by Jake Maddox
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1: Moving In
CHAPTER 2: Hockey with a Ball?
CHAPTER 3: Bully Bullies
CHAPTER 4: More Studying
CHAPTER 5: Goal?
CHAPTER 6: Cut?
CHAPTER 7: Cramming
CHAPTER 8: One More Chance
About the Author
About the Illustrator
Glossary
More About Ice Hockey and Field Hockey
Discussion Questions
Writing Prompts
Copyright
Back Cover
Chapter 1
MOVING IN
Fiona Roth was sitting on a cardboard box in an empty bedroom in her new apartment. She didn’t feel like she was at home, but she was.
All around her were cardboard boxes and big, bulky suitcases. In the corner, posters were rolled up in tubes leaning against the wall.
“Are you unpacking?” her mom called from the other room.
Fiona sighed. She was supposed to be getting her bedroom set up.
“Yes, Mom,” she called back. Then she got up and opened the box she’d been sitting on. It was full of her hockey equipment.
“Well,” Fiona said to herself, “at least this town has a hockey team.”
Fiona loved hockey. She had been one of the best players on her middle school’s ice hockey team. And the other players were her best friends. Life was great.
That is, life was great until her mom got a new job and they had to move down to the city.
Fiona had spent her whole life — till now — living in a small town way up north. Everything was different there.
There were lakes everywhere. Houses were sometimes miles apart. Between them were huge fields and forests.
River City was totally different. First of all, the city was much bigger than the town Fiona had lived in.
There were no lakes at all. Plus, almost everyone lived in an apartment, not a house.
The apartment Fiona’s mom had found for them was half of the top floor of a big, square building.
There was a back yard, but they had to share it with the people who lived in the other three apartments. And anyway, it was a tiny back yard. Nothing like the woods that were behind their old house.
It was going to be hard to get used to.
One of the last things Fiona had done in her old house was to look online for information about the middle school she’d be going to. She quickly found out that they had a hockey team. Smiling, she had turned off her computer and packed it up with the rest of her things.
Now, in her new bedroom, Fiona reached into the hockey equipment box and pulled out a puck. She tossed it up and caught it.
“My lucky puck,” she muttered. Just then, her door opened.
“Fiona,” her mom said. She looked disappointed. “You haven’t done much unpacking.”
Fiona shrugged. “I know,” she said. “I will.”
Her mother sighed. “I know you’re still sad about moving,” she said.
Mom walked over to Fiona and took the puck. Then she smiled. “Remember,” she said, “tomorrow you can join the hockey team at your new middle school. It’s all you talked about on the drive here.”
Fiona tried to smile as she reached out and took the puck back. “That’s true,” she said. “It’ll be great to get on the ice.”
“Now start unpacking,” Mom said. “I’ll order us a pizza.”
Fiona smiled. “Okay,” she said. Then she walked over to another box and started unpacking her clothes.
Chapter 2
HOCKEY WITH A BALL?
Fiona’s alarm clock buzzed the next morning at six o’clock. She moaned as she rolled over and smacked the clock.
“Wake up, sunshine!” her mom called from the kitchen. Fiona could hear her mom clanking plates and glasses, setting the table for breakfast.
Fiona didn’t feel very sunny. It was her first day at a new middle school, in a new city.
Everything was going to be completely different from her hometown. She was not excited about it at all.
Fiona slowly got dressed. Then she stomped to the kitchen. She shoveled her cereal into her mouth, chewed quietly, and drank her juice. She didn’t say anything.
“Healthy breakfast,” Mom said. “It’s very important.”
Fiona grunted her agreement. She chewed the last of her cereal and looked at her mom. “Write me a note,” she said suddenly.
“A note?” Mom asked. “For what?”
“Say that I don’t have to go to school,” Fiona told her.
“Oh, Fiona,” Mom replied with a sigh. “Don’t start.”
Fiona slowly got up from the table. “Fine,” she said. “Send me off to misery and sorrow.”
“Drama queen,” her mom replied with a laugh. “Have a good day!” she added as Fiona left the apartment with her bag.
The new middle school was only a couple of blocks from their apartment. Fiona walked slowly down the sidewalk. She was in no hurry to get to school, after all.
Soon, though, she reached the front of the school building. Quickly, she felt around in her bag for her lucky puck. It was scratched up from too much use on the ice back home, but she loved it.
She gave the puck a quick rub and took a deep breath.
“Here goes,” she said. Then she pulled open the door and stepped in.
It was chaos.
There were kids everywhere. Some were gathered at their lockers, shouting about their weekends. Others were in their own world, listening to their MP3 players. Others looked as lost as Fiona felt.
Fiona gripped her puck tighter and walked on.
Mom said to go to the office first, Fiona told herself. She looked ahead and spotted a small sign that read “Office,” so she headed that way.
She was about to open the door and walk in when she overheard something.
“I’m so excited for hockey season,” someone said.
Fiona stopped and turned. Two girls were sitting on the bench outside the office. One was a bit taller than the other and had very long, dark hair. The other was small with short, mouse-brown hair.
