Chapter Text
"What the hell do you think you're doin'?"
"Isn't hell a cuss word for you? Don't you need to go confess for that shit?"
Toni and Shelby are standing no more than a foot from each other. Toni is at least 3 inches shorter and has to slightly crane her neck to meet eyes with the Texan, but she juts out her chin and glowers at Shelby all the same. For her part, Shelby looks slightly frazzled. Her usually impeccable high ponytail has fly always spraying out the top and her cheeks and neck are turning a shade of rouge.
God, stop looking at her neck, Toni.
"What were you and Becca talkin' about? You were gone an awful long time." Shelby tries to sound calmer, but Toni picks up on the panicked edge in her voice.
"Oh my god, chill Shelby. We just talked about school." Shelby visibly relaxes. Toni can't have that. "And then we made out for a bit after I hypnotised her with my lesbian powers." All colour from Shelby's face disappears in a flicker. Suddenly Shelby looks just as queasy as Becca did on the gym floor.
"You're... lyin’ to me. She wouldn't do that." Shelby shakes her head. Toni thinks she smells the faintest hint of citrus.
"Yes, obviously I'm lying to you brainiac, what do you think? Becca's definitely chiller than you with the gay stuff, but she's still a churchy goody two shoes like you. She's not making out with a girl sober. Even if I am lesbian Jesus."
"You're no Haley Kiyoko, don't even try and flatter yourself." Shelby snaps back quickly.
Toni pauses for a second. Shelby's eyes widen slightly in horror, as if she knows her mistake.
"I didn't pick you to be a fan of Haley Kiyoko, sister Christian." Toni says with a clear tone of suspicion. She even throws in a single raised eyebrow for punctuation.
"I'm not. Just stay the fuck away from Becca," Shelby gathers herself into the toughest posture she can. Toni would nearly believe it if she didn’t recognise the look of a deer in headlights. “Okay, dyke?" Shelby spits out the last word with attempted venom, turning on her heels, ponytail flinging behind her and marches out of their room before Toni can even answer.
Toni raises her eyebrows. She's had plenty of run ins with stupid churchy homophobes back home. This didn't feel the same as that. This felt... weird. And scattered. She decided to chalk it up to Shelby just being generally shit at dealing out the hate speech. Haley Kiyoko is relatively mainstream. She would have heard it from the other girls in their dorm. Toni couldn't dwell on it too long. She had to get changed for basketball tryouts.
An hour later Toni was exiting their dorm building with Rachel, Dot and Becca, marching to the gym. And reader, when I say marching, I mean marching. Rachel may have been recovering from a knee injury but the girl still hustled like she was half an hour late instead of half an hour early. Toni's stomach was still a little raw from the last nights antics and this mornings acrobatics but it would take more than a mild hangover to get in between her and basketball. Becca was even looking nearly back to normal, except for she was slightly quieter than usual. Where Becca left silence, Rachel filled it with pointers for the girls about what the coach would be looking for in tryouts and musings over who he would name as interim captain while Rachel was injured. Even though Toni had been to what felt like hundreds of these pre season try outs, she let Rachel ramble, occasionally nodding her head appropriately and giving the occasional appreciative "mhmm". While Toni had never been seriously injured like Rachel, she had been stuck sitting on the sidelines for extended periods of time and new the frustration that came with it. Granted, the times Toni was sidelined was nearly always due to suspensions for her poor behaviour. Still, she had empathy for Rachel.
