Lessons in Love (3 page)

“Great.” Mr. Simmons sighed. “Now, can anyone give me the answer to the first equation?”

Claire shot Alex a sympathetic look, but Alex merely shrugged. She’d had detention before, numerous times, the experience wasn’t new to her.

The only issue would be her mother. Detention would mean that she’d be late getting home, so her brother would be alone for a while between her mother leaving for her second job and Alex getting back.

It made Alex feel guilty to imagine the look of despair on her mother’s face when she told her.

“First you’re late for a football game, and then detention!” she’d lament, holding her head in her hands.

“I can’t support this family on my own, Alex! I need you to step up to your responsibilities!”

Alex bit her lip in anger as she sat in class, imagining the conversation. She was tired of stepping up to her responsibilities. She was eighteen, her life was supposed to be carefree and full of parties and boys. She couldn’t remember the last party she had been to. Attending the football game was considered a privilege. She envied the students around her who got to have fun without the burden of being a semi-adult.

The bell rang, signalling the end of class. Everyone began eagerly packing away, desperate to leave but not so desperate to commence their next class.

“I told you math sucks,” Claire whispered to Alex as they shoved their notebooks away. Alex noticed that Claire had made a few attempts at the equations on the board and gotten them all wrong.

“It sure does.” Alex sighed. She regretted talking back to the new math teacher. She didn’t think she’d end up with detention because of it.

“See you at the game later.” Jeff came over and smiled enthusiastically at Alex.

“Yeah, thanks to you.” Alex smiled sweetly at him and batted her eyelashes.

“We only ever win when you’re there, Alex,” Jeff told her bashfully.

“Thanks, Jeff,” Alex replied.

Jeff smiled and then walked back awkwardly before turning and fleeing the classroom.

“Oh my God, he is so into you!” Claire enthused as they took a more leisurely walk towards the exit.

“Stop!”

“Seriously! Why don’t you get with him and put him out of his misery?” Claire asked.

Alex wanted to say that it was because the last thing she needed was a boyfriend, a guy who’d never understand what she was going through. But she said nothing.

“I don’t have time to date,” she offered honestly.

“Well, you’d better find time before Jeff goes crazy with longing!” Claire laughed. The girls paused in the doorway, the last to leave the room.

“I’ve got chemistry now, so see you at lunch?” Claire asked hopefully.

“Yeah, I’ll meet you at lunch.” Alex waved at her friend and sighed deeply, despondent about her detention.

“Chin up, at least you’ll make the game,” Mr. Simmons commented coldly from his desk.

Alex looked up, surprised to find that he had been watching her. “Yeah.” She wanted to keep up her confident routine but suddenly didn’t have the energy.

“I’ll see you tomorrow after school,” Mr. Simmons told her sternly. “And save some of your cheering energy, we’ll be doing calculus.”

****

Football games were big news at Woodsdale High. The entire school became adorned in red and white paraphernalia, with some extreme students even painting their faces in support. Local residents and alumni joined the students upon the bleachers to cheer on the high school team.

Even though it was a Wednesday night game, the level of support was just as fervent as at a Saturday fixture. Cars were forced to park on grassy verges at the school, or even along the sidewalk, as people packed themselves in, eager to get a decent seat for the game.

The players always felt the pressure to perform, as they had the hopes of an entire community on their shoulders. But the cheerleaders also felt pressured to perform. Previously if the team lost, accusations had been thrown around suggesting that if they had been better supported in cheers, the game might have turned around. Alex knew this was utterly ridiculous, but still, she had to bow to the desire of the masses and ensure that the Woodsdale High cheerleading team was in top form.

“I hear you almost got detention tonight,” Sophie noted as the girls put on their outfits in the locker room.

“Nope, tomorrow.” Alex smiled sweetly as she wrapped red ribbon around her tight ponytail, which was already giving her a headache.

“Only because Jeff bailed you out,” Kate Hughes added callously.

“Whatever, I got out of it.” Alex shrugged flippantly.

“But if you hadn’t, you could have cost the team the game.” Sophie approached Alex threateningly, her tone low and confrontational.

“If I’d got detention, you’d have had your chance to captain the team,” Alex mused. “So no wonder you’re pissed I got out of it.”

Sophie exhaled in despair and stomped away from the bench where Alex was prepping herself.

“Can’t you demote her or something?” Claire moaned from close by, where she was applying her bright red lipstick, which matched the red of her uniform.

“I would, but she takes it all too seriously, which is kind of what we need,” Alex admitted. “Can I borrow that?” She glimpsed the red lipstick and realized she had forgotten her own, which was actually her mother’s, but she’d been in a hurry that morning and not had a chance to raid her mother’s closely guarded makeup stash.

“Sure.” Claire tossed the lipstick over, and Alex caught it in midair.   

“If only catching a baton was so easy.” Claire sighed. As much as she loved being a cheerleader, none of the routines came easily to her. She lacked natural rhythm, which put her at an instant disadvantage to the other girls. It was also the reason Alex had been unable to name her as her vice-captain despite desperately wanting to. The team would have revolted and called her out on the blatant favoritism.

