Chapter Text
It’ll be different this time .
That’s what Ty Lee always told herself. She so desperately wanted it to be. Life was like some sort of big game that she was never given the rules to play. Everyone else had the directions and could follow them perfectly. Not her. She was a silly, clueless, weird girl who could never fit in. She was the kind of girl who bounced on the balls on her feet and waved her hands when she got excited. She talked too loud and far too much. Everyone including her own family would tell her to settle down. Ty Lee would try. Boy, did she try . She’d reinvent herself a million times.
I’ll shut up about gymnastics.
I’ll talk less.
I won’t make things weird.
I’ll finally get everyone to love me.
Sometimes it almost worked. The quieter version of herself got more positive attention. She was “sweet” and “cute.” She was “such a vibe.” But the second they really got to know her, she’d revert back to her old self, and they’d run away and never look back.
Not now. Ty Lee left her hometown and started her new life as a college freshman. The frilly, fancy clothes that her sister Ty Lin always said were “too extra” were replaced with casual camis, t-shirts, crop tops and jeans. Ty Lee got rid of her binders covered in a million stickers, opting for plain spiral notebooks instead. She kept her figurines, books, and other items related to whatever niche interest she had at the moment to collect dust on the shelf in her childhood bedroom. Ty Lee attended tryouts for the cheerleading squad and got in. She’d make friends and she wouldn’t screw it up this time.
Or so she thought.
“Hi! I’ll get a large matcha latte with vanilla and oatmilk!” Ty Lee chirped as soon as she got to the register at the coffee shop inside the library, taking in the scent of freshly ground coffee beans, leaning forward and standing on her tiptoes.
The barista at the register listlessly put her order in, then nodded for Ty Lee to scan her student ID.
“Thanks!” she said with a smile as she scanned her student ID, putting it back in the sleeve pocket she attached to her phone. Then, she hopped over to the side to wait for her drink being made. She watched the other barista put in a few teaspoons of the matcha powder, four pumps of vanilla, and a cup of oatmilk into a shaker—combining it vigorously.
“She’s so annoying,” a girl with a high ponytail complained, getting Ty Lee to look over. The girl tossed a glance at her friend beside her. Ty Lee looked around. No one else was in line but those two girls. Ty Lee made it to the cafe right when it opened—7:30 in the morning. The whole room was still dimly lit—mostly just empty space and bookshelves. A sinking feeling fell at the pit of Ty Lee’s stomach as she realized…it was about her . The girl’s friend nodded—a smug smile playing on her lips.
Ty Lee pulled out her headphones and put them on, blasting music to drown everything out, suddenly shaking. What did she do wrong? She asked for her drink normally. Sure, she was a little excited, but she didn’t do anything weird . At least, not that she was aware. Ty Lee looked at the girls from the corner of her eye—they were whispering, their eyes darting back and forth to her.
Then, she was met with absolute horror as she saw them wearing matching backpacks—the cheerleading team embroidered on them. Ty Lee swallowed nervously, taking her drink as soon as she saw it put on the counter, and walking out as fast as she could. She took a sip—letting the foamy bubbles at the top coat her tongue—the sweet taste of vanilla perfectly complimenting the tangy, slightly bitter matcha.
It was probably nothing. Maybe it wasn’t actually about her and they were talking about something else. And even if it was about her, she’d find a way to win them over. First impressions were never the best, right?
Ty Lee took a few deep breaths as she walked out the doors of her library back to her dorm. It’d be a few hours until her first class started. The breeze of the misty morning curled around her—the sky a soft grey, illuminated by the glow of the sun behind it. Ty Lee looked around, the green of the leaves on the trees already starting to fade. The campus of her college was so picturesque—like something in a movie. Her heart rate started to slow down bit by bit as she looked around—feeling rejuvenated by the nature surrounding her.
Ty Lee continued to sip her matcha as she got into her building, tapping the ID and pressing the button to open the doors, before walking up the stairs to her door. She was able to get herself a single. Ty Lee knew that if she wanted things to go right this time, she had to minimize any possible anxiety that she could have. Having her own space at the end of the day would be better for her. As she walked by a few other students with their backpacks slung against their shoulders, her head started spinning a little from what happened earlier.
“Why did they think I was annoying?”
“What am I doing wrong?”
“How can I make them like me?”
The buzzing of her phone interrupted her line of thought.
[Rushi] I’m getting ready to go to Calc I. Wish me luck. I hope you have a great first day, friend. :)
Ty Lee couldn’t resist smiling down at her phone. At least she had her friend Rushi, even if she was a thousand miles away at her fancy school. Rushi had always been a straight-A student with a love for math and all the sciences. The two had met when they were in elementary school and while their lives often carried them in different directions, they always found their way back to each other. Things were so silly and fun and free when she was around. Ty Lee could actually let her guard down and not worry about it. But Rushi was not the rule, she was the exception. Ty Lee started to type.
