Emily slips into the Konami Thunder Dance club. She takes off and stows her shoes. She leans against the bar on the mirrored wall.<\/p>\n
She watches Meredith dance.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s slowing down even as she watches. She can see it. Meredith is becoming confused; the certainty in her is dissipating; she is tangling herself up until halfway through Daikenkai<\/i> she loses the train entirely, falls over, and lets the song play out.<\/p>\n
Meredith just laughs it off.<\/p>\n
She wanders over. She towels off her sweat. She looks at Emily.<\/p>\n
\u201cNice eyes,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Emily gestures expressively.<\/p>\n
I can talk to Fred and Morgan in my head now,<\/i> she tells Meredith.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t think she can hear you, <\/i>Fred points out.<\/p>\n
Yeah, well, your face is ugly,<\/i> Emily informs him. She can hear Fred giggling somewhere on the other side of the School.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re not going to like eat me or anything, right?\u201d Meredith asks. \u201c\u2019Cause I\u2019m totally writing a letter to your Mom if you eat anyone. Even me!\u201d<\/p>\n
What, from my stomach?<\/i><\/p>\n
She can\u2019t <\/i>hear you,<\/i> Fred emphasizes. He squints. He tries to peer out of her eyes. Oh, hey, she\u2019s cute.<\/i><\/p>\n
Emily <\/i>glares in his vague direction: Fred!!<\/i><\/p>\n
Meredith snaps her fingers. \u201cYou\u2019re one of those stand-in-creepy-circle people! Tom was ranting about you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Emily sighs.<\/p>\n
She turns to go. Meredith has her hand on Emily\u2019s arm.<\/p>\n
Emily looks back. Meredith?<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re still allowed to dance,\u201d says Meredith.<\/p>\n
Emily considers this. Then she beckons Meredith.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat? No. No way. I\u2019m not dueling<\/i> you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Emily makes a face.<\/p>\n
This is really inconvenient<\/i>, she says.<\/p>\n
You <\/i>can still use your outside voice, <\/i>reminds Lirabelle. If you really try.<\/i><\/p>\n
It\u2019s too hard! <\/i>Emily protests.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is funny to watch,\u201d says Meredith. She sits down on the shoe cubbies. \u201cYou OK?\u201d<\/p>\n
Emily makes a neutral gesture.<\/p>\n
Then, finally, she forces out a soft clear whisper. \u201cI want to dance.\u201d<\/p>\n
But she can\u2019t.<\/p>\n
She tries but \u2014 she\u2019s crippled.<\/p>\n
When she looks at the falling Symbols they are just shapes on a digital screen. When she hears the music it is nothing more than sounds that are set to time.<\/p>\n
She cannot lose herself in it.<\/p>\n
She tries to throw Dynamite. She humiliates herself by falling.<\/p>\n
She stares at her hands.<\/p>\n
I guess this is not the one thing that I am, <\/i>she says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Emily slips into the Konami Thunder Dance club. She takes off and stows her shoes. She leans against the bar on the mirrored wall. She watches Meredith dance. It\u2019s slowing down even as she watches. She can see it. Meredith is becoming confused; the certainty in her is dissipating; she is tangling herself up until […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5099,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"series":[47],"class_list":["post-5304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-storm-that-saw-itself-chapter-4","series-the-storm-that-saw-itself"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/Hat_2_noBG.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5304"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6133,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5304\/revisions\/6133"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5304"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fseries&post=5304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}