The Perfect Touchdown

Twenty-Three

"I'm sorry to suddenly bring you here, Miss Parks," the Dean said.

I was sitting in his rather small office in an uncomfortable leather chair and wondered what in the hell I did to get called to his office.

"It was brought to my attention over the Winter Break that there has been some harassment and bullying within the cheer squad. Today, we are putting an end to that, starting with the suspension of Leah Palmer and dismissal of her captain position. Now, I understand that this position is something that is agreed upon by the members, but with one semester left of the school season, I believe your team is in desperate need of a captain."

My blood froze over in my veins.

"Are you asking me to be cheer captain?" What was he talking about harassment and bullying? Sure, she was unbearable to work under, but Leah never really bullied anyone to the extent of being suspended.

What the hell was going on? Was he really not going to tell me anything? I wondered, but there was no use asking, he kept talking.

"Yes, we need someone to take over right away and since you were the co-captain, I don't think anyone on the team will disagree. Do you?"

I didn't see any reason either, but was I fit to be captain? And if I was, was that opinion shared by everyone else?

"I'd like to speak with the others and see what they say. If we can agree upon a new captain by the end of the week, is that alright?"

He nodded and dismissed me from his office. I wandered the halls slowly before I got back to the field and tried to piece together just what happened while I was gone. I was almost back at the field when I got a text message from Avery, asking me out to lunch after practice.

It was weird of him to invite me to lunch; we were never really the kind of siblings that went out for food casually with each other. We were more of the siblings to wreak havoc together. I texted back and agreed anyway, maybe there was something he wanted to speak about.

"Hey guys, mind if we talk?" I asked the team and explained to them what I spoke about with the Dean.

To my utter surprise and joy, they all agreed that I would be the perfect fit for cheer captain and expressed excitement for the new cheers and choreography I would bring to the team. I tried so hard not to cry but a few tears of joy escaped.

That was probably the best cheer practice I ever had at San Marco, and I couldn't wait for the rest of the semester now. It was almost enough to distract me from my thoughts of Aiden.

~*~

After practice, I had went back to the dorms to shower and change into something more comfortable before I met with Avery for lunch. Even though we had spent most of our Winter Break together, he wasn't in the house for most of it and I was, since I don't have any friends outside of Avery and Aiden.

It was the second saddest discovery I had made.

I texted my brother once I was done and asked where he was, but he told me to head to Campus Square and he would meet me there to grab something to eat. Campus Square was the small shopping district attached to campus where there were clothing and grocery stores, restaurants and tons more so that students didn't have to venture far away from campus to get what they needed.

I stood at the entrance and waited until I saw my brother, but instead, it was Aiden who walked up to me with a stoic face.

"Was this some kind of setup? How did you get my brother in on it?" I rolled my eyes and prepared to leave.

"Ry, wait. Can we please talk? I have something I want to show you." I noticed he had his backpack with him, a rare sight for me to see, and my curiosity grew.