Everything I was doing then, I never did it to impress anyone. Even during cheer season, I started teaching myself choreographies from a YouTube channel called TMilly TV, the first choreography I ever learned from there ever was God is a Woman by JoJo Gomez and at first it was extremely challenging because I couldn't mirror it; On screen, it looked like she was moved on my right, so I had go left. When I was teaching myself how to dance, it was hard and very challenging because I didn't have anyone there trying to point out the mistakes that I was doing and where I was practicing, there was no mirror, so there no knowing what I was doing wrong until Cheer Practice, so when the girls were rotating flyers and bases, I was learning God is a Woman and it took me as an Amateur a month to get used to the intensity and what was to come. I learned Breathing and 7 Rings at the same time towards the end of Basketball Cheer 2019. My first season was amazing, the girls and I bonded like we became sisters in the end, I was happy for Camille, Taryn and the others, especially when we did our half time performance; Our coach believed in us equally and it was a rush. We did our tryout dance then added a stunt with a total of 12 people and 2 girls tumbling, there was more but one of our Senior Girls was pregnant, she found out right before first day of practice and our only Boy backed out because he needed his job. As time went on, I found out my grade and you should know that if you're going to be a Junior, it tends to be harder than Freshman, Sophomore and Senior Year, I don't know why, but it's best if you don't skip any classes because it does set you back drastically. I had 2 D's and an F when I thought I was doing good, trust me, I wanted to cry in the bathroom, I wanted to get mad, I wanted to punch something, break a fucking fragile object without caring because this year was going to show on my Transcript that will possibly go out to the Colleges and I think at this point, I might as well not even go because I have no job, no money, no hope for my future, this was like a huge knife to my chest and someone is just twisting it. It was lunchtime and I just didn't want to talk to anyone, not even my friends unfortunately, they were the ones that could cheer me up, I held in my tears as I was the hallways and Blake bumped into me,"Sorry" My voice was breaking and he gave me that concerned look, he was going to come after me but his buddies pulled him away, it didn't bother me because I didn't want someone like him to see me cry. I ended up going to the gym above Warberg, it was empty thank God, I set my bag down and slid down against the mat, bringing my knees to my chest as I started sobbing. This was the first time in years that I actually cared about my Grades, I want to have a better life than my aunts, my cousins, my uncles, I want to be financially stable, I want to be able to take care of myself without having to ask anyone for help because in the end for me, no one is there for me. I've spent my time caring for people and it always feels like I can never receive it back even though I am aware that someone cares for me like Camille and Carmen, we have known each other for years that we've became sisters, but they weren't here and that just pushed it. Maybe I don't deserve a better life, maybe no one will ever love me romantically because I'm too independent, that's why all the boys and girls in my life have never been able to maintain a long-term relationship with me, I couldn't even hold on to Caleb when we wanted to get married after high school, maybe I wasn't born to be as smart as the kids in my class and athletic as others, like I will never live up to the level that my mother expects me to achieve. My eyes became red and puffy from crying as I pulled out my phone to see how terrible I look, oh my God I look like shit with massive bags under my eyes from all the crying, gasping for breath, I pulled out my water bottle and I went to YouTube to try to get my mind off of my grades, at first I chose a video of these scenes from Teen Wolf when this boy was struggling, I never really knew why I chose it but I guess it was because it helped me relax a bit and let me know that even the opposite sex struggles too. After the video, I chose God is a Woman by Jojo Gomez choreography. I slowly got up, pulled out my laptop to switch to a bigger screen as I walked to the center of the small gym, taking a few deep breaths, closed my eyes before I started dancing slowly to get used to the music being slowed down then I sped it up to the point that I forgot about what I was thinking a few minutes ago. I started dancing to Breathing-Kyle Hanagami, I started paying more attention to my footsteps than my arm movements because the footsteps felt more essential to the choreography, I never knew why but that was all that I was paying attention and I started practicing my spinning. The fluid dance team movements felt more relaxing, more expressive to what I was feeling on the inside, my heart rate was now only up because I was dancing instead of getting mad at myself and pointing out all of my mistakes. By the time I stopped, the lunch bell was about to ring and it was PE for me, I needed to get to the locker room to clean my face before anyone noticed I was crying, so that's what I did.
