Knee Pads

08 | cannonballing

CHAPTER EIGHT | CANNONBALLING

throwing a teammate into the path of an opposing player.

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          Even though I hadn't joined the team (my brain wanted to keep all my options open), the other girls seemed to be treating me like I had, though I mostly blamed Katrina and Marley for that.

          Katrina dragged me along with her everywhere she went whenever we weren't in class—which was a considerable feat, considering we were a year apart and our schedules didn't match that much—and, whenever she wasn't available, Marley, a senior, took over for her. If, at first, I believed the girls from the team had other friends besides each other, I had certainly been proved wrong, as they went everywhere together.

          During the week between the end of tryouts and the release of the list of the people who had made it into the team, I found myself to be quite the nervous wreck, contrary to how I thought I'd be. It was just a stupid game, one that was, without a doubt, a massive security risk, but I couldn't help but hope my efforts had been enough, even if I had only taken part in tryouts just to spite Corinne.

          I didn't think it was possible for Corinne to despise me even more, but she kept finding new ways to surprise me with every interaction we shared. Drew, an honorary member of the team, was also Corinne's morality pet and the only person she ever listened to when she needed to keep a cool head. I was a clear threat to that, as she nearly smashed whatever she was holding at the mere sight of me, and I really wanted to believe she wasn't furious at me because of what had gone down during tryouts.

          Though I felt terrible for her and didn't think she deserved to be treated the way her own mother treated her, that wasn't my fault. It wasn't my duty to get involved or to try and salvage or fix their relationship, much like it wasn't my fault that they didn't get along. Their issues were a lot deeper than just sports rivalry, and I had my fair share of family drama to deal with at the moment. I didn't need hers on my plate.

          Between worrying about the roller derby team, ignoring Corinne's bad mood, and one-upping myself academically due to my crippling fear of failure, somehow I still found time to worry about Jordan.

          My parents said the lack of news meant good news—after all, Jordan's treatment team insisted on keeping us on a need to know basis—but I begged to differ. I knew my brother in a way some random doctors could never, and I'd go as far as saying I knew him better than he knew himself sometimes. Whenever he plunged into a dark hole, spiralling down towards a void of self-destruction, somewhere I almost couldn't reach him, I'd still pull him back to me. I still knew who he was, even if everything and every odd was against us.

          My parents were getting a bit too involved, both with Jordan's treatment and with my studies. I suspected it probably was a way of making up for all the years they had left us to our own devices and only able to depend on one another, even if Jordan had always been their baby. I felt suddenly suffocated, not used to them being so present, and I was quite taken by surprise when they mentioned the roller derby tryouts during their weekly call.

          "I hope you signed up, Wren!" my mother had told me, holding the phone too close to her face so it occupied pretty much the entire screen. My father, in the background, struggled to be seen behind her. "Jordan would be so happy to see you skate—"

          "That sport is a tad bit too dangerous, 亲爱," my father had pointed out. "We saw videos of it. It's like hand to hand combat on roller skates. It's a bit different from figure skating, no?"