The Exchange

Chapter 4: Rafe

'In two months we have a match with Hawkins school team Blackhawks.' Coach Hartley says. 'Whoever wins will go to the semifinals.'

Everyone watches him intently, we all know the stakes of losing this match.

'But before that, we have a friendly match with some county college team called Sea dogs.' Coach says. 'But we still need to prepared.'

'Who calls their team Sea dogs,' I scoff and a couple guys laugh.

We all know today's training is going to be way worse than yesterday's.

'Go Mighty Pucks!' Archer yells.

'Go Mighty Pucks!' We all reply clapping.

Coach leads us out into the ice but we all stop when we see that the rink is currently preoccupied by the figure skaters.

Contemporary music blasts out of the speakers and I see a girl leap into the air and do some triple spin before landing firmly on her skates. She skates around Madame Lulu before spinning on the point of her right skate and sticking a leg out. She skates faster picking up speed and going lower to the ground before performing another triple spin. I know these moves have names, Sage has mentioned them before but I didn't take any notice.

'Well done Giselle.' Madame Lulu claps and the other students join in. I see Sage smiling stiffly.

I knew Giselle had the posture of a figure skater. She came all the way to London to skate here?

'Madame Lulu!' Coach yells over the music, snapping me out of my train of thought.

The figure skaters look our way and Sage waves at me. I look straight past her and see Giselle smiling my way. I look next to me and see Archer leaning on his hockey stick and waving at her.
I clench my jaw and elbow him, causing him to stand up straighter.

'What is the meaning of this?' Madame Lulu skates over to us.

'We booked the ice rink.' Coach says.

'Clearly not.' She snaps. 'I've booked it.'

'We have an important match coming up.' Coach replies.

'We have a competition.' Madame Lulu says.

'No one cares about figure skating.' Coach sighs.

'How dare you!' She screeches. 'imbéciles absolument imbéciles'

Coach rubs his forehead tiredly and look at me. I step forward.

'Madame Lulu, it looks like the rink has been double booked.' I say calmly. 'And it seems like you guys have gotten enough practice, so can we take over now.'

Madame Lulu eyes me up and down with her piercing blue eyes.

'Fine,' she sighs, 'but only because you asked nicely.'

'Thank you.' I say. Coach grumbles under his breath and she turns around to wrap up her figure skating class.

'Everyone is free to go, but Giselle I would like to have a word with you.' Giselle looks over to her coach and nods.

Coach leads the warm up stretches for us. We all put out water bottles to the side. He barks out stretches for us to do and we comply.

'Ok guys into your positions!' I yell. 'Splitting into our two teams!' Archer takes one goal and a brunette named Connor takes the other.

Coach hands me the puck and I place it on the ice infront of me and another guy.

In the corner of my eye I see Giselle listening to her coach. She takes her curls out of their bun and massages her hair. The way she moves so delicately is hypnotising.

Coach blows the whistle and Ben slams into me, taking the puck away from me.

'Rafe focus!' He yells.

I shake my head, and run after Ben, I manage to get the puck off him and pass it to a guy on my team. I pick up the pace and skate faster, overtaking the other guys. The puck is passed to me and I dribble it to the goal. Conner doesn't block it and it gets into the goal.

My team cheer and I look over to see Giselle has stuck around and is watching me intently. I take off my helmet, point at her, the goal and wink, causing her to roll her eyes.

'Watch out.' She mouths, smirking. I frown before I'm tackled to the ground by someone from Ben's team.

I look up and see Giselle walking off. I look up and see Coach Hartley glaring down at me.

'Rafe, on the bench.' He snaps. 'Tyler, you're in.'

'Dad I'm captain.' I say. 'You can't bench me.'

'You can come back in when your head is in the game.' He snaps. 'This type of behaviour won't win you the cup.'

'You know I'm a valuable player.' I snarl.

'An empty head and muscles aren't valuable to me.' He replies, calmly. 'Get on the bench.'

I clench my jaw and skate off the rink, sitting on the bench. Tyler pats my shoulder as he passes me and goes onto the ice.

Replacing me with Tyler who's a rookie? That's low, even for him. He knows that sitting on the bench literally kills me.

I watch the game and see that some of our players are still not ready. They fumble with the puck or some completely miss the goal. They've let themselves go completely.

Sometime throughout the game my mind drifts back to Giselle. I shake the thoughts of her away.

This girl is messing up my focus. I need to get her out of my head and get her out now. Why can't I think of her like every other girl that I meet?
Because she's not interested in you.
The fuck does that have to do with anything.
It draws you in.

*AUTHORS NOTE*
What do you guys think of the story so far? I hope you all like it.
Have a nice day!