They looked her up and down. For a second, Fiona hoped she was dressed cool enough for her new school. She tried not to worry about it.
“Did you say hockey?” Fiona asked them.
“Yes,” said the smaller girl. “Who are you?”
“Oh, I’m new,” Fiona replied. “I’m Fiona.”
“I’m Aliyah,” said the taller girl. “And this is Selma.”
The other girl waved.
“Nice to meet you,” Fiona said. “I played hockey back home. I mean, my old home. I’m hoping to join the team here, too.”
“We’re actually waiting here to sign up for tryouts,” Selma said.
Fiona beamed. “Oh great!” she exclaimed. She shook her head and said, “I just can’t wait to get back on the ice.”
Selma and Aliyah glanced at each other.
“Um, the ice?” Aliyah said. “What are you talking about?”
Fiona started blushing. “The ice,” she repeated. “You know, as in hockey?”
Selma and Aliyah started laughing.
“What’s so funny?” Fiona asked.
“Ice hockey?” Aliyah said through her chuckles. “You play ice hockey?”
Fiona was confused. “Yes,” she said. “Don’t you?”
Selma shook her head. “We play field hockey, Fiona,” she explained. “There is no ice hockey team here.”
Fiona was stunned. She’d been looking forward to playing hockey again so much. She hadn’t thought about the fact that most schools didn’t even have girls’ ice hockey teams. Up north, it was so cold that everyone played ice h
ockey. But in a lot of schools, only the boys played — if anyone did!
Aliyah finally stopped laughing. “It’s okay, Fiona,” she said. “You should join the field hockey team anyway.”
Fiona frowned. “I don’t know,” she said. “Hockey with a ball?”
The other girls laughed again. “You’ll get the hang of it,” Selma assured her.
Fiona shrugged. “I guess I might as well,” she said.
Aliyah nodded. “Right,” she said. “It’s not like you can play ice hockey alone anyway.”
Chapter 3
BULLY BULLIES
The rest of Fiona’s first day at the new middle school went by in a blur. She met her teachers and her classmates. She walked around the school, sometimes lost, looking at a map of the school the principal had given her in the morning.
“I never needed a map at my old school,” Fiona muttered as she tried to find her way around after school. “The locker room has to be around here somewhere!”
A girl bumped into her. “Watch it,” the girl said.
Fiona looked up and saw two girls glaring at her. “Sorry,” Fiona said. “I’m a little lost.”
“Look, Jess, she has a map,” one of the girls said.
“I know, Paula,” said Jess. “She’s not used to big buildings. They live in barns where she’s from.”
Paula laughed. Then the two girls walked away.
“That was rude,” Fiona muttered as she walked on.
Finally, she found the locker room. She was a few minutes late already, so she quickly changed and ran out to the field for the hockey tryouts.
Coach Kelly stood in the middle of the field. The team sat in a circle around her.
Before joining the circle, Fiona looked up and down the field. The first thing she noticed was that it was bigger than a hockey rink. It looked more like a soccer field.
There was a center line, and a line on each defensive side, just like in hockey. But the crease — the half circle surrounding each goal — was much, much bigger.
Fiona looked at the circle of girls sitting around the coach. She was happy to see Selma and Aliyah. But then she spotted Jess and Paula, the two girls who had been rude to her in the hall.
“Anything we can do for you?” the coach asked, looking up at Fiona.
“Oh, I’m Fiona Roth,” Fiona said. “Sorry I’m late.”
“You’re the new girl,” Coach Kelly said. “That’s okay. Take a seat.” Fiona smiled and sat down next to Selma.
“Oh, great,” Jess said. “Farmer Fiona wants to be on the team.” Paula cracked up laughing.
“That’s enough, Jess,” Coach Kelly said. Then she turned to Fiona. “Fiona, Selma tells me you played ice hockey back home.”
“That’s right,” Fiona said. “I played forward.”
“Well, you’ll pick this up quick enough, I should think,” the coach said. “Just remember: there’s no checking in field hockey. I don’t want to see anyone get hurt, okay?”
Fiona nodded. “Okay, Coach,” she said. “No checking. Got it.”
The coach got the girls into two teams for a scrimmage. Fiona was glad when Coach Kelly put her on a team with Selma and Aliyah. She was worried she’d end up with Jess and Paula, who obviously didn’t want her around.
The practice game went pretty well at first. Soon, though, play stopped for a penalty call.
“I need a forward from each team,” the coach said. She picked up the ball.
Fiona knew from ice hockey that the face-off would come next. That would get the game going again.
“I’ll do the face-off, Coach,” Fiona called out. She ran over to the coach.
Right away, Jess and Paula started laughing.
“The ‘face-off’?” Paula said in a mocking tone. “Coach, seriously! She doesn’t even know how to play.”
“Okay, Paula,” the coach said. “Keep it to yourself.”
Then the coach turned to Fiona. “In field hockey, we start play again with a ‘bully,’” Coach Kelly explained. “It’s a little different from a face-off in ice hockey.”
