Chapter Seven: Soccer Game Anyone?

 

About a week had passed with no word from Alex. He hadn’t been on MSN, or facebook, or called, or drove by. Nothing. Because of my paranoia I began to worry that he was avoiding me again. I tried to make myself believe that that was the only reason I decided to call him that night, but the truth was, I also wanted to hear his voice again. I really wanted to beat myself up for that.

     “Hello?”

     “Alex? Hey, it’s Nicole.”

     “Hey Nicole. What’s up?” Alex sounded like he was forcing his voice to come out light and happy.

     “Not much, you?”

     “At home, chilling.”

     “Cool.”

     Awkward silence. My heart was thudding in my chest. I didn’t know what to do, or what to say. I was afraid to speak; afraid my words would come out choppy.

     “Well, uhm…” I tried to think of something. “Listen, a few of my friends and I are going to the park tomorrow evening to play soccer…you wanna come?”

     He didn’t answer for a while. I figured he was contemplating. “Can I bring Laura?” He asked.

     I almost hissed. I don’t know why, but I had habits of acting like a cat when I got angry, or when I felt high emotions. I clamped my mouth shut until the tickling in my throat subsided. “Sure.” I managed to get out through gritted teeth. As much as I disliked Laura, I wanted to see Alex again. But why did I want to see Alex again? Why am I willing to put up with Laura to see him again? Why does my stomach lurch when I think about how I might see them kissing or something? I tried to push all of these thoughts from my mind.

     “Alright, I’ll be there. The one near your house right?”

     “Yea.” I confirmed.

     “When in the evening?” he asked.

     “Around eight.” I replied.

     “Cool, see ya then.” He sounded perky, yet like he was trying to contain something.

     “Yea, later.”

     And then he hung up, so I did too.

     Well, I guess I’ll wait for tomorrow…I thought as I headed for my bedroom.

~

     “Nicole! Hey!” Natalie, Josie, and Ryan ran towards me. They were dropped off at the park by my uncle, who was now at my house. They all lived farther away from me, so my uncle was waiting to bring them home when we were done.

     I raced towards them with my soccer ball in my hand. “HEY!” I shouted.

     I dropped the ball once I got onto the field and ran to hug them all. It was a huge group hug. “So you said Alex and Laura were coming?” Natalie asked me, raising an eyebrow.

     Natalie, Josie, and Ryan were also close friends of mine. So I had told them the general story of what had occurred between Alex and I. As well as what happened with Laura. They were more sporty friends, though; Aly wasn’t big on ‘getting dirty’.

     “Yea.” I replied curtly.

     “So, what are the teams going to be?” Josie asked.

     “I don’t know yet,” I replied, “But I definitely don’t want to be on a team with Laura.” I spat her name.

     Josie giggled. “So who’s going to be the third wheel? Because obviously they’re going to want to be on the same team.”

     “I will.” Sighed Ryan.

     Natalie, Josie and I laughed.

     Just then, a black elantra pulled up on the side of the road. “That’s them.” I nudged Ryan in the ribs.

     “Ow!.” He whined.

     “Oh suck it up.” I stuck my tongue out at him.

     “You know, you should put that tongue away unless you’re going to use it.” Ryan joked.

     “Why? Are you suddenly straight? Want my tongue in your mouth?” I wagged it at him again.

     “Ew no.” He pushed me away, jokingly.

     Ryan was gay, so we joked like this a lot. We could because it was known that nothing would be taken the wrong way.

     Alex and Laura made their way towards the field now; she grabbed his hand and held it. I don’t know why that made my stomach lurch again. No! No! No! Aly cannot be right about this.

     “Hey!” Alex called, waving his free hand. Laura smiled at us. I tried to smile back, but it was hard.

     “Hey!” My friends called to them. I introduced everyone.

     “Nice to meet you all.” Alex said.

     “Likewise.”

     “So, teams?” Alex arched an eyebrow.

     Ryan playfully pushed me aside and went to stand next to Alex. “I’ll be on your team I guess. And then the other three girls against us.” He didn’t really let up that we had discussed this beforehand.

     “Cool.” Alex said. “Let’s go!”

     “Yea let’s!” Laura agreed, like an annoying little six-year-old tag along. I refrained from rolling my eyes.

     “Nets are here.” I pointed to two trees that were spread out evenly on both sides. It was almost as if the trees were planted there purposely to make goals.

