Page 1 of Against The Rules

CHAPTER 1

SAVANNAH

Rebecca, the pro cheer maven and director of Beaver Cheer, can’t seem to take her eyes off me… and not in a good way. Nope. More like in a “how the hell did you get this far?” way. I hit the final pose, sharp as I can be, smiling like a feral raccoon and trying not to show just how freaking tired I am. She mutters something under her breath to her assistant, and they share a look that makes a pit open deep in my stomach.

Go to Vegas to work the University of Las Vegas dance team, they said. Teach them a few routines. Work on technique. Work on the Beaver Cheer style.

It will be a fun summer trip, they said.

You’ll get brownie points with the director for volunteering, they said.

Well, now that same director is looking at me like I am a bug she’d like to step on in her expensive designer heels. I’ve been dancing my ass off the whole week, teaching a clinic for a bunch of fresh-faced college dancers.

Have I gotten to see Vegas at all? No.

Still, this is the dream: being on a pro cheer team, getting to dance, getting to perform. I’m grateful to be here. Better than being stuck at home, curled up like an overcooked shrimp with my laptop and a million deadlines for clients I can’t stand during my so called “off-time”.

The ear-splitting noise of the music cuts off, leaving the university’s large dance facility full of the echoes of women breathing hard as one.

“Ten-minute break,” Rebecca calls.

“Yes, ma’am,” the entire group says together, then runs to their UNLV-branded bags and their adorable rhinestone-covered water bottles while rubbing their sore muscles.

My stomach growls.

“Savannah, a word, please.” Leslie, Beaver Cheer’s assistant director, stares pointedly at me while Rebecca scrolls her phone, just as pointedly ignoring me.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say meekly, making my way to their two chairs, all too aware of the rest of the team watching me walk. I’m too old to talk like this, to say yes, ma’am and no, ma’am like a good little girl, but here I am—because that’s dance culture.

“Savannah, sweetie,” Leslie says to me, her smile as fake as her wrinkleless forehead. “You are stiff as a board out there.”

I nod and smile, like I love the critique and agree. Stiff as a board, thank you, ma’am!

“You are a wonderful technician, and a great performer, but we need the sex appeal. Remember when we discussed this in try-outs? And during our team camp? Try to loosen up a little. Be sexier. I know you’re just here as a guest instructor, but every impression counts. Okay?”

Rebecca looks up from her phone, narrowing her eyes at me.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say. “I can be sexy.”

I try not to wrinkle my nose. Can I be sexy? I thought I was being sexy. God.

Sometimes the weirdness of this job really gets to me. A grown woman telling another grown woman to be sexy, and then expecting her to say yes, ma’am.

But I’m happy to be here.

I’m following in my mom’s pro cheerleader footsteps, getting a free trip to Vegas before I go back to a crappy day job and three-night-a-week dance rehearsals and my first season as a Beaver cheerleader.

It’s the dream.

“That’s all,” Leslie says crisply, frowning at me for having the audacity to still be in front of her.

I nod, the words “yes, ma’am,” somehow sticking in my throat, even though I know I should say it. Instead, I do my raccoon grin and stride away to the circle of my teammates. We’ve been teaching together all week, doing rehearsals together for months, went through the gauntlet of auditions together before that… and still, they make me slightly nervous.

“What did she say?” Andy sips from a water container, her shining black curls perfect despite the hairography we’ve been doing all day.

I sit down next to her, grabbing a protein bar and nibbling at it while they all wait for my report.

“I need to be sexier,” I finally mumble, shame filling me. It shouldn’t matter that Leslie’s biggest critique is also the reason my ex-boyfriend said he cheated on me, leaving me because despite being ‘hot as hell’ in his words, I wasn’t ‘fun in bed.’ Wasn’t good at sex.

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