Mark My Words

4 | Oy Vey

    Kim waved weakly before clasping her hands behind her. Alyssa made a disgusted noise and muttered, "Stone Ridge."

    Stone Ridge wasn't exactly on the nice side of anything, really. It was a public school famous for its shitty teachers and even shittier administrators. Their sports were half-assed, hence why the Simons began rooting around for better outlooks for their soccer star. One year at Stone Ridge seemed to convince Kim that she couldn't stand another second around those rude, racist assholes.

    "Refugee from the dreaded Ridge. Yikes. Sorry you had to go through that," Ray said, and lifted a fist up for Kim to bump. "Hopefully you have better luck here."

    "Thanks. It's already so much better," she confessed.

    The girls all shared a smile and laugh, and a joke about Stone Ridge before Rosalie became distracted by the sight of Coach Maguire making her way down the hill away from Bradshaw and towards the fields. Her smile was wiped clean off her face at the sight of a student accompanying Coach.

    "Shit," she hissed, nudging Ray in the side. Ray caught her eye and then looked over to Coach.

    "For Chrissake," Ray muttered, and the girls all fell silent at the sound of it.

    Coach approached the gate and opened it for none other than Joanna Spencer. Joanna was dressed in the standard gym uniform, and Rosalie was convinced that they were extras from Coach's office. She hardly looked thrilled to be there, and crossed her arms, baggy basketball shorts slumped to her knees. They were oversized and synched at the waist.

    "Afternoon, girls," Coach Maguire said, clapping her hands together. They were all too stunned to bother replying. Joanna's sour gaze floated over all their heads, and landed on Rosalie and Kim—the only two standing.

    "It seems... we have a last minute recruit. Joanna Spencer. Make her feel welcome," Maguire said, and with that, gave a curt nod to Rosalie before heading off to fetch the ball cart.

    Rosalie felt the dire need to chase after Coach, but ground her cleats into the grass to avoid doing so. Instead, she turned her antipathy onto Joanna.

    "Trust me, I'm not thrilled about it either," Joanna said.

    "You said you quit soccer," Rosalie said, fighting back the whine she so desperately wanted to let lose.

    "I did," Joanna hissed, stepping into the powwow. She stood across from Rosalie, leaning one hip to the side. "Turns out its either this or suspension, expulsion, whatever. Sure you all heard of a black eye runnin' round school."

    Joanna raked her gaze over them all before taking a firm seat in the grass. "Don't make it two."

    Rosalie clenched her fists at her sides. She swallowed the heat building in the back of her throat, heart drumming faster against her ribcage. She cleared her throat, sharing a look with Ray before steering her mind back to where it was supposed to go.

    Unfortunately, though, she suddenly felt like her brain was the car in a ridiculous arcade race game, and "paying attention" was more like swinging the wheel back and forth, on and off the road. She kept crashing back to Joanna sitting there, standing there, half-assing her way through practice from the moment she set foot on the field.

    Rosalie tried to remember what landed Joanna in that seventh grade soccer camp in the first place. She couldn't remember how good or how terrible The Devil was back then, but now nothing seemed to get her to make the effort. After stretches, Rosalie had them all run two laps, and Joanna all but walked the course and finished five minutes after the entire team was onto passing.