"Are you serious?" Alice asked. I was too stunned to say anything. "Why are you making work with her?"
"You two are the best players that we got and would be perfect for representing the school." Coach Platt. "You better figure out how to work together because we have a non-tournament exhibition match tomorrow."
"When's the real tournament." I asked.
"It starts on Monday." Coach Platt explained. "We're actually hosting it here but all of you will be excused from your classes next week. You just have to complete any out of class assignments. I have high hopes for the two of you."
Okay so, in addition to being stood up, I was going to be playing my first match this week. I know it was going to only be an exhibition but I needed to be focused. I don't know how I was going to play with Alice but I guess I would have to manage. I mean winning is the most important thing when it comes to tennis. Well, it's the most important thing when it comes to match play. I don't play as hard for friendly matches and I do have fun doing it. I wasn't sure what was happening next with Alice and me.
We actually did not practice working on our teamwork during practice. Alice insisted on working on her individual game. This was going to be fun.
Once practice was over, I went to talk to Jane.
"So have you heard about the rumor?" I asked her.
"Yeah, I have." Jane answered. "Apparently whoever started it didn't even recognize me. If I was a lez, I would at least want people to know my name."
I glared at her, displeased that she was joking about it. This was definitely not the time for that.
"Sorry." She apologized. "So what do you think we should do about it?"
"You don't know if there's some sort of campus news, is there?" I asked.
"I don't think just saying it would get people to believe it." Jane remarked. "We have to find the person who started the rumor and get them to admit it."
"How are we going to do that?" I questioned.
"Well we should start by asking the person that told you who they heard it from." Jane explained. "Who did you hear it from?"
"I heard it from Jessica, you know my roommate." I answered.
"Well we might not have that much time to trace the source of the rumor considering you have a match tomorrow."
"Well I want to see what I can find out tonight." I replied. "I mean the gayness of the story isn't even the problem. I just don't like people saying I'm in a relationship with someone that I'm not."
"That could become a problem if you go pro." Jane commented. I looked confused. "It's just you know how celebrities are occasionally linked to each other even if they're not dating. You know the everyday gossip kind of stuff."
"Right so we should go talk to Jessica right now." I stated.
I decided to bring Jane back to my dorm with me. I realized that this could only be furthering the rumor that we were a couple but if we figured out who started it, that would nullify all of that. I opened the door to my room and Jessica was indeed there.
"Jessica, I don't know if you know my friend Jane." I said, motioning to Jane.
"Yeah we're in the same Calculus class." Jessica replied. "But I wonder why you decided to bring her here to the room."
"We're trying to find out who started the rumor about us." Jane explained. "Who did you hear it from?"
"I heard it from this guy named Eric." Jessica replied. "I don't think that he's the one who started it, though."
"Do you have a last name?" I questioned.
"It's Eric Yorkie." Jessica responded.
"Thank you." I told Jessica. The two of us walked down the stairs and began our search for this Eric guy. We also decided that it would be a good time to get some food since neither of us had eaten dinner yet. Who knows maybe Eric will even be after the restaurant. How crazy would that be? Our search took us to Taco Bell.
We went to order and I noticed that the cashier's name was Eric. He had dark curly hair with a little bit of acne.
"Are you Eric Yorkie by any chance?" I asked.
"I am so what can I get for you." Eric questioned.
"Well I'm kind of interested in finding out where you heard that rumor about me." I replied. "I'm Bella Swan."
"Listen I can't really talk about that but if you want to order, I can do that." Eric responded.
"Two Number Eights." Jane replied. "Now will you give us a name?"
"I don't remember the name of the person who told me." He replied. "I didn't know them very well."
Okay, so that wasn't very useful. Now I had no idea how we were going to find out who had started the rumor.
At that point we got out of line and waited for our food. It was at that point that I found out what a Number Eight was. It was 3 tacos and a large drink. It actually seemed pretty boring to me. Although, Jane might have just ordered that since we were on the spot.
