A Change for the Best - Chapter 3

Jade and Autumn cautiously walked into the crowded hallway filled with the sounds of laughter, shuffling, and lockers slamming.   Each with schedule in hand, the girls worked their way through the crowd, heading to the gymnasium for first period Physcial Education.  The two sisters were welcomed into the gym by the faint smell of sweat and tears.  Not many other students had arrived yet.  Scanning the area, they saw two somewhat familiar faces sitting on the ground; Kyle and Stan from the bus stop.  Sitting next to them, but not being part of their conversation, was a boy with messy blond hair, an unevenly-buttoned shirt, and crazy eyes.  The boy seemed to have a nervous tick and looked like he hardly got a wink of sleep.  Dark circles stained the skin under his wide hazel eyes.  Taking that description, many would match it with someone psychotic, someone dangerous. However, this kid’s eyes did not have a hint of ill-intent, but rather compassion and the desire to be accepted.  The boy was now looking around as more and more students began to file into the gym.  His twitches seemed to become more frequent as the class became full.  The sisters began to feel silly just standing around, so they headed towards the only two people they had been acquainted with.

            Kyle and Stan broke away from their conversation to greet the two girls they had just met earlier that morning and offer them to sit with them.  The twitchy blond boy nervously stared at the girls. “Wh-who are they? Nng- I’ve never seen them before in my life!” he asked his two friends, visibly shaking as he fidgeted with his hands.

            “They just moved here this weekend.  Her name is Jade,” Stan motioned to the blonde girl, before moving on to the brunette, “and her name is-“

            “Autumn Smiles!” the younger sister jumped in, extending her hand toward the blond boy.

            “Gah!” the boy exclaimed, twitching again.  Reluctantly, he quickly shook her hand. “I’m Tweek. It’s nice to – ngh – meet you!”  Autumn smiled at Tweek while Jade gazed around the gym.  The tardy bell rang and almost immediately the gym teacher emerged in front of the students.  Nearly everyone was involved in conversation and was not paying any attention to the teacher.  A shrill noise cut through the air as the teacher blew into the shiny metal whistle hanging from his neck.  Tweek and Jade both jumped at the noise as the rest of the class slowly came to a hush.

            “Hello, everyone.” The scruffy gym teacher paused to look over his students. “I am Mr. Slow and I will be your Physical Education coach for this year.” He walked a few steps to a metal desk set up in front of the bleachers, where he picked up a manila folder. “I will now begin to take roll. Token Black?”

            “Here.”

            “Kyle Broflovski?”

            “Here.”

            Autumn elbowed her sister in the side to get her attention.  The movement  caused the three boys to also look at her.  She had a playful smirk on her face. “I wonder why they would hire a gym teacher with a name like ‘Mister Slow.’  Aren’t they supposed to be fast and agile?”  Jade and the boys chuckled a little, earning a displeased look from their teacher.

            “Next on the roll, we have a… hmm… Sunshine Jade?” A few whispers from surrounding students made Jade’s face redden. As the girl slowly raised her hand, a smiled played across Mr. Slow’s face.  Autumn immediately felt guilty about making fun of their teacher’s name, especially right before her sister’s name got called out.  Mr. Slow continued on with roll call.

            “Hey,” Kyle looked towards the embarrassed Jade, “If it makes you feel any better, I always get ripped on for being Jewish.”

            “Stan Marsh?”

            “Here.”

            Jade smiled at the boy in the green hat.  “That does make me feel better. Thanks.”  Autumn flashed her trademark smile towards Kyle. While she did not understand why her sister worried so much about her name or what other people thought, Autumn was happy to see someone side with her sister.

            “Moving on now...  Is Autumn… um… Smiles here?” The bubbly brunette nearly made the Tweek boy have a heart attack from raising her hand up so quickly and loudly pronouncing her presence.  Everyone in the gym was now staring in the direction of the loud girl and her four friends.

            “Jesus Christ! Gah! This is way too much pressure!”  The blond boy tightly closed his eyes and buried his face into his knees, blocking out the intense stares.

            “Ahem… yes… And last we have,” Mr. Slow began. “Tweek Tweak?”  A muffled noise came from the closed-up kid huddled next to Stan Marsh.  The gym teacher stared blankly a few seconds before marking the boy as present.

            “Okay, class, we will start the school year off with a raging game of dodgeball!” Mr. Slow pulled over a basket full of red rubber balls, picking two of the up, one in each hand.  “Whoever catches these will be the team leaders.”  The man tossed both of the balls into the students.  One of the red balls bounced off of Tweek’s head, which was still pressed against his knees, and landed perfectly into Stan’s lap.  Two boys behind them were wrestling for the other ball.  Finally, the kid with brown hair wearing a red and blue jacket won.  With the team captains picked out, the rest of the students lined up against the back wall, ready to be picked.

            Autumn stood up slowly, watching everyone else automatically move to the back.  Even her sister was moving with the crowd.  Autumn grabbed Jade’s arm and pulled her back, almost knocking her off balance.

