Read Online The Geek Girl's Guide to Cheerleading by Charity Tahmaseb, Darcy Vance - Free Book Online Page B

wrestlers might think it was the referee.
    Rick retrieved our pom-poms, walked us to the far side of the gym, and gestured to a corner where the yellow mat ended and the hardwood began.
    “You should be out of the way here,” he said. “I’d better go warm up.” He strolled away, pulling off his sweatshirt as he went. I had no idea one boy could have so many muscles.
    “Whoa,” breathed Moni. “He’s hot.”
    Yeah, I thought. And he knows it.
    “He was totally nice, too,” Moni continued, still breathless. “Can you believe they call him Rick the Prick?”
    Actually, I could. “Shh. Don’t say that.” With our luck, his mom was behind us in the stands. But it was true: Rick did have that awkward nickname. And according to gossip, he didn’t just know about the name, he embraced it.
    “Didn’t you see what he did to Todd today?” I asked.
    Moni gave me a confused look.
    “In the cafeteria?” I prompted. “Talk about being a—”
    “You know,” Moni said, as if I hadn’t spoken. “Speaking of nicknames, there’s something about that wrestling outfit….” She gave me that sly half grin.
    I couldn’t believe this. “What about Brian?” I asked.
    “What about him?”
    “I thought you and—”
    “In real life?”
    “No, in la-la land, or whatever you call it.”
    “Oh, in the game he’s a serious mack daddy. But then he stops over the other night to return a book he borrowed and I think, cool, the boy finally figured out an excuse to spend some nonpixelated time with me, right?” Moni rolled her eyes. “He spent the whole time talking to my mom.” She shook her head. Poor Moni.
    And poor Brian. Ever since the two of them went from just friends to…whatever they were…I could tell he didn’t know what to say or how to act around her. The game was probably an easy way out.
    “What about the wand?” I asked. “That was something.”
    “Yeah. That’s what I thought. But tell me this.” Moni looked grim. “Where is he right now?”
    If he were as smooth as Rick the Prick, he’d be in the bleachers behind us, supporting Moni’s cheerleading debut. Okay, this was Brian. Smooth had never exactly been a quotient in his formula. But if he wasn’t here, where was he?
    “Home?” I guessed. “The library? Over at Todd’s?”
    “Ding, ding, ding,” said Moni. “He’s gone over to the Dark Side.”
    “What?”
    “Todd got to him. I went online before dinner and suddenly Brian’s telling me that the wand is just a loan.” She huffed in disgust.
    A staticky version of “The Star Spangled Banner” began playing, and everyone stood. Fixing Moni’s love life would have to wait. When the song ended, two boys walked onto the mat, taking stances opposite each other.
    “What exactly are we supposed to do now?” I asked Moni. “Do we cheer?”
    “I guess. But what?”
    During all the prep for Friday’s big game, I’d memorized dozens of cheers. Problem was, only two were for wrestling. “Let’s do that takedown one,” I said.
    “Ready?” Moni whispered. “Okay.”
    Together we chanted, “Takedown! Takedown! Two points!”
    There was a takedown, all right. But judging by the crowd’s response, it was for the other team.
    Moni cringed. “Bad timing?”
    “How are we supposed to know when to cheer it?”
    “I don’t know…the Internet?” Moni offered.
    I gave Moni a quick look before raising my eyebrows at the new and highly unusual position the wrestlers had taken. “The what?”
    “I found a cheer site the other day while I was surfing at my dad’s.”
    “A cheerleading site?” I didn’t know which was more disturbing, that such sites actually existed, or that Moni was surfing them in her spare time.
    “I’ll print some cheers off tomorrow. I think they had a whole page for wrestling.”
    After a moment—and another takedown—I asked, “Just one page?”
    “Yeah.”
    That would help. But really, knowing what the boys were doing out there on the mat would be