A small, boney finger traced the outline of a music note into the dust that caked the downstairs window. Rissa sighed and peered through the soot, staring at the deserted avenue. It had been like this for too many years. Most of the towering light-posts flickered on and off at night while the police roamed the streets diligently, searching for the next rule-breaker to crack their whips on. Unfortunately for her, she had only been outside a few rare times. Even on those occasions, her stern mother would nudge her forward quickly and shove her into the backseat of the car. There really was no need to leave the house; the schools had been shut down years ago, back in 2036, when the new generation of televisions was released, and the music and art industries collapsed. A trip out of the comfort of her old, Victorian home was always due to a shortage of batteries, frozen T.V. dinners, or a yearning for a newly released video game. In Seattle, as well as in every nook and cranny of the United States, most commoners were trapped inside their homes - slaves to their ever-expanding electronics collection and cheesy soap opera series.
Rissa pushed aside a lock of her wispy, golden hair and gazed intently at the music note before her. It was as though she was expecting it to float off the window and out onto the barren streets. As if, maybe, it would repaint the world in an cheerful hue that would allow laughter and merriness to sweep through the streets once more. Closing her deep green eyes, she traveled back six years to when she had just turned eleven. She could still smell the delicious aroma of pumpkin waffles wafting through the kitchen, and she could hear the jolly rumble of her papa's laugh bellowing out from behind his spatula. The metal mail flap on the front door had slammed shut, and she skidded across the polished floors in her fuzzy socks to retrieve the letters that had just floated to the ground. Seeing a manila envelope with the name “Rissa Flynn” etched across it, she reached down and tore out the treasure that lay inside.


“Congratulations! Based on your impeccable placement at StarQuest
Dance Competitions, you have been chosen to attend our Elite Junior
Rockettes Dance and Music Camp!”


Shaking with excitement, Rissa had run over to her dad and shared the exciting new with him as he drizzled syrup over his signature breakfast dish.
“I always knew my little girl would be a star just like her father!” Her papa was a renowned songwriter and musician, having composed beautiful melodies and lyrics for popular bands across the country. She had always been so proud of him. They rejoiced and started to make arrangements for her to attend over the summer, until her mother started to rain on their parade as per usual.
“Oh,” she grumbled. “This is in June? I was planning on going to a video game expo that week.” Rissa rolled her eyes and stomped away. It was no surprise to her that her parents argued so often when they held such different opinions on their daughter’s life.
“Rissa Flynn!” Rissa leapt out of her chair and landed on the floor with a reverberating thud, shaking her out of her daydreaming.
“How many times a week do I need to yell at you for skipping a meal?” her mother chided as she yanked up Rissa’s thin, tender arm and dangled it in front of her face. Rissa hid her annoyance as she thought about her secret trips to the basement. If her mom didn’t fry her brain all day with those childish games, maybe she would be aware of what Rissa was always up to. She ate three square meals a day, even an extra platter of chicken here and there, but she had always been much skinnier than all her neighbors. Perhaps this was because she didn't fall victim to a cozy couch and a game console all day.
“Mom, I ate this morning, I promise,” Rissa pleaded. Her mother scoffed and bounced down the long hallway. It was at moments such as this one that Rissa missed her Papa more than ever. He was the only one that understood.
Reaching into the deep pocket of her worn, blue sweatpants, Rissa rubbed her thumb over the smooth rhinestones that covered her jewel-encrusted iPod. It was the first gift that her dad had ever given to her. She loved to think back to the day she got it. It was her eighth birthday and their old dog had just peed all over her favorite pair of boots. Luckily, her papa swept around the corner with a giant, gift bag and plopped it right into her little lap. Ripping through layer after layer of tissue paper, Rissa had come across her iPod and a perfect pair of black leather tap shoes.
“Now you can play all the music you want and dance to it at the same time, my little princess!” he had joked. Wrapping her arms tightly around his neck, she squeezed him and tenderly kissed his cheeks. He had always understood her love for music, art, and performance.
Rissa eventually realized that she had been squeezing her music player for too long, clinging onto the last memories of her dad. Uncurling her hand, she studied the deep pattern that had etched itself intricately into her skin. She wondered if her dad’s skin had been cut and dented like hers was when the police finally got hold of him. Growing up in Seattle meant hearing a lot of horrible rumors about what the government does to you if you break their rules. After the officials came in and confiscated all their instruments, CD players, iPods, dance shoes, paint brushes, and canvases, her dad had decided to not give in to their outrageous demands. He hid and protected a small flute that he would boldly play weeks later in the center of town. Crowds gathered around, exchanging bewildered looks and surprised whispers because they couldn’t believe that someone was breaking a law so confidently. Soon after he began to play, guards had shot a copper bullet right into his hand and then thrown him to the ground. That was the last time Rissa had ever seen her papa.
