Jon and Karyn watched them go.
“That bitch.” Karyn said to him, quietly. It wouldn’t do to catch the attention of a teacher. “She just came by to twist the knife.”
“You could always just not go.”
“I can’t do that.”
Jon looked around and then pulled the stone out of a pocket. “I mean, we have a magic wishing stone. We can do whatever we want.”
“It’s a matter of principle. I lost the bet, and said I would go, so I’m going. It doesn’t matter if we use the stone to make it so she didn’t know. I would know. And that’s the important thing. It’s only a few practices. Two this week, I think three next week. Maybe four. Then it's over. My honor is intact, and Sarah agreed to not bother me about cheering for the rest of the year. I come out ahead. I promise.”
“Well, okay. If you’re sure you don’t want to use magic to fix your problems…”
“I didn’t say that.”
The two of them spent the rest of lunch theorycrafting a wish for Karyn to have a super special sports bra in her gym locker. Something that would allow her to run and jump and twirl and whatever else cheerleaders did at practice and high school students did in gym, yet in a way that her new center of balance wouldn’t impact her abilities. They made the wish, and Karyn promised to report back to Jon after she had tried it.
The rest of the day went well. Jon received a lot of compliments on the skirt he had borrowed from Zoe. He resolved to continue to not tell her he had taken her skirt, but that he’d be looking into this style for himself.
Jon waved to Karyn through the fence before walking home. Karyn looked towards him with an exaggerated pleading look, before turning back to the cheer squad. Sarah was giving them things to do. There was a jingle from the charm bracelet as she gestured to one of her cronies “And Tiffany will be helping you work on a simple hand spring. She’s really great at teaching people. What sort of compliments do people have for you teaching them moves, Tiff?”
The world froze for a second, including a bird in the air above the field, and everything began again as Tiffany answered. “Oh, all sorts of compliments, but many say it’s the most fun they’ve ever had.”
And Karyn wanted to protest and debate it, but it was really hard. Tiffany had always seemed focused on boys to the exclusion of everything else, but she proved to be a great teacher. A combination of patience and exuberance. She had no problem helping you repeat a move twenty or thirty times, and her squealing, applause with the little leaps looked like it should be silly, but when she was perfectly elated at something you did, every piece of progress felt amazing. Cheer practice felt like it took no time at all, and Karyn did have an absolute blast with it. But she’d never admit that to anyone.
