IF IT IS MEANT TO BE

Reggie

The wood creaked as the footsteps got closer, it got louder by every inch. The principal's office had hollow wooden flooring, a surprising thing considering the funding provided to the institution. Apparently it was left like that on purpose by Mrs.Stone, specifically the trophy cabinet, which never made sense? Why would someone let it go unchecked especially if it's this precious to them?

The principal was checking her files and signing permissions, "...The Parade Committee decided that we should postpone the parade for another 2 months due to lack of sponsors..", May Oltin the student's committee representative read from her notes.

"Lack of sponsors?", Mrs.Stone smirked and looked up. "Did you say that no one wants to invest in our college festivals?", she added and went back to reading permission letters.

"Yes...ma'am. Surprising enough. They are hesitant ever since the incident...", Mary stopped and looked down.

"What...", Mrs.Stone looked back up with disgust.

"Ever since the last Stanley Championship event and what followed afterwards made most investors look the other way...", Mary replied and shut her book.

"Oh.", Mrs.Stone replied and rubbed her fingers on her forehead. "We'll...We'll look into it later, anything else Mary?", she asked and looked back up.

"Nothing else, we're yet to conduct refresher meetings for the rest of the committees.", Mary added and got up from her seat.

"Alright then.", Mrs.Stone smiled back and leaned back on her seat.

Mary walked away and pulled the door, just before she was about to leave she turned back, "They're prepared for the next game Ma'am. The wolves, especially your little wolf.", she said and closed the door behind her.

***

"So how's Greendale?", Reggie asked.

"Well, I've been everywhere lately. It's a bit more tiring than expected.", Tyler replied as the two of them walked down the road that led out to the town, away from Greendale and into civilization.

Reginold had come over to Greendale as an exchange student, to understand the curriculum, faculty and student base.

Who was he kidding? That exchange was in the name of Lee Chang from Trident which was Reggie's college but the place he was supposed to go was Dustin University, a few blocks away. So it was obvious he came to see his best friend!

"Did you find your pack?", he asked and looked around at the crowd.

"My what?", Tyler asked.

"Your pack, Ty! Friends!", Reggie laughed.

"Oh, yeah a few people here and there. Nothing special.", he replied and stopped by the nearby waffle house.

"Oh, nothing special? Well that's sad. Wanna hear about mine?", Reggie smirked.

"Sure.", Tyler replied as they walked inside.

"Well, for starters there's a party at this girl Addison's house this week for the newcomers, even though I have been to like 3 already...Anyways, that day I called you during our game, we won! A close one! 33 to 29, and I was the one to score the winning three pointer, how cool is that?!" Reggie said with excitement, he had a wide smile on his face the reason for which no one would have understood, was it the game or just after seeing Ty? Regardless, he was happy.

"Woah, Woah slow down! That's a lot to throw at someone, you talked about 3 parties? Huh? It's been like barely 2 weeks, and the game? Wow...", Tyler was cut off immediately.

"One dark chocolate waffle and a cold coffee. What about you?", Reggie turned around and asked Tyler.

"...Umm, let's see. They have...", He was about to say something...

"They have too many options.", Reggie sniggered. "...and just a Nutella waffle, thank you!", Reggie told the cashier and paid the bill.

"But, I was about to say...", Tyler mumbled as they took a seat.

"Save your breath champ, I know you.", Reggie taunted. "You would have taken forever, anyway you still need to tell me about your adventures.", he added.

"Right.", Tyler looked around. "It's a roller coaster.", he added.

"Oh, I love roller coasters!", Reggie checked his phone and looked back at Tyler. "Tell me all about it!"

***

"Alright people line up! We've got only months left to prepare, I don't expect any slacking or lazy players in the team! Is that clear?!", Brooks addressed the class of freshers.

It was the Basketball tryouts for the Championship, and Brooks Banner was leading the team this year for the first time it was a student mentoring instead of Mr.Anderson. The Committee vetoed the extra coaching sessions for sports other than football, some may say they had too much expectations from the Football Team to carry them to victory.

Mrs.Stone herself had voted against this but the majority favoured the former due to the successive results over the past few years showing that they could have nabbed the trophy only if they had a better score sheet.

"Too much pressure on them.", Mrs.Stone sighed, observing the tryouts from a distance. "...and lesser importance given to the rest of the sports, don't you think?", she turned around to Coach Anderson who himself had a heavy face.

"What can we do about it? The committee had decided it after all...", he sighed. "It's the Stanley Cup we're talking about, not just some Football Competition. We need to focus on the rest of the sports, especially Athletics and Chess. We can't expect to be carried just by one!" he added.

"Did he agree to participate? The new kid?", Mrs.Stone asked as she grabbed a glass of water and she reached out for her medicines.

"Tyler? I did try to persuade him, I hope he does turn up.", Coach replied.

"He's fast, that kid. We need that for the 400 m this year.", Mrs.Stone said and removed the paperweight from her documents. "Keep me updated Coach, will you?", she added.

"I will.", he replied and left.

Mrs.Stone looked around and caught a glimpse of the trophy cabinet, the last time they won the Stanley Championship was when she was in her final year in Greendale, she was the goalkeeper. At the time it wasn't against the Rednecks, it was the Tridents.

***