Kalico 2: Hypnotized & Naked in Hope Springs

Kalico: 14 Butts, Four Clowns

Kalico: with Volleyball Team, Girls' Gymnasium, Thursday morning

Silly me. I had not realized how much effort is required of the captain of a volleyball team. I always thought the captain's only duty was to call the toss of the coin to choose the court at volleyball matches. And then only in the rare occasion that a third game was required to break a tie.

Now I saw that a great deal of interaction was required between the coach and the captain – and that the coach expects a lot of interaction between the captain and the team, not all of it popular with the other team members.

Captain Janice beamed with the coach's praise. She also turned a mild glare toward her friends who had given her a hard time.

– – –

"All right! Gather Around!" Coach Ainsworth yelled suddenly. "I am going to make a speech to your butts from up on that podium.

"All fourteen of your butts will be the audience. Sit your butts on the floor before me. Park your bottoms. I don't care who you sit your butt beside, but sit your butt on the floor. Sit your butts in straight lines. Very straight lines.

"We have some vitally important issues today and your personal butt is going to be involved in this. I want you to make sure that your butts are paying attention. Make sure your own butt is ready to participate. Make sure your own butt is ready to cooperate. Park your butts now so your butts can listen to me. Make sure your butt is ready to do what I tell you to do. Park your butts now."

Some of the girls looked as if the coach might have taken leave of his senses. I wasn't too sure about it myself, but the coach had been overly generous with me only a few minutes earlier, so I was prepared to give him more than he asked for now. I drifted toward my friends and began looking for a place to park my butt.

Nearly everyone cooperated right away by sitting cross legged in several rows. The seniors claimed front row, sitting four across. Right behind them were the three other upper classmen, followed by the three ninth graders who had been around long before this week. This left the four of us "Jenny-Come-Lately's" who had joined practice only two mornings ago. The girls who were already seated looked at us smugly, as if to say we are excluded from their  rows.

Flower and Yolanda locked their elbows around Amy's arms, and I latched onto Yolanda on the outside. We formed our own row in the back echelon. Likewise, we sat on the floor cross-legged, squeezing ourselves close to each other, cheek to cheek, so to speak.

A moment later, we realized that by extending our legs straight out, ankles together, we could maneuver ourselves even closer to each other. If we are the four outsiders, we will at least stick together. When we placed our ankles beside each other, our overall formation was a slight crescent, rather than a straight line. We reckoned we were straight enough.

"You Four Clowns on the back row, settle your Glory Butts down," Coach Ainsworth called to us as he climbed up the steps to the officials platform. It did indeed make a fine podium, although it was not apparent why he would need one for this small group. I thought by "Glory Butts" he was referring to our green uniform practice shorts with Glory printed across the seats.

Those same smug faces which had excluded us from their rows now turned to us again, even more smugly, as Coach called us clowns.

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From his lofty platform, Coach looked down on the 14 of us almost as if we were a bunch of small children. Then he talked to us as if we were some football team, or maybe recruits for the Army about to undergo basic training.