Rivals : Nothing But Net

Chapter 1

The shrill sound of the whistle pierced the air, bringing all the basketball players to attention. "Alright boys, that's it for practice! I expect to see you all right here tomorrow morning, bright and early!" shouted Coach Kosmack, watching the gangly 11th grade boys file out of the gym. "Aadit, Isaiah, stay behind for a few minutes." The 2 boys sauntered up to their coach, smug smiles on their faces.

"Well Coach, do you have anything to say to me?" asked Isaiah, looking all too proud of himself as he took a long swig from his water bottle.

"What I think Isaiah means to say is, do you have any news for me?" questioned Aadit, taking an equally long drink from his water bottle.

"Boys, I know you're both very excited about winning provincials, but again, there were no scouts in the audience, and I haven't gotten any word about your game performance. Back to more important matters, we need to talk about your dynamics! Both of you are like alleycats around each other, and it's throwing off the whole game!" The boys looked confused, glancing at each other, trying to figure out who ticked off Coach Kosmack. "Don't act like you don't know what you're talking about, both of you. The fight you just had about who was better at push ups , that caused you to miss that shot for your team, Aadit! And you, Isaiah, aren't any better! Just last week, we almost lost our big game against Gator High because you wouldn't stop purposefully missing shots just to make Aadit upset!"

"We, um, I, well..." Aadit fumbled, leaving his coach looking unimpressed.

"What Aadit is trying to say, is, we really don't fight that much! It's just a little bickering, that's all!" reasoned Isaiah, trying to get out of the situation.

"Well, that bickering may just cost all of us our next game. So, shape up, both of you. Or else, this may be the end of both of your time on the team." With that, Coach Kosmack walked off, leaving both boys deeply confused. However, they weren't too lost in thought to start screaming at each other.

"I can't believe you! You just had to start that argument in the middle of our game! If you hadn't done that, he probably wouldn't have gotten mad at us!" raged Isaiah, balling his fists.

"Ok, maybe I did miss that one shot in our warm-up game, but at least I wasn't the reason that we almost lost provincials!" argued Aadit, knowing that he had probably won this argument.

"Maybe the reason I almost lost," started Isaiah, walking menacingly towards the shorter boy, "was because I couldn't stop staring at you."

Wait, what? Aadit's mind screamed. He flushed bright red, out of surprise, embarrassment, and something he couldn't quite put his finger on. It took Isaiah a moment to realize what he had just said. He didn't register his words until he was inches away from Aadit.

"Uhhh... well... that didn't come out right. I didn't mean it like, um, in that.....way..." Isaiah mumbled, taking long strides away from Aadit.

"Yeah, yeah, obviously you didn't." responded Aadit, not wanting to sound like he got flustered in any way at Isaiah's words. Both boys turned away from each other, and gathered their things before awkwardly stepping out of the gymnasium.

The second Aadit opened his front door, his large golden retriever, Boomer, came bounding up to him, and nearly pushed him to the ground.

"Easy, boy! I just need, a little space" he said, gently pushing Boomer off of him. His dog could sense that something was wrong, because the boy usually wasn't so opposed to cuddles. Aadit instead gave his dog a pat on the head and meandered to the kitchen, swinging open the fridge door for a protein shake that he made for the week. Ever since he had started getting serious about basketball, Aadit knew that he had to keep his body fit and flexible, so he had cut off his sugar and junk food intake. He downed his shake in three gulps, almost choking on the last one. Sure, it wasn't easy just eating rabbit food the whole day, but it would be worth it on the court.

His mind wandered back to his spat with Isaiah, remembering his coach's warning. He realized that he would have to step it up, because his coach didn't usually let things like this get to him so easily. Blood rushed to his cheeks as he recalled what the taller boy had said to him before he left. Obviously, Isaiah didn't mean to say it in a way that may have been perceived romantically, but thinking about those words sent a small flurry of butterflies into Aadit's stomach. It was probably just anger channeled into something that... wasn't anger at all. Before he had any more time to think, he heard the front door open.

"Adi! I'm homeeee!" squealed the voice of his 13 year old sister, Diya.

"Ugh, what do you want, Diya? And I told you not to call me Adi!" he shouted at her. She responded by rolling her eyes, as she joined him in the kitchen.

"Hey! Who's moving here? Oh my god, I hope it's a hot guy! Or a hot dad!" she giggled, pointing to a moving truck outside the kitchen window. Even though his anticipation was nothing compared to his sister's, Aadit wondered who would be moving into the house in front of theirs. It had been four months since the annoyingly cheery old couple had moved out, and he had been waiting for someone else to inhabit the space. It probably wouldn't be anyone his age, since the only people who lived here were middle-aged, wealthy families, who's children had their own place. He was the only real teenager on the block, excluding Winston Heathrow, the 12-year old genius who attended the private school 3 streets away from his. Aadit would have been going to that school as well, if its basketball team wasn't made up of 13 mid-range players who would rather have been cleaning the bathrooms, but were forced to join the team to look good on their university applications. Thinking back to basketball, Aadit pondered who would replace him and Isaiah if they ended up being kicked out of the team. Maybe it would be that overachieving 9th grader who was seriously good at spin moves, and could take out a defender at any time. Or maybe they wouldn't get completely kicked out, but hover around as substitutes. That would definitely be more humiliating than being booted. Well, if we learn how to act like civilians around each other, being kicked off would be the last thing on Coach's mind. It's never gonna really happen, so why bother worrying about it? With that, Aadit let go of the thought.

The next morning, Aadit was surprised to see that Isaiah didn't corner him in the hallway as he walked in. Instead, he just glowered at the boy from afar. Hmm.. interesting. I could get used to this, he thought as he walked to his locker without any baseless death threats uttered to him. Gathering his things for Language, Aadit noticed that the locker next to him had a bright green sticky note on it, with a name written in blue pen. He didn't bother reading it, and slammed his locker shut, walking off to the first class of the day. Sliding into his seat, Aadit got out his notebook and pencils, getting ready for copious amounts of homework. As he neatly printed the date onto the corner of his page, he saw someone walk in. If it had been some other random 17-year old, he would have looked back down, but this person was different. He had wavy brown hair that reached his jaw, sharp hazel eyes, and artfully placed freckles that just completed his face. Aadit couldn't stop staring. Upon laying her eyes on him, Mrs. Finn ushered the boy to the front of the class, and announced,

"Class, meet your new student, Alexander Laurier."

There might be some errors so if you find them please tell me!