under-appreciated

Chapter 0.3

The Teenage Phase

Off she goes to Hallbay High School, not knowing anybody at all in the north-east district. Flora is an outgoing person so it's not a problem for her to make new friends. At first, she is kind of awkward and afraid because she thinks that history is going to repeat itself like in elementary school. However, she made sure that it won't be the same and start a new.

In the first few days of orientation, she managed to mingle around with her classmates. She was even chosen to be the class chairman. Flora doesn't even know what these teachers actually see in her. So, she just went with it and became the class chairman, only for a year. She wasn't interested in any of the leadership roles as she knows that she doesn't have those kind of qualities. Well, that's not how others see in her apparently.

Then, the time has come for the ice hockey trials. Flora was incredibly excited and she loved the sport too much that she actually can't live without it, literally. She didn't do any research on the school such as subjects they offered, what co-curriculum activities offered, and other important things that she should've checked. Flora basically just went for it which usually is termed as "YOLO".

In addition, she felt that she was fated to be in that school, as her father would usually drive down the road that passes by the school when she was about 9 years old. Therefore, Flora would say and point out repeatedly that she wants to be in that school in the future. So that's how she ended up in Hallbay High School.

Flora was quite nervous about the trials, when she entered the rink, she saw her senior batches training. However, it wasn't as intense as Flora expected. In her batch, there were only 5 girls including her and she was the only person that is experienced. Flora was unsure how she was going to play with them if they never played the sport before. Therefore, she didn't plan to go solo and be arrogant. In her mind, she wants to teach others and improve all together as Flora always wanted to guide others on what she knows best.

When she looked around, the seniors were sort of arrogant and act as if they were so good in it but actually, they are quite terrible at it. She eventually went around and talk to most of them, she got some news and heard that their batch is only the third year of players playing ice hockey. Flora pondered to herself, "there is no surprise that the team looks so scrambled".

All in all, she managed to keep it together and go with it. Trainings after trainings, changing of coaches, adapting new skills and learning, Flora had an opportunity to play in a club. She was so excited and she didn't expected much. The club had two teams, they were division 3 and division 1 team. She wasn't familiar with club leagues and external events on ice hockey so she decided to went solo on these kind of opportunities. The reason why she went solo when it comes to ice hockey is because she was separated with her elementary school teammates, so she didn't had anyone to explore teams or events with her.

The day of club trials finally came, she was extremely nervous. It wasn't the best team but it was a good start for her passion on the sport. There were two sides of trials going on and she chose to tryout in the division 3 team, because she thought to herself, "holy crap, the division 1 team side looks super intense and fast paced". So, she stepped in the court and trained with the division 3 players. After 15 minutes of playing, the coach called out Flora. She was anxious as to why did he called her. She went up to him and he said, "go train at the other side". Flora was shocked, can she manage to be part of a high tier league? She nodded and proceed to the other side of the rink.

When she joined the queue for the drill, it was super intense for her. She was only 15 years old at that point of time, so the pace and aggression is a whole new level for her. In the first few drills, Flora was struggling and it was pressuring for her as the players were extremely focused. The coach told her some tips on how to keep up with the drills, eventually she was slowly getting used to it.