chapter nine
team bonding
"MY BONES ARE GOING TO BE BRITTLE BEFORE I'M THIRTY." Jules complained, laid on the bench in the changing rooms with icepacks covering nearly ever inch of her body. She had gotten out of her equipment as quickly as possible, changed into normal clothing and then effectively collapsed onto the bench.
Her body was on fire, after a long session of team bonding, where they were all tied together with a big rope and she was stuck between Goldberg and Averman, it was not all that fun. They'd all kept falling onto the side she was stood on and then they scrimmaged, and she was on the opposite team to Dean Portman, she was slammed into a wall too many times to count and flipped over more times then she was slammed into a wall.
Adam walked towards her, drying his wet hair with a towel, "What's wrong with you?" He peeled her jacket away from her face.
"She says, and I quote, 'my bones are going to brittle before I'm thirty'." Connie told him, brushing her hair. Jules wanted to pull the jacket back over her sore eyes, a splitting migraine pounding inside her skull but she didn't have the energy.
"Come on, it wasn't that bad." Adam told her, perching on the very end of the bench to do up his trainers, "It was actually kind of fun once we got the hang of being a team."
"Easy for you too say." Barnes groaned, letting out a tearless cry, "You were on Portman's team, It was the Cardinals came all over again. Smashed into the walls, flipped over, shoved over, punch, smashed, attacked. He was basically punching me with his foot."
Banks frowned in confusion, "That didn't--"
"Give me a break!" She cried, too tired to argue with him about her wrong wording.
Connie leaned over her bestfriend, "You coming to lunch or are you withering away here?" Jules let her eyes fall shut, indicating she picks the second option. The younger brunette sighed, taking her duffel bag and leaving for lunch.
"Come on, Tibbles has something exciting to show us." Adam nudged her leg, "You can't stay here forever."
"I'd like to debate that, but I can't be assed right now, Banksy." She sighed, lifting her sore arm to apple pressure to her right eye, trying to remove the cluster-headache behind her sore eyes.
Banks sighed, "Come on, Barney." He took her hand, pulling her up, letting the ice packs slide off her body and onto the floor, "Want a piggy-back ride?"
"Since you offered." She chuckled, he crouched for her to jump onto his back, looping her arms around his neck and legs around his middle, he lifted her up into a comfortable position for them both, her head on his left side and they walked to the cafeteria where everyone was sat with their lunch trays. "Thank you very much, my knight in shining armour."
Adam just nodded, hooking his arm around her shoulder and pulls her into his side, pressing a kiss to her head. Jules flushes, but she hides it quickly and goes to collect some lunch. Settled in her seat beside Connie, Tibbles wheels in a huge looking box thing covered in a black piece of fabric. Goldberg stopped attempting to talk up Julie's sister, Rosie, who was paying no attention but reading her book opening in her right hand whilst she ate her salad with her left.
With a small, 'ta-da', Don unveiled the huge cereal box. Jules winced, they were on the front of Wheaties whole grain. The team all gasped in awe at them in their USA sweats, in rollerblade and helmets, stood in a group.
"Hey, that's us!" Dwayne laughed, stood beside Juliet. She chuckled, patting his arm with sympathy as the team mocked him and his smile fell.
Tibbles clears his throat, "Today, it's a wheaties box. Tommorow, it's video games, action figures, lunch boxes, the sky is the limit." Barnes doesn't really like the box, but she goes along with it. She doubted they'd have action figures made after them, video games maybe, but not action figures. "Now, just to make sure that everybody knows who you are. Try on one of these." He lifted up huge USA jersey's, with the flag colours on it, white stars plastered all over the jerseys and their numbers on it. "Brought to you by those wonderful people at Hendrix for all your hockey needs. Fulton, there you go. Coach."
He showed them the sleeve with the brand up it, Barnes chuckled at him promoting the brand like some form of ad but she took her new jersey without complaint. It was cool to have a USA jersey, a ducks jersey and a North Star jersey, she was just collecting them all now, although she'd need a new ducks jersey because of the unfortunate accident.