Perhaps that’s why she felt okay with harboring a secret room to dance and sing in. Rissa believed that she was honoring her father’s memory and doing what he would have wanted her to do. She took one last longing glance at the ghost town outside that window, and then, when she was sure her mom had fully disappeared into one of her TV rooms, she tiptoed to the back door and slipped into the backyard. Although going out was a rare occurrence, Rissa always found time to sneak over to the neighbor’s house where she would catch up with her only friend, Thomas. Ironically enough, she had met him during one of the best summers of her life: the summer she attended the dance and music camp.
Slipping under the hole in the white fence, Rissa knocked four times on his side window. Four knocks was the secret code; it said, “Hey it’s me, not the police here to come and drag you away from everyone you love.” Thomas poked his head out and his shaggy brown hair swayed in the cool night breeze.
“Welcome back,” he said as she slipped through the window into his room.
“What’s on the agenda tonight?” she teased as she stared at the freckles that dotted his pale cheeks. He was irresistibly cute and had gorgeous lips that knew how to play a trumpet beautifully. The best days spent with him were the days before everything changed. They would lay out in the open, and he would teach her piano while she hopelessly tried to teach him how to do a simple lyrical combination. Nonetheless, their secret nights spent together were some of the only times she enjoyed anymore.
“Help me think of a few more lyrics for this song,” he pleaded.
“Um, excuse me sir… a song!? I might just have to call the Center on you.” Thomas giggled and playfully shoved Rissa away. “Imagine if we could both grow up and be anything we wanted to be. Like, I could be the featured dancer at a show, and you could play an original piano composition for me to dance to.”
They both looked at each other with sadness.
“Maybe in a different world,” he whispered.
“Do you remember when we first became friends?” Rissa asked.
“Oh, you mean when you barged in on me at camp in the practice hall and demanded that I evacuate your practice space immediately?” They both howled with laughter and fell back onto his satin bedspread.
“We used to be real feisty. Daring, too,” Rissa added. Thomas’ eyes lit up and he grabbed her small wrist. “Where are we going?” He shushed her and pulled her off the bed and back to the window she came in through. As he was helping her through, he felt the outline of her iPod in her pocket and shook his head, worried that one day they would get caught. Nonetheless, with one sneaky look from Thomas, Rissa knew exactly where they were headed. Once they slipped outside and crawled under the fence, they scurried back across the yard to Rissa’s house.
“Wait here,” Rissa said as they reached the side door of her house her. She tiptoed up the creaky stairs to her room, praying that her mother would not hear. Reaching under a loose floorboard, she tightened her grip around a small metal key. With it, she crept back outside to where Thomas was waiting beside the door and signaled for him to follow her quietly. What they were doing was illegal, and she didn’t want to be assigned an unknown fate like her papa.
Each room they passed housed the faint glow of a humming TV coming from underneath the tiny crack in the doors. As they eventually reached the far end of the house, Rissa took one last look around. They were safe; her mother never ventured this far away from the comfort of her movies and fancy battery-eating devices. The blue wall they approached held the many secrets of what lay beyond, and Rissa quickly located the small hole hidden near her right knee. Shoving the key in, she twisted it roughly and swung open a hefty secret door.
“Rissaaaaaaaaaa!” her mom bellowed. Rissa’s heart rose into her throat and she whipped herself around, slamming into Thomas and preparing to face her outraged mother with her throbbing purple vein that always popped out under her left temple. Nobody was there. Seizing advantage of the moment, Rissa and Thomas thrust their unusually thin bodies through the secret door frame, ignoring her mother’s plea. Closing the entryway tightly, Rissa blindly felt around the plastered walls for the light switch.
“Over here,” Thomas said. He flicked on the faint lights and together, they gazed down the narrow staircase. On their descent, they passed aged posters and vinyl records that her dad had hung up years before. There were some spots where rusty water leaked through and peeled up the paint on the walls, but all of her father’s knick-knacks were placed in spots where they would be unharmed. Rissa had even added her own piece to the hallway. The sheet music for the song her dad had played downtown.
