THE PHOENIX

T

he Phoenix was a mixed group of black and white, male and female dancers who had taken over the arena of Los Angeles.

They heard about our fame; how we dominated the streets of New York and decided to move all the way from Los Angeles  for a lighthouse show. However, they had absolutely no idea of what they were coming for; we waged dance battles with dance squads from different parts of the United States, Miami, Santa Barbara, Texas, and Washington, and still remained undefeated, just name it, we are down for whatever.

The Dance Empire made a whole lot of money from this dance battles and they have serious plans of going international and transforming this dance wars into a huge multi-million dollars investment.

The Dance Empire was an underground multi-millionaire carcuss made up of dons who took over the dance entertainment business as a whole. Since they could not compete with the bigger guns in the music industry, I’m talking about record labels like Deff Jamz, Atlantic Records, and Sony Music, etc. They had to settled for something different, but with good potentials; a dance entertainment Industry.

The Street Ace, Mayor Banks, joined us as we all walked to the house of the Robo- man, who also happens to be a computer geek, Ryan ‘handsome’ Gates.

We reached the X.A, the nickname we gave to our training centre, meaning Extra-ordinary Action. The X.A is a newly renovated elementary school hall in the neighborhood, located just some few blocks away from Ryan’s home and weve just been permitted by the owner of the School Ryans mum to have our dance rehearsals at the hall.

For sometimes, I had been attending our secret rehearsals later than the expected time or than any other member of the team, and this was really beginning to upset our  team leader, Max-Dwayne and some other team members of our dance crew, but they just don’t get it. Miss Taylor, my mama, is hell bent on making me quit dancing and she is seriously bent on doing whatever it takes to frustrate my dance career but most time I had to sneak out of the house to reach the X.A. But I never made this known to anyone on the team except my closest pal, Lloyd.

There were also these young dudes from the orphanage home of the St. Mary Magdalene orphanage home, young dancers who wanted to be a part of a dance crew, but were constantly pushed away by so many dance crews and now just happen to be our own turn. I wanted them to be a part of our dance crew, having some  place for good rookies but Max never shared that idea, he was only obsesses about winning and so the young dudes were also sent away by Max, Raul, Natasha, Tonya, Wales, Klause and the Asian-American Wong-Kimchung, but we just called him Kim. The training began, as everyone was present and set.

The intensive dance training kept going on for some hours, everyone on the team kept working so hard, and since the showdown will be tomorrow evening, we just had to perfect all our dance moves and choreography before the showdown. Besides, we know that the famous Phoenix definitely did not just come for a child’s play; they must be down for whatever and set to give us one hell of a battle. So Max and the rest of the dance crew were taking it too serious and this was gradually wearing the team out. However, Max was becoming too inconsiderate, it was written all over him, and he saw no reason to stop yelling at anyone who just wasn’t getting it right. But would intentionally ignore the errors of his girlfriend, Natasha flames, even when she missed out of line. I kept noticing this was getting just too far, so I told him to stop being so paranoid and quit yelling at everyone on the team. This led to a hot and bitter quarrel between the irate Max Dwayne, who once used to be my lover, and me.

‘You’re pushing everyone too hard Max,’ I yelled back at him, but Max would not take that lightly as he was ready to come at me, but Lloyd quickly stepped in between me and the leader of the Maximus Prime dance crew. He would rather die than to see any guy place his hands on me.

‘This dance crew definitely aren’t about your selfish pride, we all wonna win too,’ I said to Max Dwayne because I was set to really get hot with him, who keeps thinking he could never be stood up to, just then, we heard the footsteps of someone who walked into the X.A like he wanted to be noticed. It was Wesley Gibbs, the leader of the Phoenix dance crew.

Wesley has been seeing hanging around Brooklyn for close to a month now, probably spying on us, or God knows what. Mayor Banks, the Street Ace, heard about this and made it known to Max, but Max made him keep it a secret from the rest of the dance crew, revealing it only to his girlfriend, Natasha Flames.

As Wesley Gibbs walked closer to us, the angry Max said to him ‘what on earth you are doing here, and what do you want from us?’

‘Patience, patience my friends,’ replied Wesley, ‘I only came for a visit, and well since I’m hearing so much of quarrellings amongst you, even before you lose to me and my crew, I felt some peace treat might just be helpful.’

