"Diamond? What kind of name is that?" The bigger boy yelled at him. James stood there, staring at his feet, not saying anything. Hockey practice had ended five minutes ago, and the eleven-year-old was waiting outside for his dad to come pick him up. It was his first day of pee-wee hockey, and he had no friends, and a few too many not-friends.

The brunette pulled out his lucky comb and ran it through his hair a few times, eyes never leaving the canvas of his Converse All-Stars.

"Hey, pretty boy!" the bully called, trying to get James to look up at him. "What? Are you afraid? Are you scared?" He taunted after James continued to look at his shoes. "Are you chicken?" The boy and his jerk friends started making chicken noises.

"Hey! Leave him alone!" At this, James looked up to see what was going on. A tall blonde-haired boy had walked up, closely followed by a shorter brunette and an even shorter Latino boy. James recognized the blonde as Kendall Knight, the team captain.

"Oh, yeah? You gonna make me?" The bully taunted, his buddies laughing. At this, Kendall launched himself at the boy, fists flying. The bully's friends jumped on Kendall, only to be pulled off by the boys that had been standing with him. Before James could even process what was happening, Kendall and his friends were laughing as the bully and his friends ran off crying, holding an assortment of bloodied and bruised body parts. Kendall and the other boys turned around to face James, who was rooted to his spot outside the doors of the hockey rink. The four boys stared at each other for a while before James pointed out the bluntly obvious to Kendall.

"You could get demoted from captain for this."

Kendall's eyes got really wide for a second, as if suddenly realizing the consequences to his actions, and then he smiled. "No, I won't. I get in enough fights that coach knows that demoting me is only going to hurt the team. Besides, Carlos and Logan can vouch for me: it was for a perfectly good reason." The two boys standing on either side of Kendall nodded. James then remembered that the brunette was Logan Mitchell, the left wing, and the Latino was Carlos Garcia, the goalie.

"A perfectly good reason?" James was confused. How was defending him a perfectly good reason? His dad always made it perfectly clear that he was not worthy of anything.

"Yeah, I'm sick and tired of those guys picking on the new kids. You were just kind of…what's the phrase I'm looking for?" Kendall asked, snapping his fingers, searching for the right words.

"The straw that broke the camel's back?" Logan offered. Kendall nodded.

"Yeah! Thanks, Logan." The shorter boy shrugged.

"Oh, well…thanks." James turned to take one last look at the road. When he realized that his dad had probably forgotten about hockey practice (and probably didn't care), he sighed. "Well, it looks like I have to walk home, so I should get going." As he turned in the direction of his house, a red minivan pulled up and honked.

"Wait!" Kendall called. James turned back to face the blonde. "My mom could drive you home," he offered.

James smiled and nodded, following Kendall, Carlos, and Logan to the minivan.

On the ride home, the four boys talked about hockey. Kendall's father played for the Minnesota Wild, and Kendall wanted to be just like him when he grew up

As Mrs. Knight pulled out of his driveway, James waved goodbye to his new friends. He smiled to himself, glad that he had found friends who would do anything for him.

&&BTR&&

You know, I think I liked this one. I wasn't so sure when I started it, but I'm pretty sure that the ending is growing on me.

This is the start of three (maybe more, if you guys want) little looks into the lives of the boys before Big Time Audition. The first three will be tags to my one-shot "In All Honesty". They're all going to be somewhat James-centric, but who knows what will come out? Haha. I hope that you like them!

XOXO UB

p.s. I don't own BTR…sadly. Also, the idea for Kendall's dad to play hockey came from the story "Minnesota Wild" by Clarry. If you haven't read it, you really should. It's so amazing. I love it!