The new girl - Elmax

Chapter 1 : The changing room

The snow was falling and the wind was icing. Like every Saturday, Max and Beverly were going to their basketball training. Max liked this weekly appointment, they really had a team spirit which surprised her as at school they weren't really all friends. The changing room was empty when they arrived. On the left of the door was a big sink with two taps and open showers in a square. On the right was a bench doing the angle with wall hangers above it. All the place was tiled. They saw some clothes on the extrem left of the bench, near the door to the gymnasium. A black leather jacket with spikes was hooked on the coat hanger, a khaki backpack, decorated with pins, with clothes overflowing, and black boots with spikes too, under the bench.

- "I've never seen that kind of clothes before," Beverly said with a frown.

- "Me neither," Max added, grabbing the boots. "Maybe we have a new girl in our team."

- "In December?"

- "Well, I don't know! At least it's not an other girl with girly tastes."

Beverly pouted. Max replaced the shoes, and the two girls got ready, both wondering who was this new girl. Beverly opened a bit the door and slid her head. It wasn't a big gymnasium, there were bleachers on only one side, in front of the changing rooms. The new girl was sitting between two benches, her legs on the bench in front of her.

- "Do you see her?" Max whispered.

- "Yeah, she is on the benches."

- "What does she look like?"

- "Brown long hair in a ponytail. She has old dirty shoes, an horrible long gray short, a...normal white tee-shirt," Beverly answered. "She is listening to music."

- "Does she seem nice?"

- "I don't know, it's hard to tell at this distance."

- "Then, let's meet her."

The two redheads opened the door and walked on the field. They were both stressing, but Max thought it was stupid, this new girl was probably more stressed than them right now. They saw their coach preparing the stuff and saluted her.

- "I will present her to you when everyone will be here," the woman explained with a big bag full of balls in her hands. "You can talk to her if you want."

- "Okay, thanks," Max smiled.

They approached her like if she could attack them at any moment. Max watched the girl before trying anything. She thought she was pretty cute and didn't seem to be a bully which reassured her. She had a long scar on her right arm and on her neck. Beverly pointed her finger until it touched the new girl's cheek. She had a startle and looked at both of them with a frown. Max gave a tap on Beverly's arm to tell her it was weird before miming to the new girl to take off her headphone.

- "Um...hi," Max clumsily began, "I'm Max, and this is Beverly."

The new girl slowly nodded, still frowning.

- "And you, you are..." Beverly told with her eyebrows raised and moving her hands to encourage the girl to answer.

- "Um...Jane," the new girl shyly answered.

- "Then, Jane, welcome to Hawkins," Max greeted, holding out her hand.

The new girl startled and hid behind her hands like to protect herself. She watched between her fingers before moving them slowly when she realised she wasn't going to be hurt.

- "I, I didn't want to scare you, I'm sorry," Max said, taking back her hand.

- "No, no, it's not you..." Jane said, looking at her knees.

- "Okay, um, let's try again then."

Max held out her hand again, a bit slower this time. Jane took it weakly. The two redheads looked at each other with an amused smile. Max shook it slowly and thought Jane was funny and extremely shy.

- "My turn now," Beverly intervened.

The two girls shook their hands too. Max saw a small smile on the new girl's face and couldn't resist to smile too.

- "Did you ever play basket-ball?" Beverly asked.

- "Yes, I play sometimes with my sister".

- "Cool! How did you finish here Jane?"

- "Um...life..." the new girl answered, looking away.

Max nudged Beverly and showed Jane with her chin. The girl was fidgeting a lot and seemed to shudder.

- "What are you listening to?" Max asked with a smile to change the subject.

- "Pink Floyd."

- "Oh cool, I'm not surprised that you listen to this."

- "Why?"

- "We saw your clothes, you've a punk and rock style, and Pink Floyd, it's rock," Beverly added.

Jane nodded with a serious face before looking down at her walkman. The two redheads heard some of the other girls of the team arriving and greeted them. Max turned to watch Jane who had put back her headphone. She didn't know what to think about her, but she was really curious to know more about her. Once all there, they sat on the bleachers while their coach was standing in front of them. They were eight in the team, nine now with Jane, it wasn't in the mentality of the town to let girls do sport.

- "So, as you can see, we have a new partner in our team," the coach began. "Jane, can you introduce yourself?"

Jane gave a corner look to everyone. She seemed really anxious.

- "Um, well, I'm Jane, I'm...no one, just a girl who doesn't like to introduce herself."

Her presentation made chuckle the team which relaxed a bit the new girl. The coach didn't insist but asked the girl to show them her skills in basket-ball. Jane pouted and extricated herself from between the benches. She went in front of the basket and threw the ball. It bounced on the circle and almost hit the coach's head. The woman frowned and threw an other ball to her. Unfortunately, Jane dropped the ball on her foot which made it roll on the field.

- "You told me you had already played basket-ball," Beverly frowned.

- "I've never said I was good!" Jane answered.

- "Yeah, you did well!" Max told sarcastically with a smile.

Jane shrugged and went back on the bleachers with a quick walk. She sat shyly and embarrassed again between the benches. The coach began the warms-up, wanting to forget what they saw, before doing some matches, four against five. Max noticed that Jane was really bad at basket-ball but very athletic, she was not out of breath or sweating a lot.

After two hours, the coach stopped the training. She congratulated the girls before letting them going to the changing room. Max heard whispering coming from her partners. She turned and saw the girls giving some quick looks to the new girl. Max tapped Jenifer, a blonde girl on her left, to make her stop.

- "What? She is weird," the blonde girl murmured.

- "She is new, she is probably scared to meet a lot of people," Max told.

- "I know, but being weird won't help her, and she is really bad at basket-ball."

Jane was ready, now wearing her punk clothes and her hair styled back. The girl left the room with a quick walk in an heavy silence, under the eyes of the entire team.

- "Even her clothes are weird."

- "I like her style," Beverly intervened.

- "Me too," Clara, a brown-haired girl, added.

- "You always had weird tastes," Jenifer mocked.

The joke relaxed the atmosphere and closed the subject of Jane. Max tried to finish to get ready as fast as possible. She didn't know why, but she was impatient to see Jane again.