Chapter Text
Why would any of this have been a good idea? Coming to tryouts for a sport that he’d barely heard of before, a sport that required skills that he didn’t possess, and which came with a team full of strangers that would watch him embarrass himself. Stan really didn’t know why he was doing this as he walked into the gymnasium of his school on a Tuesday evening, a small backpack with a change of clothes slung over his back. It was pure curiosity for all he knew.
It began so: with Stan walking home from school one day, alone as always, and seeing a small group of girls skating past him, maybe five, all following a guy that seemed like he could be their coach. All of them were handing out flyers to the students, though most of them ended up either on the ground or on the trash.
However, in a moment of curiosity, Stan decided to pick one of the papers up just as the group circled back, overhearing the sheer amount of laughter coming from them. And then, one of the girls stumbled and fell, but instead of the expected mockery that Stan was sure would come, there was laughter again, coming more from her than any other as she stood up again. How could that possibly not be embarrassing?
Finally, he looked at the flyer in his hands.
“South Park Roller Derby Tryouts” it said on it, with a logo of a manicured fist with sparkles all around it, the team name “Sparkle Smashers”, and a date and time of the first practice. Something told him this wasn’t just your usual PE class.
When he came home that day, it took him a long while of just staring at the paper and having a think about it before he finally moved on. He did as much research as he could. It wasn’t the first time he’d heard of roller derby, but it sure was the first time he was directly exposed to it. All of the informative videos he’d watched had a common theme of the team being like a family, and how much it meant to them all, the classics of every sport. Though, it… felt different. Stan could feel it in his gut.
For those couple of weeks, it didn’t get out of his head, and the more he thought about it, the more it dawned on him that if he was so fixated on it, he should just go to the tryouts and see how it was. If he didn’t like it, he could always just not join the team, right?
Besides, how fun could falling on your ass be?
A familiar poster hung on the message board inside the school, the same one he received on that day, except the date had been crossed out, and “TODAY!” was written in big, silver letters on it. Although, maybe this wasn’t the best idea, he thought–maybe he should just turn back, go home, and do exercises in his room. No, no, he already got this far, he might as well get to the end. With a tight breath, Stan pressed on down the hallway to find the locker room with people changing and putting skates and various protective gear on. His steps were slow, careful, and his general body language would tell anyone that he was nervous, almost scared.
Right as he walked into the large room, a sudden noise came from behind him, the thud of skates against hard floors. Before he could react and see what was coming, there were hands on his shoulders, the weight behind them feeling as if the person connected to them was trying to catch themself before slamming into him.
“Whoops!”
Stan couldn’t even turn to get a look at their face, because in a moment, they spun around him and stood maybe a foot in front of him. For a second, he stared dumbly before recognising the person as one of the girls he’d seen when they were handing out flyers, slightly taller than him thanks to the skates. Her hair was mostly hidden by her glittery, golden helmet covered in stickers,but Stan could see a black ponytail at the back.
“Hey there! Fresh meat, right?” she asked him, and for a hot second, he sputtered over his words before managing to mumble out a nervous “yeah”.
“Sorry about the scare, I’m Wendy, team captain,” she continued, making her way to the benches after patting him on the shoulder firmly, “come on over here, we’ll get you some equipment. Might not be the best, but you’ll get your own if you don’t hate us too much after a week or two.”
Following the instructions, Stan took a few steps closer while Wendy called for one of the other girls to pass her a large bag in which he guessed the equipment he’ll be borrowing was. It was handed to him, and he was told to put it all on, as well as change. As said, it definitely wasn’t the best. The wrist guards and the knee and shoulder pads were all frayed, and the plastic on them was completely scratched. The helmet was covered in stickers (Stan noticed that was a theme for more or less every helmet in the room), and the skates seemed worn and beaten up, duct taped at the toes. The whole set smelled of sweat mixed with detergent, as if the sweat had dug so deep into the fabrics that nothing could help it.
