Contronym

Chapter 8

My arms thrust forward and my hips twisted as I hurtled the ball in my stick towards the goal. The air whooshed around my ears as the crosse passed my ear. The yellow ball went flying through the air and right between Sam's hip and his goalie stick's head.

"Are you trying to take his fucking head off, Mason?!" I heard Finn yell from the drill line behind me. I turned my head to see him walking over to me, leaving the warm up drills. We had our mouth guards in so we had to speak louder than usual. "Don't break my star goalie before the season starts. And don't pull your arm with shots like that." He berated me.

I crossed my arms despite the stick in my right hand and glared at Finn. At lunch we didn't speak to each other as per usual. Lunch conversations usually were only between Sam, Chris, and Al. Unless we were having separate conversations. Most of the time we just glared across the table and everyone else pretend to ignore it by engaging us in conversation. During period 8 we worked out together but we never said one word besides asking about changing weights. No hi, hello, thanks, or any of the above.

We hadn't spoken since last friday but that was no big deal. We never had conversations to begin with.

"Okay. First of all, I'm not hurting him. He's a fucking goalie and I'm warming him up. You think they're going to shoot nice? I think you're just doing this to piss me the fuck off. Second of all, if any other guy made that shot you wouldn't warn them about pulling a muscle so shut the fuck up. I am just as good a player as anyone else on this field."

Even though we were wearing helmets I could see his jaw tighten and his gloved fists clench on his stick. "This has nothing to do with you being a good player. You're a woman. Despite what you seem to believe, women's bodies are different. Your joints are looser and your muscles shorter."

I pointed an accusing finger at him. "Don't lecture me on my body. I know when I'm pushing it. Fuck off, Finn. You might be the captain but you don't run my life. You seem to forget that I'm the coaches captain which means I have a say. It's not more than yours but it means you have to at least respect it." I growled at him before turning back around and holding my stick up for Sam to pass.

He whipped the ball at me with the same force I used on him and I caught it in my stick as gently as I could. My head turned back to Finn with a snap. "That is trying to kill someone."

Finn opened his mouth to speak but the referee blew his whistle and signaled the two captains from each team over. We were scrimmaging against New Canaan today. I was slightly tense to say the least. All week I had been reworking the defense line and Finn even changed the positions to 3:4:3 like I had suggested. I was honestly surprised when he complied. He probably just realized what I was right for once.

"This isn't over." He muttered as the two of us went to meet the ref in the middle of the field with the two captains from the other team.

We dropped our sticks and took off our gear, leaving us in just our jerseys. It was customary for captains to not put their gear on until after the coin flip.

When we both made it to the center, I quickly noticed that New Canaan was not friendly. They had glares on their faces before any words were said. It was clear that this was more than a little rivalry between teams. They were vying for scholarships and national titles. The refs might not see it, but there was clearly bad blood.

The New Canaan team had blue and black jerseys this year. No white. Considering they were the home team and our away jerseys were black and their home jerseys were black, the ref had to flip a coin for that too.

"Okay. Let's shake hands. I'm referee Brown. This is a scrimmage game and doesn't go on record but we are playing normal Varsity rules."

"Griffin Riley," he said and held out a hand to shake. Both of the boys took it but they didn't look happy about it.