Summary: Emily dreams of being a gymnast for when she goes to college she can join the team. She is struggling with life and being a sophomore in high school. She envies a senior that attends her school and is surprised to find out they have things in common. Will Emily be able to turn her life around and to achieve her dreams, or has she chosen a path that might just lead her to the end?
Categories: Original Fiction Characters: None
Genres: Angst, Drama
Warnings: None
Challenges:
Series: None
Chapters: 1 Completed: No
Word count: 1255 Read: 388
Published: 02/03/08 Updated: 02/03/08
Story Notes:
Here is my attempt at a non fan fic story that I am using inbetween writing fan fic. Please let me know what you think.
1. Chapter 1 by Anita
All I ever wanted in the entire world was to be a gymnast. I had grown up watching it on TV, eyes always glued to the TV screen watching the young girls flipping around performing amazing tricks on the apparatus's.
When I was younger, I went to gymnastics summer clubs and then took a few private lessons after. Now here I am, 16 years old and I am still not the gymnast I have always wanted to be.
My name is Emily Richardson. Like I mentioned before, I am 16 years old and I am a sophomore at Washington High. Both high schools and the elementary school in my small town are named after dead presidents, I live in a small town near the heart of Kentucky where everyone knows each other.
I am very happy here having grown up in a beautiful home, and my family has always been very wonderful but yet, I am not always so happy. Though I have known the kids in my class and school my whole life, I don't have many friends. The two people that I am closest to are Karina Wilson and Josh Harrison. Like me, they are both Sophomores and dreamed of a bigger life.
Josh wants nothing more than to be a famous chef, Karina loves to bake and both have gotten me into cooking and baking. Josh wants to continue on to college to culinary school, Karina would go for baking and later, they both hope to move to either New York or California and open up their own restaurant.
I was still not too sure what I wanted to study in college. If I could really dream, I'd be on the wild cats gymnastics team but I don't think that there would be any way for me to learn how to be a level 9 or 10 gymnast in two years. If I tried hard enough I was maybe a beginner in level 4.
In secret, I always admired Lori Rogers, a beautiful and popular senior. She is on the high school gymnastics team, and she is dating the school basketball player, Nick Jones. Teri is so different than who I am and in so many ways she is everything that I want to be. Pretty, popular, talented, smart, an all around golden girl.
Many people think that Lori is stuck up but in my opinion, she has every right to be. I mean if I were like her, I'd probably be stuck up too. Teachers loved her because of how well she did in class, she was their dream come true.
Her parents owned the car dealership in our town so they lived in one of the bigger houses in town and her clothes were always brought in from Paris, London or New York.
I sighed taking a seat on my bed. Thinking of little Miss Perfect, oops I mean little Miss Junior Kentucky always made me depressed. We were so different, she had the warmest honey brown eyes that were always lit up with laughter, and her light brown hair was naturally curly and fell to her shoulders, she always wore it back with trendy headbands. I on the other hand have stick straight dirty blond hair with frumpy bangs, blue eyes and a round face.
I knew I should be getting stuff ready for lunch as Karina and Josh were going to come over. Getting up I headed down stairs.
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"Hey guys." Emily said opening the door when her friends got there.
"Hey there." Karina smiled stepping in with her bags of food, Josh following with more.
"So, what are we going to experiment with today?" Emily asked looking at the stuff as Karina and Josh began to empty the bags on her kitchen counter.
"We are going to try to find out what will work best with white truffle oil." Josh said with a smile.
"Cool." Emily said helping set the stuff out.
"I'll start with the dessert, Josh will work on the salad, Emily, you get the main dish." Karina said.
We all set to work and soon very good smells began to fill the room.
"Mmm, that smells really good." Josh said looking up.
"Thanks." Emily replied with a smile working at the stove.
"What are you making?" Karina asked.
"Grilled cheese sandwiches." Emily said flipping one in its pan.
"Oh my ugh! I can't believe you are wasting white truffle oil on a grilled cheese!" Karina exclaimed.
"Why not? That girl on that TV show Gossip Girl had her sandwich like this."
Karina sighed.
"Alright, if that's what you want."
After they worked for a bit longer in silence, Emily spoke up.
"I was thinking of maybe dying my hair, how do you think black would look?"
"Gross, girl talk." Josh said with a laugh.
"Why do you want to dye your hair?" Katrina asked.
Emily paused putting the sandwiches on a plate.
"I just want a change."
"Well sure, I mean it might look really pretty with your blue eyes." Karina offered.
"I'm so glad that I am a guy, I don't have to worry about silly stuff like that." Josh said getting the bottle of oil and sprinkling some over his salad.
"Looks good." Emily said.
Josh had mixed together some fresh spinach, slightly blanched asparagus, crumbled goat cheese and pine nuts.
"Well my cake is baking, let's sit to eat" Karina said bringing over cans of soda.
The three friends sat down serving themselves some salad and sandwiches.
As her friends talked, Emily's mind began to drift. Her friends were so sure of themselves and knowing what they wanted in life and yet, the only thing she wanted was impossible.
"Daydreaming about gymnastics again?" Josh asked breaking into her thoughts.
Emily blushed and shrugged trying to play it off.
"Yeah, I guess so."
"Look why don't you just sign up for a class?" Karina asked taking a bit of the salad.
"I'm too old to be trying to do gymnastics." Emily argued.
"It's something you really want to do and something you care a lot about, why not just give it a try, there is nothing to lose."
"Just my dream in life if I fail."
"Well, maybe you won't fail. You don't know unless you try."
Emily bit her lip thinking.
"Oh alright, I guess I can try."
"Good." Karina smiled at her and they talked about maybe going that weekened to see one of the local bands performing.
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Karina was right. What was holding me back from signing up for a class? There was nothing to lose. But what if I ended up making a fool out of myself infront of Lori Rogers? I know for a fact that she is the star of our gym.
I lay with a sigh. My friends had left, our food was heavenly as usual, well mainly theirs, and it was now 11 pm and time for bed.
I rolled onto my side and stared at the wall in the dim light that came from light in the hall, creeping through the crack of my door.
I had to do something, I could not just lie around wasitng away or being jealous of my friends goals. I had to get off my bum and do something. After school tomorrow I was going to go to the gym and sign up for gymnastics.
Thinking about the choice I made, I actually began to smile. I could almost feel the beam under my feet as I danced on it and I could smell the chalk dust I would use for the uneven bars.
Shutting my eyes, I fell asleep with a smile on my face, dreaming of becoming a star.
End Notes:
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