            “What?” Jade snapped at her sister.

            “Do you really want to be involved in such a violent game?” Autumn questioned Jade, crossing her arms against her chest.

            “I would rather play than get a failing grade on the very first day of school.” Jade pulled her arm from her sister’s grasp and turned to join the rest of the students against the back wall.  Autumn stared after her sister, her mouth slightly agape.  There was no way she would play a game that encourages violence and pain.  She rolled her eyes before turning and walking towards the coach.

            “Mr. Slow, I refuse to play a game that promotes violence.”  She stood tall and confident, despite the scowl on the man’s face.  “It goes against the lifestyle and beliefs I grew up with. I will not participate.”  Mr. Slow sighed in exasperation.

            “Fine. Here is a health book. Read up to chapter three. Here is the assignment that is to be completed by class tomorrow.”  The man handed the girl a large textbook and two pages of questions, front and back.  Autumn thanked the teacher politely before taking a seat in the bleachers.  Back on the floor, Jade looked up at her sister in disbelief.  That girl was fearless when it came to her standing up for what she believed in.  Jade did not think that it was something to get that worked up over, but respected her sister for doing so anyway.  Autumn did always prefer reading or writing over physical tasks.  She was probably happier doing an assignment anyway.

            Each dodge ball team now had four members.  Jade was hoping that she would get picked soon and would not have to be last.  It was an unwritten fact that being picked last for anything meant that you were only there to even things out.  She did not know how she could handle being –

            “Jade.”

            The blonde girl snapped out of her thoughts in surprise.  Did someone actually call her before over half of the other students?  She looked at the two team leaders and saw Stan waving her over.  Jade kicked off the wall, trotting over to join the other four people in her group.  Tweek was picked next for the other team.  A minute or two later, each team had their ten players.

            Half of the students were posed with their arms behind their heads, prepared to through the rubber balls as hard as they could; the other half were partially hunched over with their arms in front of them, ready to catch the balls.  All hell broke loose as Mr. Slow blew his whistle to signify the start of the game.  Jade, keeping an eye out for any projectiles coming her way, made sure to stand behind the tallest guy on her team to avoid getting hit.  All is far in love and war, she thought to herself.  Kyle and Stan stood nearby.  Out of the two, Stan seemed to be way more into the game than his red-headed counterpart. She had heard before that Jewish people were not very good at sports, but that was just a silly stereotype.

            Kyle looked over at Jade for a split second before turning back to the game. “What’s up with your sister? Why isn’t she playing?” Jade ducked as a ball whizzed past her head. She quickly ran to fetch it and then threw it as hard as she could to the opposing team.

            “My family has always preached against any display of violence, whether physical or verbal.”

            “Why are you playing?” Kyle ducked sideways, just barely avoiding getting out. Jade, on the other hand, caught a ball thrown at her.  A short boy in a blue shirt and a tuft of blond on top of his head walked over to the wall with an “aw, shucks, fellas” and sat down.

            “To be honest,” Jade ducked again. “I think most of what they believe in is just silly. That lifestyle just isn’t for me. It’s impossible to save the Earth and all mankind. It’s just… boring. I need excitement in my life – and meat!” She laughed lightly to herself before looking up at her sister in the bleachers.  Autumn was watching the game with a look of disgust mixed with sadness on her face.  Noticing that she was watching, Jade took a few seconds to wave at her sister.  Autumn tried to warn her, but it was too late.  Just as Jade was turning back to the game, one of the rubber balls came flying in her direction, pelting her hard in the face.

            A yelp came from the blonde girl as she stumbled backwards, grasping the right side of her face.  In spite of her injury, the game carried on as if nothing happened. She opened her right eye, but everything was blurry.  She rubbed and blinked, but her eye just would not clear up.  Her nose and cheek were stinging so badly, she did not realize the slow drip of blood coming from her nostril.

            “Dude, you’re bleeding,” Team Captain Stan informed Jade, who had to rub under her nose to confirm his words.  She started to feel a little woozy from the sight of her own blood.  She covered her nose and headed towards the coach.

            “Gah! Oh, God! Oh, God! I didn’t mean to!” the twitchy Tweek shouted from the other team.  Someone from Jade’s team saw that as a prime opportunity and threw a ball at the apologetic Tweek, striking him out.  The boy seemed almost relieved to be stripped of his duties and quickly hurried to the “out” wall.

            As Jade neared the bleachers, her sister came to her side in the blink of an eye. The older sister was bombarded with questions: Are you okay? Does it hurt? Is it broken? Can you see? Most importantly came the “I told you so” part: See! You should have just sat out with me! Jade simply ignored her sister’s musings and asked if she could go see the nurse – and where the nurse’s office was located. Mr. Slow wrote her a note and asked for Autumn to go with her.  Noticing the time, the girls grabbed all of their stuff, expecting to go straight to their next classes after seeing the nurse.  Jade moaned and held onto her nose to keep it from bleeding out any more.  What a great start of the day.  She was almost afraid to find out what would happen next.