‘What on earth do you mean?’ asked Max, as sweat kept dropping from his face.

‘I only came to tell you and your filthy crew to get ready to lose for the first time at the lighthouse tomorrow, because I already know all the dance moves you’ll  be bringing,’ replied Wesley, who revealed nine of our secret dance moves and called them by their exact names, even describing each one in details, and then he walked away.

The whole team was shocked, and I have never been so disappointed my whole life, tears rolled down my eyes. ‘I gave up everything for this dance crew and now one of you had to come up been a mole,’ I said to the team. 

As I starred at each member of our dance crew who also seemed surprise and that just made me mad and more disappointed with whoever the mole is.

I grabbed my red bag plus my NY desighners face-cap to leave the X.A, Lloyd tried preventing me but I warned him to back-off.  Max, the leader of our dance crew then called my name, but that was the last voice I just needed to hear. Ever since Natasha joined the team, Max had seen it as a perfect opportunity to carry out his bitter hatred towards me by constantly spitting at me, simply because I would not lay on his bed with him. Moreover, since he could get all of that with Natasha, he always wanted to make a fool out of me in front of her, and she liked every bit of it because she hated and envied my fame. But she had no idea what I felt for her, just patiently waiting for when I will have the chance to drop the whole world on her. I cherished my dignity, which was one thing no man in the world could ever take away from me; my body is my pride to be treasured.

Max Dwayne, the leader of our dance team, ordered me to wait, I turned around as he kept on saying ‘if you leave I would be forced to...,’ I quickly interrupted him as I was sick of watching him dominate me. ‘or else what , don’t you get it Max, I am sick and tired of everything with you, I am quitting.’

I bet Max never thought he would someday hear those words from me, as an emotion of regrets and surprise started running through his veins. In addition, for the first time, after a long time, I saw in his eyes the stable Max that I once fell in love with, but I guess it’s too damn late for all that. Miss Mystical, a.k.a Natasha flames, grabbed a hold of his right hand and pulled him back as she said ‘let her leave, you don’t need her.’

As I walked out, Natasha spoke something and believe me, I felt like dropping the whole world on her at that moment. But on a second thought, I was scared for her mama, so I just played cool by saying, ‘Natasha, you got something to say, quit salivating and talking at the same time.’ I yelled ‘I don’t  wonna lay my hands on you, so don’t  start suffering from seizure or something worse, shut the hell out of my face and go mind your own business’, as I completely walked away.

Natasha tried saying more words at my back but Ryan asked her to ‘shut up!, saying can’t you see you’ve done enough already.’

I suspected Natasha as the mole, but really had no proof to back it all up and could not say much since the enchanted Max Dwayne was too blind to see beneath his feet. But I knew she never loved him, she just fell in love with his fame, penny and it was only a matter of time before she preyed on him. I got into a taxi, and as the driver drove along, I grabbed my mobile phone and listened to my most favourite artist of all time; the multiple Grammy Award winner, the white pop star, Adele, as I played her track, ‘Don’t You Remember Me,’ from the album, ‘21.’

This made me remember the good friendship I used to have with Max, until he became a monster, now filled with so much hatred for me.

The taxi dropped me off right at my house, and I rang the doorbell with the earpiece of my phone stuck to my ears. Mama opened the door. Standing in front of the door way, she said ‘where on earth are you coming from?’ from my dressing she knew I had gone dancing but has no idea where the X.A. is located or would have busted me right there, right in the middle of our rehearsals. Putting on a more angry stare she yelled at the top of her voice, saying ‘and what did I tell you about dancing?’ as she continued. I looked at her in the eyes, and could immediately sense something wrong, perceiving the smell of alcohol and sensing the tipsyness I could certainly sense what was wrong, mama was having too much of a drink. I said to her in reply, ‘well I’m just coming from hell and the good news is I’ve quit dancing’ as I walked passed by her into the house and headed upstairs for my bedroom.

‘And yeah, a guy came by, dropping this beautiful gift for you. It is a bunch of   rose flower, and a purple pearl ring. He did not say his name though.’ She smiled behind me, and shut the door behind as she said, ‘you know I wish you stayed in hell and never had to quit dancing.’

‘Are you drinking some of those crazy gins again?’ I asked her. She quickly hid the bottle of whisky behind her, I grabbed the half-drunk bottle of whisky from her and headed for my room and turned the light off for some good night rest.