it was Thursday and it was the worst lesson of the day: gym. I hated gym. I wasn't good at it and it was just embarrassing to play a dumb sport in front of an entire class of people who were probably judging me. at least all of my friends were in my class, and most of the time I got to stick with them. otherwise it would have been way worse.
me and my friends entered the changing rooms together and began to get changed into our gym kit as quickly as possible. we did it quickly so we could be the first in the sports hall and get first pick of things. as I pulled my trainers out of my bag I heard a door slam shut and turned around instantly to see what was going on. it was the new kid sean. I was already aware that he was in my class before that day. he didn't look happy to be there at all, but I couldn't really blame him. as soon as he walked in he looked around, frowned and then entered one of the shower cubicles to get changed. not many people used those as mostly everybody was fine with getting changed in front of other people. I guess that wasn't the case for him.
I turned back around and continued to get ready at my friends' command. I was always the last one in the group to get changed. as soon as I was done we all left the room and entered the sports hall, but oddly enough our teacher wasn't in there. without any pointers as to what we would be doing in that lesson we all just sat on a nearby bench and chatted amongst ourselves.
soon enough the teacher entered the room followed by another group of students. we started to help out with setting up equipment as we usually did. we were very helpful which is probably why mr fredo liked us so much. when we were done helping out and the other students were sat in the hall waiting to start the lesson, the teacher began to explain what we would be doing on that day: basketball.
I hated basketball. to be fair I hated every sport, but to me, basketball was one of the worst. I always got terrified that someone would chuck the ball at me too hard and hit me in the face, and those basketballs hurt like a bitch when they hit you. plus I wasn't very good at it, mainly because there was just something about it that I didn't understand. my friends tried to help me out as much as they could, but I still sucked.
the teacher asked us to get into groups of four, so me, mark, ethan and ken went together. we found ourselves a court to play on, some bibs, and obviously, a basketball. we were about five minutes into doing shooting drills (which were actually quite fun when we got to decide which drill to do) when we noticed the teacher approaching us...and he had sean with him.
"hey boys! I just came over to ask if any of you would be willing enough to join another team and take sean's place? you see, him and his team aren't getting along very well at all. and I know you're nice people, so I thought you wouldn't mind." me and my friends looked at each other trying our hardest not to show that we weren't pleased. we didn't want to be in mr fredo's bad books.
"what team was he with?" mark asked out of curiosity.
"he was with emma, pj and mary-"
"i'll go." ken offered with no hesitation at all.
"thank you ken, it's much appreciated." ken waved goodbye to us before very quickly running over to his new group and leaving us with our new member.
"we'll start some actual games up in ten minutes." mr fredo informed us before running off to go see how the other groups were doing. for a few seconds there was just pure awkward silence.
"do you uh...do you know how to play basketball?" mark asked quietly. sean nodded.
"sure I do. I was actually on the basketball team at my old school. I was one of their best players. I won awards and everything for it." I raised an eyebrow and folded my arms, not really seeing sean as the sporty type.