[Ty Lee] Oof, I’d rather die than take Calc I. Good luck! Cheerleading practice meets for the first time today! I’m so excited!
Ty Lee frowned a little as she put her phone away. She wished she still had the same excitement as she did for it earlier. Ty Lee knew almost everything there was to know about cheerleading. She’d done gymnastics and tumbling since she was little. In the last semester of high school, she got some books about cheerleading and watched videos and YouTube tutorials to learn more, so she’d be able to join the team. But those two girls at the coffee shop worried her. Ty Lee’s breath became shorter, starting to feel dizzy as her stomach churned. What if everyone decided they hated her? No. She wouldn’t let it get to that point. It was a new year and a new place. A completely fresh start.
Ty Lee took out her pink lanyard, swinging her keys before unlocking the door to her room. She swirled her matcha around in its plastic cup, taking more sips as she tried to settle down. Nerves on the first day were normal. Everyone was a bit out of their element. It would all end up okay if things weren’t perfect. It had to.
As soon as she finished her matcha, Ty Lee tossed it in her garbage bin, hopping on her bed and hugging her elephant plushie to her chest. She couldn’t bring herself to leave it at home or get rid of it. It didn’t really matter anyway. No one seemed to judge college students who had plushies. Her older sisters had some of their own, and a couple of them had already graduated college. Besides, it felt so soothing to cuddle with a soft little friend.
Ty Lee mentally went through the list of her classes for the day. College Writing I, Consumer Science, and Introduction to Literature. She decided to major in English since it was her best subject in school. Ty Lee even wrote her own short stories and novels when she went on vacations with her family, and won Scholastic awards for her poems. She loved getting lost in her own fictional universes—making anything she wanted it to be. Her inner world was filled with all kinds of stories. It’d be so much fun to spend most of her time on topics that she already considered hobbies.
She wasn’t thrilled to be taking Consumer Science with a separate lab. Science and math were never her strong suit, to put it mildly. But it was supposed to be one of the easiest options. And she had the lecture right at 10:00am.
Ty Lee lazily opened up Pinterest and scrolled through the app—it suddenly felt like a million years before she’d be taking off to go to class, and she started feeling a bit restless. There wasn’t much she could do before class, since it was the first day. But she just continued to breathe, mindlessly scrolling and holding her plushie. It was going to be a great first day. She’d make sure of it.
***
The rest of the morning didn’t go exactly as planned—not by a long shot. Ty Lee happened to walk into the wrong building—sitting in a lecture hall for some upper-level psychology class for a few minutes until the professor started to speak and she realized her mistake. Her head rang with humiliation as she awkwardly gathered her stuff from the front row, having to explain that she wasn’t in the right class, earning some snickers from the students. She was able to find her way to Consumer Science within five minutes. She wasn’t too late but everyone looked up when she walked in. Her legs wouldn’t stop trembling as she sat at her desk, looking down and trying to collect herself. Ty Lee always did things like this—even Rushi would tease her affectionately for not exactly being the most aware of her surroundings. But it got embarrassing when people noticed.
As soon as she regained the ability to focus, she heard the professor talking about how they would be calculating molar mass and figuring out the structures of complicated molecules in household products. This was supposed to be an easy class. But it seemed to be a far more advanced version of the chemistry class she passed by the skin of her teeth in high school.
The bright buzzing of the fluorescent lights in the room didn’t make things any easier. Ty Lee felt so dizzy as she got up to her next class—feeling like everything was humming. She couldn’t even enjoy much of her other two classes—she already made two faux pas before noon hit and the work she needed to do for Consumer Science was filling her with dread.
Ty Lee didn’t feel ready for cheerleading practice, but maybe some fresh air and exercise would help with all this. And she still had another opportunity to charm the people on her team. She took as many deep breaths as possible as she got into her athletic clothing, putting her keys, extra hair elastics, and a protein bar in a gym drawstring bag. This could be a fun way to end the day!
Luckily, the campus shuttle arrived right when she got to the stop. She got on the shuttle, with music fluttering through her headphones as she took a seat, a few groups of students following suit. Ty Lee could see them in small clusters—talking, laughing, and smiling with each other as the shuttle rolled by their college town. She sank down a little. Everyone seemed to have all their groups figured out. Making friends had to be hard . Ty Lee looked down at her phone, putting her favorite song on repeat. That always helped comfort her. She stared out the window–watching the sunlight hit the trees, and the traffic lights, and the street lights whizz on by.
