Unfair Advantage ) Adam Banks

ch 17, aha moment

She refused to look up, wanting nothing more than to just leave and go eat elsewhere. Eating with the cheerleaders would've made Ripley feel more comfortable than she was now.

"Dude." Kenny bumped Ripley's arm, getting her attention. "Rick won't stop staring at you."

"I noticed that, too." Guy chimed in, "Looks like you're at the top of his hit list, Rip."

The girl laughed, still poking at her food. "I've been at the top for awhile now. I can't wait for the game next week."

Connie laughed at her sarcasm, "Oh well, he had the punch coming. He didn't get anything he didn't deserve."

"True shit, Moreau." Ripley nodded, smiling at her friend.

The table went quiet for a moment, before Averman interrupted the silence. "So... Are we all gonna just ignore what Rick said?"

The friends all turned their attention to the ginger boy, confused. Well, all confused except for Adam and Ripley.

"About... uh.. you know. You two."

Averman looked between Ripley and Adam, and everyone else turned to face them as well. 

"Oh come on guys, don't play dumb. We all heard the comment about-"

"Can it, Averman." Julie said, gripping the ginger's arm. "You know that boy will say anything to get a rise out of people."

Everyone nodded and tried to forget the awkward topic, except for Ripley. She wanted to throw up, recounting everything going on in her life.

No, really, she wanted to throw up. She felt like she was going to throw up.

Ripley kicked out her seat in an instant, and rushed out of the lunch room as quickly as possible.

She heard footsteps follow her, praying it was just Connie, and it was.

"Dammit, Averman." Adam yelled at out, loud enough for Ripley to hear even as she was rushing away.

"What?"

She still heard Connie behind her until she made it to the bathroom, bursting into a stall and throwing up all the lunch she had just eaten. 

"Go away, Adam!" Ripley heard her friend call out from the hallway. "You know she doesn't want to see you right now, especially right now."

"I just want to make sure she's okay!"

"Fuck off, man!" Connie replied, Ripley taking in how angry she sounded. "Just because all of the other Ducks have forgiven you, doesn't mean we do too. Go away."

She heard her friend rush into the bathroom after that, finding Ripley hunched over in a stall.

Connie turned on a faucet, trying to drown out the hurls coming from her mouth, and made her way over to Ripley.

"It's okay, Rip." She said, pulling the girls hair back into a make-shift ponytail. "Let it all out."

-

"All right, I've been doing my homework on the varsity." Coach Orion said, looking out upon his players. "I'm not gonna lie to you, they're good. The way they wiped your faces in the dirt last time was no fluke. So if you want your pride back, you better be ready to work."

"There's nothing glamorous about it. In the pros, we call it blue-collar hockey. Now there's one thing the varsity does very well. They're vultures around the net. They pick up every piece of loose trash. That's how they beat you. Not with the first shot; the second and the third. They bang in the junk. So if you wanna win, you're gonna have to pick up the trash."

Orion spilled out contents of a trash bag in front of the team, everyone turning away in disgust.

He encouraged the team to clean it up as fast as they could, banging their sticks against metal cans and soggy banana peels.

"We definitely didn't do this on varsity." Ripley said, turning to Connie.

"I bet you're starting to miss it now, huh." Connie teased.

Ripley nodded, "Maybe a little."

The team continued to swipe at the trash, until it was once again piled into the bag.

Orion smiled, "Good work."

The friends smiled, until the saw the man tip over the trash bag once more, unleashing it over the ice again.

"Now, again!"

-

The players were all dead towards the end of practice, all except for Adam and Ripley of course. They were both used to hard practices.

"Grab a knee!" Orion yelled as the group circled around him, falling to their knees exasperated.

He waited until everyone was paying attention before he started, "You guys are not skating like Warriors!"

Ripley and her friends huffed, wondering what he meant because they all thought practice was going great. 

"You look like something else." Orion started.

The group looked at him in confusion, before a smirk began to spread across their coach's face.

"You look like Ducks."

They all glanced around in excitement as Orion began to open a box, pulling out an infamous Duck jersey.

"Robertson."

The friends continued to cheer and jerseys went flying as names were called. Finally, everyone had a jersey, except for Ripley.

"And, Bell." Orion said, personally handing her over the jersey. "Welcome to the Ducks, kid."

She smiled brightly as her friends swarmed around her, drowning her in a group hug.

When they finally let go of her, she turned the jersey around, staring at the back.

Bell, 27.