The Championship

I: The Tryout

I: The Tryout

It's kind of funny how fast time passes when you don't want it to. I spent the past three years of my life surrounded by my favorite people in the whole entire world (mostly), and now I only had one more year left. They say that high school kind of sucks, but I don't think that's true. Life is what you make of it, and I had certainly made the most of -

"Sydney!" My head jolted up, and I dropped my pen, quickly snapping the little journal I had been writing in shut as I heard a faint feminine voice call from my bathroom. It was probably the sixth outfit my friend Lilly had put on this morning. She was trying to find the perfect outfit to wear for our last first day of high school.

We were finally seniors, and if I knew anything about Lilly, I knew she was going to pull out all the stops for her last first day outfit. She walked out of my bathroom, "Syd, you're still writing in that journal? You need to get ready" she shrieked. She picked up one of the throw pillows on my bed that my mom insisted I have, something about routine or looking fancy, and threw it at my head.

"Hey, hey, hey I'm almost ready!" I defended, easily catching the pillow and throwing it back on the bed, "and maybe you should take some notes and get a journal too. It might be something you wanna look back on one day."

Lilly's head tilted as her big blue doe eyes widened in consideration, "You're so right, Syd, I am totally gonna get one- I can't believe I didn't think of that soon- wait, hold on, you are so not gonna distract me on our first day. Now, what do you think of my outfit?"

She was wearing a black romper with mini lilies on it which I thought was very fitting for her. She had worn, battered white sneakers on which I had to admit was a fashion trend I never really quite understood. Given that I was a soccer player and had been playing since, well- ever- I always took care of my sneakers, however, I could admit that Lilly pulled them off.

"I think you look amazing as always-"

"Syd, you know that is so not helpful-"

"Well if you'd let me finish," I rolled my eyes and with a small laugh said, "you would know that this one is my favorite."

Lilly rolled her eyes at me and let a small smile creep onto her face, "Get dressed you loser, we're gonna be late."

I walked into the bathroom and splashed some cold water on my face. I normally wasn't one for makeup, but I'd been up into the late hours of the night outside in my backyard practicing drills and kicking goals and my eyebags totally betrayed that. I was trying out to be a representative from my school for the elite 2 v 2 championship games of Michigan.

Every participating school in the state sent their two

soccer players to compete in bracket determined games and tournaments that all led up to the final championship game. It wasn't very often that a girl was selected for a 2 v 2 team, and it was even more rare that a team with a girl won the championship, in fact, it hadn't been done in the past thirteen years, and I felt like it was maybe time for that to change.

I quickly concealed the bags under my eyes, and put on a quick swipe of mascara for the special occasion, there were no doubts in my mind that Lilly would make us take at least a couple hundred pictures throughout the day.

My first day outfit was simple. A pair of ripped denim shorts and a Glenview High soccer t-shirt. I knew Lilly was gonna yell at me for not wearing something a little more glamorous for the first day, but that just wasn't my style. I let my stick straight blonde hair out of its loosely tied bun, and I was ready to go. I had always wished my hair had been more curly like my moms was, and she always assured me that it would probably change as I got older, just as hers had.