12. A League of their own #2
Every year, this was the highlight of the HSPVA presentations.
The group came in second place last year, to The Rivals, an outgoing senior class duo who only won because it was tradition for the seniors to win.
This year, The H-Tine Hotshots, a senior-class quartet, were favorites.
They couldn’t sing better than their trio, but Preston’s dancing ability held them back.
While it was tradition for seniors to win, the outcry from last year’s debacle put pressure on the administration to judge more fairly— pressure spearheaded by Talia Cole, who had made more than a few calls to the administration reminding them about their obligation to integrity, since industry executives would show up to these events.
There was no denying everyone was waiting to see what the Justice League would do.
“So what are we doing?” Brian asked, tapping a beat against the floor. “Because I hear Hotshots are doing R Preston needs to learn how to dance; we need to beat these guys.
And the law of our family says, if I throw a punch, all the Ellison’s gotta fight.
Like it or not, cuz, you inherited this beef when you signed up. We gotta go big or go home.”
Spring stared at them for a second. “You serious?”
“Yeah,” Cameron said. “You already in the show directing, you have half the school hating you because you’re around us, and you get to spend time with… the crew,” he looked at her pointedly. “The point is, it would be a great way to kill two birds with one stone.”
Brian chimed in. “As long as this chocolate glistens on camera, I’m good.” He sat down, then Cameron turned to Spring as she thought about it.
He put his arm around her. “Come on, cuz, don’t tell me you don’t miss doing those talent shows with me and you at Nana’s house when we were little?
This will shut your haters up, and we get to have fun.
Plus, with the work it’s going to take to get a certain someone up to speed, you’ll have lots of time… alone.”
“That could work,” she said slowly. “But only if y’all listen. Starting with Big Bird over there.”
Cameron laughed. “That’s ambitious.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Then don’t ask me. Cause I don’t have time?—”
Cameron held up his hands. “Alright, alright, you win. We follow your lead. But there’s no time to waste.” He stood up and turned to Preston. “Yo, Big Bird, you’re going home with Nai today to start your first lesson.”
Brian grinned. “I mean, I need lessons too. Will you help me Nairobi?”
“Boy shut up.”
Brian raised his hands in surrender.
Preston and Spring took the bus to her house to talk about the dance routine.
The rhythm was always easier when it was just the two of them. They unconsciously got off the bus two stops earlier than they needed to, just to extend their time together.
The neighborhood was calm in that after-school way. Sprinklers ticking, screen doors slapping shut, the sky already flirting with dusk even though it was still warm out.
They walked side by side, backpacks slung low, not touching but close enough to feel each other’s presence.
“Thank you for doing this,” Preston finally broke the silence.
“You’re welcome, just another day in the life of a Justice League sidekick.”
Preston chuckled at the notion.
“I hate it,” Spring said suddenly.
Preston glanced over. “Hate what?”
She kicked a pebble across the sidewalk harder than necessary. “Everybody treats me like I’m an add-on. Like I came with Cameron. Or like I’m just… part of y’all.”
He slowed his steps, listening carefully.
“I’m not mad at him,” she continued. “I love him. But I’m not just his cousin. And I’m not one of y’all’s accessories either.”
Preston nodded. “I get that.”
“No, you don’t,” she said quickly, then sighed. “Sorry. That came out wrong.”
He smiled a little. “I kinda do. People hear my name before they hear me or even know me. These girls who you call groupies, I’m just a trophy for them. None of them really know who I am or even care, you feel me?”
“I get that.”
“Besides you’re bigger than this group. You’re bigger than all of us the way I see it.”
She looked at him then. “That’s why I don’t want to be onstage as ‘Cameron’s cousin’,” she said. “Or ‘the girl in the group’. I want to be… me.”
They walked a few more steps in silence.
“Can I ask you something?” Preston said.
She braced herself. “Depends.”
“What’s your middle name?”
She stopped walking and turned to him like he’d asked her something illegal. “Why?”
“Just curious.”
She scoffed. “It’s stupid.”
“That don’t mean anything,” he said. “My grandma got my middle name from a jazz pianist she had a crush on. Elijah Calloway.”
She laughed despite herself. “Okay, but don’t judge me.”
“I won’t.”
She hesitated. Then, quietly: “It’s Spring.”
Preston stopped. He looked as if the sidewalk had shifted under his feet. “Spring,” he repeated.
She grimaced. “See? Told you. It’s stupid.”
“No,” he said quickly. “No, that’s not – it’s perfect. In fact, it’s beautiful. Nairobi Spring Ellison. Sounds like one of those names for people who go off and do great things. It suits you.”
She crossed her arms, self-conscious all of a sudden. “Well… thank you, Preston Elijah Cole. That means a lot coming from you. I always felt it was kinda corny. My mom was poetic like that. Always naming things like they meant something.”
