A/N: Thank you for the continued support, I'm really enjoying reading your reviews.
The practice was similar to the last, Aubrey pushed the girls and everybody tried to show their best hockey in order to secure a spot on the team. Near the end of the training, Aubrey and Chloe left to take a quick shower before they would have their meeting with the coaches to decide the faith of the other girls. Once they returned to the field, Coach Smith ordered the other girls to clean up, shower and head to the meeting room in the sport centre. They would learn whether they made the team in an hour.
Beca only listened half, as she was distracted by the beautiful redhead in from of her, who was now wearing a white tank top with a black sports jacket and a pair of dark skinny jeans. She had collected her still wet her in a loose bun on her head. She turned to Beca, who looked away quickly, because she didn't want to get caught staring. She felt the gaze of the redhead, and decided to help Amy pick up the balls at the far end of the field.
The constant chatter of the Australian and the task of picking up balls helped to keep Beca's mind occupied enough for the next few minutes. By the time they were done, Chloe was long gone, and the field was cleared. Most of the other girls were already getting their bags at the dug-out or walking off the field. Beca and Amy now also made their way to the dug-out. As they arrived Beca heard a familiar voice call her name behind her. She turned around and saw a grinning blonde goalie.
"I made the team," he said as his face broke into a big smile. "When will you hear?"
"In about an hour," she responded. She tried to look indifferent, but felt the nerves inside her built.
"You wanna hit some balls at me? It might help to distract you a bit."
She nodded grateful, feeling this was exactly what she needed. They made their way to the goal. As Beca hit her balls, she felt the nerves dissipate. Jesse seemed to enjoy the challenge of stopping even the hardest balls, and he did a remarkably good job for his relatively short posture. After a while the men's team entered the field, which Beca took as her cue to leave. Jesse walked her to her bag and wished her good luck. She thanked him, partially for allowing her to forget about her nerves for a while and made her way to the showers.
She showered alone, since the other girls had already finished, and headed to the meeting room at the sports centre. She was relieved to find a free chair besides Amy, who was still chatting away. Most of the other girls were silent, as was Beca. She couldn't handle the nervous atmosphere, so she got out her headphones and started playing one of her mixes. This helped her relax a bit, but it didn't work as well as usual. Luckily the wait wasn't too long, since she had entered the room late. Amy tapped on her shoulder to indicate that she needed to remove her headphones.
As she looked up, she met bright blue eyes watching her. She pointed her gaze at her head coach who was explaining the procedure.
"We have picked the 16 girls that are going to form the team this year. We will announce our selection first. Then we will personally have a short conversation with all of the girls who didn't make it, the rest of you can wait here. We will then have our first team meeting of the year in which we will go over the rules for this team. Is that clear?"
Everybody nodded. Coach Smith took out a list and started calling off names. Beca was counting down in her head. Since Aubrey and Chloe were obvious picks, only 14 other girls could make the team. As she counted, she saw girls around her break out in smiles. She also got increasingly nervous. Four more to go, three, two…
"... and Beca Mitchell." Beca led out the breath she was holding. She finally averted her gaze from the coach and saw two sets of eyes looking at her. She tried to fake a confident smirk, but knew that she had already been caught by her two captains. Chloe smiled at her while Aubrey displays only a whiff of approval. She heard some sniffles around her and Chloe immediately walked to the source of the sound and hugged one of the girls that didn't make the team. Aubrey was obviously not at ease right now, and Beca understood now why Chloe was co-captain. She felt a pang of jealousy as the redhead was still embracing the girl in tears. She quickly reprimanded herself, she made the team and she should be happy. Besides, this meant spending more time with her favorite captain. Unfortunately this also meant spending more time with her least favorite captain, who was still standing in front of the meeting room with an uneasy expression on her face. Chloe now took the lead and directed the rejected girls towards the door.
As the girls left the room with the captains and coaches, Beca took her time to look around the room. She was glad to see a few familiar faces. She wasn't too big on making friends and hadn't talked to most of the girls during practice. She was happy to see Amy still sitting beside her. Opposite her Lilly and Stacie were also smiling. Cynthia Rose of course made the team, being the only goalie. She didn't know the other girls' names, but was sure she would learn them soon enough.
The wait didn't seem too long, because Amy was entertaining the girls with stories from her time playing in Tasmania. Beca started to really like the Australian. Just when the blonde girl was engrossed in some story about a mermaid dancing competition she had won, the door opened. A relieved-looking Aubrey lead the way to both of her coaches and her co-captain. The blonde took the floor.