     Everyone nodded. “Ready?” I shouted.

     “Ready!” I got a chorus in response.

     I picked up the ball and walked to the centre of the field. Alex met me in the middle. “One, Two, Three.” He counted. I dropped the ball and the game began.

     Natalie used to play rep soccer, and I used to play house league. We used to practice together at our grandfather’s, so we were used to being on the same side. Josie slid in easily. Natalie and I knew strategies in our head, and could guess at what the other was doing, so fitting Josie into it wasn’t hard at all.

     Ryan was having trouble because he didn’t fit in so well with his team. Laura didn’t seem to be very good at soccer, anyhow. And she was so small, every time she crashed into one of us she toppled over.

     After a few minutes the score was 2-1 for us. Alex was running all over the place, playing almost every position. Ryan retired to staying back, being goalie/defense. Natalie and I would run back and forth between offense and goalie. Josie mostly held back as defense. She was vicious.

     Now Alex and I were getting extremely competitive. Laura wasn’t a problem. If she tried to get at me, I just kept running and she’d fall over. She was too weak. Alex, on the other hand, may be small, but was powerful.

     Natalie kicked the ball to me, and I could feel Josie running behind me. Alex came up in front of me and I tried to cut left. He changed his footing, however, and managed to keep up with me. I stopped and tried to go a bit backwards. I was going to kick the ball back to Natalie, but Laura got in the way. I was tempted to kick the ball as hard as I could and let it hit her. But I didn’t. Instead I veered right. Alex kept up with me and now Laura was closing in. I looked over my shoulder and winked at Josie. She stopped running and I kicked the ball back to her. She tapped it with her foot.

     Laura couldn’t slow down quick enough and bounced into me. She fell over and I jumped over her and ran a little ahead. Alex looked torn, he must’ve been wondering if he should make sure Laura was alright or chase after me. It only took him a split second to decide though, and he began to follow me. I let him and then stopped suddenly and ran in the opposite direction winking at Josie again. She kicked the ball over to me and I caught it on my chest. I let it bounce lightly to my feet.

     Alex caught up with me and I ran faster. Somehow he managed to catch me and tried to snake his foot in between my legs to get the ball from under me. I kept jumping over them.

     Finally he caught his foot in between mine and managed to tap the ball. My foot caught on the now stationary soccer ball and I tripped over it. I flung my arms out in the air to try and steady myself and caught my hand on Alex’s arm. Our arms tangled and we both fell over the ball. We started dying of laughter and tried to get up. He managed to disentangle himself first and then tried to stand. Laura had unexpectedly come up behind him, however, and his back bumped into her knees. He tried to turn around to see what or who he had hit, but somehow lost his footing and fell back down. His shoe had fallen off.

     I reached over to grab it, laughing, at the same time he did. I had crawled over and had my head suspended over the shoe, when he tried to reach for it and our heads bumped. “Ow!” we both cried. And then I lifted my head, also bringing my hand up to rub it. Alex did so at the same time and our faces were not even an inch apart. My nose was a millimeter away from his. And that’s when it happened.

     Laura got ticked off and made to slap Alex in the back of the head. The force just knocked his face into mine and our lips met.

     Instinctively our hands went up to the others face, but after only two seconds we realized what was happening and pulled away.

     Everyone had gathered around us. They were staring, dumbfounded. Laura looked like she was on the verge of tears, but her eyes also flared angrily. She looked ready to kill. If looks could kill, I think we’d all be dead.

     “What was that?!” She shrieked at Alex.

     “You hit me. It was an accident.” Alex half-heartedly tried to explain.

     “I should hit you again and again and again!” Her voice cracked as it got louder. “How could you?” Her arms were flailing about angrily.

     I was wondering why Laura had hit him in the first place. If she had just controlled herself this wouldn’t have happened. She got mad for what? Because we fell over each other? Because our heads accidently clanged together? Still my heart was jolting. I couldn’t formulate words. The scene before me was just too intense. No one dared say anything. We were all just watching Alex and Laura. I was still on the floor, so was Alex. He made to get up now. I couldn’t see his face, he was looking at Laura.

     “I’m sorry. It was an accident.” He struggled to explain. His voice was filled with mixed emotions.

     “Uhm, Nicole, I think we should go.” Natalie whispered in my ear.