"Aren't you glad you're out here with these things then on that bench all by your own?" Adam nudged her, grinning down at her. She bit back her smile, tucking her dark hair behind her ears, "Come on, you know you are."
"Fine, maybe a bit." She sighed dramatically, but only laughed following.
LEANT ON THE LOG BESIDE ADAM, Jules listened carefully to Ms. Mackay as she informed them at the backstory of the Olympics whilst they sat beside the lake. She almost wanted to sunbathe, it was such a perfect day. Not too warm, but not too cold and there was a kind breeze in the shade. Her skin was already tanned from their vigorous sessions of hockey in Adam's drive but she still wanted to sunbathe, however, she'd get a lot of chances when they go to LA. Juliet was extremely excited to lay on their beaches.
"Ancient Greece was the beginning of western civilisation." Mackay explained, walking around the semi-circle of USA sweats clad teenagers, "See, in Greece, they didn't have professional sports... or Wheaties boxes. So, the athletes competed for another reason. Anybody?"
"Falafels?" Goldberg asked with a hopeful smile. Jules rolled her eyes at his idiocy.
The team chuckled, "Charlie?" Ms. Mackay turned to the captain, raising her brows, who had his hand raised.
"Pride." He responded, getting the question right.
"That's right. The various city-stated waved their flags and wore their home colours proudly." She grinned. Jules wasn't a big fan of the tutor, she was pretty and a good teacher, but she had an annoying voice and was too cherry for her gloominess.
Fulton sat forward, "Did America always dominate?" Barnes snorted at his comment, hiding her smile of amusement from him.
"No, America wasn't around back then." Reed looked down sadly, cursing himself for asking such a stupid question, "It's okay. Dont' forget that compared to other countries, America is still young, still forming its own identity. America is a teenager, just like you guys. A little awkward at times, but always right there on the verge of greatness."
"It has an identity alright." Jules mumbled, "The misogynistic, racist, homophobic capital of the world?" Connie and Julie agreed with her but the boys seemed ever so slightly confused, Jesse, Ken, Goldberg and Luis agreed though. They'd experienced those things before, not the sexism or homophobia, but the racism. "You know, I don't know a single woman who hasn't experienced some form of sexism, I know I have myself."
Mackay nodded, "You're right, Jules. I don't know a single woman who hasn't experienced sexism or sexualisation either, maybe you can take that and make a difference." She nodded a little bit, looking out onto the lake in thought.
JULES ENDED UP STUCK BETWEEN FULTON AND DEAN FOR THE FLIGHT TO LA, although she wasn't very happy about it at first, she got to know them pretty well. She'd spoken to Fulton before and they were pretty close friends, but Portman was a whole mystery. They listened to her speak about figure skating, and what that was like, and then rant for about twenty-five minutes about how she wishes they allowed more weight in suitcases because she couldn't just bring one with all of her stuff and then she fell asleep with in two minutes of her rant, and ended up snoring on Dean's shoulder.
She ended up realising that even though they look like huge scary boys, they're soft and sweet inside. After a good two hour sleep, there was about an hour left of the flight and Jules needed to get up and stretch her legs, leaving Reed and Portman trying not to cry at Top Gun and Goose's death.
Juliet washed her hands in the bathroom, after a scary flushing of the toilet that was way too loud. The girl looked like a corpse, to be honest, she's yet to put on some makeup to make herself look presentable, she'd do that when there was about twenty-five minutes left of the flight. After washing her face and hands, she left the bathroom, only to bump into Adam. He had a small packet of pretzels and another of M&Ms in his other hand, he was wearing a North Star jersey, that he had from before they met whilst she was wearing one of his hoodies she'd stolen a few weeks ago.
"I saved you some pretzels and M&Ms, know how much you love the sweet and salty balance." He mumbled, feeling embarrassed for saving her that stuff. Jules smiled gratefully, taking them and tucking them into her hoodie pocket.
"Thanks, I'll enjoy it." Adam nods, nervously fiddling with the hem of his jersey, "If someone said you were gonna effectively be in the Junior Olympics a year ago, would you of believed them?" She asked as they walked down the aisle back to their seats. Banks felt the tension in his shoulders relieve at their relatively normal conversation now.
