Centre Stage: A Novel

all. It was partly because it was quite difficult and partly because I could feel everyone watching. As I made mistake after mistake, I got more and more tense and that made my dancing even worse. I saw people whispering to each other. I was sure they were talking about me.
    ‘OK, maybe we’ll call it a day for now,’ Dizzy said, to my utter relief. ‘Justine, that was great. Just remember to keep your body as straight as possible in the changements . Sophie,’ she turned to me, a slight frown on her face, ‘I’ll go through it again with you on Sunday. You’re obviously finding it difficult. But don’t worry. You’ll get it in the end — it’s really not that hard.’
    I wanted to drop through the floor with embarrassment.
    ‘Off you go and sit down now,’ Dizzy said.
    I hurried back to my seat, my cheeks burning.
    Justine caught up with me. ‘Sophie. Wait!’
    I stopped.
    ‘Look,’ she said sympathetically. ‘I know you haven’t done much ballet. If you want you can come to my house and we can…’
    ‘Way to go, Justine!’ Samantha interrupted, hurrying over. ‘You looked brilliant!’ She glanced at me and there was a triumphant smirk on her face. ‘Guess we know now which team’s going to be picked to perform on opening night.’
    I’d thought I couldn’t feel any worse. But I’d been wrong.
    ‘Come on, Jus,’ Samantha said to Justine. ‘Come and sit with me, David and Xav. We’re going through our lines in the first scene.’ Justine looked at me but Samantha linked arms with her. ‘Come on!’ she insisted.
    I slowly made my way back to where Colette, Jack and Mark were sitting. ‘That didn’t look much fun,’ Jack said, giving me a wry smile.
    ‘No,’ I muttered.
    ‘You’ll pick it up,’ Colette said breezily, but I heard a note of worry in her voice. Oh great; she thought I was going to let the team down too.
    Picking up my script, I pretended to study my lines but the words blurred as I blinked away the tears of humiliation prickling my eyes.
    Thankfully the rest of the rehearsal wasn’t too bad. When the chorus had finished learning the dance in the Queen’s palace we all started learning moves for the big battle scene. Although it was set to music, it was more like acting than dancing and as I pretended to be Lucy in the midst of the battle I felt myself starting to relax. The moves came easily and by the time we finished for the night I was actually enjoying myself.
    ‘That was more like it,’ Dizzy said, coming over to me as everyone started to get their bags. ‘When you relax you dance really well, Sophie. Now, go home and I’ll see you on the weekend.’
    I headed for the door. I could see Mum in the foyer. I had just reached her when Velda came up to me.
    ‘Sophie, I’ve had calls from journalists who’ve heard about you being Lucy in the play. They know about you being in the film and they want to do articles on you, if that’s OK?’
    If it was OK! Excitement leapt inside me at the thought of being interviewed. ‘Yeah… yeah, it’s fine,’ I replied.
    ‘Which papers are they from?’ Mum asked.
    Velda checked her clipboard. ‘It’s the two local papers — the Loughborough Echo and the Nottingham Evening Post . I’ll try and arrange it so that they both interview Sophie on Saturday.’
    ‘How exciting,’ Mum said to me.
    ‘I’m sure they won’t be the only interviews Sophie has to do,’ Velda told her. ‘There are bound to be magazine and radio interviews nearer the time too. It’s a good story — local girl comes from nowhere to take the lead in a film and then gets the main part in a big Christmas show. It’ll be great publicity for us. People are bound to want to come and see the local film star. Anyway, see you on Saturday, Sophie.’
    I nodded. Velda’s words had made my stomach suddenly go all squirmy. Not the bit about seeing me on Saturday of course, but her comment that lots of people were going to come and see the play because of me. Help! They’d all be expecting me to be perfect. But what about my dancing? What if I made a total mess of things on stage?
    I followed Mum to the car feeling almost sick.
    ‘Sophie?’ Mum frowned as we got into the car. ‘Are you OK? You’re being very quiet.’
    ‘I… I’m fine,’ I mumbled.
    ‘Are you sure?’ Mum asked, looking at me closely.
    I nodded. I didn’t want to talk about it. ‘I’m just tired,’ I lied.
    To my relief Mum seemed to accept this. ‘It is late,