Contraindication

Eight| Meat Sweats

"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take."
- Wayne Gretzky, ice hockey legend

I agree with him... but I don't even know who Wayne Gretzky is.

*PHFFFT!*

I covered my ears as the whistle burned my eardrums.

"ALL RIGHT STUDENTS, IT'S YOUR FAVOURITE TIME OF THE MONTH... FITNESS TESTING!" Mrs. Zip, the school's very buff and very intimidating gym teacher screamed to get our attention.

Great. This was just great. I wished I took the entire week off.

To be fair, fitness testing was a completely random day of the month so I didn't know it was going to be today... but still? Why did it have to be the day I return?

Fitness testing was a day (or week) where all the students were graded based on their abilities to perform athletic tasks.

Ugh! Fitness testing was my personal hell.

The students from all around the large gym converged in to the centre. They were all depressed and dressed in black shorts and thick grey t-shirts. Each t-shirt had the school's stupid Wizard mascot, and the name plastered in the middle.

Property of Beans Ville Secondary School

Everyone, even the athletic students, groaned as Mrs. Zip took out her pink bejeweled clipboard. Today her blond hair was up so high she couldn't fully blink. Her face was also caked in makeup, and her pink tracksuit was wrinkled. She even donned a pair of 6-inch heels that made her already tall stature, taller. But don't let the fancy get-up distract you; Mrs. Zip will destroy you in ball hockey, soccer, and basketball without breaking a sweat.

"Ok, everyone!" She looked around the semi-circle that formed around her. "I think we should start off with something easy?" She flipped up some papers, then smiled widely. "How about the rope climb?"

"No!" The class booed and moaned.

"You gotta be kidding me." Tracy played with her long bright yellow nails, "I just got these done."

I rolled my eyes at her petty comment. Tracy said she was going to skip gym to go out to lunch with Charles. But here she was, standing beside me.

Charles was no where to be found.

I don't bother asking her why she was here; she had her life, and I had mine.

"Come down everyone!" Mrs. Zip blew her whistle once again. "It's only select students today! I don't want to watch every one of you fail. "

The fact that she said today made everyone freaked out even more. Only select students today meant this was going to continue daily for a few more days. Ugh, this meant fitness testing for the rest of next week.

While the class complained, Mrs. Zip asked a few students to bring out the blue foam mats. She also got the custodian to release the rope from the sky.

"What's rope climbing?" Darren asked as we stood far away from the setup.

Felix groaned, "there's a rope that's about 8 metres long attached to the ceiling and you have to climb it."

"That's it?" He scratched his blonde dog hair.

"No..." I crossed my arms and leaned against the vent on the cream wall. "You're timed and since there is only one rope, the entire class sees everything." I shut my eyes, "Everything..." I recalled the time I couldn't even make it a metre up the rope. It was my first time, and I felt really embarrassed.