Being captain had taught Alex a lot. About diplomacy in particular and how difficult it could be to keep everyone happy. She had a whole lot more respect for the president since doing it. She found keeping twelve high school girls in line challenging; she had no idea how he managed to govern the entire country. It baffled her and was one of the many thoughts that helped keep her awake at night.

“Ten minutes!” someone shouted into the locker room, sending the team into a frenzied mist of perfume and hair spray, everyone desperately making the final tweaks to their appearance before they had to go out and be on display to pretty much the entire population of Woodsdale.

“Right, line up!” Alex ordered her team, quickly giving them a once-over to make sure everyone was properly dressed.

The rules around attire were pretty strict and had to be followed completely. First, there was the uniform, a short pleated skirt and vest top, both in red and white and adorned with the school’s emblem. Beneath the skirt were red shorts to prevent giving anyone in the crowd an eyeful when they did high kicks and lifts.

As they stood in line, each girl fanned her skirt to reveal the shorts. Legs were always bare, even in the cooler months, except for white Converse sneakers, which could be worn with or without white trainer socks. Every white item had to shine; there could be no marks or scuffs. Then came hair. Each girl must wear a pristine high ponytail, pulled tight and decorated with a red ribbon. There could not be a strand of hair out of place; hence the copious use of hair spray. Makeup was optional but quietly encouraged, as it helped their features stand out during evening games beneath the floodlights.

Most girls opted for a slick of red lipstick, in keeping with the school colors. Jewelry was allowed so long as it didn’t detract from the uniform. Most girls accessorized their outfit with Tiffany earrings and a bracelet, some wore Pandora. If you chose to wear jewelry out on the field, it had to be designer, as it was an opportunity to show off to the rest of the school.

Alex didn’t wear any jewelry, not that she even owned any designer pieces. She told the others it was because she was leading by example and, really, they shouldn’t wear any, but she wouldn’t be enforcing that rule. She’d hate them to know the truth: that actually she owned nothing of value, as she lived in a trailer, and her mom had to work two jobs just to make ends meet. The lie was much safer and saved Alex an unimaginable amount of shame and grief.

“Shannon, shoelaces.” Alex noticed a pair of untied shoes.

“Chloe, bit more hair spray, your ponytail is coming loose at the back.”

Those small adjustments made, the team was ready to go out and show support for their football players.

“Woodsdale Warriors on three!” Alex commanded, adopting her gleeful, high-pitched cheering voice, which always sounded foreign to her, as though someone had invaded her body and was cheering for her.

The girls gathered around in a circle and placed their hands in. Alex noticed how most had taken the liberty of fitting in a manicure to ensure that their nails also matched the school colors. Her own nails were still fluorescent pink.

“One, two, three,” Alex began, and then the whole team chorused, “Woodsdale Warriors!”

Then the girls ran out of the dressing room in a crowd of giggling excitement, headed straight for the field and into formation.

The crowd always grew quiet when they were about to begin, eager to hear their latest chant.

The opposing team’s cheerleading squad watched from the other side of the field, the rivalry between the cheerleaders just as fierce as it was between the players.

Alex led her team in a chant she had devised that always seemed to go down well at home games. She’d found it difficult to think of anything to rhyme with warriors. The best she could do was parry it with ‘coming for ya.’ It was lame, but the crowd seemed to love it, which was essentially the only reaction Alex cared about.

The routine was fairly difficult. There were numerous kicks and lifts involved, but they were more limited than other teams since they didn’t have any male members on their team. Woodsdale was traditional in mindset and didn’t see the point in guys cheering even though Alex had been approached a few times since she had been appointed captain. She was all for it. It would give their routines some much-needed diversity, but it never went down well with the rest of the girls. So, for the time being, they were an all-female squad. So lifts were not that adventurous, and the climax of any routine was always the pyramid. Alex would much rather end with some daring throws, but the girls lacked the strength to hurl one another into the air more than once during a routine.

As the routine concluded, the crowd roared in appreciation, rising to their feet and clapping and cheering.

“Nice job.” Claire patted Alex on the back, breathing hard.

“Thanks.”

The cheerleaders then took up their position on the sideline while the real stars of the evening now took center stage.

The Woodsdale football team always entered the field to the same song, “I Need A Hero,” by Bonnie Tyler. Alex had heard the song so many times now that it haunted her dreams and had become an unwelcome backdrop to her thoughts. The other girls were much more enthusiastic, singing along at the top of their lungs each time the song played.

Ironically, Alex didn’t care for football, even though she cheered emphatically for it. She found it to be a dull sport that endured for far too long each game. During that evening, the sun set and the floodlights came on before they had even reached the halfway mark. Alex shivered in her skimpy outfit as the evening cooled and began to dread her walk home in the dark. If she didn’t like the trailer park in the day, she loathed it at night. Drug dealers would hover with intent, as would those looking to solicit more than narcotics. She tried to ignore them, but she was a beacon for their taunts, even hidden beneath a hooded sweater.