"First of all, congratulations! However, the real work is just beginning. I went easy on you this week, but that will change as we start to prepare for the season. We will train three times a week. I expect a 110% out of all of you, both on and off the field. On the field, you run for every ball. Off the field, you make sure you sleep enough and eat healthy." At this point, she was looking at Amy, who was shrugging and muttering something about treating herself. "You will not be distracted by relationships. You are expected to be present on the field fifteen minutes before practice. You do not miss a practice. You definitely do not miss a game, so sundays are sacred. We have arranged several preparatory matches before the competition starts. These will take place the upcoming few weeks either on sundays or on practice days. We will approach them like we do normal matches. I will be your captain in the field, so my word is final there. Chloe will handle everything off the field, so if you have any problems you turn to her. We will win the championship this year, whatever it takes."
After Aubrey finished her speech everybody started getting up. Some girls talked about some party the men's team was throwing and made their way back to the field. As Beca wanted to leave the room, Aubrey called her back and asked her to wait outside for a bit. Then the captain turned to Amy and asked for a word. Beca walked out and sat on the bench. After a short while, Amy emerged, shot her a goofy grin and wished her good luck.
Beca shyly her opened the door, and walked in. Chloe saw her appear, waved her over and told her to sit down. The freshman was slightly intimidated, as she sat in front of her two captains and two coaches. Aubrey addressed her.
"We were very happy to see your penalty corner today, your drag flick is very good and we could definitely use it the competition. However, a lot of work still needs to be done, you need to train with different stoppers and injectors. We will also train on some variations the next few weeks. Being a penalty corner specialist for this team means a lot of extra responsibility. We need you to be at practice half an hour before everybody to train for the corner. You need to be resistant to pressure and you need to be able to score the decisive goal in the last minute of a match. Are you able to make that commitment?"
Beca was taken aback by the harsh tone of the blonde. She understood that her captain wanted to take the championship this year and that this caused of lot of stress. She also knew that part of that stress would be on her, if she was their penalty corner specialist. They couldn't afford spending time training her to have her cave under the pressure and walk away. But Beca had a lot riding on this as well, she needed to stay on this team in order to keep her end of the deal with her father.
"Yes, I can do that."
Aubrey looked at her sceptically, but Chloe smiled, and Beca decided to focus on that. Then Dawson addressed her.
"You have a lot of talent, kiddo. I will work with you over the next few weeks to refine your skill. We will meet every practice half an hour in advance. Sometimes we will practice with other girls, sometimes it will be just us. I will ask a lot of you, but I promise you will get a lot back as well."
Beca nodded. The tension in the room was tangible, since Aubrey still didn't seem to believe that she was committed to the team and was staring intently at her. Besides her, Dawson looked content, while Chloe was outright smiling. Beca couldn't read the look on the head coach's face, but at least it didn't resemble that of Aubrey's. Chloe decided to break the silence.
"Okay, let's go find the other girls. This ginger needs her jiggle juice!"
Beca shot her a thankful look and got up. As she turned around she felt Chloe link arms with her and lead her out.
Somewhere between arriving at the field and climbing the stands on the side, Beca had lost sight of Chloe. She was probably of congratulating some of the guys that made the men's team. Somehow, she knew most people her by name and field position. This left Beca alone in the stand, until her favorite goalie approached her.
"So you made team. You know what this means, right? You are one of those hockey girls, I am one of those hockey boys, and we're going to have beautiful hockey children. It's inevitable."
"Yeah, that is so not going to happen."
Jesse's face immediately fell and Beca felt sorry for her harsh tone and explained. "It has nothing to do with you, I really like hanging out with you as a friend, but I'm gay."
This seemed to help a bit, as Jesse started smiling again. "Well, then I need you to wingwoman me. I'm going to grab a drink, you want anything?"
Beca nodded in response and Jesse turned around. As he walked away an already slightly tipsy redhead took his place. She pulled Beca close and started talking in a whisper.
"I'm so glad you made the team. We will get to hang out like all the time. I think we're going to to be fast friends!"
Beca was extremely uncomfortable with the distance between them, so she was relieved when Chloe released her. Admittedly, she also felt a bit disappointed, because she liked the touch and smell of the redhead close to her. Chloe held her gaze for a while before they were interrupted by Jesse. He pressed a drink in Beca's hand, causing Beca to avert her gaze to him. Chloe looked from Beca to Jesse and then quickly excused herself. Beca wanted to stop her and tell Jesse to leave, but she was too late. Her face fell as her captain walked away.
"So, you like the redhead," Jesse remarked matter-of-factly.
Beca looked shocked. "It isn't that obvious, is it?"
Jesse nodded in return. Beca made a mental note to keep herself in check around her captain in the future. She knew she would be spending a lot of time with Chloe over the next year, but she definitely didn't need to get attached to anything here. She wanted to play hockey one year, and one year only, and then move to LA. Besides, Chloe obviously thought she liked Jesse. Ugh, this was going to be a long year.