Why Boys Are Idiots

Chapter One - Zaira's POV (Revised and edited)

          Immediately, my mom’s accusing hazel eyes landed on me. “Why, honey?” she asked patiently. I almost rolled my eyes at her. It was nearly impossible to stand his annoying presence, but to actually encourage him to talk? That was ridiculous.

          The little red-headed boy pointed his finger in my face, and I scrunched my nose up at the motion. “Zairy told me to!”

        "Why would you do that, Zaira?” my mother questioned with narrowed eyes. See? Life was not fair. She could spend hours talking to that idiot but couldn't even ask me a question in a sincere voice.

          “Because he needs to.” I sighed, not bothering to hide my annoyance.

          “How many times have I told you not to talk to your brother like that?” she asked again, but this time looking a lot more pissed off. And she was using the annoying motherly voice, too, which on normal days should've been a bad sign, but today I couldn't care less.

          I rolled my eyes for what seemed like the millionth time that day. “Two times too many.”

          “That’s it, you’re grounded.”

          “Surprise, surprise,” I said sarcastically.

          The day was already going bad; it couldn’t possibly get worse, could it? Well, it turned out luck wasn't exactly my best friend.

          ***

          The dismissal bell shrieked across the classroom and the hallways, and I winced. A few more times of hearing that and my eardrums would be destroyed, especially since my seat was directly underneath the speakers on the ceiling. Nevertheless, I hurried out of geography class and literally sprinted to the bristol board beside the restrooms. I had been waiting for days for this and it was mainly the reason why I couldn’t sleep at all the nights before. What is ‘this’, you might ask? Well, ‘this’ is the badminton team.

          Sure, I wasn't the greatest at badminton, but I did play it on a regular basis and it would practically crush me if I didn’t make the team. Honestly, I'd even gone out of my way to practice for the try-outs.

         I tried my best not to get my hopes up, since I was only a freshman and there were tons of other freshmen in this school, and even more people from the grades higher than mine. But I was determined to win one of these spots, especially since my dad had been a former badminton coach before he left. I mean, there had to be at least some of his sportiness in me, right?

          But then again, he did leave us.

          Stuffing the ugly thoughts about my dad to the back of my mind, I squeezed through bodies of lazy students and finally made my way to the board. Looking up expectantly at the piece of paper that had been stapled there, my eyes scanned the list frantically.

          William High’s Badminton Team:

          Boys:

          Xavier G.

          Charles I.

          Zuke L.

          Bryan P.

          Paul L.

          Mark L.

          Blake C.

          I groaned in frustration. Paul. I knew he would've made it. He used to always brag about his amazing badminton skills to me, even though I beat him every time we played together. But whatever, it wasn't like I cared about a thing he did anymore. Shrugging it off, my eyes continued making their way down the list.