Page 20 of The Handoff

Chapter 11

David

Curiositykilledthecat.

Yet, I felt like a cat, knowing they had nine lives, so Monday morning I was curious as I finished class and knew the cheerleaders were rehearsing. I wondered why Dane was so wrapped up in Lisa, so I decided to watch their practice. I hadn’t been to practice for a while, but I noticed there was something different about it all. They seemed to be enjoying it, and for once, they weren’t focusing on pleasing Fiona, they were interacting with each other and talking about trying new moves. I didn’t dread watching them—not that I’d done it often—I enjoyed it.

Maybe intelligence had finally appeared on the cheer team.

Interesting.

It was almost as the environment had gone from Othello, Shakespeare’s tragedy full of jealousy and hate. As if they’d learned the lessons from Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield and realized that they needed to work together and be kind to each other, which was more important if they are going to work together as a team.

They couldn’t have this life lesson in such a short space of time?

She’d only been with the team for one month. They’d been acting like a bunch of tigresses, ready to tear each other’s eyes out for months.

I watched them with curiosity, thinking another one of my lives had been lost just by sitting here.

Then, out of nowhere, Penelope tripped Lisa. It wasn’t an accident. Her long leg pulled out as soon as Lisa was about to attempt a flip.

“Shit!” Lisa screamed as she flopped to the ground.

“Penny, what were you thinking?” I shouted as everyone, including myself, ran to Lisa’s aid.

“It was an accident. I thought… It wasn’t…” she stuttered as her brown eyes started to fill with tears. I ignored her as I focused on Lisa, who was trying to stand. Luckily, Penny tripped her before she went up in the air or it would have been a nasty accident.

Lisa waved her hands in the air. “I think my ankle’s just twisted or something. I’ll live,” she said as she tried to make light of the situation. As she tried to put pressure on her foot, she screamed out in pain and ended in my arms.

“I’ll drive you to the hospital. Let them get it checked out.”

She held on to me as everyone agreed, and Penny, who was once tearful, disappeared.

“I’ll come with you,” her blonde friend said. I remembered that we hadn’t met, but I knew her name.

“It’s okay, Tanya. Maybe you can take her bag back to the dorm and carry on with practice.”

Her eyes shifted to Lisa for confirmation. “You sure?”

Lisa nodded. “Yeah, it makes sense. Maybe Penelope will be back. If she does, tell her it’s no big deal. I’ll be back, and accidents do happen.”

I wanted to disagree, because from where I was sitting in the hall, I could see it was no accident. There was a time and place for everything, and unfortunately, this wasn’t one of them. As tempted as I was to point the finger, I knew I had to bite my tongue, something I rarely did.

We had to find out what was wrong with Lisa and see if she could get back on her feet. She’d only just started as captain, and already her role was over just as quickly as it’d began.

I helped her as we headed to the car. Luckily, it wasn’t too far from campus since I was late for class this morning. I had an exam on Friday and spent all night studying. My head was all over the place; I never had issues focusing, but for some reason, last night was an issue.

“Nice, I never knew you had a car.”

Oh no! What was happening to us, we were revealing too much of ourselves to this girl. The one who was a freshman and had only joined university. I had to think of something, quick.

“Yeah, Mom lets me use it sometimes if she doesn’t have to work.”

“Makes sense. Why didn’t you have it the other day? Shoot, it was only yesterday… feels like a long time ago.”

She was practically hopping and more worried about my car, or lack of it, yesterday. She was too considerate, and sometimes I felt as if she didn’t belong on the cheerleading team. Consideration and kindness didn’t get you anywhere in this world, especially the crazy world of college, yet she had it, and part of me just wanted to protect her because of it.

“Let’s get you to the hospital and see what’s going on with your ankle.”

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