Chapped Lips and Cold Kisses

Essie and Mela woke up in their New York City hotel room refreshed and ready to have a long day of sight seeing. Well Essie was ready for the day, Mela was still clinging to her pillow as Essie pulled at her feet, "Mela, get your skinny ass up! We have so much to do today."

"Nooooo!" Mela cried not wanting to leave the warmth of the bed.

"If you don't get up I'm gonna call Ville and tell him you love him." She said, holding up Mela's cell phone.

"You will not!" Mela screamed, throwing her pillow at Essie, "I'm getting up, just give me five minutes."

Mela groaned when she looked at the clock, it was only 9am. She forced herself out of bed and dressed in a Mickey Mouse sweater, skinny black jeans, and combat boots. The two girls then put their makeup on in the big bathroom mirror while singing along to all the songs on the radio.

When they were finally ready, they caught a cab to take them to the Statue of Liberty. Of course the ride took an hour with all the traffic when they probably could’ve walked there in less time. The ride gave Mela time to check if Ville had emailed her back. When she saw that he did, she smiled then caught herself when she remembered Essie was right next to her. She’d read the email later.

Their visit to the Statue of Liberty was a lot of fun. They’d looked at all the street vendors and performers, Essie squealing about every little thing.
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Now it was time to get down to business. They returned to the hotel, put their pointe shoes on and got to work, practicing as well as they could in the small room. Tomorrow was their audition and they were going to get as much practice as they could before they either passed out or got a visit from the hotel manager about all the noise.

Essie was stretching her toes when Mela fell during an arabesque. Essie gasped and jumped up to help her friend, “What’s wrong? Are you sick?”

“No, no, I’m fine.” Mela said, shrugging her blonde friend off. She hadn’t eaten anything since they’d arrived, almost going on 48 hours. She was kind of dizzy, but it was worth it. She needed to be in her best shape for tomorrow’s auditions. She wasn’t starving herself. She was fasting. That’s what she told herself anyway. She could see Essie giving her a side eye, but she continued on practicing until the dead of night.