Battle of the Captains

ballgames

I was dragging my feet to the class I had been dreading since the day started as I walked away from my group of friends just to show them how much I didn't want to go. The soles of my overused training shoes filled with dried up dirt in between the gaps from our practices out in the football field rubbed against the school floors and I felt bad for making the janitors' work harder than it must already be but I couldn't help it.

"Can you be any slower? We're going to be late." I actually could've gotten slower if I wanted to. I could've even started walking backwards if I wanted to. My friend Ashley from the cheerleading squad was lucky that I was even moving towards class and walking with her.

I did not want to go to gym class.

Don't get me wrong, I loved games, we had a really great teacher and kicking butt of sexist boys who underestimated the female population was really fun and entertaining but gym was the class I would've easily transferred out of if I was given the choice. The reason was obvious yet still a mystery to the whole school.

Austin Collins.

His name alone had the ability to drive me mad and was the only thing that could make me cringe the way it did. I hated his face and how he knew I was the only one who could ever call him hideous because even a blind person would know that he was easy on the eyes. I hated his conceited smirk that he used on me very often and I hated how he could get any girl to fall to his feet without lifting a finger. It was crazy.

The school and every single person in it, including all the teachers and staff, was very much used to and aware of Kody Taylor and Austin Collins' mutual hatred towards each other and after eventually getting used to the constant arguments over the most petty things and the numerous detentions we had almost gotten, everybody learned to get used to it and eventually started to enjoy it. One day, my life became an entertainment. And at first it was perfectly fine.

Oh, I did enjoy a fair share of fun and games and sweet, sweet victory against the great Austin Collins, especially in front of an audience, but a girl like me could only take so much frustration, irritation and anger before she finally snapped. That being said, I did make an effort to stay out of any situation that could lead to me getting arrested for murder.

Mr. Ryer was pretty cool for a teacher. He wasn't old, around his late twenties maybe, or worn out like everyone else and he tried to match his lingo with ours though it never really fit him. It looked like he was trying too hard. The guy was never boring, but then again, I don't think anyone could find gym class itself boring. The thing about our gym teacher was that he didn't even bother trying to hide his amusement when it came to Austin and me. He understood the need for us to be put in different teams to make everything a bit more interesting. Plus, we needed to level the playing field. I wasn't a big, buff football player but I was definitely an asset when it came to anything involving being athletic. When things started getting heated, I could tell that he was enjoying himself even as he tried to be professional about it by scolding us and telling us to stand at least ten feet away from each other and 'cool it'. He obviously found us very amusing as well as everyone else. Except last week when I got really mad and nearly kneed a certain someone in the balls, but luckily for him, I missed.

Million dollar question: why did they even bother putting us in the same class when the school could've easily made arrangements to give us classes on opposite side of the school to avoid conflict?

Believe me, they tried.

The year before freshman year, we were at our peak, both struggling to build reputations of ourselves to come out on the top. The next year, we had no classes and no breaks with each other, which was an amazing arrangement that worked for about a month before the football tryouts. I was watching because my big brothers were in the team and I had no self-control so I kind of blurted out to all the guys that I thought Austin ran like a duck. Well, obviously since he got in the team, I was the only one who thought so, but it was still embarrassing for him so then we went back to our childish ways.