     But I couldn’t move. I had to find out what happened. Why couldn’t I leave? This wasn’t even my business…well not entirely my business…

     “Go back to the house,” I whispered out of the corner of my mouth, “Take Ryan and Josie, I’ll be there soon.”

     “Are you sure?” Josie’s breath tickled my ear.

     I nodded slowly.

     Ryan patted my shoulder and they took the soccer ball and walked off. I couldn’t get up, Laura and Alex were still screaming at each other.

     Without letting go and trying to feel the emotions emanating off of them, I could already feel Laura’s. Laura’s feelings were bouncing off of her skin, and flying around the air all around me. She wasn’t containing anything. Hate. Jealousy. Hurt. Mistrust. Anger. All of these feelings were bouncing off of the ground, off of Alex, off of me. Slapping me in the face. They were everywhere; I couldn’t even feel Alex’s emotions at all.

     They were still yelling back and forth. Well, Laura was yelling mostly, Alex was just trying to explain. He refused to look over at me. I bit my lower lip. Should I let go and try to feel Alex’s emotions, too? Or would it be too much?

     I was still contemplating when Laura slapped Alex across the face. Hard. I heard it, I felt it, I saw it. Alex didn’t even try to retaliate. “I hate you!” She spat at him.

     Then she glowered at me, turned on her heel, and stomped off. “Wait!” Alex called after her.

     She gave him the middle finger without looking back. She stalked off down the road, pulling out her cell phone. I assumed she was going to get a ride home from someone other than Alex.

     Alex didn’t move. He didn’t even turn around right away. I didn’t move either. I felt it was safe now to release my ties to the world and attempt to reach Alex’s aura. So I did. That’s when he turned around. I gasped.

     His beautiful blue eyes looked shattered. He was clearly confused. It was so hard to tell what those eyes intended to look like. There was disgust, love, confusion, so much etched into the lines of his eyes. They looked like an ocean, big and blue and rippled.

     I didn’t let my concentration break. I slowly got up, but his hands fell on my shoulders and pushed me back down. It wasn’t that aggressively, but it was enough for me to attach myself to the world again.

     I shook my head. “You!” He yelled at me. “Look what you’ve done!” He shrieked.

     “Me?!” I asked, shocked.

     “Yes you!” He growled. Anger flashed briefly through his eyes. “She’s been my girlfriend for a year! She’ll never forgive me for…for this…” He pointed his finger at me accusingly.

     I tried to get up again, but he shoved me back down. “You need to keep me on the floor to feel bigger?” I felt myself getting defensive.

     “Don’t talk to me like that!” He yelled.

     “I thought you’d never hit a girl!” I shouted back.

     “I didn’t hit you, I pushed you. Besides, my definition of a hit is with a closed fist.”

     I tried to get up a third time, and this time when his hands came down on my shoulders I grabbed his wrists. “Who do you think you are?” I asked, tossing them from me with as much force as I could muster.

     “I’m stronger than you!” He said, inching closer.

     I began to shake a little. I didn’t know if I was stronger than him or not, and his eyes were flashing dangerously. I didn’t know if he was really upset with me, or what was going on. I tried to let go again, to feel what he was feeling, but something unexpected happened. In all of his anger, the back of his hand made impact with the side of my face. The force of it knocked me back a few steps.

     He had hit me close to my eye, and so it began to water. I stood there, astonished for a few seconds. He hit me. He hit me! I just stared at him. I saw comprehension of what he had just done dawn on his face. His lips were moving but he couldn’t speak.

     “You hit me.” I exclaimed. My hand brushed across my cheek, it burned.

     “You freaking hit me.” I blinked. “You jerk!” And suddenly, a violent anger pushed through my stomach and up into my chest.

     Before I knew what I was doing I had closed the two steps in between us and had one hand gripping his shirt, holding him up to me. “You a*****e and a half.” I felt him tremble slightly.

     I released the front of his shirt and he smoothed his hand over it. I let him think I was going to turn around and leave, but instead I whipped around and threw my fist into his face. He clutched his right cheek where I had hit him. Not a sound escaped his mouth.

     “How could you hit me?” Tears spilled over my face now, unwillingly. “How could you get mad at me?!” I thrust my index finger into my chest. “You know it was an accident.” But even as the words tumbled out of my mouth I knew I had enjoyed the brief kiss. I knew that Aly was right all along. I hated myself for it.