Without complaints, Stan took out his change of clothes and took a few steps away to change, turned with his back to the girls. Was it okay to just change in front of them like this? There were no remarks, to his relief, and he put his regular clothes to the side to put on the gear. The only parts he didn’t put on yet were the skates and the wrist guards; he didn’t trust himself enough to skate from the locker room to the gym and not eat floor. It felt strange, to say the least, and he bet himself that if he looked in a mirror, he’d think he looked ridiculous.
During the time he was changing, a few more girls walked into the room, saying their greetings excitedly and remaining excited while chatting and changing at the same time, unbothered by his presence. Weird, most girls at school would scream at the presence of a guy watching them change. Some said hello to him, and he politely replied, but other than that, there was no other conversation that concerned him.
He was then roused from his thoughts by a male voice echoing through the room, but from the side where the gym was instead of the hallway.
“Let’s get a move on in there, ladies! I’m not going to say it again!” It was quite loud, and quickly, all the girls got up and filed out the door and into the gym, with Stan at the very end of the queue, holding his skates in one hand, and his wrist guards in the other. His heart was pounding in his chest, faster with each step.
When the commotion settled down and they gathered in a circle around the coach, Stan could finally get a better look at him. Apparently, nothing about this experience was going to be traditional, because the coach seemed maybe a year older than him, if not the same age, holding a small notebook and a pencil. He gestured to Wendy, and she elegantly slid up next to him, giving him a playful nudge with her hips as she stopped, at which he barely budged.
“It’s so great to see all of you again,” she started, earning a plastic clapping of wrist guards-on-wrist guards and a few cheers, “I hope you had a great vacation and that you’re ready to train hard this year. I’m looking at you Bebe.” A few laughs were had, though Stan couldn’t pinpoint which girl the remark was centered on. There were so many faces he’d seen at school, only vaguely, and he hoped none of them knew him, the awkward new guy that never talked to anyone. “Now I think there’s not much point in wasting our time, so let’s get started.” Another small applause followed, and Wendy took a bow before rejoining the lines.
“Okay, girls, warm-ups, and I’m gonna take care of the fresh face over there. Wendy, you lead,” the coach then said, and finally, the attention shifted to him for a split second cheer, before they all dispersed onto the track. At least he wasn’t expected to immediately skate with them, which he was happy about.
“I’m Kyle, welcome to the South Park Roller Derby Club,” the coach said and held out his hand after approaching him, which Stan quickly shook after putting his skates down and wiping his hand on his shorts. It was weird to shake a wrist guard, to say the least.
“Stan, Stan Marsh.” What else should he say? Thank you? Was that appropriate? No, he was just going to remain quiet.
“Marsh? Oh! You’re that new kid, right? Moved in to the house next to mine?” The fear of being recognised was coming true, and Stan glanced up at Kyle in slight panic.
“Yeah. Yeah, that’s me,” he mumbled in response, giving the tiniest, insecure nod. What if he embarrassed himself now? Now that he knew, his neighbour could make his life even more of a hell. He didn’t need this, no, what if he just went home-
“Sweet, I can teach you through my window.” Or maybe he should just see how it goes.
“Ever skated before in your life?” Kyle continued questioning, gesturing for Stan to come over to the bench and sit down to put the rest of his gear on. “Or maybe on blades? Ice skates?”
“I’ve ice skated occasionally.” Stan had a good look at his skates before starting to pull them on and tie them securely to his feet.
“Alright, but never on quad skates?”
“No.”
“Okay, then this is what we’re gonna do. You warm up, do some stretches, I’ll get you a balance beam, and you’re just going to skate around it to get a feel for your skates. So that, then… derby pose and maybe some stops, sticky skating maybe, nothing bad.” As if Stan knew what this “sticky skating” was, but rookies probably wouldn’t be doing anything dangerous, right?
After doing a few stretch exercises, he began putting the remaining equipment on and tapping the skates against the floor to make sure they were secure. Slowly and carefully, he pushed himself up and off the bench, managing to skate a few feet behind Kyle, who’d zipped off to move the balance beam he’d mentioned before, then attempt to straighten himself up when he found his balance.
That balance quickly broke when he automatically put his weight on his heels, and his skates fled from underneath him, as if someone had swept his feet off the ground from behind, and he toppled straight down onto his ass. The breath he had in him escaped with an undignified grunt. In a second, Kyle was stood beside him, parked on his toe stops while smiling and offering a hand to him.
