It was a little less than two weeks after Connor's eighth birthday, and he had just arrived at the dance studio for his ballet lessons. He was warming up and practicing his splits when Mrs. Shapiro entered with a boy behind her, who looked like he was around Connor's age.
"Connor, I would like you to meet someone," Mrs. Shapiro said with a warm smile. "This is Luke, he's your age, and he's been take dance here for the past couple years, but he only just started taking lessons on Fridays too. I thought you two boys might want to get to know each other, since there aren't many boys your age in the studio." Connor brightened at her words. Another boy who did dance too! "Well, there's just under ten minutes to class, I'll leave you two to talk and get to know each other," Mrs. Shapiro added as she briskly swished next door to supervise another class.
"Hi," Connor shyly greeted.
"Hi," the other boy—Luke—smiled back. He was slightly taller than Connor but just as skinny, with blonde curls and blue eyes.
"You're eight?" Connor asked, just to make sure.
Luke slid down into a split. "Yep," he said, popping the 'p'. "Well, almost. I turn eight next month. My birthday is the first of February."
"Mine is January fifth," Connor replied.
"How long have you been dancing?" Luke asked as he continued stretching.
"Since I was five, you?"
"Since I was two."
Connor's jaw dropped. "Two?" he nearly spluttered. "Wow… that's really young. That's like a toddler."
"Yeah," Luke laughed at h is expression, but not unkindly. "My big sister danced too, so my mom let me join. She said it was more for babysitting me than anything else, but apparently, I loved it."
"So is your sister a ballerina?"
"No, she did jazz but she quit two years ago."
"Why?"
"She said she was too busy with school and stuff."
"My sister dances ballet too."
"How old is she?"
"She's almost seven. Her birthday is in February too, like yours."
Luke opened his mouth to reply, but just at that moment, Mrs. Shapiro reentered the room. "Let's get this class started, boys. Luke, do you want to show Connor the number you've been working on for competition?"
"Okay, Mrs. Shapiro," Luke replied, getting up from the floor. Connor scooted over to the corner so he wouldn't be getting in the way.
The music started and Connor couldn't take his eyes off Luke. His leaps were effortless, he nailed all his turns, his feet were pointed, and his flexibility was impressive. When Luke had finished, Mrs. Shapiro nodded in approval and smiled, and Connor clapped loudly.
"What did you think, Connor?" she asked, eyeing him.
"He was really good!" Connor enthusiastically said. Luke flashed him a bright smile.
"Well, what could he do to improve?" Mrs. Shapiro continued.
"Um, I don't know?" Connor had thought the dance was pretty much perfect, but then, Mrs. Shapiro was a teacher, so she probably had noticed the things Luke had done wrong. "I thought it was really good."
Mrs. Shapiro nodded, then turned back to Luke. "Overall, really well done, much better than what I saw on Tuesday. Just remember to keep your body straight all the time, engage your core more when you pirouette. And use your face—you have a great personality offstage, I want to see that when you're dancing."
Luke nodded, and Mrs. Shapiro said to Connor, "Would you like to show us your dance?"
Connor got up slightly reluctantly, feeling woefully inadequate after watching Luke perform. But he tried his best and when he was done, Luke clapped loudly and cheered. "That was really good, Connor!"
"Thanks!" he beamed.
.
.
.
"How was class today, honey?" Cynthia asked as she prepared dinner that night.
"It was great! I made a friend!"
"A friend?" Cynthia repeated with a surprised smile. "Wow, that's awesome, Con!" She looked so happy he thought that she might cry.
"Yeah, he's really nice. And Mrs. Shapiro put us in the same class so I'm not the only boy anymore."
Cynthia smile grew even wider. "That's wonderful."
He nodded, he knew that she had been concerned about him, because he was so painfully quiet and shy. And while Zoe was the charismatic social butterfly, always going out with friends for birthday parties or sleepovers, Connor was much happier reading a book by himself in his room. At school, he kept mostly to himself at lunch or recess, and other than occasional squabble with another child on the playground, he didn't like to interact much. Cynthia had tried time and time again to sign him up for more activities that might allow him to meet new people, but to no avail.
"Do you need any help?" Connor asked, gesturing towards the pan.
