The Chaos Read Online Free PDF Page A

short of breath. And it wasn’t working, anyway.
    “You don’t practice on your own, right?”
    “Girl, you know she doesn’t,” said Ben.
    It was true, I didn’t. I shook my head.
    Glory threw her hands up. “See what I mean? You barely work on the routine, yet you usually learn the steps first time out. And you remember them.”
    “So?”
    “And every time you come to practice, you’re a little tighter than the time before. Except these past few weeks, when you’ve barely been here at all. What’s up with that?”
    I pointed at her. “You started acting all high-and-mighty, that’s what!”
    “Oh, stop it. You don’t even think that.”
    I bit my lip. I wasn’t good at lying.
    “That’s not the real reason you and me are warring.”
    It wasn’t, but I wasn’t ready to talk about the real reason yet, so I just crossed my arms and looked away.
    Ben chuckled. “And Miss Glory hits a sore spot!”
    Irritated, Gloria kissed her teeth. “Fine. So don’t answer that one. Is not what we talking about right now, anyway.”
    Grudgingly, I replied, “So what, then?”
    “Scotch, you have all this talent, but you’re such a slacker!”
    “And another hit!” said Ben.
    Glory continued, “I bet you don’t say the moves in your head while you’re doing them.”
    “Not once I know the routine.” Did she do that? Say the moves over in her head?
    “Yeah, and you know it within minutes. I bet you don’t have to count the beats.”
    “No. Well, except for this one entrance,” I said sheepishly.
    “One! Just one! I have to count off most of them to keep up. I know these damned moves in my head, like a drill! I have them sketched out on a piece of poster board up on my bedroom wall! I go over them every morning. And I still have to recite that drill in my mind every time, every practice.”
    I goggled. “Really?”
    “Really. I’m even going to have to do it during the performance. I’m putting in all this work, and what are you doing?”
    “Gloria, cut her some slack, nuh, man?” said Ben.
    She rounded on him. “Whose side you on, anyway?”
    He held both hands up, like I surrender. “Chill, girl. Don’t try and drag me into allyou man trouble.”
    Together, Glory and I blurted out, “We don’t have—”
    Ben cut in. “Is only one move, right? I will make her practice it. And her solo for the singles battle.” He smiled at me. “Every day between now and Wednesday.”
    Gloria looked from Ben to me, her perfectly straightened hair bobbing perkily as she did. “Okay,” she said. She sounded doubtful. “And she best come to every single practice between now and then.”
    “Every one,” Ben reassured her. “If I have to throw her over my shoulder and bring her myself.”
    “You don’t have to talk about me like I’m not here.”
    Gloria frowned at me. “For the last little while, you haven’t been. Even when you’re at practice, your mind’s not on it.”
    A second Horseless Head Man popped into the air right in front of my face, then a third. I yelped. Ben raised an eyebrow. Glory just scowled. “See what I mean?” she said. “You’re not even listening to me.”
    “But I can’t do extra practice; I have to study for next week’s bio test!”
    Glory shrugged. “Well, Miss Sojourner, I guess it sucks to be you.”
    When Gloria called me by my real name, she meant business.
    Ben said, “You can’t pull that one on Glory. She and I both know you can study and practice and not even break a sweat.”
    I made a face at him.
    “Don’t give me that look. I want you to win. I know how important this is to you.”
    He knew, all right. He and I had figured it out; if my team won, I’d get a portion of that money.If I won the singles battle on top of it, that’d be a bit more cash. Together, it’d be almost enough to make back the money I’d spent instead of saving it for my share of the rental deposit on the apartment my brother Rich and I had our eyes on.
    Gloria unplugged