Cheap Shots

00:02

2.

"Orion!" Lauren yelled from across the hallway, waving her hand in the air in an attempt to call me over.

I grinned and walked over to my friend. Her blonde hair was pulled into a side braid, and her right arm was draped across her boyfriend's shoulder. "Hey, Lauren," I said to her, and I nodded to her boyfriend, "Sean."

He held out his hand in a fist, and I bumped it, watching as my other friends walked over. "Hey!" Jacque smiled.

"Hey, dude." Charlie said, Catherine following close behind him.

Jacque was roughly five foot, Asian, and the happiest person ever. Catherine was a tall brunette, with bright green eyes and Charlie was her boyfriend of recent, with dark black hair and blue eyes.

"What's going on?" I asked.

Catherine shrugged. "Do you guys have a game today?"

I looked to Jacque and frowned a little. "Yup," she said plopping the 'p' and ignoring my sour look.

"You'll get better soon, don't worry about it." Lauren told me, "Besides, you get to spend your afternoon's with Beckett!"

I rolled my eyes as Sean playfully gasped, and removed his arm from her waist. "Lauren!"

She grinned innocently. "What?"

Jacque and Catherine laughed at the couple as the first bell rang. "See you later!" I called over my shoulder, still shaking my head at Lauren's pathetic joke- attempt at making me feel better. They knew I didn't like Beckett, and it was common knowledge that we were known to despise each other, being captains of the different hockey teams.

I sat down in my Global class, desperately hoping that our teacher changed her mind about changing our seats.

The small curly haired woman came in shortly after the second bell rang, putting down her purse and shrugging off her heavy coat. "Okay, everyone stand near the door, we're doing seat changes today!" She sang excitedly.

I groaned but followed everyone to the door, my book bag slung over my shoulder lazily as she started to read out the names and point to seats.

"Melanie, Grace, Teddy, Beckett, Orion, Patrick..." She droned on as I groaned even louder and took my seat in the row.

Thankfully, I was next to Patrick, and Beckett was the pair of seats next to mine, but there was space in between the desks.

"Hey, Pat." I whispered. When he turned to look at me I widened my eyes and put on my best puppy-dog face, "Will you please trade places with me?"

He grinned. "Nope."

The smile vanished from my face, "Screw you."

His smile only widened as he moved his head so that he was facing the board, watching Ms. Decosola write the homework down.

"Hey, sieve, can I borrow a pencil?" Beckett's annoying voice rang through my ears.

I tried to pretend like I didn't notice he was talking to me, but I was the only one he ever called "sieve."

"Smith!"

I still ignored him, copying down the daily homework in my sloppy handwriting, not even bothering to turn towards Beckett, knowing it would just fuel his teasing. "Hey, Goalie, I need to borrow a pencil!"

"Ask Teddy!" I practically yelled, losing my temper and snapping at him as he started to poke me repeatedly in the arm.

I could sense him smirking as half the class turned in our direction, our teacher among their curious stares. "Is there a problem?"

"Yes, actually." I told her, pointing to Beckett, "I need my seat moved, please."

She quirked an eyebrow and her lips tugged upwards in the corners. "And why is that, Ms. Orion?"

"Because I cannot stand him."

"Well, I'm sure a lot of kids don't like who their partnered up with, but you two aren't even partners. Figure it out, please, and don't disrupt my lesson again." She said coolly, turning back around to continue her lecture on the United States.

I sighed heavily and leaned back in my chair, twirling my pen around in my fingertips in an attempt to cure my boredom.

"Hey, sieve." I heard again.

I ignored it, again, and waited for another call to be made.

Suddenly, something jerked the back of my chair, causing it to hit the side of my desk and tip over, crashing into the desk behind me, spilling me out onto the floor. "Orion Smith!" Ms. Decosola yelled loudly, gaining the whole classes attention. Like they didn't notice me falling out of my chair, I thought bitterly as I fixed my chair. "What are you doing?"

"He pushed my chair out, Ms. D, I didn't do anything."

"But disrupt my class," she said as Beckett started to defend himself. "Detention after school for both of you."

"But I have a game!" I protested.

"Me too!" Beckett whined.

"Well, that's unfortunate that you'll have to explain to your coaches why you won't be able to make it to the game."

***

Lauren looked at my disgusted face before bursting out in uncontrollable laughter, again. "It's not even that funny!" I said, exasperated.

"You fell off your chair in class, and now you have detention. It's hilarious," she wheezed out, making Jacque start laughing again.

"Whatever," I muttered, "I'm leaving."

"I have detention too!" Charlie announced proudly, running a bit to catch up to me.

I rolled my eyes at him, "That's not a good thing, why are you happy? All you do is sit in a room for an hour."

"The teacher doesn't do anything, so it's basically a free period."

"After school," I pointed out.

He shrugged. "Better than taking the bus."

I shook my head. You have a car, I wanted to yell out, but I knew he would only retort with something immature like 'I know I do, do you?' or something else along the lines of middle school jokes. I was losing brain cells just standing next to him, I don't know how Catherine put up with him.

"Don't you have tennis after school?"

"I hate tennis," he said in disgust. "I don't know why I play."

"So quit," I told him in a 'duh' tone.

He shrugged again as we walked into the detention room.

It was quiet. There were one or two people sitting at random desks, so Charlie and I sat down in the back row, next to a girl with her headphones in.

"Look who it is!" Beckett thundered, walking into the room and plopping down into the seat next to me, kicking his feet up on the neighboring chair.

Groaning, I took out my physics homework and started on the problems. "Your coach is pissed at you," Beckett informed me.

"Yeah?" I asked rhetorically. "And how would you know that?"

He shrugged. "Saw her storming down the hallway on the way here."

My eyes widened and I looked towards the door, hoping that he wasn't being serious. My coach would be-head me if she found out I couldn't go to our game because I got detention, with an idiot. Two idiots.

"Nah," he said suddenly, a deep chuckle bursting from his throat. "I'm messing with you, sieve."

Charlie snickered from off to my side and I slapped him on the arm. "It's not funny," I hissed at him.

"Yeah it is, sieve," he mocked.

My eyes narrowed into slits. "Watch it."

"I'm so scared!"

I huffed and sank back into my chair.

Beckett Manno, this means war.