“That’ll happen a few times,” he told him as Stan pulled himself onto his knees first, then carefully stood up again. “Try to squat a little. Shift your center of gravity forward and down.”
This time, Stan kept it in his mind to follow the instructions, managing to get to the beam and grab onto it for dear life. Along with those instructions, his thoughts were running through questions like: “when does this get fun?” and “why didn’t I just stay home?”. His instinct told him to just take the skates off and go home, but his gut told him, as indigestible as the thought was, that he had to push through.
All he had to do was skate circles, right? That shouldn’t be hard. He had this.
“I’ll get back to you in a few minutes, I gotta go warm up,” Kyle told him, and before Stan could properly answer, he was already gone and stretching with the pack.
Well, Stan supposed, it was better if he got started himself, and with a deep breath and the grace of a newborn calf, began to circle around the beam. It didn’t take much logic for him to figure out that he had to push with his feet outward to get moving, though it took a bit more brain power and some observation to remain in the so-called derby pose.
During the time it took him to do only a few circles, the others, he noticed after Kyle loudly told them to skate fast for a few minutes, were zooming past him at such a speed, he could feel the wind they created. Quite honestly, he couldn’t imagine himself with them, more somewhere off to the side–not to mention the things they were doing with their legs on the turns, what even was that? Obviously for speed, but jeez… All Stan could imagine was falling over on every turn, skidding on the floor and causing a chain collision. And then, they stopped, wheels screeching over the lacquered parquet, and Stan expected them to relax, but instead, they started to push themselves backwards, reaching the same speed as they did before; except backwards. What the hell were they doing with their legs at the corners?!
With thoughts of never reaching that level, Stan continued with his clumsy circles around the beam for another two minutes before Kyle called for a water break. As he was promised before, he also came to check on him, skating up beside him while holding his water bottle.
“How’s it going?”
“Uh…” Stan grabbed the beam tightly to keep himself upright while they talked. “It’s going, I guess.”
Kyle chuckled, mostly to himself, then gave him a reassuring smile and pushed himself back for a few feet. “Show me.”
Oh, no. Did he have to? It was embarrassing enough to imagine everyone occasionally glancing at him, but to be watched, intently, analysed, that was different. However, it took everything in him to not just clam up and stand there dumbly, but instead nod and keep moving. He’d stopped holding onto the beam so much, only reaching for it when he felt his balance was off. Kyle gave him a few quick claps.
“You’re doing awesome, dude,” he encouraged while skating backwards with him. Stan didn’t really believe that, but… it did help, in its own way. It was actually nice to get some reassurance that the effort he was putting into this was paying off, who’d have expected it? Maybe he shouldn’t be hating this so much; everyone seemed really nice, and the only bad part was falling. Though, maybe even that went hand-in-hand.
While the girls went off on their own at the leadership of Wendy, Kyle and Stan stayed in that little end of the gym, having the individual lesson.
The next thing that he was taught was how to fall properly. It wasn’t expected, but it wasn’t very surprising either. The first part of the instructions was to always make himself as small as he could, so that other people wouldn’t trip over him. The second part was to always try to fall on his front, which was where all the pads and protection was–falling on the ass wasn’t very comfortable, regardless how soft one’s behind was. Finally, he was told to never fall with his fingers outstretched, unless he liked them being crushed by the wheels of other players. It sounded simple enough, and when Kyle demonstrated, Stan followed. His knees lowered to the floor first, one slightly behind the other, and then his arms, each plastic guard making a little click when it hit the floor. Stan curled up just as shown, head bent down between his arms, then slowly and carefully pushed himself back up onto his feet, shakily regaining balance.
Kyle, again, gave him two thumbs up and encouragement, even though he literally only lowered himself to the ground. None of this made sense, why, why, why and why would someone get so much praise just for learning how to fall?
Another thing he was taught was a thing called a plow stop, or, simply put, the easiest and safest way to stop. Of course, it sounded easy: “just drag your feet out like you were drawing a lemon, and push yourself down so you feel the resistance of the wheels” was what he was told. The problem with “pushing himself down” was that he immediately leaned too far back, ironically, from the fear of falling forward, and his feet once again slipped right out from underneath him, and he landed on his ass for the second time that day.
