My Boyfriend's Best Friend

Chapter Fourteen

Aidan

“Alright ladies, shut up and listen!” I yelled to the group of about eighty boys between the age of fourteen and eighteen. It was Tuesday afternoon and soccer trials had just started. I had been elected head captain last year by the previous head captain and it was my job to organise the trials and pick the teams. It was a heavy task that required my undivided attention but I couldn’t stop my mind from trailing off to thoughts of Rylie. Due to a series of unanticipated events, I had gone the entire day without speaking to my girlfriend. I had had a meeting with coach at first break to discuss the try-outs and by the time second break had rolled about, Rylie had left for an optometrist appointment made weeks ago and wouldn’t be returning to school today. Our talk kept getting prolonged and it was giving me an uneasy feeling the more time we spent fighting and not talking about it.

The excited chatter amongst the boys finally started to wear down and once the majority realised that the head captain was addressing them, the rest quickly shut up. I was standing on the first step of the terraces so that everyone could see me and it gave me a good view of the students. Looking down at them all, I could see that most of them were relatively fit guys which reassured me that we would have at least one team win the grand final this year. I recognised a lot of familiar faces but I didn’t know most of their names, especially those from the younger grades.

“Right, I’m Aidan Kingston, captain of the year twelve soccer team which makes me the head captain,” I began. “As you all should know, that puts me in charge of choosing who makes the cut for each grade. Once I’ve sorted out the teams, it’ll be up to the team members to appoint a captain who’ll report to me. This here is Coach Flanders,” I pointed to a muscular looking guy in his late twenties standing next to me. He was one of the school’s HPE teachers as well as the soccer coach but since our school was always going on about how ‘everyone is a leader’, he was mainly there to supervise the try-outs and give advice. He left the training part up to the captains. “He’s the one officially in charge but if you have an issue, talk to me first.”

Coach Flanders nodded at all the boys. “No one here is to give Aidan any trouble, okay? He might still be a student here but he’s the head captain and I expect all of you to show him the same respect you would show me or one of your teachers. Clear?”

A few boys nodded. I was glad for the support from Coach. He was a decent bloke and he knew how to keep kids in line, which I was sure I would be grateful for at some point in time. I cleared my throat. “We’re going to start the trials together and then we’ll split into different grades so I can access everyone. Questions?”

I saw a few nods and no one raised a hand so I continued on. “Okay,” I nodded at Tyler and Trey standing just in front of me and they both stepped up onto the terraces next to me. “This is Tyler and this is Trey,” I said pointing each one out. “They’re my vice-captains so feel free to ask them anything. Our first activity is going to be five laps around the field.”

I waited for everyone to stop groaning before continuing. “Yeah, yeah, get over it. We’ll be doing at least five laps at the start of every training session so if anyone isn’t prepared to do that, get out now.” Everyone looked around them to see if anyone was backing out but no one did. I grinned. I knew this lot would be up for it. “I’m going to be in front and no one is to go past me. Tyler and Trey will be about thirty metres behind me and everyone must stay between us at all times. If you can’t keep up, you’re out. Sorry.” It was a tough rule but I wanted kids who worked hard and I knew I wasn’t going to push them too hard on the run anyway.

Jumping down from my place on the concrete staircase, I began walking over to the goal post. The rest of the guys trailed behind me and I couldn’t help but grin as they followed after me like eager little sheep.