"No." He chuckles, nodding, "You?"
Juliet tilted her head to the side, "Uh, a year ago I was still figure skating so yeah, probably, since I was a promised future Olympian, but from when I started playing hockey, no, not at all. See you in a bit." He nodded, waving a little. Portman got up to let her in, she settled back into her seat, pulling the fluffy blanket back over herself.
"How long have you guys been dating?" Dean asked, watching her plug her headphones back into the screen. Fulton chuckled, amused that he didn't know half the drama that was going on between Banksy and Barney, "Are you not... oh, guess that whole interaction was misleading then."
"We're not dating, no, but I like him, I guess." She ran a hand down her face, "It's just complicated. My life's a mess, and playing hockey was supposed to be normality again, but now we're going to LA and I might see my mom and it's this whole thing so no, we're not dating because I can't handle that right now. I might literally explode."
Portman lifted his hands in surrender, "Sorry, didn't mean to poke the sleeping bear." Jules just leaned back in her seat, shutting her eyes with a deep sigh, "Will you ever date him?"
"Yeah, I want to date him, I just can't because... I might explode." Dean nods, thinking he understands what's going on between Adam and Jules but he'd probably need it more elaborately explained if he was going to befriend her.
She checked the route and saw that there was only about thirty minutes left and reached into the backpack on the floor, pulling out her makeup back with a deep sigh, "What the hell is that?" Fulton asked, pointing at the toiletry bag she pulled out, setting up a mirror on the coffee table and placing her bag onto her lap.
"It's my makeup, gotta look presentable." Jules shrugged, putting some moisturiser on her face. She took no notice of Dean when he picked up her eye lash curler, lifting it with a horrified expression, "That, my friend, is an eye-ball extractor. Pain is beauty."
"No it's not, is it?" He gasped, dropping it back with the bottles and pots of makeup. She chuckled and shook her head, rubbing in her moisturiser, "What is it then?" The two goons watched her lift it up to her eyelashes and curl then with it, "Does that not hurt? It can't be healthy, right?"
Barney rolled her eyes, "Come here." Tilting his chin towards her, she bit her tongue in concentration, not wanting to pinch his skin when she curled his eyelashes. He flinched in pain, feeling them get tugged on, but when she removed them, he saw that his lashes were all stood up, "There, gorgeous."
"Wow, I'm so pretty." He grinned, touching his face. Juliet couldn't help but giggle, especially when Fulton mocked him, only resulting in a name-calling fight which she shushed in a second when she had to focus on her eyeliner.
Once they landed, she met up with Connie, Julie, Rosie and Adam, Dean and Fulton had gone to get some snacks from whatever ship they could find and only returned with a whole bunch of overpriced merchandise, laughing at their souvenirs. Juliet thought they looked like idiots, but she still laughed. They reached the conveyer belt that brought out their luggage, Banks had a trolley between them as they waited for their suitcases to come out.
"Oh, my God." The boy grunted as he lifted her suitcase onto their trolley, "Jesus, did you back the entire Empire State Building in there?" Jules frowned in confusion, shaking her head when she took her smaller suitcase off the conveyer belt that had her hockey gear in. Her big suitcase looked like it was going to burst open, "Do you have a body in there? Be honest, I won't judge."
"No, you psicopatica." She flicked him, watching him lift up his much smaller and singular suitcase, placing it on their trolley, "I just have all my stuff in there, I would've separated it into two suitcases but one that was only suitcase my dad had and I didn't want to pay the extra money for it." Psycho.
Adam nodded in agreement, "Fair enough, but if that bursts open, I won't be breaking you out of jail because they thought you had a bomb in there." Juliet rolls her eyes as they walk towards the team gathered in front of the airport, waiting for their minibus to take them to the dorms. Connie, Julie and Juliet were all bunking together, Dean and Fulton together, Luis, Goldberg, Ken and Dwayne were together and Charlie, Adam and Guy were in one room and Jesse and Averman were in another room.