. I hope you find someone good out there. Please don’t forget me.”

  Convulsions rock through my body as I lay unable to move, the image of Jax walking up the hill and out of my life, flashes in bold red.

  “Jax!” I cry out knowing he won't hear my plea for help. I did this. And now it’s time for me to pay.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  – Three Years Later –

  I’m a senior in high school and eighteen years old.

  I’ve seen Jackson a couple of times since that Thanksgiving, but we don’t speak. I think it’s a mixture of uncertainty and pain that keeps us both away.

  He’s brought a couple different girls home for the holidays, but according to Emma, they don’t last very long. I’m glad he’s dating though; he deserves to find someone that will make him happy, someone his own age.

  Emma is cautious of what she tells me.

  Becca ran away the summer after Jax left. Aunt Liv and Uncle Trey found her a few weeks later in New Mexico working on a community farm for housing. She looked terrible when she came home, she was practically skin and bones and malnourished. Emma doesn’t like to talk about it, so I don’t push. No one ever mentioned that Jace had said sister that awful day, a thought that never left my mind. Did Becca running away have anything to do with him?

  Emma came to live at our house while Becca recovered. I can only imagine the pain she felt watching her twin suffer the way she did. We’ve become close friends, her and Sophie are all I have now. I think our mutual disgust towards Jace bonded us. I still give her lessons three days a week and Ms. Trousseau has even complemented her several times.

  I was accepted to the School of American Ballet and Performing Arts up in New York and have plans to dance with the New York Ballet this summer as usual.

  I eventually forgave my parents and we’re slowly becoming closer, but just because I forgave them, doesn’t mean I trust them.

  “Cora, come on! We’re gonna be late.”

  “Relax, Emma. You can’t have a show without the star.”

  Ms. Trousseau spoke with our school’s principal and managed to mix my senior review in with our school’s dance team, Senior Spectacular.

  I had been influential in their choreography the last three years, helping them win at each competition they attended. I was making a name for myself outside of classical and romantic ballet. Though I still loved it, the contemporary style did something for me the way the other two couldn’t. It was almost like therapy. I found peace in it, and when I blended the three, I could get lost for hours in some faraway world.

  “You know Jax will be there tonight, right?”

  My heart skips a beat at just the mention of his name, palms sweaty, breath shallow.

  “Are you gonna be okay?” Emma’s hand rest on my back in a type of comfort. “I know things are still strained between you two.”

  I hesitantly laugh and shake her off. Two strong nods and I roll my shoulders.

  “It’s fine. I’m fine.”

  I was most certainly not fine. I was the complete opposite of fine. In fact I had picked my music with him in mind.

  He was always on my mind, even after his girlfriends strolled through our house on Thanksgiving. There was a dark corner of my mind that had Jax’s name permanently tattooed on it.

  I needed to break this crazy cycle. Ms. Trousseau, she was the key to my escape.

  Twenty years old.

  That’s the age my parents and Jackson’s parents had agreed on, and there must have been a reason behind it.

  They wanted Jackson to experience college and based on the way Liv and Trey talked about him, he was definitely doing that, while still working hard to make a name for himself.

  What did they want me to experience?

  “Emma, don’t forget. I’m leaving right after my second number, no questions about it.”

  “I think you’re being a coward, Cora. It’s my brother, not some crazy, psycho person you need to run from. Just talk to him.”

  “I can’t talk to him, Emma. I know he’ll tell me I’m wrong. He’ll fight for us. I need to know who I am without him. I need to be just Cora.

  “My whole life it’s been Jackson and Cora. Our parents wanted this Emma, and I need to find out why. Now, if he asks you where I went what do you say?”

  She rolls her eyes and drops her shoulders, “I don’t know.”

  “Thank you. Now are you ready?”

 
“Umm, I was the one waiting on you, remember?”

  “Whatever, let’s go.”

  I drive to the high school with Emma in the passenger seat; playing my dances out in my mind, making sure I have everything for the next few months.

  We make our way backstage before the show starts, and I find a corner to hide away in.

  Years of dancing and performing behind me, never once have I felt nervous, and tonight I feel sick to my stomach. My nerves are a mess along with my head and my heart.

