The Urban Princesses: Rapunzel

Chapter 19

Celine and Jason are my only friends.

After we got past the awkward stage, they turned out to be pretty cool. Celine is on the volleyball team and convinced me to try out. Jason is in my calculus class and I didn't know until he said hi to me on Tuesday.

"Alright, grab a ball and a partner!" Celine yelled. She winked at me and grabbed a volleyball. Day one of tryouts, this should be interesting. Celine was the team captain so I have an advantage of getting on the team, but she told me she wasn't afraid to reject me.

She taught me how to do the basic hits over the weekend, mom had a volleyball court installed just for me.

We bumped the volleyball back and forth to each other, I wasn't bad, but Celine's hits were so graceful and perfect, it came so naturally to her. Next, we moved onto sets which I was better at.

"Wow, Jackson, not bad. We always need good setters." Celine said.

I smiled. High school isn't as bad as I thought it was.

We worked on spikes (which I was horrible at), then we started scrimmaging.

I wiped my sweaty palms on my new Nike shorts. I was front and center, waiting for a girl named Carolyn to serve the ball over the net. It came soaring over the net and looked like it was coming straight to me. I decided to bump it, so I connected my hands together and waited for it to come down. It seemed to be happening in slow motion.

"I got it!" I called to the rest of my teammates.

It finally connected with my forearms and I moved my arms up slightly. It soared back over the net and flopped to the ground as a few girls dove for it. My side cheered and I blushed.

The rest of tryouts that day went really well. Celine seemed pleased with me.

Charles picked me up after tryouts and drove me home. I almost fell asleep in the car I was so tired. Mom, dad, and Earl were waiting for me in the living room when I got home, a box of steaming pizza on the coffee table. The TV was turned on to an action movie with a giant monster terrorizing a Japanese town.

Earl met me at the door and kissed me lightly on the lips. "How was tryouts?"

"Great."

"Good." He led me over to the couch and I flopped down next to my mom, Earl on my other side.

"Tonight is Japanese movie night." She said as she handed me a piece of pizza on a paper plate. "Every Friday, we have pizza and watch a certain category of movie. We didn't do it last Friday because of the party."

"Cool." I said as I sunk my teeth into the warm sauce and cheese. I could get used to a tradition like this.

Earl slung his arm over my shoulders and I focused back on the TV.

We watched three more Japanese monster movies (which didn't turn out to be all that bad, even though we didn't know what they were saying) then I went up to bed. Volleyball took a lot out of you.

It was probably around midnight when I heard the alarm blaring. I sat up in my bed and rubbed my eyes. My mom immediately rushed into the room, relief filled her eyes when she saw me.

"What's going on?" I yawned.

"Lock your door. Somebody is in the house." She whispered as she closed my door silently for me.

I immediately perked up and locked the door as she said. I laid down on the floor and peeked through the crack under the door. My room overlooked the top of the stairs so I looked into the foyer and saw two large men standing there, and I recognized them immediately.

The Stabingtons.

My heart was pounding as I watched them trot up the stairs. Their large feet were visible from my point of view.

"Find Rider." One of them grunted.

I put my hand over my mouth to stifle a gasp. Where were the police?

Suddenly, the door blasted open downstairs and a few officers ran up the stairs, restraining the fugitive brothers. They cursed under their breath simultaneously.

I took a sigh of relief and went back to bed.

Monday, tryouts continued. I was still doing pretty good, but I could tell some other girls had been doing it a lot longer and compared to them, I was mediocre. Celine wasn't helping, she didn't give me any signs if I was doing good. Ten girls were getting cut and I really didn't want to be one of them. I wanted to be apart of something.

I was sitting in home room one day, my head buried in my backpack, when a boy came up to me, his friends snickering and laughing behind him.

"Hi." He said nervously as he rubbed the back of his neck. His hair was sandy colored that complimented his blue eyes. His nose was long and slim, matching his body stature.

"Hello." I said back.

He plucked at a rubber band around his wrist, the skin was red like he had been doing this repeatedly.

"I'm Xavier. So, um, I know you're new and all but um,"

His friends broke out laughing behind him. He turned around and gave them the stink eye. He focused back on me and gave me a pearly white smile.

"Do you want to catch, um, a movie or something sometime?"