Have you ever been hit by a hockey puck before? Let me tell you it hurts. A fire shoots through you like there is no end. It burns, it stings, throbs and aches all at the same time. It's like being kicked in the ribs. By a horse. It's like having your heart ripped out and handed to your neighbor. It's like… well. It hurts. We'll just leave it at that.

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I trudged down the hall of the dorms at Eden hall Academy. I carried a large duffel over my shoulder and a boom box in my left hand. I shifted my bag and cursed my mother for dropping me off at my new boarding school without even saying goodbye before running off with her new boyfriend. I cursed her again and again for "moving on" so quickly. Dad had died 3 months ago of a heart attack. No one really knew how it happened, but I was sure my mother had told him she was cheating. I hated her even more now as all this thinking made me even more angry. She even made me leave my guitar at home. "what will you play?" she asked. "music" I replied. "but when?" I left it at that. I asked her if I could take the lap top. "what will you use it for?" she asked. "typing" I replied. But she still didn't let me take it. I asked if I could bring my drum set. "what will you do with it?" she asked. "make loud annoying sounds." I replied. Needless to say she didn't let me bring that either. I cursed under my breath and set my bag down to get my key out for when I found my room.

Something zinged over my head and hit the wall behind me with a loud crash. Startled, I stood up and turned to see what had made the awful racket. At that instant something with the force of a thousand rockets hit me in the stomach making me feel the burning, throbbing, aching pain that is a hockey puck. I took a sharp shallow breath and clutched my stomach before another puck glanced off the side of the hall, leaving a black rubber mark on the white paint before zipping past my leg.

"what are you trying to do? Kill me?" I tried to yell as I bit back the pain. The puck had hit my last rib on the left side.

Three boys rounded the corner. One was slightly mouse faced with blonde hair and brown eyes, his hair was all combed over and looked Jelled. I basically wrote him off as one of the snob's I'd seen everywhere else. He was wearing a jersey with the number 99 on it. He was the same height of the second one who had shaggy brown hair, dark eyes, thick eyebrows, a round face and an optimistic look. His jersey had number 96 on it. The third was the shortest, but still taller than I was with an oval face, dark skin and interesting looking hair that looked like he had been electrocuted by a spark plug or something. Each had a hockey stick in their hands.

They all rushed up when they saw me standing there grasping my midriff. They all started to apologize profusely.

"I'll be fine." Or at least that's what I was telling my self.

"Y'want help with your bags?" Number 99 asked, picking up my duffel as number 96 grabbed the boom box.

"Do I have a choice?" I asked.

"not really." The third boy stated, picking up the hockey pucks laying along the hallway.  All three insisted on escorting me to my room.

"so, what're all of your names?" I asked as we walked.

"Adam." 99 said.

"Charlie." 96 put in.

"Jesse." The third boy added.

I nodded. "I'm Mel."

"Mel?" Jesse asked.

"Melissa." I replied as we turned down another corner. "here." They stopped as I jammed the key into the hole of room 359. I turned it slowly and it clicked. I pushed open the door to reveal a bland white room with two beds underneath two windows with a dresser between them. A small refrigerator sat on top of the dresser and two mirrors attached to the walls on either side of that. Closets were along the right side of the wall and a desk was behind the door. The bed spreads were bland along with the rest of the room and it made me sigh. I stepped in and collapsed into the desk chair as Adam put my duffel on the bed as Charlie put the boom box on top of the dresser. "So do you guys always hit hockey pucks at the new kids?"

Jesse leaned against the door way while Charlie sat on the bed and Adam leaned against his stick. "no…" Adam started.

"Hey, we're sorry about that. No one's usually in the halls, and we just wanted to see how far down they'd go." Charlie explained.

"You sure you're alright?" Adam asked.

"Yeah, I'll be fine." I replied.

"Which puck hit ya?" Jesse asked.

"What do you mean?" I queried.

"We only shot three pucks. Which one hit ya?" He asked again.

"The second." I replied.

Charlie cringed. "Ouch. Jesse, you really have to lay off those crackers man." I took it from what he said that it was Jesse's puck that hit me.

