Chapter Twelve - Part Two

Background color
Font
Font size
Line height

Chapter Twelve Part Two

"Hunter! What were you going to say!?" I screeched.
"Not telling," he replied childishly.
"Alright! Training will now begin!" The coach yelled. I nearly forgot. Training hadn't even started. "The squad captains will handle your training."

The team swarmed around Sarah and Ace, pleading them to make training easy.
"The coach will kill me if I make training easy and we lose at cross country!" Sarah replied. Ace and Sarah discussed the training.

"We've decided, today's training will be interval training," Ace announced. A deathly, soul sucking shriek could be heard coming from the team. I could feel dread sweeping over me. The pain in my chest was just starting to subside; interval training would destroy me. I accidentally made eye contact with Ace in my moments of misery and looked at my feet.

"Actually, let's take it easy. Three kilometres. Take your time," Ace re-announced.

For some unknown reason, I mouthed "Thank you".
"For what?" He mouthed back. "I'm too tired to run."

Right. Okay Ace. Just when I start thinking you might be half decent, boom, indecent again. The team lined up at the starting mark at the bottom of the hill and on Sarah's call, everyone raced off. Actually, majority of the team crawled. Except for the elite athletes like Sarah and the others.

"Taking it really slowly, aren't you?" Ace asked, jogging beside me.
"I'm half dead," I mumbled, noticing that I was at least one hundred metres behind the person in front of me and that I was officially the last person.

"Slacking off," Ace said, tutting.
"And what about you? Squad captain trailing behind?"
"I'm tired, like I explained earlier.
"Tired? From what?"
"You gave me quite the panic, frantically screaming when you ran down the hill."
"Did not!" I exclaimed.
"Ace! Ace! Ace!" He shrieked in a girlish voice.
"I did not do that! And I do not sound like that you idiot!"
"Move it Cathy! You're the weak link in our team! Move! Move! Move!" He grabbed my forearm and dragged me up the hill.

"Now I'm tired," I groaned, bending over to temporarily rest my hands on my knees.
"How on earth did you get onto the team?" He asked.
"There was no one else? Besides, is the squad captain going to trail behind and come last?"
"Nope. I'll see you at the finish line," he laughed before jogging off.

Tired my ass. I watched as he ran, overlapping majority of the team and eventually overlapping me as well with nothing but a wave from behind as he ran past. Marvellously, I finished without dying in twenty five minutes. I came last, as predicted.

"Marvellous performance," Hunter said, clapping sarcastically. I was puffed out and sweating despite the cold weather. "Need a drink?"
"No!" There was no way on earth I was accepting a drink from him after what he had done last time.

The coach dismissed us all and everyone started heading off. Some went to school, others went home. I was still to decide where I was going.

We walked up to the top of the hill and I realised it was the decisive moment. Forward to school or right to go home?

"Good morning Miss Tutor!" Dylan shouted from nowhere.
"Skipping out on your duties!" Dean exclaimed. The jeep pulled up beside the path and Dylan honked the horn suddenly, nearly making me jump out of my skin.
"Ah, you two actually turned up," Hunter said, folding his arms.
"Well, chop chop you three, get in the car!" Dean leaned into the back seat and pushed the back door open.
"Uh.." I said.
"We're heading to the library too, get in," Dylan kindly elaborated.
"Uh.." I repeated.
"Just get in," Hunter said, crawling in first.
"We won't bite," Dean added.
"They eat girls whole," Ace grinned, getting in.

Despite myself, I got in and in less than a minute, we were at school.

"Well, let's hurry to the library. We should make use of the time we've got," Dean said, getting out of the car before opening my door. I got out.
"You're unusually excited to study," I commented.
"Well, high school does affect the future. I don't exactly want to be homeless."
"So even you have a brain that thinks like that," I murmured to myself. "Anyway, I need to go get changed," I said, holding up my sports bag.
"So do I," Ace said.
"Same here," Hunter added.

Dean and Dylan went to the library first with our books while we headed to the change room. "So what's the forecast for the exams?" Hunter asked as we walked.
"Uh...I don't know? I wouldn't know until I study," I replied.
"I'm still hung up about how you rejected my offer to go to the festival."
"Really?"
"Tell you what. If I manage to get seventy five percent, you have to come with me."

"Uh, isn't that too easy?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Well, considering the fact that my average is about forty percent, I'd say it was pretty hard," he said. "Now, deal?"
"Fine. Deal. I'm looking forward to seeing you attempt to study seriously," I said before turning to the left to enter the girls' change room while the other two went to the right.

Could Hunter seriously get seventy five percent? That would pose some serious problems. Archer was there and if Hunter suddenly got an ego boost and decided to push everyone around, that would be incredibly bad.

I comforted myself with the fact that he probably wouldn't get seventy five percent and got changed.

"Well that took you a while," Ace mumbled as I left the changeroom.
"Holy crap! Don't just stand there and then suddenly talk!" I exclaimed.
"I was standing in plain sight."

"No you're not. When a person is leaving the changeroom, their main objective is to go straight through the hallway, not look to the sides."
"It's important to check for predators," he countered.
"What predators?"
"Hunter," he grinned, pointing at Hunter who was standing on the other side of the door.
"You guys are weird," I muttered, heading down the hallway.

We finally arrived at the library where Dean and Dylan were practically sleeping on the desks. The library was fairly empty since only the junior students were left and it was class time.The seniors didn't come to the library during exam time. After all, who would come to school when they had the option of staying at home?

"It took you long enough," Dean muttered, yawning.
"It took /her/ long enough," Ace said.
"We made a bet," Hunter announced proudly as we took our seats. He remained standing as though he were king of the tiny corner of the library. "If I get seventy five percent or more in the chemistry exam, she's coming with me to the annual show."
"It's a deal, actually," I corrected.
"How so?"
"Well, in a bet, if you lose, I get something. In this case, if you lose, I don't get anything, so, it's a deal."
"Obviously the difference in intelligence between a genius and a dumbass," Dylan laughed.

"Please keep quiet. The library is for study purposes, so if you want to talk, please leave," the librarian said from her desk. We nodded and quietened down.

"Now King Dumbass, please take a seat, will you?" Dylan continued teasing. Reluctantly, Hunter took a seat.
"We should start studying," Hunter said, stretching as though he were preparing for a fight. "After all, I have a bet to win."
"A deal," I corrected once again.
"Whatever. Let's get started."

I flipped open my chemistry textbook to the latest chapter we'd done and left it in the middle of the circular desk. "So guys, what do you remember? Anything you recall?" I asked. They all looked at me blankly. "Do you remember any topics?" They continued looking blank.

I internally groaned. "Well, let's start with the particle model," I said, a wave of nostalgia coming over me.

How could there be people who couldn't remember a single thing about the simplest thing in chemistry!? What surprised me most was Ace. Last time I had fallen into an unfortunate situation resulting in me having to stay at Ace's house for the night, I found out that the guy did homework. He just never handed it in.

That day, I found out a lot about Ace's life at home, but was too afraid to ask or even try to find out more. Regardless, it was none of my business and no one would appreciate me snooping my nose around everywhere.

"I'm starting to get this proton, neutron and electron stuff," Dean said, chewing on the end of his pencil.
"Proton? Positive. Neutron? Neutral. Electron? Negative. I got it!" Dylan said with a click of his fingers, grinning triumphantly.
"Thank the Lord!" I exclaimed.

They all laughed at my reaction and we ended up cracking up because of how stupid our laughing faces looked.

You are reading the story above: TeenFic.Net