"I'm fine, sweetie, thank you. Oh, do you want to invite your friend over one of these days? Also, what's his name? Is he your age? I would love to get to meet him, and maybe his mom."
Connor smiled slightly at his mom's overeager barrage of questions. "His name is Luke, and he's almost eight—his birthday is in February. I can ask him if he wants to come next week when I see him at class."
"Oh okay, please do that, I'd love to have him over soon."
"Okay, thanks, Mom," he mumbled, skipping out to the living room to join Zoe in front of the television.
.
.
.
"My mom wants to know if you can come to our house for, like, a playdate," Connor told Luke the following week.
"Really?" Luke asked excitedly.
"Yeah, she was wondering when you're free."
"I think I'm free on Monday, let me ask my mom," Luke said, running out of the classroom. He reappeared a couple minutes later, beaming. "Yeah! My mom said Monday is fine! And she needs your address."
"Oh, right," Connor dug through his dance bag before pulling out a slightly crumpled Post-It note with his mother's handwriting on it. "Here."
Luke took it and tucked it into his dance bag, then turned back to Connor, grinning. "I'm so excited."
Just then, the door swung open and Mrs. Shapiro entered. "What's going on?" she asked, noting the bright smiles on both their faces.
"Nothing," they answered in unison.
"Alright then, let's get this class started."
.
.
.
Connor and Luke greeted each other at the door with broad smiles on Monday.
The tall blonde lady who stood behind Luke introduced herself, "Hi, I'm Sarah Davidson, Luke's mom." Connor could tell that Luke got his big blue eyes from her.
"I'm Cynthia Murphy, it's a pleasure to finally meet you," Cynthia was almost rambling, eager to make a good first impression. "Connor, why don't you show Luke your room? We'll be in the living room—I've already prepared lunch so please come down to eat in half an hour."
"Okay, mom."
"Your house is really big," Luke commented admiringly as they started up the stairs.
Connor wasn't too sure what to say to that, so he just mumbled a "thanks".
They entered Connor's room. "You have a lot of books."
Connor blushed a little. Just last week, Larry had mentioned that he should stop reading so much and go outdoors to play more sports. "Yeah… I like to read," he coughed awkwardly.
To his relief, Luke didn't seem to find that strange at all. "What's your favorite book?"
Connor chewed the inside of his cheek thoughtfully. "I like Narnia, I guess."
Luke hummed appreciatively. "I read a bit of that, because my sister said it was good. Until the third book, then it got boring, so I stopped."
"You should finish them. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is my favorite!"
"Hey! Is this Marvel?" Luke suddenly exclaimed, pulling a superhero comic off the bottom shelf.
Connor nodded. "Yeah, my dad got the Spiderman series for me as a Christmas present."
Luke plopped down on Connor's beanbag and flipped the comic open. Connor read it over his shoulder for a few minutes, but feeling awkward at the silence, finally broke it by asking, "Do you wanna play something?
Luke thought for a moment. s"Do you have Legos?"
"Yeah!" Connor dragged out a large box and dumped its contents on the floor. "Do you want to build a house?"
"Let's build a car first."
"Okay."
"Boys, lunch in ten minutes!" Cynthia reminded them as she appeared in the doorway, Luke's mother just behind her. "Are you guys having fun?"
"So much fun," Luke grinned as he snapped two red bricks together.
Mrs. Davidson turned to Cynthia. "Thank you for having us over, I'm so glad that Luke has a friend. He was getting picked on at school because of the fact that he did dance, so the past year has just been… quite difficult for him."
Cynthia smiled a little sadly, as they watched the boys animatedly discuss how they should design the Lego car. "No worries, it's just that Connor's a really quiet kid. I'm also really glad he met Luke."
Connor looked up and noticed his mother still lingering in the doorway. He smiled at her, and she smiled back, realizing how joyful and excited he looked as he ducked his head back down to continue playing with Luke.
"Don't forget—lunch in ten minutes," she gently reminded them, as she turned to head back down the stairs, leaving them chattering and giggling with each other.
. . . sneak peek of the next chapter: printer incident(sorry...after the fluff comes the angst...you're welcome tho) anyway, comment, subscribe, share, whatever. or follow me on tumblr (thewickedverkaiking)
constructive criticism is always appreciated! until next week :)