Fiona blushed deeply and stood back. “Oh,” she said timidly.
“Just watch for a while, and you’ll see what I mean,” the coach added.
Selma walked over to the coach to do the bully for their team. Paula did the bully for the other team.
The coach placed the ball on the ground between them. Suddenly, the two girls slapped the ends of their sticks together three times. It made a loud clapping sound.
Then Selma slapped the ball backward to Aliyah, and the game was back on.
“This is not hockey,” Fiona muttered to herself.
With a sigh, she tried to keep up with the action. But it was like trying to watch television in a different language. She felt completely lost.
Chapter 4
MORE STUDYING
It was a long week for Fiona. Selma and Aliyah did their best to be nice to her, but it didn’t help much. Jess and Paula were still giving her a hard time. Fiona kept going to field hockey practice, but she was sure she wouldn’t end up making the team.
On Friday, Coach Kelly posted the names of the girls who had made the field hockey team. Fiona was sure she wouldn’t be on the list.
“There is no way I made the team,” Fiona said to Aliyah and Selma after school. They were walking fast down the hall toward Coach Kelly’s office.
“Sure you will,” Aliyah said.
“I don’t even know the difference between a field hockey field and a soccer field!” Fiona said nervously. “The sticks look like candy canes to me. How could I make the team?”
“You’re a good athlete, that’s how,” Selma replied. “That’s the most important thing. You can learn the sport easily.”
“Right,” Aliyah agreed. “Besides, it’s not that hard to make the team.”
The three girls reached Coach Kelly’s office and waited for the crowd of girls to clear.
While Fiona waited for a space to look at the list, Jess and Paula stepped out of the crowd.
“You’re lucky, farm girl,” Jess said. She sneered at Fiona.
“Yeah,” Paula added. “You may have made the team, but trust me, you won’t like being on the team.”
“We’re not going to make this easy for you,” Jess explained, glaring at Fiona. “You can count on it.”
With that, the two mean girls strode off.
Selma and Aliyah looked at their new friend. “Well,” Selma said eventually, “at least you made the team, right?”
Aliyah chuckled. Just then, Coach Kelly stepped out of her office.
“Fiona Roth?” the coach said.
“Here, Coach,” Fiona replied.
The coach walked over to her. “First of all, good job. You made the team,” the coach said.
“I heard,” Fiona replied. “Thanks.”
The coach nodded. Then she said, “Now, I can see you’re a good athlete, but you’ll need to study up on the rules of field hockey a bit.”
“I know,” Fiona said.
The coach pulled a booklet out of her pocket. “Study this,” Coach Kelly said. She handed the booklet to Fiona.
“Um, okay,” Fiona said. She glanced at the cover of the booklet. It read “Field Hockey – Rules and Regulations.”
Coach nodded. Then she went back into her office.
“It’s like homework,” Fiona said to Selma and Aliyah. “This is so weird. I’ve been playing hockey since I knew how to walk. I really don’t think I need to study.”
Fiona flipped through the booklet. “Seriously,” she went on. “This is ridiculous. I learned to skate when I was about two. I was holding a hockey stick in no time. And now the coach expects me to study for a hockey team?”
Selma laughed. “Well, it is a little different,” she said.
“I have enough studying for math, history, and language arts,” Fiona said. “How will I have time to study hockey? This is crazy.”
“Don’t worry about i
t,” Aliyah said. “Field hockey is really not that complicated.”
Fiona glanced at the booklet again and then shoved it into her bag. “I’m really not worried about the rules at all,” she said.
“You’re not?” Selma asked, confused.
Fiona shook her head. “I hate studying. I don’t want to do it,” she explained.
“It won’t take long,” Selma said. “Pretty soon you’ll be a pro.”
Fiona looked down. Then she said, “The truth is, I’m mostly worried about Jess and Paula making my life miserable.”
Chapter 5
GOAL?
Fiona had all weekend to get to know the rules of field hockey. Her mom even found a cable channel that was showing a couple of field hockey games played by teams from Europe.
“They’re showing a few games this weekend,” her mom said. “It would be a fun way to learn the sport!”
But Fiona just shrugged. It still felt like studying to her.
So instead of studying the rules booklet or watching field hockey on TV that weekend, Fiona e-mailed with her friends back home. Then she set up an ice hockey goal in the back yard and practiced slapshots with her lucky puck.
“This counts as practice,” she said to herself. “Staying in shape is staying in shape, right?”
By the time Monday came around, she didn’t know any more about field hockey than she had all week. And after school, she had to go to field hockey practice.
“Okay, girls,” Coach Kelly said once the team had gathered around her on the field. “First of all, congratulations to all of you for making the team. We had a big turnout this year, so you should be proud.”
“Some of us prouder than others,” Jess said with smirk.
Paula laughed. She looked right at Fiona and added, “Or luckier.”
“Today, before we get into drills, we’ll do a short scrimmage,” the coach went on. Then she divided up the girls into two teams.
This time, Fiona ended up on a team with Jess and Paula.
