Chapter 2 Ashton Hollow

~Hailey's POV~

The hallway smelled like floor wax and too much cologne, and the noise was already in the air before I even got through the front doors, lockers slamming, sneakers squeaking, someone's laugh way too loud. Banners hung from the ceiling, huge ones, gold letters on navy blue:

ASHTON HOLLOW HAWKS, STATE CHAMPIONS, HOME OF GRANT HALE.

I kept my head down and my grip tight on my duffel bag strap, the one with Dad's basketball zipped up safe inside. I wasn't here to make friends. I was here to survive until graduation, find the tryout sheet, and disappear.

"You look lost."

I turned and found a girl with glasses and a stack of books hugged to her chest, watching me with the kind of open curiosity that usually made me want to walk the other way. This time I didn't.

"I'm looking for my locker. Number two-fourteen."

"Oh, that's easy, it's right past the trophy case." She fell into step beside me like we'd known each other for years. "I'm Allison, by the way. You're new. Everyone's already talking about you."

"Great," I muttered. "Exactly what I wanted."

"Small town." She shrugged like that explained everything, and honestly, it kind of did. "So what's your deal? Sports, band, drama club, secretly a genius?"

"Basketball," I said, and for the first time since walking in, something in my chest loosened a little. "Where do I sign up for girls' tryouts?"

Allison's face changed. Not dramatically, just a small flicker, her mouth pressing into something careful. "There isn't a girls' team."

"What?"

"They cut it two years ago." She said it gently, like she already knew this would land hard. "Budget stuff. The board voted to put the money into the boys' program instead, travel costs for championships, new gear, all that. The boys' team basically runs this whole school."

My stomach dropped so fast I actually stopped walking. Basketball was supposed to be the one thing that stayed the same. The one thing Dad gave me that nobody else could touch. And now I was standing in some hallway I didn't choose, in a town I didn't choose, being told even that was gone.

"I mean… There has to be something. "A club team, intramurals, anything."

"Not really." Allison hesitated, then added, "Although... there's no actual rule that says a girl can't try out for the boys' team. Nobody's ever tried, but it's not written down anywhere that you can't."

I looked at her. "You're serious."

"I mean, good luck surviving it," she said, "but yeah. Tryout sign-up sheet's on the gym door. First bell's in twenty minutes if you want to go look."

Something in me settled, hard and certain, the way it does right before I step onto a court. "Show me."

We hadn't even made it halfway down the hall when the crowd in front of us shifted, parted almost, the way water does when something bigger swims through. I heard them before I saw them, that particular kind of walk, loud voices, easy laughter, the sound of people who'd never once worried about being invisible. Varsity jackets. Gold letters. And right in the middle of them, a boy with black curly hair and a small scar cutting through his left eyebrow.

My whole body went cold before my brain even caught up.

He saw me at the same moment I saw him, and his stride slowed, that easy grin sliding into something sharper. "Well, look what crawled into my town."

"Tristan." His name came out of me flat and hard, like a door slamming.

Allison's head whipped between us. "Wait, you two know each other?"

Tristan stopped a few feet away, close enough that I could see he'd gotten taller, broader, his face harder than it used to be. "Carter." He said my last name like it tasted bad. "Still running around acting like you own every court you step on?"

"Still an idiot, I see."

A couple of the guys behind him laughed. Tristan's smile didn't move, but something behind his eyes did. "You just can't stay in one place or you got kicked out from your previous team.

No response

“Guess that explains why you dragged yourself out to the middle of nowhere." He shrugged, already turning away like I wasn't even worth finishing the conversation. "Try not to embarrass yourself here too."

He walked off before I could say anything back, his friends trailing behind him, and I stood there with my hands shaking, not from being scared, from wanting to put my fist straight through that stupid smirk.

"Okay," Allison said slowly, "that was... a lot of history for a Monday morning."

"We were kids together," I said. "Before. It doesn't matter."

"Clearly it matters a little."

I didn't answer her. I just started walking toward the gym doors, faster now, my duffel bag banging against my hip with every step. The sign-up sheet was taped right there on the glass, a plain sheet of paper with a pen dangling from a string, ASHTON HOLLOW BOYS' BASKETBALL TRYOUT SIGN-UP printed across the top in block letters. My hand closed around that pen like it was the only solid thing left in the whole building.

I'd barely touched the paper when a hand slammed down flat against it.

"What are you doing?"

Tristan. Of course it was Tristan. He must have doubled back, or maybe he'd never actually left, just waited to see what I'd do.

"Trying out for basketball," I said, not looking up.

"This says boys' tryouts, Carter." His voice had that same cold amusement from before, like he was already enjoying whatever came next. "Tryouts are for players. Not cheerleaders."

"I'm not a cheerleader."

"Could've fooled me." He leaned in, close enough that I caught the smell of his aftershave, sharp and expensive. "This court is mine. Has been since I was twelve. Girls don't play on my court."

Something in me went very still, the way it does right before I drive to the basket, that quiet second where everything narrows down to one clear line. I looked up at him, and I didn't blink.

"We'll see about that at tryouts."

I pushed the pen against the paper and signed my name in bold, dark ink, pressing hard enough that the tip nearly tore through, HAILEY CARTER, right there under a list of names that were all boys, all confident, all certain this gym belonged to them. Tristan watched me do it, his jaw tight, that easy smirk gone now, replaced by something harder to read.

Behind him, Allison had gone quiet, watching the whole thing like she wasn't sure whether to be impressed or worried for me. Maybe both.

The bell rang somewhere down the hall, sharp and sudden, and the crowd around us started moving again, breaking apart like nothing had happened, like I hadn't just signed my name on a piece of paper that was about to turn my whole life upside down. Tristan didn't move for a second longer, just stared at my name on that sheet like it had personally insulted him.

Then he looked at me one last time.

"Don't say I didn't warn you… Carter.”