Once Rissa reached the concrete landing at the end of the stairs, she flicked on a second light switch to reveal her safe haven. A glossy wooden floor hugged a wall of sparkling mirrors at the front of the room. A worn-out, wooden ballet barre traced the perimeter of the massive studio and stopped where a large stereo system was hooked up. The secret room that her dad had built shortly before his disappearance was now being used to fulfill Rissa’s dreams. She grinned widely and leaped over to a cabinet in the corner where she threw out her royal blue shirt, black spandex, worn pointe shoes, and her favorite black, frayed tap shoes.
Twirling around like a glass ballerina, she plugged in her music and bent down to tie her tap shoes. The leather at the front was peeling away at the sole, but the hardy taps at the bottom still glistened up at her. As the music swam into her ears, she started bouncing to the beat. Her tap shoes quickly followed suit by madly scraping and slapping the floor. The beat picked up and eventually Rissa was floating across the room, singing the beautiful melody of the song playing, and doing jumps and flips back and forth. Thomas joined in and started harmonizing with her, watching her with awe as her presence filled the entire room. He could be jealous that he never had access to the things he loved. Trumpet. Piano. Guitar. But he never felt sad or upset watching Rissa dance and sing. She was all the art and music he needed.
Rissa continued to lose herself in a sea of expression. Groping at her tight ponytail, she ripped out her elastic and flung it to the marked up floor. She wrapped herself into a tornado of dance, song, and...happiness.
She eagerly prepared to jump up into a toe stand, but as her right shoe balanced itself, a loud smash echoed behind her and she toppled over into a pile.
“Thomas…?” she groaned and opened her eyes as the room’s fluorescent lights pierced her eyes. Balancing herself, she leaned up slowly, only to see Thomas towering in the corner, staring at her alarmingly and her mother, trembling, with a phone in her hand.
“All along,” she slowly stated as if she couldn’t quite comprehend what she had just walked into. “Your lean figure, that look of boredom behind your eyes when we watched TV, that...that, looming curiosity you had since you were young that I tried to dispel… you were dancing and singing everyday!” she shrieked with a tone of hollow disbelief.
“Mom! I can’t help what I love to do. I can’t help that what I love isn’t right in your eyes, or the eyes of everyone else. I can’t stand sitting around and doing nothing with my life. I want to be a dancer! I want to bring creativity back to our sad world. It’s what I’ve always wanted,” Rissa cried. Tears started to slowly swell in her eyes and they rolled down her face, burning her cheeks.
“You can’t sneak around my house breaking a law! Multiple laws!” Her mother’s mouth dripped with disgust.
“I really don’t care what anyone says. This is so much more than getting a high score on Zombie Smash 6. Dancing makes me feel like I can soar… and, sometimes, I just need to get away from the laziness of all the people who are just like you.” Rissa was now boiling over. Nothing could compare to music and activities, or dancing to make up short routines that no one would ever see.
“Thomas, tell her I’m right!” Rissa screamed. Her mother shook her head and stared at her daughter with pain in her eyes.
“Rissa, Thomas was taken away five years ago for hiding his piano in his room.”
“No, Mom. No. Thomas is right there in the corner. We come here every single day. We hang out. Every. Single. Day.”
Her mom held her phone out and let the tears fall down onto the blank screen. “This is for your safety and in your best interest,” she said as she dialed those four numbers. 6613. Those were the numbers to the “Detention Center for the Mental,” as Rissa regarded it. It was the number you called when you ratted out your neighbor for humming an old song or doing an old dance move. This was the phone call that would transform her life forever. “I love you, Rissa,” she whispered as she hit the green call button.
It seemed like only seconds before government officials were tearing down the mirrors and crushing her iPod under their concrete boots. She was dragged away, kicking and shrieking as they mutilated her only safe haven. Her Thomas in the corner watched with despair as the bulky arms of the men fastened around her like a permanent seat belt, but he could do nothing to help her. He was merely a figment of her deprived imagination.
Her mother slumped to the floor, weeping, and as Rissa was dragged back up the staircase, the aspiring dancer watched, horrified, as they continued to rip and torch her room into piles of rubble. Upon reaching her living room, she noticed car lights turning around a bend outside. Cars were rarely seen roaming the streets, but she knew this one was for her. To take her away.
As she was yanked past the doorway of her favorite spot in the lower level of her house, the lights of the police car swung by it outside. The meaty hand of the police officer nudged Rissa forward, while she stared intently at the only light that passed, and glowed, through her filthy, opaque living room window. The broad light of the vehicle illuminated the shape of the tiny music note that she had scratched into the dust only hours before.