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Bitch.

One of her assistants (I still couldn’t remember their names) did the worm, and that got a lot of support, as well as two girls from Echo’s squad doing a choreographed routine that they had clearly known for most of their lives.

When it was my turn, I pulled out my tried and true move: the shopping cart. That elicited both laughs and groans and I didn’t even care. I pulled a toe-touch out of my ass that wasn’t as good as it was in high school. Yoga had kept me limber enough to throw a decent jump, or at least it felt decent when I landed.

They cheered for more, but I put my hands up in defeat and semi-limped back to the edge of the circle.

I needed to do more cardio. Maybe I should be conditioning with the squad.

The dance party slowed down and everyone sort of collapsed on the mat together in a pile.

“Good job, everyone,” I said, clapping. “I think we can end on that note. Tigers, I’ll see you all tomorrow for the sendoff party.” Dom had organized a party for all the cheerleaders and their parents at the local VFW hall so we could all eat spaghetti and have some team bonding before we flew out on Thursday.

“And Bulldogs, I will see you all at the restaurant for our sendoff party.” Of course they were having one at a restaurant. Mine was a spaghetti potluck.

Everyone rolled up the mats and put them away and there was chatter between the two groups, almost as if they were friends. Their room block at the hotel in Orlando just happened to be next to ours, so we were going to see a lot of each other the rest of the week.

I circled up my squad to say goodnight.

“This is it, everyone. In two days we get on a plane. Sleep, if you can. Try and pack earlier rather than later, because you will forget something. I can text you the packing list. This is going to be an amazing week, and all I ask is that you give me energy eleven. You’ve got this. I’m so proud of everything you’ve done so far this year. You’re amazing, you’re awesome, you’re the best. We’ve got this, Tigers. We havegotthis.”

They all whooped and cheered and then we did our signature chant to end the night. The Bulldogs had their own and we ended up each doing ours at the same time, so the gym was just a big bowl of noise for a few moments.

I got all my kids out the door, and Echo put hers on the bus and sent them off. She was doing that thing where she packed her shit up slowly and I shared a look with Dom.

He just shook his head and tossed me the keys for the gym and walked out.

A few seconds later, I got a text message from him.

Don’t do anything bad.

I snorted and looked up from my phone to find Echo walking toward me, her bag over her shoulder.

“Something funny you’d like to share?” she asked.

“Not really,” I said.

She set her bag down and started pulling something out of it.

“What are you doing?” I leaned over to see what she was pulling out.

“I thought we could take a little trip down memory lane.” She pulled out two cans of the horrible energy drink that had gotten us through cheer camp in the past, along with the hot, crunchy snacks we had gorged ourselves on.

“How did we consume these two things at the same time?” I said with a shudder. I did not want to read the ingredient label on either product.

Echo pulled out the first level of the bleachers that had been pushed back to make room for the cheer mats.

“You up to see if it’s as great as we remember?” She sat down and nodded at me.

Dom had told me not to do anything bad, but this wasn’t going to be bad. It was going to be fine.

Echo and I cracked open the cans and clinked them against each other.

“To Orlando, and may the best team win,” she said, and then burst out laughing. “I couldn’t even say that with a straight face.”

“You can’t do anything straight,” I said, pointing my can at her.

“That’s true.”