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the next day, they had practice again. however, coach made them all wear either red or blue jerseys. this meant arabella joked about having the same outfit with everyone wearing red. she decided to target dwayne first. 

"dwayne, why are you literally copying my outfit? i was wearing this first, go change."

he looked at her and blinked before playing along. "uh, actually ma'am, i was wearing this first. go home and change, it's embarrassin'."

arabella dramatically gasped before putting a hand over her heart, then skated over to talk to kenny. he was really nice and funny, and he always made arabella smile. plus, he was really cute. 

"hey kenny!" she greeted, skating next to him as he went to put his water bottle down. 

"hey arabella!" he smiled, happy to be talking to her again. the two asked each other how they were and how there day went until bombay blew the whistle and told them to get in a big circle. arabella was a little confused, but she knew better than to ask. 

she wished she had asked. the team was tied together with one big rope, and arabella wanted nothing but to leave. the good part about it was that she was next to kenny. she was also next to averman, which meant she had two people she liked to talk to near her.

"hey averman." he was pretending to ignore her, so she kept calling his name, along with a bunch of nicknames. "averman. avenue. manny. manbun. acorn."

he finally gave in, and said hi back. their conversation didn't go past that because of a gross odor that filled the room, and the ducks immediately knew who it was. "goldberg!"

but goldberg defended himself, saying it wasn't him that time. instead, dean held up his arms and said it was him, which made arabella gag. 

coach bombay blew a whistle and started walking around them. "you are a team. and to win this thing, you have to work as won. now as one, skate."

arabella tried skating, but everyone was going their own direction, which led to them falling down. arabella fell next to kenny, who smiled at her from the ground. "hey."

she let out a small laugh, then replied. "hi. fancy meeting you here."

coach laughed at the team before continuing. "everyone goes their own way, everyone falls down. now get up and try again."

once they all got up again, dean announced that they should all go right. it was a good idea, until fulton had to speak up. "who made you boss? everyone to the left."

"oh my god, fulton. just deal with it and skate to the right," arabella complained. 

since everyone went two ways, they fell down again. arabella's butt was starting to hurt, and she wanted nothing more than to go home and go to sleep. 

"guys, i don't know about you, but i'm so sick and tired of falling." arabella sighed and she tried to get back up. 

coach watched and shook his head. "you guys can argue all you want, but i am not untying you until you move as one."

finally, a few tries later, they were skating together. it was actually pretty fun. after a few minutes of skating and turning, coach untied them. they were all sitting on the floor as he started talking about how hard they worked, and then he grabbed the rope. he said something about hockey was supposed to be fun, then called dwayne's name. 

"yes sir!"

coach smiled before handing him the rope. "round me up some stray cattle there."

arabella groaned, knowing what was going to happen. "oh god."

she got up when everyone else did, and they were all skating around the rink, trying not to get caught. kenny and arabella skated around together, and he did some fancy twirls to get away from dwayne. he even spun arabella around one time when dwayne was on the other side of the ice, which caused arabella to fall since she wasn't good at it. 

kenny and arabella were too busy laughing to notice dwayne sneak up behind them. he roped them at the same time, which caused them to go over to the bench to watch everyone else. when dwayne had caught everyone, he taught them some country line dance. 

"i suck at dancing!" arabella exclaimed when she tried to learn. 

"c'mon ara, it'll be fun!"

it took arabella a second to snap back into reality. kenny called her ara. usually the only nickname she got was bella, or belle occasionally. she decided kenny would be the only one who would be able to call her that, it would be his nickname. 

kenny noticed the girls smile and red cheeks, and he made a mental reminder to call her that more often. 

as they continued dancing, arabella realized kenny was really into the dance. it was definitely a fun practice, and arabella liked the new team. even bombay started dancing, which is something arabella thought she'd never see. 

at the end of practice and after getting each other's numbers to make a group chat, they went to another room after changing out of their gear. arabella was sitting on the floor next to kenny, who was sitting in a chair at a table. he tried giving her the chair, but she said she liked floors better.

there was something big in the middle of the room with a black tarp over it, and charlie asked her what she thought it was since he was sitting at the table kenny was also sitting at. "probably like, a dead body."

he looked at her in confusion before slapping her arm playfully. don pulled the tarp off dramatically, and it was a huge wheaties box with a picture of them on it. arabella was shocked. how did they print it so fast? they took the photo earlier that day!

dwayne, who was standing next to don, pointing to the box. "hey y'all, that's us!"

fulton looked at dwayne and rolled his eyes. "duh, what d'ya know?"

arabella leaned over and slapped fulton's arm. "don't be mean to dwayne, i love him."

don continued. "today, its a wheaties box. tomorrow, it's video games, action figures, lunch boxes. the sky is the limit."

arabella raised her hand so that don could look at her, and when he did, she started to talk. "uh, i don't know if i wanna be some action figure doll because like as much as i love coraline, it made me paranoid."

don rolled his eyes and didn't respond, but kenny just laughed a little. "it's okay ara, i'll protect you from the doll."

arabella grinned, turning towards him. "thanks kenny."

"no problem."

don ignored those two and continued his rant. "now, just to make sure that everybody knows who you are, try on one of these."

he picked up a red, white, and blue jersey that said usa on it, and it had a few stars. they looked cool in arabella's opinion, but when don said something about hendrix, the company sponsoring them, she knew charlie would say something about it. 

sure enough, when she turned around, charlie had a confused look on his face. arabella figured she'd talk to him about it later. don passed fulton his jersey, then told everyone else to come get theirs. 

they piled over the jersey pile, eager to find their names. arabella waited a little bit, she didn't want to get trampled. she heard charlie talk to bombay though. "that's nice coach, but we're ducks. this stuff says hendrix all over it."

bombay hadn't realized charlie's distaste for it, and he replied simply. "well yeah, they're our sponsors charlie."

"so what? can't we be usa ducks? or at least keep our own colors?"

"it's business stuff charlie, don't worry about it." bombay put a hand on charlie's shoulder before getting up and leaving the table, going to talk to don. arabella sat in his seat to try and reassure charlie. 

"hey, charizard. it'll be okay. i know the ducks are like, majorly epic, and it won't be the same, but maybe that's good. i loved the ducks as much as you, but maybe we need a change." she tried giving him a smile, but he just sighed and shook his head. 

"we already changed players, why change our name?"

arabella figured there was no point in trying to make him feel better, he just needed a break and to accept it. she walked over to the pile of jerseys to try and find hers, and then she saw it. 

in bright white lettering, there it was. her last name and number. she was admiring the jersey when she felt a presence next to her, so she looked over to see kenny. 

"myers? like michael myers?" he asked, referring to her last name. 

she nodded, smiling. "that's what everyone says."

kenny smiled before staying silent for a second. "i'm gonna start calling you m'n'm then."

arabella was a little confused before she realized. m'n'm was basically m and m, which were the initials of michael myers. "you're really creative."

kenny pretended to flip his hair before saying, "i know."

she laughed before pushing his shoulder playfully. he just smiled to himself, happy that he made her happy.