"So do you have any suggestions on what to do from here?" I asked.
"Well we could always start with another person." Jane suggested.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"We could ask someone else who heard it who they heard it from." She explained.
"Who did you hear it from?" I inquired before I wondered why I hadn't done that before.
"Is finding this out really that important to you?" Jane asked. "You know you can actually use rumors to build your reputation like this might help you get more guys."
"Or guys might want to stay away from me because they think that I'm a lesbian." I pointed out.
"Don't you know that guys love lesbians?" She remarked. "By the way and definitely hypothetically, if you were actually a lez, would you go for me?"
"Probably." I answered truthfully. "I mean you are short but you're also cute and I do think you would make a good girlfriend. Of we're speaking hypothetically and neither of us is gay, right?"
"Right." Jane replied nervously. "But whatever you want to do about this rumor, I am fine about it."
"Maybe we should let it go." I agreed before I gave her a hug. There was nothing gay about hugging my hot friend. "So if we're not solving a rumor, what are we going to do tonight, Ms. Valentine?"
"Well, Ms. Swan…" She started. "Do you want to go to a movie? They're showing Black Swan at the theatre."
"The last time I saw that movie, it gave me nightmares." I replied. "Why can't we watch a movie about tennis? There's no way that that could be scary."
"Well there really aren't that many movies about tennis." She reminded me. "But I do have Wimbledon if you want to watch that."
"It's been so long since I've seen that movie." I commented. It was a few years after it came out. I had just taken up the sport and Mom rented it for me. You can't rent movies like that anymore. All you can rent is new movies now. "I would like to see it again."
"Okay there's just one small problem." Jane remarked. "I don't have a TV so we'll have to huddle close together to watch it on my laptop. Do you think that you're okay with that?"
"Yeah, sure." I replied. "Just lead to me your room."
I followed her back to her dorm. She seemed to be in a room by herself. That was strange but at the same time, I felt bad for her. The fact that she had to be in a room by herself while all of the other girls had roommates didn't seem fair.
"So you live by yourself?" I asked for confirmation.
"Yes." Jane responded. "I did have roommates at the start of the year but both of them got kicked out for drug possession. I didn't like either of them that much but it gets kind of lonely in here sometimes."
"You know I could probably sleep here with you if you like." I offered.
"You don't have to do that." She replied.
"I just want you to not have to feel alone even if it is only for one night." I told her as I texted Jessica to tell her that I was going to but sleeping in Jane's room tonight…but not sleeping with her.
We ended up sitting next to each other on Jane's bed. This made me wonder what the slumber party in the gym on Friday was going to be like.
In the morning, I went to my chemistry class where I met Alice. I guess if I could handle being lab partners with her, I could deal with being her doubles partner.
"So are you excited for the match today?" I asked her, making small talk.
"Yeah about that...just stay out of my way." Alice instructed.
"I'm not just going to stand there and let you make all of the moves." I told her.
"Well you should because I'm better than you." Alice replied. Okay now I think she was trying to start something with me.
"If you're better than me, how come I beat you?" I asked.
"We've already gone over this. You never would have beaten me in a real match." She replied.
"Girls I would appreciate if you only spoke about the assignment at hand." The teacher chided the two of us. "That is unless the two of you wish to see the headmaster."
"No sir that won't be necessary." I replied.
"We'll stop." Alice promised as she glared at me. I had no doubt that she blamed me for what just happened. I just was not going to say anything about it.
There was definitely a lot of tension while we were doing the assignment. I had a feeling that if her grade didn't depend on it, she probably would have tried to douse me with chemicals.
At lunch, I happened to see Edward. I was still very pissed off at him for standing me up. I did my best to avoid him. That didn't prove possible as he took a seat by me at lunch.
"What do you want?" I asked him angrily.
"I'm really sorry about the other night." He tried to apologize.
"But not sorry enough to make me wait for you for an hour." I spat. "If you didn't want to go out with me, you should have just told me so."
