~Pucker face~ Charlie Conway

Chapter two: Meet the Ducks

Once I got back to my room, I changed into some sweats, a t-shirt, and threw on a sweatshirt from my team in New York. I packed all my other gear into a duffle, grabbed my stick and headed out the door.

Walking across campus, I took into notice how beautiful it was here. Students littered the quad, greeting each other after the long summer. The grass was green and plentiful, the sun was shining. For being August, it wasn't all that warm, but regardless it was a good day.

Eventually, I got into the sports complex and checked in. This place was extremely cool. A whole weight room was upstairs, an indoor and outdoor pool on the ground level. Physical therapy was in the basement. Just a casually insanely rich school. Totally not freaking out either.

The man at the front desk pointed me towards the locker room. I walked in and was greeted by a bunch of stares and silence.

"Sloane!" Julie yelled, waving me over to a bench in the corner. I nodded and walked over to her as every pair of eyes followed me there. Another girl with long, dark hair took notice and started scolding the boys. "Quit gawking guys, you're freaking her out," she looked to me, "Don't worry about them. They're just shocked there's yet another girl who may be better than them. I'm Connie Moreau by the way." She smiled offering her hand.

Shaking it, I introduced myself. "Sloane Hagen. I'm from upstate New York. Can you tell me who's who? I recognize a few faces from when I watched the goodwill games on tape, but I just want to be sure I know who I'm talking to."

"Sure! That's Guy Germaine, Adam Banks, Charlie Conway, Luis Mendoza, Lester Averman, Fulton Reed and Dean Portman aka the Bash Brothers, Ken Wu, Dwayne Robertson, Greg Goldberg, and Russ Tyler. Quite a mouthful, but you'll get em all in time."

I nodded and started to quickly put on my gear. I was a little late so everyone was almost ready. Everyone left and got onto the ice without me, which I didn't mind. The boys were still gawking when I left, kinda weird if you ask me.

When I stepped onto the ice, everyone was crowded around the coach arguing. Julie and Connie were picking a bone with Adam and Lester, and everyone else was shouting things at Coach.

"THE BOTTOM LINE IS-"
"WHY DID IS SHE EVEN-"
"COACH ORION WE DON'T NEED A-"

We're just a few things I could pick out of the bickering. Julie pushed Charlie and started yelling at him.
"You're so annoying! Because nothing ever gets past Charlie Conway without his approval!"

"Seriously Julie? It's not fair. Our lines are only getting bigger, less play time for all of us." He responded.

"HEY!" The coach yelled, grabbing everyone attention.
"All of you need to settle down or we'll do drills all of practice, with an extension of time. No buts, go get warmed up. I need to talk to your new teammate." He said, emphasizing the last word.

It really is a great feeling to know you're causing problems on the first day. Skating over to the coach, he began talking.

"You must be Ms. Hagen. I'm Coach Orion. Sorry about them, they're quite the wild bunch. But welcome to Eden Hall's JV team. You're going to play your specialty position of left wing, but as for your line, I'll watch your training and decide. Stick with Julie and Connie, you'll be just fine. Now go start your warmup."

"Got it. Thanks Coach Orion." I said as I skated away towards the girls.

Before I knew it, a boy came hurling towards me and slammed me to the ice.

"Ow! Stop much?!" I yelled, scrambling to get up.

"Nope." He said winking. The boy was Luis Mendoza. He went back to the group and started slapping his friends backs and laughing. Asshole. Most of them looked towards me and smirked. This was going to be harder than I thought.
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Connie, Julie and I did a few scrimmages to pass the time. This practice wasn't super important as we had no games anytime soon. It was just a refresher of being on our skates.

All of the boys were being extra irritating. Stealing our puck, tripping us, hiding our water. The girls explained that this wasn't normal and that something was definitely up. Guy apparently was really sweet and was never hostile to anyone. Especially not friends of Connie's. Averman too. So who was the center of this?

Charlie's POV:

This girl wasn't anything compared to us. We were the ducks. Almost undefeated, and just crazy good hockey players. Now, I knew nothing about her, but she seemed lame and uncommitted. Plus, our team was already large, we didn't need an extra person to put in line. If she was on the ice, she'd be taking playing time away from someone good, a real duck. This wasn't going to work out, Coach Orion just had to know that.

If it meant pushing and pulling, I would do it. I wanted to victory in the same way we had it last year. Varsity had given us Adam, but to be honest, we were at the same level they were. JV was just a label.

I had to meet Linda later, but first I had to get the new girl her jersey. I would give it to her just like any other person would, but what is life without a little fun?

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Sloane's POV

As practice ended at 5:30, I was going to head to the gym for some yoga to stretch and calm myself after a busy day. When leaving the locker room, I heard a voice shout behind me.

"Hey you!" I turned to see Charlie Conway waving me over. Of course he hadn't learned my name. I walked over and stood in front of him. He seemed harmless, but boy was I wrong.

"You know, we don't need you here. We've got a full team. And we came first. We played as USA in the junior goodwill games, and won. We're top dogs. You're already showing the opposite of potential, cowering with the other girls."

I couldn't believe what I'd just heard. Who knew that Charlie Conway was an absolute jerk? My mouth was slightly open, trying to process every insult that had just been thrown my way. To keep the peace between us, I stayed silent. All I could think about is how the girls said this behavior wasn't normal. But this seemed almost too natural. I felt kind of humiliated. My playing being judged so hard by someone my own age. Staring blankly at Charlie, I drew in a shaky breath and waited.

He turned and left for second, then came back with something in his hands. He shoved a folded up jersey into my chest and walked off.

What. The. Hell.
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