  Ms. Trousseau finds me among the curtain ropes, anxiously looking me over as I shake out my nerves. “What is it dear? You’re a mess.”

  “I’m fine. I’m fine.”

  I jump a little to shake off some of my anxiety like a boxer does, getting ready to go into the ring.

  I peek out into the audience and immediately see Jax sitting next to my parents; my stomach drops. They’re laughing about something and he looks like a glass of lemonade on a hot day. Sex on a stick. Perfect dirty blond hair swept to one side, long on top and short on the sides. Chiseled jawline hidden under a two-day scruff, and full kissable lips covered his perfectly white teeth. Broad shoulders, pronounced chest, his navy-blue button-down shirt had an extra button at the top open, and the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up midway exposing muscled forearms to match the biceps attached.

  I didn’t know forearms could have muscles.

  “Mine,” a little voice in the back of my head chimed as my eyes linger a little too long on him. He shifts in his seat, draping an arm around the back of Becca’s chair giving me a better view of his body. There are no words to properly describe the way he looks tonight, just a feeling of pure arousal I get from looking at him.

  “Cora!”

  I snap out of my trance to see Ms. Trousseau frantically pointing to center stage.

  “We’d like to begin now if that’s alright with you dear.”

  “What?”

  “You’re up. This is your night. Will you be joining us or you going to pretend not to stare at a certain handsome young man.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Behind closed curtains I take center stage and try to control my breathing.

  Inhale.

  Exhale.

  Inhale.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, before we get started, I would like to take a moment to welcome you all here tonight to this year’s Senior Spectacular. Most of you may be wondering who this strange old lady is standing before you, but I am here as the coach to Cora West.

  “The dances you will see preformed tonight have all been choreographed and arranged by her. She has worked tirelessly over the last few years with your daughters, and tonight we honor her along with the rest of the senior performers.

  “Please put your hands together as she starts our night off with a dedication piece to her parents. Robert and Presley, may the Arizona sky forever be etched in your mind’s eye.”

  The slow and steady beat of an A minor chord gives way to a building crescendo as vocals, piano, and then guitar, fill the quietness of the auditorium. A fluid sweeping motion of my foot, and my body sways like golden grain fields on a hot summer day. With each build up, the complexity of the dance increases and I find my calm for two minutes and fifty seconds.

  As the music ends, I look to my parents just before my curtsy. Both Mom and Dad have tears in their eyes and Mom blows me a kiss.

  A quick eye dart to Jackson and I witness him wipe a tear away as well. A lump in my throat threatens to break me, threatening my plans.

  I make my way off stage repeating, “Don’t look at him. You need to do this.” I repeat the mantra over and over.

  “Fuck,” I blow out in frustration the minute I’m sure I’m far enough away from everyone. Come on Cora. Keep your shit together. One more. Just one more. You can do this.

  Tight boney fingers wrap around my wrist and I’m spun around from the blackened corner I’m trying to disappear into.

  “Oh. My. God! Do you hear that!” Emma beams with excitement.

  I hadn’t noticed the applause was still going even though the curtain had closed.

  “They loved you!”

  I shrug. I can’t get cocky. Cockiness is what ruins a performer. Messing with the mind. It’s what kills the fight to always do better than the last performance, and I needed to give my all in my next performance. “I guess it was okay.”

  “Okay? Cora, you freaking killed it!”

  “Emma!” I snap before shaking her off of me. I need to be alone. “Please, just leave me alone. I need to focus right now.”

  “You don’t have to do this Cora.” Her tone changes to someone with authority. I’ve never once heard her like this. The Emma who could be pushed over by a fly, had grown a backbone, and was trying to push her way with me.

  “Yes I do.”

  “No. You. Don’t. You have a backup piece. Play the backup piece, Cora.”

  “I can’t. I need to do this Emma. I need to figure out what they wanted me to experience. Obviously there was a reason behind the twenty, I need to know what it is.”

  “Cora,” Ms. Trousseau’s voice is a welcome reprieve from Emma’s begging. “Two minutes.”

  I wrap my arms around Emma and say my goodbye. “Remember, you know nothing.”

