Drunken Miracles

She's Such A Slag, Not Even The Pimps Want Her.

The next day seemed to come too slowly, for Taylor's taste. All she wanted to do was finish the damn track running and go home to curl up on the couch and either have a big cry or watch Friends until she was mentally drained from thinking anything about anything other then Chandellers funny haircuts.

She needed to get away from the small group of teens, all who were her peers and friends, minus the obvious few. She just...needed space.

Space to get over the suddenly crushing realisation that Nate wouldn't actually ever fully be hers. The thought had always echoed in the back of her mind, but Taylor felt different now it was sinking in. Actual reality had caught up, and the hollow in her chest made her wish that she could take back that night at Nate's house.

If she could go back and not sleep with him, she may have. Or even if that had happened, she wished she'd left it as a one time thing, nothing more.

Because no boy was worth this.

What shocked her more was the force of painful emotion. For her not to realise how much Nate actually had meant to her was annoyingly surprising. She wondered when she had started to feel like that, and had tried to go back to the first defining moment when she started to develop feelings and erase it from her mind.

If she was to be honest, however, the moment she started to feel something would have been that first night. And her mother had told her once that the moment you start to care, is the moment you start to hurt.

Taylor wished those words weren't so true.

“Hey, T! Coach wants to have a meeting about the relay race.” Jenna, one of the other teenagers on the trip said to her gently as Taylor jolted in surprise and looked up to a smiling Jenna.

“Okay, thank Jen.” Taylor smiled back, standing and stretching her arms slightly. She followed Jenna into the locker rooms, taking a seat next to the door immediately.

Not even bothering to look around the room, Taylor concentrated on the floor and waited until everyone was seated and Coach was ready to talk.

“Alright, first off I'd like to start with a congrats to our main girl Taylor, who won her finals earlier today.” Coach said, beaming like a proud parent. Taylor heard the whoops and cheers of the others, smiling slightly and looking up. She instantly regretted it because her eyes met Nate's automatically, and the fresh stab of pain hit her. Looking away, Taylor focused on Coach again, balling her hands into fists.

“We know the running order of your teams, right girls and guys? There are some aspects of the other teams I want to tell you about...” Taylor tuned out, not really in the mood to listen to Coach's pep talk.

It lasted a good five minutes, and as soon as she heard the room cheer again, she looked up.

“Nate, Taylor, you two know you're roles of being the last runner. You want to go over it with me in private?” Coach asked, and Taylor quickly shook her head before Nate could even say something. He looked annoyed when she glanced at him, but kept his mouth closed. Coach nodded, clapping his hands together again.

“Let's do this, folks.” He grinned in excitement, the two teams feeding off him as they chatted noisily on the way out of the locker rooms.

“Taylor.”

God, that voice.

“What?” Taylor asked, not turning to face Nate in case her heart died of cardiac arrest or something.

“Can I talk to you?” He asked quietly, and she shook her head quickly, walking quicker in hopes to get away from him. “Please?”

“Not now. Not before the relays.” Taylor hissed, desperate to put space between them. Nate sighed, sounding annoyed as he kept following her.