The Perfect Game (GxG) (cliffhanger/completed)

Four: Rivalry Night

Nani Cazetti

In the locker room, filled with guys who have sprayed an intense amount of cologne, I listen as people whisper, joke, and make sly comments about what went down between me and the new bitch. Doing my best to ignore them, I heave the chest guard over my head and strap it down, while looking down at my purple and white Nike cleats. I think of the kiss, what was I thinking? I totally said I was staying away, right? So what the hell, Cazetti? I smile beside myself, it was a great kiss. I shake my head and dig my left cleat into my calf, ow, I squirm uncomfortably, but continue to apply pressure until I feel the soft ooze of red glide down into my right cleat. Frowning, I realize what I had just done, pull my jersey over the chest guard, unlace my cleats and slide my feet back into my Nike Slides,and proceed to the athletic trainer. As soon as the locker door closes behind me, I hear an eruption of laughter and profane shouting.

I try not to think of my team, I try to think of something that may make me happy, happy enough to play right; happy enough to think right. I frown, only coming up with Christmas of o'four:

"NeNe!" Pop called from upstairs, we lived in a bigger house then, we could afford it, "NeNe!" He shouted again, there wasn't anger in his voice, more pleasure and delightfulness. "Come quick!" Ma was still in Afghanistan, stitching up her brothers in Arms, preparing soldiers for immediate emergency relief, and such. Going to and fro the FOB hospital and out on missions that really a man should've been going on all along. Because who's going to miss a father? (Well, I sure would. I don't think war should happen at all...but it happens, and it's a part of life.) I had rushed up the stairs, my awkward nine year old body shifting in different ways to find the fastest way up.

I smile at the thought; I used to think I was the fastest kid around...

"Coming, Daddy, coming!" I had called back, more irritable than I imagined it had been. When I got upstairs, a five foot six tall box was standing next to the tree, about four feet wide, and four feet deep. I remember thinking surf board; Dad is finally going to teach me how to surf. "Go ahead honey, open it up," He had encouraged me, gesturing to the box.

Looking back, I don't know how I became so tall, I tower over Pop and Ma, I have my father's features, and my mother's personality, a girlish yet powerful physique from Pop's side. But the height? No clue. They're both under five-six.

The memory escapes me as I jog into the athletic trainers' office.

It's not much; six tall purple benches face each other, three to a side, one clean, crisp white pillow on each bench. A thick fake wood desk is tucked into the far left corner, or right, depending on which door you come through, with a small portable laptop shoved aside among papers and sports packets. Various sized balls are piled into a corner behind me, next to the door to the bathroom, which is closed. A nice lively tune plays on the boom box he has set up in the middle of the closest wall, by the door, next to his equipment bureau. That was full of amazing magical soothing wonders. I don't even know what most of it's called. But there's this cream in there, that smells like cool mint, and feels like heaven; a very icy hot heaven. It's gotten me through my share of games. I call it Saving Cream. I laugh beside myself.

"Hey, there, Nani," He's the only one in the whole school that calls me that; his voice is gruff, yet soft life a teddy bear. And honestly, if you know him well enough, you'd think that's what he was in his last life; a cute, fluffy, soft, teddy bear. "Whoa, what the heck happened to you?" He's staring at my calf, which, when I look down at it, is now completely soaked in blood. I think of possible reasons why I bled out so bad; jogging causes more blood to pump through your veins, I cut through a vein (highly unlikely) or...I don't know.