“Sorry,” he mumbled out, but Kyle remained cheerful and offered him his hand once more.
“Don’t apologise, we all started out the same way.”
Stan was pulled onto his feet again, still averting his eyes for fear of embarrassment. The statement quickly rooted itself in his head though, and he nodded in a vague direction, somewhat at Kyle. With a new-found balance, he tried again, much slower this time, pushing his legs out, and then pulling them back in in a point. It wasn’t perfect, far from it, but he managed to stop after a few feet, looking up to be met with that earnest, reassuring smile. Stan actually felt encouraged, just knowing that he was doing something right, and a small smile of his own crept onto his face as a response.
“Now keep it up. The more times you fall on your ass, the further you can push your limits,” Kyle told him, then quickly skated past him, gave him a pat on the shoulder and joined the girls on the track.
For the rest of the training, Stan continued practicing the stops, as well as falling and stopping by dropping to either of his knees, or both. Wendy came to supervise him for those even, while Kyle was off coaching the rest of the team.
By the end of the hour and a half, his legs were sore, his feet were aching, his lower back was killing him, and his ass was bruised. The only thing was, he didn’t feel bad. The physical exhaustion wasn’t making him want to throw up, the sweat covering his body didn’t feel like slime on his skin, and the bruises didn’t hurt. No, when the team and him got back to the locker rooms, there was a smile on his face, a very genuine smile.
“How was it?” Kyle asked from the bench across from him, in the process of untying his skates.
“Not too bad.” Stan shrugged. “When’s the next practice?”
Kyle seemed to practically light up with joy, and a smile as wide as his face came over him, his teeth still covered by a bright red mouth guard. “Thursday, same time, same place. Oh, by the way, you can take the equipment home with you.” As he said that, Wendy practically slammed herself down onto the bench right next to Stan, bumping into his side quite forcefully.
“So, what did you think?” she asked in apparent curiosity. The sudden amount of not one, but two pairs of eyes on him made Stan freeze up a little, and he could only shrug again, that dumb smile still on his face.
“He’s coming back on Thursday.”
“Really?! Oh man, we rarely get new members, that’s so great! Kyle didn’t go too hard on you did he?”
Stan shook his head, shoving his newly-acquired equipment into the bag it came in. All these interactions were foreign. Questions, enthusiasm, praise. There was a strange divide in him between liking it, and wanting to hide from it, and right now, he wanted to run home and take a long shower. It seemed that Kyle had read his mind in that moment though.
“Wendy, give him a break, he’s only been with us for an hour and a half.” She seemed to get the message, and, slightly begrudgingly, pushed herself off the bench and went to change, but not before rolling her eyes at him. It might have not been apparent, but Stan was actually thankful.
After managing to get everything off of him, he went ahead to change out of the sweat-drenched clothes; when did he tire himself out that much? Stan said his goodbyes, mostly just to Kyle and Wendy because he didn’t formally meet anyone else, but some of them still waved at him or said goodbye back. It felt so unnatural, so strange and too nice to be real.
Despite his still aching feet, Stan walked home, which wasn’t really that big of a deal since this town was so small, you could walk from one end to the other in about thirty minutes. His trip took a long fifteen, but his thoughts just kept wandering all throughout of the rest of the evening. First, they persisted through his shower, the images like recordings in his head, playing the same scenes over and over again; falling embarrassingly and not being laughed at, the encouragement that made him feel uncomfortably inspired, his mind felt like slush. Coldly churning to try and process everything that was going on inside it.
He weighed out the pros and cons, went through all the possible timelines of “what would happen if” that he could think of. He turned and turned in his bed for at least an hour, if not more, curling up, sprawling out on his back and stomach to try and get comfortable and fall asleep. Nothing helped his troubled mind. Eventually, the mental exhaustion got to him.
Stan’s last thought before his consciousness drifted off, however, was of him on skates, cheerful and happy, cruising the streets with the team. Next morning, he dismissed it as a dream, not admitting that he was looking forward to Thursday.