My Life as a Teenage Rebel

Chapter 42: Replacements

Evan Touber

CHAPTER 42 Replacements

 “Twenty seconds on the clock,” Raj starts, his eyes wide to add to the drama.

“Roy Washington has the ball, he’s dribbling it down the court; oh! Look at that boy go!” Owen adds on, walking backwards as he dribbles the ball, using the same dramatic voice as Raj.

“He’s going for the three-pointer… No! He fakes it! The Wolves are so confused!” Schwartz exemplifies this feeling of confusion. “Washington passes over their heads to Evan Touber!”

“Touber shoots,” Raj starts.

“HE SCORES!” the whole group echoes. I crack up as I receive rough pats on the back and supportive punches on the shoulder.

A small group of us roam the hallways, having left the after-party to find Ky and Andrew (who walked off to find the other girls and never seemed to come back) and also Kyle (who never showed up at the party to begin with).

When the affectionate roughhousing eases up, I allow my laughter to fade as I say: “I don’t know what you guys are making a big deal out of; we were ahead the entire time. It’s not like the last twenty seconds determined whether we won or lost.”

“We were ahead because of you, froggeh.” Owen tells me, tossing me the ball.

“Naw…” I say sheepishly, turning the basketball in my hands.

“Ha!” Griffin booms in a naturally loud voice, “We’ve got a modest one over here!” he ruffles my hair as I laugh again.

“Don’t worry; we’ll fix that right up, Griff.” Diego says with a big grin. I narrow my eyes good-humoredly and chuck the ball at him, fully aware that he could catch it with ease.

We stop all our goofing around though when we hear a loud, echoing SLAM! We pause, looking around at each other in confusion. We hear yelling and swearing, and then another SLAM!

In my best guess, it sounds like…someone being thrown against a locker.

“Fight,” Griffin mutters, and we all take one last glance at each other.

Realization hitting us, we race each other down the hallway in search of the source of the noise. Despite the after-party, most people have gone home at this point. That limits the possible candidates for the fight to: teachers, the team, and the other team.

Oh, and cheerleaders. Although I doubt they’d be slamming each other against lockers yelling in masculine voices.

Once we turn the corner, my eyes go as wide as saucers. And sure enough, a Wolf – and I can tell it’s a Wolf because he’s still in uniform – grabs one of our teammates by the collar of his shirt and strikes him across the face.

Our teammate is stunned for a moment, but recovers quickly and responds by blocking another hit with his arm and then punching the Wolf hard in the stomach. The Wolf lurches over, coughing, and our teammate takes that opportunity to bring his elbow down on the back of the Wolf’s head.

It’s like watching a UFC fight, except the only point of perspective is inside the cage, and that’s the end of it. In all the school fights I’ve seen, there’s always a crowd around, a loud crowd that chants things and pumps their fists in the air. There’s no crowd here. And yet somehow, that makes the fight seem all the more violent.

We rush over as fast as we can, pulling the two guys apart. Both yell, struggling against us, trying to break free of our grip so that they can tear each other to pieces. Ever tried to stop a fight between two lions? Cuz that’s what this is like, except lions can’t yell or swear, they just roar. Maybe I’d prefer to stop a fight between two lions over this.