As soon as the shuttle stopped, Ty Lee stood up and put her headphones away in the drawstring bag, throwing it over her shoulders before slowly walking off the shuttle surrounded by all the other kids. She took some more deep breaths—trying not to focus on the crowd closing in around her. Once she got off, she raced over to the field, seeing a circle of girls by the bleachers. They must be the other cheerleaders. And sure enough, she saw those two girls from earlier stand next to each other with their arms crossed.
“It’ll be okay. They just haven’t gotten to know me yet!” she kept reminding herself over and over, like a mantra. But it didn’t do anything about the tangled mess of knots in her stomach. Ty Lee made her way to them and smiled.
“Hi! I’m Ty Lee,” she introduced herself. Immediately, the girl from earlier whispered to her friend, her hand shielding her mouth, and her friend started giggling. Ty Lee’s face flushed as she grew shaky again.
“Hi, you’re new aren’t you?” another girl piped up, her hair french braided down her back. “I’m Song,” she said with a sweet smile. Ty Lee let out a small sigh of relief. At least, someone here seemed nice and friendly.
“Yeah, I’m a freshman,” Ty Lee replied, as Song nodded, and the two girls kept whispering. Ty Lee looked away, trying desperately to ignore them, but the shaky feeling still wouldn’t go away. She started to play with her braided hair, hoping some of this nervous energy she was holding would start to dissipate.
A beat later, one of the other girls sighed. “I really hope Coach Zhang isn’t such a hard ass today. She takes herself so seriously as someone without her sh*t together.” A bunch of the other girls hummed and nodded in agreement.
Ty Lee looked around and spoke up. “Yeah, I was wondering why we didn’t get our uniforms already! I really wanted to wear it to practice today,” she said with a little chortle of laughter, smiling.
Deafening silence took over as soon as she spoke up. All the girls started looking at each other, and then pulled out their phones, staring at their screens and mindlessly scrolling. Ty Lee turned to face Song and even she seemed to be in agreement with whatever unspoken social rule that Ty Lee just broke.
“What did I do wrong?” Ty Lee started internally panicking. Maybe that comment wasn’t exactly related. She had a habit of saying things that were slightly or completely off-topic without realizing. But she was just trying to contribute. Or she might have said something too silly. One of the two. Ty Lee swallowed and continued to play with her hair, trying so hard to fight the stinging sensation that pricked at the corner of her eyes. Why was this day already so difficult? She bit her lip. She knew she had to persevere. Things would be fine.
Suddenly, an older woman in her late-thirties to early-forties showed up with a clipboard and a whistle around her neck. That had to be Coach Zhang. She clapped her hands together.
“Alright girls, let’s move closer to the field. Practice will be starting in a minute or two,” she said matter-of-factly, taking a glance at her watch.
Ty Lee walked with the other girls to the center of the field. She watched as a bunch of boys in football uniforms ran across the field in their cleats. Among them, she saw a girl with raven-black hair tied up in an impossibly neat bun. She gasped a little. There was a girl on their football team? That was so cool! She’d never seen a female football player on her high school team or heard of any in her neighboring towns. Ty Lee knew it wasn’t impossible , some girls in other states made news for it, but she wouldn’t have expected it here. She made eye contact with the girl for a split second. Her expression was focused and serious, before she turned her head back. Ty Lee’s heart started to beat faster—not because of nerves but something else. She’d never seen a girl so pretty in her life—amber eyes and smooth skin and bright red lipstick. An immense desire to talk to her and get to know her rose up in her chest. But for now, she had to focus.
“Let’s all go around and introduce ourselves briefly,” Coach Zhang said. “Just say your name, year, and your major.” She pointed to Ty Lee.
“Hi! I’m Ty Lee. I’m a freshman and I’m majoring in English with a concentration in Creative Writing,” she said a little shyly, still nervous about her interactions earlier.
“I’m Star,” the girl from the coffee shop drawled lazily, her tone and her expression flat. “I’m a sophom*ore and I’m a psychology major.”
Her friend started next. “I’m OnJi, I’m a sophom*ore, and I’m a psychology major.”
“Both psychology majors? That must be how they know each other,” Ty Lee thought to herself, feeling surprised that two girls who seemed so mean were into psychology as a field. But maybe she had to give them the benefit of the doubt. They could have just been tired or cranky that day. Ty Lee knew that starting a new year after a fun summer could feel a bit disappointing.
The next turn went to Song. “I’m Song,” she said with a friendly smile. “I’m a junior and I’m a Biology major with a minor in Public Health.”
The rest of the circle took their turn and Coach Zhang stood in front of them, clapping her hands together again. “We’ll start with some stretches.”
The whole group followed her example–doing some stretches with their arms and legs, reaching their toes, and bending backwards. Ty Lee smiled a bit as she did hers—it felt good to stretch after a long day. And she knew exactly what to do—there would be no screwing up here. After a minutes of stretching, Coach Zhang spoke up again.