"Nice shot." I smiled at Jesse who, in turn, smiled back.

"Where are you from?" Adam asked.

"Madison, Wisconsin." I replied.

At that moment a round curly haired boy ran by, did a double take, and appeared in the doorway. "C'mon guys!" he turned and looked at me and stopped talking. "Hello there…" He said as if he were trying to make a move.

"GOLDBERG!" Jesse hit the new comer on the back of the head.

"What'd I say?" Goldberg asked as if he had done nothing wrong.

Adam and Charlie rolled their eyes. "lets go guys, practice." Charlie said, turning. Jesse followed, dragging Goldberg off by his pant loop. I stood to wave them goodbye, but Adam stopped before exiting.

"you sure you're alright?" he asked.

"I think I'll be fine." I tried to reassured him.

"Jesse hits hard." He said. "where'd it hit?"

"My rib." I replied.

"Show it too me." He said. I raised an eyebrow. "show it to me." He repeated.

I lifted the edge of my superman tee-shirt to show the forming bruise on my side.  He touched it lightly and I cringed. "uh. Ow." I said, sarcastic like. I gave him a look that made him pull back.

"Sorry." He apologized, He wasn't starting to look like such a snob anymore. "You should get that looked at." He said just as a blonde appeared in the door.

"Adam! C'mon! Coach'll throw a fit!" She walked in, grabbed him by the arm and dragged him away with no regard to me. I watched them walk down the hall and shook my head. The lady at the front desk had told me I'd be the only girl in my room and that the dorms were co-ed… for some reason or another. I flopped onto my bed and moaned. A pain shot through my side again. I took a deep breath and it hurt too. I sighed. 'It'll be alright in a few days' I told myself before sitting up and pulling clothes out of my pack. I grabbed my underwear and stuffed it into a drawer before dumping my clothes onto another bed and spreading them around the room.

"more homey already." I smiled. I pulled out a poster of my favorite band and placed it on the wall, fixing it with my ever present duct tape. I turned on some music and before I knew it I had pictures up everywhere, posters, and bumper stickers plastered to the back of the door. I glanced at the clock and it was 5pm. Dinner to be exact. I stuffed some pens in the pockets of my super wide leg jeans and grabbed a note book. It was something I carried with me everywhere. I walked down the hall and into the cafeteria. It was the biggest cafeteria I had ever seen.

I got in line for food and loaded it with the only things that looked edible. An Orange, a donut, and a bowl of soup. After paying I stood staring at the endless tables of eating teenagers. There were obvious "cliques" of people as you may call them. There were the cheerleaders, and the Jocks across from them. The snobs, the nerds. And my personal favorite(yeah right), the dead heads. I rolled my eyes. There didn't seem to be anyone worth sitting with really. I started to walk forward to an empty seat at the end of the hall and tripped, over what, I don't know. But My tray flew into the air and the orange landed on the ground, where another kid with a full tray stepped on it and tripped, sending food everywhere. My soup landed on the head of a buff looking boy with curly brown hair and a leather jacket. He stood and turned as I cringed.

"Is this yours?" He asked taking the bowl from his head and handing it to me as I nodded.

I took it slowly. "Sorry." I said.

"You bettah be sorry…" he was starting to get in my face as a brown haired boy ran up to stop him. I recognized him as Charlie.

"Hey Portman, lay off, she's new." Charlie said as the boy backed off and sat down again. Charlie turned to me. "Hey Mel. There's an empty seat by Adam if ya want it." He said pointing across the table to a vacancy between a brown haired girl and Adam. I smiled and went around to take it. "Hey everyone, This is Mel, Mel, JV Hockey team."

I was greeted by a bunch of Hi's and Heyya's from the team and the boy I dumped soup on even smiled at me. I shrugged. Boys are just weird. The brown haired girl next to me introduced herself as Connie and the blonde next to her was Guy.

"You play hockey?" She asked. I shook my head. "You don't know what you're missing." She said before turning back to Guy.

"so, is everyone on JV this friendly?" I asked Adam.

"you could say that…"  Adam shrugged. I opened my notebook and started to describe as thoroughly as possible everything that had happened in the recent past.