  “But—”

  “Nothing Emma.”

  Her tearful expression guts me, but at least she nods her understanding.

  I take the stage again and focus my breath. “Four minutes, twenty seconds. That’s it. Then it’s done,” I whisper to myself as Ms. Trousseau announces my second piece.

  “This next piece was chosen because of the focus it places on personal growth. Ladies and gentlemen, I give to you...Where I Stood.

  The curtain opens and this time I look at Jax.

  Please forgive me.

  A sad A minor piano chord backed by smoky vocals portrays the turmoil I find myself in. Pain and longing in each verse push me to new complexities. Now is the time to leave everything out on the floor. Jumps are higher, spins tighter and faster, every shift of my body is executed with precision. I bite the inside of my cheek to keep my emotions at bay, and completely focus on my choreography.

  My chest heaves in pain as the music ends and I land in a crouched position. Two tears, pit-pat on the floor, the others on the brink of joining the first two.

  I allow myself one final look at Jackson and see him mouth one word, “No.”

  He’s up before the curtain closes and I run off stage, grab my car keys from Emma and quickly kiss her goodbye. “You know nothing.”

  She just shakes her head as I run through the back door and out to my car, tears streaming down my face as I put it in drive and head to the interstate.

  * * *

  I’m not letting her get away like this. She’s wrong. There has never been anyone that even comes remotely close to her. I’m not letting her leave like this.

  I’m up before the curtain closes, excusing myself from the audience, trying to make my way backstage.

  “Emma! Emma! Where is she?”

  With tears in her eyes, she shakes her head, “I don’t know.”

  “Emma, I know you know. Where is she?”

  “I don’t know, Jax!” she screams in frustration. “She didn’t tell me anything, I promise.”

  “Shit.” I mumble under my breath while pulling out my phone and quickly calling her cell.

  Even though I haven’t called it in years, she is still number one on my speed dial.

  I hear ringing and look a few tables over. “You have got to be kidding me!” I yell. “Emma, I swear to God, if you know where she went and aren’t telling me—”

  “I don’t! I swear, she didn’t tell me anything. Maybe you shouldn’t have been such a dick by flaunting your flavors of the month during family holidays. Do you have any idea what that did to her?”

  “What? Flavors of the what?”

  “Your girlfriends, dip shit!”

  “They weren’t gi
rlfriends. I mean, yea, they were girls, but just friends whose parents were going elsewhere for the holidays and they didn’t want to go with, so I invited them back home with me. That’s it.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really!”

  “Wow....well, um—”

  “Well, um, what Emma?”

  “We just all thought you were dating, well, bimbos. All of them hung on you and laughed at your corny jokes, and well, we just figured you were dating them.”

  “Who do you mean when you say all?”

  “Everyone Jax! Mom. Dad. Cora. Aunt P and Uncle Rob. Literally everyone. You should have seen the boys making fun of them.”

  I can't believe what I’m hearing. So for three years Cora thought I was dating other women. No wonder she never talked to me. No wonder she avoided me. She was a good girl and would stay away if she thought I was happy. I had moved on in her eyes.

  I throw my head back in defeat, threading my fingers through my hair.

  I should have never fucking left. I should have stayed. I should have tried harder with her.

  “Emma, where’s Cora? I know that voice and answer for Emma.

  “She’s gone.”

  A quick slap to the back side of my head, I pivot on my heals, nearly stumbling over Cora’s coach.

  “What was that for?”

  “I’m sure you deserved it.”

  “Your star dancer runs out on a show, and I’m the one getting blamed. Someone please tell me how any of this makes sense.”

  “Look.” Emma looks as if she’s actually about to say something useful. “I don’t know where she went right now, but she has a place with the New York Ballet Company this summer, now the rest is up to you.

  Other Books By Catherine Charles

  The Tag Series

  Book 1

  Tag You’re Mine

  Book 2

  Tag Forever Mine

  A New Romantic Comedy

  The Author

  About the Author

  Catherine Charles currently resides in a small town in Texas with her two children and two goldendoodles. She was born an army brat, spending her childhood moving every two years. Born in Germany, she spent the first half of her life roaming across Europe and surrounding countries before moving stateside.