Page 13 of The Cheerleader

Laughing, Judy rolls her eyes. But I’m as concerned as Sherry sounds. With my meager spending money, I’m afraid I can’t afford to pay for all the extras that cheerleading might require.

“Get used to it, new girl,” Judy says. “We’ll be lucky if we get sweaters with letters on them this year. Last year we had blank sweaters because Pete couldn’t be bothered to order the ‘C’ for us.”

Attempting to keep my concern from my expression, I don’t say a word because I see the faces of the others registering tolerance. Shit. I turn to Liz.

“I’m sure we’ll get fantastic new uniforms this year,” she says. I let out a breath. If Liz isn’t concerned about extra expenses, then I suppose I shouldn’t be.

Then she claps and shouts, “Line up.”

We practice our on-field cheers with the guys, wearing them out. We learn new mounts and stunts that Liz and Carol saw in a cheerleading magazine and practice “old” ones, though it’s all new to me.

“Let’s do shoulder stands,” Liz shouts, pointing to four girls, including me, to stand in front of the four guys.

We jump up while they hold our waists and lift us to sit on their shoulders. I’m assigned to poor Josh, and he’s patient with me in spite of my clumsy lack of confidence.

“Now pop up to standing,” Liz calls out.

“What?” I mutter to Josh as I watch the others.

“Press down on my hands,” he says as he raises his arms. I do as he says. “When I dip and lift, you stand on my shoulders.”

My heart thunders. All the others have completed the stunt, even Sherry. Now they’re all watching me. This is nothing like dancing or anything else I’ve ever done. Shit.

“Ready?” Josh says. “One, two, three…” He dips, and I lift my knees, timing it so I find his shoulders under my sneakers. “Now straighten up and let go of my hands.”

Shit. Shit. Shit. Not looking down, I find my balance and straighten, holding my arms out to the side. Then I breathe and look around. Liz is on the ground, looking us over, inspecting us.

“Smile and raise your arms above your heads.” She pauses while we comply, and the thudding in my chest calms down.

“Excellent. Dismount. Next we’ll do leg raises.”

What? What is she talking about? I don’t have a chance to ask or even think about it because Josh takes his hands off my legs and dips again, and I find myself jumping to the ground, though not as gracefully as the others. I stumble forward.

Liz says, “If you stumble during the game, turn it into a forward roll.” She smiles at me and comes over. “You did great for your first time.”

“Thanks. Sherry did way better than me.” I smile at her.

“Thanks. I’ve done it before. In high school, though we didn’t have guys.”

I nod, refusing to admit I’ve never done cheerleading stunts before because I was never a cheerleader. I hope Liz is okay with that being our little secret.

Why do I have a feeling we may have a few more secrets between us before the semester is over?

“Let’s move onto pyramids. You guys on the bottom.” She points to the three larger guys, including Josh.

Standing next to her, I whisper, “Pyramids?”

“Don’t worry. This is easy. You can be on the second layer. Just watch the others.”

I join Judy and Carol on the guys’ backs, and we build a pyramid with Sherry standing on the top, assisted by a couple of guys lifting her.

“Take a photo, Keith,” Liz shouts from above me, and we hold on while he grabs a Kodak camera. We smile for photos before we dismount. Then we move on to more stunts. Stand on the guy’s legs and jump into their arms. And what turns out to be my favorite, flipping over their shoulders, Superman style.

“We need more guys,” Keith says, panting.

“I’ve been trying to recruit⁠—”

“I’ll take care of recruiting,” he says. “I know a couple who might want to join.”