I looked at myself in the mirror and realized: 'Dancing become not only a way to gain coordination for Cheer, it became something that I want to improve outside of Cheer, this was my second chance to take the first step into Dancing' The girls started coming in and started talking boys or whatever they were talking about, I didn't have PE class with majority of my friends, only a couple and they were boys. I asked my PE teacher to ask if it was okay to practice upstairs for choreographies,"For?"
"For Cheer next season, if that's okay" He tapped his pen on his clipboard for a second,"Yeah sure go ahead, I want you to check back in at the end of the period"
"Yeah okay, thank you" I grabbed my laptop, phone and water bottle to walk upstairs. I remember seeing this choreography then, it was Light It Up, at first when I saw it, I knew I couldn't do it, especially where I was at and I wasn't ready for it yet. The more I was dancing, I felt free, it was like everything around me was constant chaos and peace was never to be found, but only dance can bring me peace, it puts me at ease, now that's something that my mother can never understand. After intense 35 minutes of dancing, I went back down early because I was drenched with sweat and I want to cool down before putting my school clothes on, I hate it when I'm sweating through them, it makes me feel fat. I finally checked my phone and there was a message from Blake
Hey are you okay? You look like you were about to throw up before lunch-Blake
Yeah, I'm okay, it was just a stupid mistake, but I'm gonna get it worked out-Sabrina
Okay, take it easy, you know I'm here for you-Blake
Right back at ya-Sabrina
I know I should've told him, told him what I was feeling and what triggered, but the thing was, I got used to closing myself off emotionally because the last time I opened up, I was sent to Therapy and even the Therapist wasn't helpful because I ended up feeling a whole lot worse. It was 3 years ago, after that small conversation, I put my jeans on as the girls came in, I'm not gonna lie, I actually did envy those girls for being confident in what they were wearing and I wanted to be that confident, but the body parts that bothered me then was my stomach, legs and butt. I put on my sweatshirt and walked upstairs to my homeroom, leaving behind what just happened an hour ago. At the beginning of Study Hall, I was requested to US History and I knew why, but I was willing to find out what I did wrong and do what I can to get it back up.
After a week, it felt like I needed to do more than just getting my grades back up because what I've been doing, it seemed like it wasn't enough for me to keep going so I did what I could do on my own: I scheduled an appointment at school for ASPIRE, a place where kids go for their future plans, I'll be fairly honest, I don't even know what the fuck the future has in store for me. I was nervous as I went to this room and saw Juniors and Seniors waiting for one of the 5 teachers to be done with a student; when it came to my turn, the teacher went and got my transcript,"Your GPA as a Junior seems to be at an 2.34" My heart dropped,"I-I don't understand, the last time I saw it, it was at an 2.7" The school system was out of place, it didn't make sense, but she told me,"You need a 2.5 or above to graduate and if you don't pass your 3 classes that you're struggling, you're either looking at Credit Retrieval, held back or perhaps repeating classes in your Senior year…...I'm sorry" I was tearing up, as much as I didn't want to cry in front of her, they just started coming out but I wasn't sobbing or anything, I wiped them away and took a deep breath,"I'm already trying to get them back up"
"That's good, now is there any schools that you would like to go to after school?" I don't think any school would want to accept me with the grades that I have, I wanted to go to University of Oregon, but why would they want to accept a failure like me? "There's University of Oregon, but there's this school in California and New York under the same name"
"Okay good, what's it called?"
"American Academy of Dramatic Arts, I've already had to look it up in Success 201, I have all the information on the schools that I want to apply to"
"What's in American Academy?" I shrugged,"Acting I guess, I like doing that" She asked another question,"What else do you do?"
"I dance, that's about as much as I can think of right now" She nodded and we discussed more about my future, as exciting as it sounded, but the problem was the money, I don't even know if my MIA Father saved any college money, I was told but I doubt it even exists, I can't even get a job because I need a Birth certificate and my mother can't even remember where she put it which is why I don't have a license, everything that this woman was saying, it felt impossible, I didn't have all the essentials that I would need for applying. I'm stuck in a house with a mother who has a job that wasn't paying enough for the apartment that we were staying at and we're barely getting by with our storage payments, my Grandfather was stressed about the mess in the house and luckily my mother helped out and I did as much as I could, my aunt talks shit about my mother and I every Saturday and Sunday night while my 2 cousins don't even work and they graduated meanwhile I'm begging for a job because I don't want to stay here any longer, there is always this feeling that's telling me that I don't belong here, but not in a suicidal sense, just….in general.