“Two cheeseburgers, extra ketchup,” Ava announced, holding up a greasy white paper bag as she walked into Kylie’s hospital room later that afternoon.
“Ava, you’re the best,” Kylie said, sitting up in her hospital bed. Ava pulled a green plastic chair closer to Kylie’s bed and sat down. She thought her friend still looked really tired. Her braids were pulled back behind her neck.
“When you texted me that you had creamed chicken with peas for dinner on Sunday, I thought you might appreciate these,” Ava said, handing Kylie the bag. “Mom stopped at Burger Hut on the way here.”
“Tell her thanks,” Kylie said, biting into the burger. “Oh wow, that’s good.”
“How does your leg feel after the surgery?” Ava asked.
“It hurts pretty badly, but the medicine helps,” Kylie said. “I just want to get out of here! I’m going crazy. But the doctor says I might have to say another couple of days.” She sighed.
“Well, you didn’t miss much at school,” Ava reported, trying to remember if anything interesting had happened. “Oh yeah. During lunch, Billy Scarbek balanced a chair on his nose. He said he was practicing for the Variety Show.”
Kylie stopped chewing and looked down at her hands.
“Hey, you looked sad when Alex mentioned the Variety Show on Saturday, too,” Ava said, remembering. “You weren’t going to be in it, were you?”
Kylie put down the cheeseburger she was eating and took a deep breath. “Ava, I need to tell you something about me that you don’t know,” she said solemnly.
“Okay, now I’m in suspense. What is it?” Ava asked.
“I love line dancing,” Kylie blurted out. “I know you probably think it’s goofy, being from the East Coast and everything, but it’s actually a lot of fun. I learned when I was a little kid.”
“Well, you are wrong about me thinking line dancing is silly, because I don’t even know what line dancing is,” Ava admitted.
Kylie picked up her phone and found a video clip. Then she handed it to Ava.
“This is line dancing. You’ve probably seen it in movies and stuff.”
Ava looked at the video playing on the phone. Three rows of people wearing cowboy hats were dancing in perfect step. They clapped and slapped their knees in time with the music. Ava thought the tune was pretty catchy.
“Hey, this is cool,” Ava said. “It’s pretty amazing the way everybody does the steps at exactly the same time, and they keep the lines straight too.”
Kylie smiled. “I’m glad you don’t think it’s dumb. Anyway, since the theme this year is Wild West, my line-dancing friends and I were really excited to have an act in the Variety Show. When I texted them that I broke my leg, I could tell they were upset. The dance works with five people, but it looks a lot better with six.”
Kylie looked really sad, and Ava felt so bad for her friend. She wanted to do anything she could to make Kylie feel better. Before she could really think about it, she blurted out, “I’ll take your place!”
Kylie looked surprised. “Ava, that’s sweet, but what about your ankle?”
“It’s been a week already, and it doesn’t even hurt,” Ava countered. “I’m allowed to walk on the brace, I just can’t jump and run and stuff. It doesn’t look like there’s any of that in the video.”
Kylie looked thoughtful. “No, there isn’t, really. I mean, you’d probably be okay . . . but you didn’t even know what line dancing was until I told you!”
“I know, but it doesn’t look that hard,” Ava said. “I mean, I’m sure you need to practice a lot, but I learned a lot of complicated cheerleading routines when I was pretending to be Alex, right?”
Kylie shook her head. “Yeah, and that worked out really great,” she said sarcastically.
Ava laughed. At the beginning of the school year, Alex wanted to impress her friends by trying out for cheerleading, but she knew how terrible she would be at it. So Ava had agreed to dress like Alex and try out in her place. She was supposed to do well enough to be respectable, but not well enough to make the team. But she had really gotten into it, and Alex (actually Ava) had made the team! Then, when the real Alex took her place on the team, it had been a disaster.
“Okay, that wasn’t the smartest thing I’ve ever done,” Ava admitted. “But the point is that I was really great at cheerleading. And on the football field, I have to follow complicated plays all the time. So I should be able to figure out line dancing, right?”
Kylie looked amused. “You know, it just might work,” she said. “Okay, do you know Carly Hermano?”
“Yeah, she’s a cheerleader,” Ava replied. “And I think she’s on student council with Alex.”
Kylie nodded. “So, Carly and I were in dance class together when we were little. She’s the one who’s leading the dance. I’ll text her and let her know you’re going to replace me.”
She had a funny grin on her face when she said it.
“You don’t think I can do it, do you?” Ava asked. Kylie’s skepticism made her even more determined to help the line dance be the best act at the Variety Show.
“I think that it’s really nice of you to do it, and I think it’s going to be really fun to watch,” Kylie replied. “I just hope I’ll get out of this hospital before the big night!”
“Of course you will,” Ava assured her.
Then she realized that she had just committed to performing a traditional Texas dance in front of a crowd filled with native Texans, and she had just moved to Texas and had never even heard of line dancing before.
What have I gotten myself into? she wondered.