The trouble might have remained small if Crestmont had not announced its Winter Spirit Showcase.
Every December, the cheer squad performed a major halftime routine during the last home basketball game before winter break. The showcase was filmed, attended by alumni, and heavily promoted because a regional athletic foundation sponsored the event. This year, representatives from two college cheer programs were expected in the audience.
Three weeks before the showcase, one of Crestmont’s strongest tumblers fractured her wrist.
Suddenly Coach Ortiz’s question became relevant again.
This time, head coach Melissa Avery called Zaria into the athletic office.
“We need someone for one routine.”
Zaria shook her head.
“I really don’t want to join the team.”
“You wouldn’t be joining.”
Coach Avery turned a laptop toward her.
“We have a tumbling sequence with three athletes. Without the third, the entire center formation collapses.”
“Change the routine.”
“We could.”
The coach paused.
“But there are fourteen girls who have worked four months on it.”
Zaria looked at the screen.
The routine was good.
Very good.
She hated that.
Coach Avery played the video again.
“You’d attend practices for three weeks. You perform one night. After that, you’re done.”
Zaria exhaled.
“Does the team know you’re asking me?”
Avery hesitated.
That was enough.
“Samantha doesn’t want me there.”
“This isn’t Samantha’s decision.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Coach Avery leaned back.
“No. She doesn’t.”
Zaria looked toward the office door.
“Then maybe find somebody else.”
Coach Avery did not argue.
She simply said, “Think about it.”
Zaria thought about it for two days.
Maya told her not to do it.
Her younger brother, Jordan, told her absolutely to do it because he wanted to see whether high-school cheerleading was “actually a sport.”
Monica asked a different question.
“Do you want to?”
Zaria sat at the kitchen counter.
“I don’t know.”
“That usually means yes with complications.”
“The captain hates me.”
“Apparently existing incorrectly.”
Monica waited.
Zaria finally told her everything.
The hallway.
The vending machines.
The rumors about the open position.
Monica listened without interrupting.
When Zaria finished, her mother stirred sugar into her tea.
“Are you afraid of her?”
“Do you dislike her?”
“Yes.”
“That wasn’t the question.”
Zaria sighed.
“I don’t know her.”
“Exactly.”
Monica looked at her daughter.
“Don’t give somebody you barely know enough control to decide what you’re allowed to enjoy.”
That sentence made the decision for her.
The following afternoon, Zaria told Coach Avery she would do the showcase.
She regretted it by the end of the first practice.
The cheer squad was talented, disciplined, and exhausted.
Most of the girls treated Zaria politely.
Two were genuinely welcoming.
Samantha was neither.
She never openly insulted Zaria during practice.
She did something more effective.
She questioned everything Zaria did.
If Zaria landed slightly forward, Samantha pointed it out.
If she asked where she should stand, Samantha answered as though explaining something obvious to a child.
If Coach Ortiz praised Zaria, Samantha immediately corrected someone else louder.
Nobody could point to a single dramatic incident.
Together, they created an atmosphere.
Zaria understood it.
She had seen the same method at her old school.
Make the target feel unwelcome without giving her anything concrete enough to report.
One afternoon, Zaria arrived at the locker corridor and found her black practice shoes inside a trash can.
They were not buried.
They sat neatly on top.
She pulled them out.
Three cheerleaders watched from near the lockers.
One covered her mouth to hide a smile.
Samantha was tying her shoe on a bench.
Zaria held up the shoes.
“Anybody know how these got there?”
Silence.
Zaria looked directly at Samantha.
Samantha looked back.
“You tell me.”
“I don’t touch other people’s shoes.”
Zaria dropped them into her bag.
“Keep it that way.”
The room went quiet.
Samantha stood.
“You accusing me?”
“You’re looking at me.”
“You’re looking back.”