Preston slowed. “Your mom? You never talk about her,” he observed.
Spring hesitated. Her first instinct was to deflect or joke.
Keep moving. But something about the way he asked – not nosy or prying – made her answer anyway.
“Her name was Njeri… Njeri Ellison. She was beautiful. She loved music. Always singing.” Spring smiled as she recalled her mother.
Preston allowed the air to fill the space for a moment then asked,
“Could she sing?”
“No, she was terrible.” Spring chuckled remembering her mother in the kitchen, singing loud and wrong, turning every song into her own version anyway, then continued.
“But that never stopped her. She loved to do it, and she was so animated, it was hard not to love watching her. She had this big wide smile with these perfect pearly white teeth and would sing with her entire soul. I used to record her singing Diana Ross, Elton John, hell everyone. She would joke and ask if this was the one she could send to American Idol. My dad would just laugh and tell her, ‘It’s not quite ready yet but keep trying.’” Spring took a deep sigh, then continued, “She was my hero. One day her and my dad got into a fight about his work with a client, Mr. Yabluidbytch and she stormed out the house and went for a drive to cool off. It was...the last time I saw her. She was killed by a drunk driver,” she said.
The words were flat, practiced, like she’d said it enough times that the words had learned to behave.
The sidewalk seemed to stretch between them.
“Oh, is that why you came to HSPVA?” he said quietly.
“Yeah. It was too much to stay in Beaumont after that. I’m surprised Cameron didn’t tell you any of this.”
Preston shrugged. “Isn’t our business. One thing about Cameo, if he wants to talk about something, you’re not gonna stop him, so if he doesn’t bring it up we leave it alone.”
They walked a few steps more. Her chest tightened – not from the memory, but from saying it out loud and not being rushed past it. “She named me Spring because she said I saw things blooming before anyone else noticed,” Spring added, almost defensively. “She thought I’d grow into myself.”
Preston nodded, eyes on the ground now. “My dad was a drunk driver,” he said.
She stopped, turned fully toward him this time. “What?”
“He didn’t kill anyone else,” Preston said quickly, like he needed to get that part out before anything else. “Just himself. Wrapped the car around a light pole when I was little.”
Spring stared at him, the air knocked clean out of her lungs. “I didn’t know,” she said.
“Most people don’t,” he replied. “They just know he’s gone.”
They stood there, two teenagers suddenly holding something much heavier than backpacks and after-school plans.
“I hate that,” she said softly. “That one bad decision can take so much with it.”
“Yeah,” he said. “It’s like – it keeps rippling. Even when you think you’re past it.”
She nodded. “I don’t think I’ll ever be past it.”
“Me neither.”
The silence that followed wasn’t awkward. It was reverent, like they’d stumbled onto something fragile, and neither wanted to break it by speaking too soon.
After a moment, Preston cleared his throat. “So,” he said lightly, almost carefully. “Spring.”
“Corny, right?”
“That’s not corny,” he said. “That’s… majestic.”
She rolled her eyes. “You don’t have to say that.”
“I do,” he said, serious now. “Because, now that I think about it, that’s exactly what you’ve been looking for.”
She frowned. “Exactly what?”
He searched for the words, then shrugged. “Okay, hear me out. You think that people treat you like an add-on. But you don’t feel like a person people add on. You feel like a shift. Like when the air changes, and everybody notices but can’t explain why.”
She stared at him.
“You don’t show up quietly,” he continued. “You don’t blend in. You arrive, like a season. Which is why I think your mom named you Spring. So, I say own it.”
Her throat tightened unexpectedly. “What do you mean exactly?”
“Cameron was right about one thing: we’re all dealing with a branding issue. So, when you teach me a few of these dance moves, we’re gonna win. And when we do,” he continued, softer now, “you shouldn’t be Nairobi, Cameron’s cousin. You shouldn’t be the girl who hangs with the crew.”
She swallowed. “Then who should I be?”
He smiled. “You should be the girl in the crew. You should be… Spring Ellison.”
They stood there for a moment, the words hanging between them like they had been waiting their whole life to be spoken out loud.
She exhaled. “That’s… a lot.”
“Yeah,” he said. “But so are you.”
A laugh shot out of her. “You really think I could pull that off?”
“I think,” he said, “once you step onstage, and you own it, nobody will ever call you anything else.”
She thought about the lights. The sound. The way it would feel to claim space instead of borrowing it. “Okay,” she said slowly. “But if I do this, you can’t let me disappear.”
He met her eyes. “I won’t.”
They kept walking. And somewhere between the bus stop and home, Spring began to understand that names weren’t just given.
They were chosen.
And Spring was waiting.