Free Shutout by Brendan Halpin Page A

asked.
    â€œHey, yourself,” I said, trying to sound more casual than I felt. “How come you never called me back last night?”
    â€œOh my God, I am so sorry. Courtney was breaking up with Jonathan, and I had to hear all about it and she wouldn’t let me off the phone until like nine-thirty, and then Mom told me it was too late to be on the phone and blah blah. Were you avoiding me because you’re mad?”
    â€œOh no,” I lied. “Not at all. Marcia was feeling really bad about the handball yesterday, and she stopped me to apologize, and she was being kinda high-maintenance, and it took me five minutes to convince her that it wasn’t a big deal, and by that time I was already sitting there. Besides, it looked like you had somebody better-looking to talk to.”
    â€œAmanda, Courtney is not better-looking than you.”
    â€œI’m not talking about Courtney,” I said, smiling.
    Lena broke into this great big grin. “Is he the cutest thing on the face of the earth? It hurts my eyes to look at him. Too bad he likes Courtney.”
    â€œNo way, he totally likes you.”
    â€œYou’re crazy!”
    â€œNo, I could read the body language from across the caf.” True. I read his body language during lunch when I was not looking over there and not getting jealous. “It’s all about you.”
    â€œHis friend Jared is having a party on Saturday and he asked us to go, but I thought he was just being polite and asking me because I was sitting there. Oh my God, you have to come with me. I mean, I wasn’t even going to go, but you have to go with me. I’m freaking out.”
    I patted her on the shoulder. “Don’t freak out. Of course I’ll go with you.”
    Of course. Because Mom and Dad will be delighted with the idea of me going to a kegger. Because I’d love to stand there feeling awkward while Captain Gorgeous hits on my best friend! Being a good friend completely sucks sometimes.
    I was the first one at soccer practice that afternoon, and when I went to grab a ball, Beasley told me, “Grab a seat there first, Amanda. And don’t sit on the ball. I hate it when people do that.”
    â€œWhat’s up?” I asked nervously.
    â€œYou’ll see,” she said.
    Everybody looked at me when they came to practice, and I just shrugged. Finally, when everybody was there, Beasley said, “Okay. Who can tell me something they learned from watching the varsity game yesterday?”
    All the girls looked at each other. I guess we wereexpecting her to go over what happened in our game. Finally I raised my hand.
    â€œAmanda?”
    â€œWell, I saw how important subs can be. The other team thought they had the offense figured out, but the offense totally changed when Lena came in the game. It took them two goals and a lot of yelling from their coach before they stopped marking Courtney and started paying attention to Lena.”
    â€œFor all the good it did them,” Beasley joked. “Great, Amanda. You’ve just earned your starting spot in the next game.”
    A lot of girls gasped when she said this. She’d told us to bring notebooks, but if anybody besides me had brought them, nobody had used them, and now she was giving out the starting positions based on who had something to say about the varsity game! I was really glad I went first because I didn’t have much else to say.
    â€œI told you I wanted you paying attention to what was happening in the varsity games. You’ll be earning your starting positions for every game by showing that you’re not just playing the game, you’re studying it and trying to get better. Now, who’s next?”
    It took an agonizing twenty minutes for ten girls to come up with stuff to say, and so we spent a shorter time running around than usual, but I’d never spent so much time analyzing a soccer game before.
    That night, getting ready to leave