"I do want to go out with you…" He said before I cut him off.
"No if you wanted to go out with me, you would have showed up." I pointed out. "Just do me a favor and stay out of my life."
"You just have to let me explain." He replied.
"No I don't." I replied as I walked away and headed to another table. I can't believe that he actually had the nerve to do that. Did he really think that saying sorry would make everything better? Plus because of the fact that he didn't go out with me, there was a rumor going around that I was a lesbian.
"So what just happened there?" Rosalie asked. "Weren't you really into him a few days ago?"
"Yes but that was before he stood me up." I responded. "I don't want to talk about it, okay."
I saw Edward again and I just raised my middle finger at him and walked towards the gym. If he followed me, I knew he would be sorry.
After school, we went out to the tennis court for our match. It was the first time that I was going to be wearing my official tennis uniform. We were playing a pair of girls from Seacrest Prep: Angela Weber and Bree Tanner.
Alice served first and the match had begun.
Okay so maybe the idea of pairing me and Alice together wasn't such a good idea. It was the like of two of us were competing against each other while we were also competing against our opponents, who seemed to have the idea of teamwork down. It wouldn't be shocking to say that the two of us lost. Once the match was over, Coach Platt called the two of us into the locker room.
"Okay I am officially embarrassed to be your coach." She told us. "That was one of the worst matches that I have ever witnessed."
"It was her fault." Alice blamed.
"No it was both of your faults." The coach declared. "You two are too good to lose any match in straight sets. Maybe if you girls actually tried to work together than outdo each other, you would have won. You two are going to spend all weekend working together and getting to know each other so you don't get knocked in the first round on Monday."
"And why should we do that?" Alice asked.
"Fine, don't but I'm sure you sponsors would love to hear that you lost in the first round of a high school tournament."
"Let's just do it." I told Alice. "The school is counting on us to win this tournament and I'm sure it would beneficial to both of us."
Alice sighed. "I guess you're right." She responded. "I don't want to lose in the first round. I want to win this tournament."
"Great then I want the two of you to spend the night together." Coach Platt said.
"What? Why?" I asked. "You said this weekend."
"Well I have four days to turn the two of you into capable doubles partners and I feel that you two will need all of that time." The coach explained.
After the two of us were changed, we walked out of the locker room.
"She really needs to get laid." Alice replied.
"Well what can we do about that?" I asked.
"Well I know that she has a crush on Dr. Cullen." Alice explained. Dr. Cullen was the headmaster.
"I don't think she wants us playing matchmaker for her." I pointed out.
"Hey if we're doing it together, we're doing what she asked." Alice challenged. "Besides did you have any other ideas for what we can do?"
"I was thinking that we could go down to the game room and maybe play some air hockey." I suggested.
"Air hockey?" She asked in disbelief. "Honey, you're acting like this is a date when it's clearly not."
"Why did you just call me Honey?" I asked. For some reason it made me feel warm inside when she did so.
"Don't worry about it." She said.
"Okay then how exactly are we going to set up our coach with the headmaster?" I asked.
Just leave all of that to me. Alice Brandon always has a plan." She replied.
The two of us ended up going to Dr. Cullen's office. I hadn't seen him since I first arrived here.
"What can I do for you girls?" He asked. I had no idea what Alice was going to say.
"We were just wondering if you were going to be at our tournament on Monday." Alice stated. "Coach Platt would really love it if you were there."
"Yes, I think could make it." Dr. Cullen replied.
"Great we'll make to get you a seat by our bench." Alice replied. "Come on Bella, we have other places that we need to go."
Alice dragged me out of the office. At this point, I couldn't help but wonder what the hell I just got myself into.
So this chapter really develops the relationships that Bella has with Alice and Jane. I'm undecided on whether I want Bella to date Jane before Alice or not. Casting in this chapter includes Adam Sevani as Eric, Sarah Hyland as Angela, Rebecca Black as Bree and Jonathan Rhys Myers as Carlisle. Anyway, don't forget to review.