     “You’re going to leave me again, aren’t you?” I said, trying to regain control of myself. The tears still slowly spilled over but they were silent tears. I felt the ones on my bruised left cheek tingle.

     Alex looked slightly calmer. He still wasn’t able to speak. I tried one last time to let go and feel his aura. This time I succeeded, as there were no interruptions.

     The amount of emotions and the force in which they hit me with made me stumble. There was hurt, anger, confusion, aggression, regret, longing, misunderstanding, there were so many I couldn’t even pry all of them apart. But the one I felt the most, is the one that shocked me the most, the one that almost made me fall face first into the ground at my feet – love.

     I looked at Alex quizzically. He studied me too. I knew I was radiating just as many feelings, but I didn’t know if he could sense them or not. Love for Laura, that’s what it is Nicole. All of those emotions are revolved around Laura, except the anger that’s the only thing that’s inflicted on you. I tried to steady my breathing.

     “No, I’m not going to leave you again.” He managed to say.

     “You aren’t?” My voice cracked.

     “But hell you made my girlfriend hate me!” Alex’s hand flew out to the side in frustration.

     “I didn’t do anything!” I yelled at him.

     “You kissed me!” He shouted back.

     “No, you kissed me!”

     “You still like me!” He accused me, his jaw twitching in rage. Or was it just rage? Maybe there was something else. I could see it working in the gears of his mind, could see it through those deep blue eyes…

     “I thought we figured this out!” I tried to ignore the fact that my stomach was twisting and turning in knots. Tried to ignore the fact that I suddenly felt like throwing up.

     “I thought so too! But I knew it, I knew you were going to mess things up for me and Laura!” He shot at me.

     “Do you even like Laura?” The words flew out of my mouth before I could stop them. I quickly covered my mouth with my hands. Oh s**t.

     This seemed to catch Alex off guard. The rage left his face, his jaw stopped twisting. His hands rested at his side and he looked weak and tired. He didn’t say a word for five whole minutes. Neither did I. I just let my hands fall from my face and waited. I realized now that it was all an act, it had to be. He was forcing himself to do those things, and now that he had let it go…he looked exhausted from the efforts.

     But maybe I was wrong…He walked up to me and we were only inches apart again, “How dare you ask that?” His eyes glowed with such brilliance that I felt blinded – trapped. They were a deep intense blue; it was scary to look at them. But I couldn’t look away…

     Alex’s hands grabbed my shoulders. I tensed. I was afraid he was going to shake me or throw me on the ground. But he didn’t. No, what he did was much more special. With his hands gripping my shoulders like that, he pressed his lips to mine and kissed hungrily. My knees buckled and I thought I might fall, but his hands held me up.

     I tried to match his fierceness and somehow managed as sparks were flying. The way he was holding me, my hand could only reach his elbow, and so I let it rest there. My hands wanted to touch his face, but I couldn’t find the will to wiggle free of his grasp. I liked the way his hands felt gripping my shoulders.

     His face pressed harder against mine, and so I instinctively pressed back. I guess my energy made him more aggressive, and he fully moved a step forward as his lips continued to caress mine. The klutz that I am, I tripped over my own two feet as he did this, and we both landed on the grass.

     He had managed to slow down my fall, and move his hand from my shoulder to the back of my head so it didn’t hit the ground when we landed. Now he used the hand to push my face closer to his as his tongue pushed its way into my mouth. He held up all of his weight with one hand, as I was underneath him.

     After a few minutes he pulled away. He seemed astonished at what had just happened. I think I was starting to understand everything that had happened this past year, but I was afraid to let myself believe it.

     Alex rolled off of me and lay down on the grass next to me. “Looks like we’re going to have to have another talk.” He whispered, trying to chuckle.     

     “I guess so.” I sighed.

     “The mosquitoes will eat us alive out here though. What do you say we go to my place to talk this time?”

     I gestured at my house, “Guests.” I said.

     “Just a few minutes? It’s just down the street and no one’s home.”

     I shrugged. “Fine.”

     Alex led me to his car as I texted Natalie to let her know I’d be back in a half hour or so, and to tell my parents the same. She replied, “Alright, we’re waiting for details.” I smirked to myself as Alex drove off towards his house.