“Alright, now we’ll start with some basic moves. We won’t be doing pyramids or any other stunts until a bit later. Let’s start with the clasp.” She started with her hands at her sides, bent them at the elbow, cupped her hands and clapped.
Ty Lee did as she said, smiling wider, forgetting all her troubles from earlier. Being a cheerleader was going to be so much fun!
“Now, the V. It’s exactly how it sounds.” She lifted her arms to resemble a V and balled her hands into fists.
Ty Lee and all the other girls followed suit.
“Great job girls, let’s keep going!”
***
The rest of practice went by pretty fast. As Coach Zhang said, they were only doing basic moves. Being able to focus on task was helpful, and Ty Lee was even complimented for her form a few times! Years of tumbling and gymnastics really paid off. For once, it was a good thing that she was utterly obsessed with all things related to it. But she still wasn’t going to talk about it too much. That would be annoying. The air started to cool down as the sun slipped below the horizon, the pinks, purples, and oranges of the sunset casting its warm glow on the field. Everything looked so beautiful.
“Bye!” Ty Lee said to the girls as they all gathered their stuff and started to head out.
“Nice meeting you, Ty Lee,” Song said, offering a little wave before rushing to the shuttles. Everyone else ignored her—some boisterous laughter coming from Star and OnJi. Ty Lee’s muscles tensed up as she let out a long, heavy sigh. Hopefully, she’d stop doing whatever she was doing to keep them so entertained, or they would decide not to act so weird around her.
Ty Lee walked over to the football players wrapping up–hoping to find the girl she saw earlier. Without noticing, she bumped into one of them, their helmet flying off their head.
“Ugh! Watch it!” a high-pitched, overly-enunciated voice sounded. Ty Lee’s face grew dark with embarrassment and panic. She just knocked over the girl she wanted to talk to.
The girl faced her—the snarl on her face softening a little as she saw Ty Lee with her head bent down, her eyes brimming with tears. She sniffed, feeling mortified, willing herself not to cry. “Hey, hey,” the girl said gently. “I’m sorry. I just wasn’t expecting that.”
“It’s okay,” Ty Lee said softly, trying to smile. “I’m not usually such a klutz,” she managed to giggle.
“Who are you, anyway?” the girl asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I’m Ty Lee. I’m on the cheerleading squad,” she answered, puzzled how this girl couldn’t have noticed. “It’s my first day.”
“Mine too. Well, except for pre season,” the girl shrugged. “Azula,” she said, offering a hand to her.
Ty Lee giggled a little at the formality and reached out, taking her hand, which Azula shook firmly. “I think it’s really cool that you’re on the football team,” she blurted out, and then slammed her mouth shut. “Why did I say that, why did I say that, why did I say that?” she internally panicked. That probably came across wrong. Oddly enough, Azula didn’t seem offended. In fact, she smirked.
“Not many places allow for a female quarterback, but here we are,” she replied in a haughty tone.
“Quarterback? Wow!” Ty Lee gasped. “That’s amazing! What are you studying?” she asked, a warm, delicate rush settling over her as she talked to this girl. Everything about her seemed so interesting and she really couldn’t get away from the fact that she was pretty. Even her arrogance had a bit of a charm to it.
“Mechanical engineering with a business administration minor,” Azula sighed.
“Oh smarty pants,” Ty Lee said with a smile.
Azula chuckled a little, raising her eyebrow and smirking again. “Are you like this with every new person you meet?”
“Not exactly,” Ty Lee answered, feeling a blush rise to her cheeks. “Just the people that I think are really cool.”
“I’m cool, hm?” Azula said, putting a hand on her hip. “What about you? What are you studying?”
“English with a Creative Writing concentration, so on the other side of campus” Ty Lee chirped. “I’ve always liked writing novels, short stories, poems and stuff. I want to be a full-time writer when I graduate.”
Azula just nodded, starting to put her things away.
“But I’d love to see you and chat more if you’re interested!” Ty Lee said, leaning down to meet her eyes. “I have a lab that I go to on your side of campus once a week—on Wednesdays! The lab is at like 9:00am but I have nowhere else to go until like 2:00pm that day.”
“I suppose I could meet you in the library for an hour before noon—on the third floor where it’s quiet. I’m very busy,” Azula responded.
“Oh of course,” Ty Lee said with a big smile, suddenly feeling happier than she had all day. “Well, I’ll see you then!” she waved, running off before Azula could wave back.
She looked behind her for a split second. The girl was crossing her arms and smiling, shaking her head to herself, before going back to gathering her things.
Ty Lee’s heart raced again, unable to resist smiling as she stopped to wait for the next shuttle.
Freshman year wouldn’t be so terrible after all.