Toni was happy they got there early. The sound of bouncing basketballs echoing through the gym began to fill the hole in her chest she thought may be empty forever. The smell of body spray and sweat perforates her sinuses and Toni makes sure to take a few seconds just to pass the basketball from hand to hand. She runs her fingers over the grippy leather, letting the weight of it sit comfortably in her palms. She feels strong. Her heart had been so torn apart by Reagan and losing basketball that she thought she may never feel like her normal self. But, a few minutes on the court shooting hoops and she could feel the old Toni start to stir, as if waking from hibernation. Her jump shots sailed through and she was even hitting most three pointers. Reagan used to call it her 'Toni Swagger'- cute but cocky, she'd say. It was the sort of attitude that used to drive Reagan wild, have her pulling Toni into the back seat of her car as soon as the game was ended, breathless and needy, spreading wide to let Toni press inside her. It was also the attitude that got Toni dumped. So, on balance, maybe not the best thing. By the time basketball trials actually start the Toni Swagger is in full force. She breaks ankles, takes outrageous shots and she can feel the coaches eyes on her. It's during one particular flashy play that she has the arrogance to look into the stands to shoot the ball blind that she spots a familiar blonde ponytail in the bleachers. She smirks and jogs to the bench for a rest. She can't help it if the bench so happens to face Shelby and her group. The Texan is sitting next to her boyfriend and a couple of others that look like the male basketball team. She also can't help that she wants to fuck with Shelby a little bit. It would almost be impossible to not. Toni can’t help it, something about the blonde makes Toni unreasonably mad. She could chalk it up to Shelby’s homophobic slurs, her blind Christian faith or her seemingly perfect life, and yeah, that did fuck her off. But it was mostly the little stuff. The way Shelby never pronounced her g’s. How she was needlessly optimistic about everything. Even just the sight of her swishing high ponytail set off a stress headache for Toni. So she waits until Shelby makes eye contact- granted, it doesn't take long- before spreading her legs apart ever so slightly and gently licking her top lip. She is awarded with her desired reaction from Shelby nearly straight away. Even from a fair distance Toni can see the deep red seeping into her cheeks and her eyes go wide before looking anywhere but at Toni. Toni smiles knowingly.
The rest of try outs wrapped up without much issue. Toni, Dot and Becca were named on the squad. Dot was even named replacement captain which made Rachel actually squeal with joy. As the team was leaving the court Coach Taylor called Toni over.
"What the fuck was that Shalifoe?"
"What do you mean? I made the team?" Toni’s head spins a little in confusion.
"I mean what the fuck was that? Basketball is a team sport. You acted like the Lone Ranger. I would need more than both hands to count how many times you ignored an easy pass in favour of a flashy shot. That may have been fine at your old club, but here it won't fly. You’re a good player, you’re talented. But if you keep it up you'll be warming the bench. Now hit the showers." Coach Taylor turned on his heel and headed to his office. Toni knew there was no point causing a scene right here and now. She's new, bottom of the totem pole, but her blood was boiling all the same. Who was he to call her selfish? She worked so hard on her game and knew that when push came to shove, that she could only trust herself out there. Fuck coach. Still seething, she began to skulk to the locker room.
"What's wrong Shalifoe? Can't handle the heat? Fucking dyke.” Toni’s head whipped around to see Andrew sniggering with his mates as they make their way down from the bleachers and onto the court. If Toni wasn’t mad already she was fuming now. “You know I heard she got kicked out of her last team because nobody wanted to play with a lezzo,” Andrew continued. Toni was seeing red. She could practically hear her heart pumping. Her vision blurred at the edges and her hands started shaking. Andrew is at least a foot taller than her, but Toni knows that height doesn’t mean shit in a fight when she’s angry and she is sure that she’ll be able to get a few good jabs in. She’s about to walk over to Andrew, take the fight to the big guy, when she feels a hand grab her shoulder firmly.
“Shut the fuck up, Andrew.” Rachel, Becca and Dot were by her side. They looked as angry as Toni felt. It actually made her heart swell just a little to see them there, defiant and unafraid. It had been a minute since Toni had friends willing to go into bay like this for her. Andrew shrugs, nonplussed, and begins passing the ball around his teammates. Toni goes to start towards him, but feels Dot pull extra hard at her arm.
“He’s not worth it, Shalifoe.” Dot says quietly. Begrudgingly, Toni let’s herself be lead from the court.
“Pay him no mind, Toni. The guys weak as piss. Last year he cried after he jarred his fingers in a match. They didn’t even bruise.” Rachel, Becca and Dot laugh at the memory and then begin swapping ‘gnarliest injury’ stories. They burst through the doors of the gym into the oppressive heat of the afternoon. Toni zones out from their conversation completely as she catches sight of her least favourite Texan (and that’s saying something) disappearing into the toilet block. Something was off. If Toni didn’t know any better she would think Shelby was… crying.