london nights

0.1

caitlin's tossing and turning on her bed. its 11pm, but she can't sleep at all, she's too nervous for tomorrow. she does the only thing she can even think of doing, she grabs her boots, a team issued hoodie, and a ball lying near the couch. she jogs over to the pitch near her house, the lights are off, it's probably closed at this hour, but the moonlight in london is bright enough that she can see the goalposts from at least 40 yards out. logically, she should find the entrance to see if it's unlocked, but the lights aren't even on, so she assumes the pitch is closed, and as a result of that, she hops the short fence.

the pitch is the only place she feels calm, still, she's nervous for tomorrow, and can't get that thought out of her mind. she sits on the edge of the pitch and switches her running shoes for her boots, and places her phone next to them. when she's dribbling her ball to center pitch, there's a figure there that she hadn't seen before. they're doing keepy uppies and caitlin cant help but wonder why anyone would be here at this hour.

"oi! what are you doing here?" she yells out. the figure seems shocked, their ball drops as they look over to caitlin, who is still slowly dribbling her ball over to the figure. she's still a bit far out, but caitlin can now tell the figure is a girl. her hair is tied up in a high ponytail and it looks like she's bending over to pick up her ball. when she looks back up to caitlin, who is now almost 5 feet away from her she immediately looks down at caitlins torso. caitlin has never felt more self conscious than this moment, because damn the girl is hot. she's barely sweating, the moonlight gives her face a nice glow to it. she's wearing a running jacket, half zipped up, beneath it, clearly a tanktop, and some jeans that contrast nicely to her white sneakers.

she must notice caitlin checking her out because she laughs (a laugh in which caitlin thinks she could never get tired of),to get her attention back to her face before asking the same question to caitlin.

"what are you doing out here...." she switches the ball to her hand that is watch-free to check the time, "at 11:17pm on a friday night," she says with an accent caitlin can't put her finger to. it's definitely not english, scottish, or irish, like her teammates.

"uh, i was just going to get some shots off before my game tomorrow..." she says uneasily. the girl raises her eyebrows before looking down at her hoodie once again.

"arsenal fan?" she asks nodding towards the hoodie.

"oh," caitlin says looking down, "yeah, actually got this one recently," she finishes, not really wanting to explain that she plays for arsenal womens side.

"it's a nice hoodie, you can try to shoot on me if you want..." she trails off, "you know just for practice, so you're not shooting just at an open goal." she adds quickly.

"you play goalkeeper?" caitlin asks looking around for keepers gloves.

"central/defensive mid, although i haven't played in a while so i may not be much." she says. caitlin can't seem to find a problem with that, shooting against someone is better than on an open goal, good to get reps for such things. she nods as she drops her ball and boots it to the sideline. there's a huge grin from the other girl, and when caitlin sees it, she can't help but grin as well.

they run around the pitch chasing the ball for what feels like forever. the girl blocks quite a bit of caitlin's shots, and she doesn't have a bad shot of her own, her dribbling is unreal as well, caitlin barely manages to win the ball back once she's lost it. caitlin forgets that she's wearing just sneakers. caitlin's shots herself are really hitting their strides. when she hits an unreal curler from about 5 yards outside the 18, the girl claps and compliments her for the shot in her accent that caitlin still can't figure out. it makes caitlin blush, hopefully its too dark now for the girl to see the pink creeping up her cheeks.

eventually, their shots start going way off target, the tired legs not being able to keep up with the ongoing will to keep doing what they're doing because both girls are genuinely enjoying themselves, at least based on the loud laughter that is ringing out in the silent night. they settle near center pitch, both girls backs lying on the grass field breathing heavily. it's relative silence, just the sounds of them breathing before caitlin finally decides to break the silence.

"are you sure you're not that good? because those were some pretty amazing dribbling skills," she says staring up at the stars, unable to see the blush creeping up on the face besides her.

"you werent so bad yourself superstar striker, those shots were incredible!" she exclaims heartily, a giggle escaping her lips. caitlin finds herself laughing with her, she has such infectious laughter, caitlin thinks. she could never get tired of this. they lay there together, for a long time, caitlin can't be bothered with anything other than making the girl next to her smile. she feels like she could fall asleep right here, morning be damned. suddenly the girls phone rings, she abruptly sits up.

"scheisse!" she exclaims before answering the phone and putting the phone next to her ear. the person on the other side starts rapidly speaking, caitlin's pretty sure it's not english because the girls answers are also not in english. trying to keep up in a conversation that she can't understand hurts her head, so she focuses on the girls face to try to get an understanding of what's going on. at first she looks like she's apologizing, and then she looks a bit frustrated, the person on the other side is cutting her off before she can get what she wants to say out, then she looks like she's pleading with them, the person doesn't talk for a bit, and during that moment the girl turns and gives a soft smile towards caitlin, which she reciprocates. when the person finally speaks up again, the girl looks elated, a huge smile of relief appears on her face. she says some quick words back to the phone before she hangs up with a tired smile on her face.

"sorry, i lost track of time, my bo-," she pauses, before starting again "leo's been texting me for ages wondering where i was, i completely lost track of time, i was supposed to be back 30 minutes ago," she laughs. caitlin can't help but laugh before standing up alongside the girl before checking her apple watch. 12:10. damn she's really supposed to be resting before the big game tomorrow.

"thanks for agreeing to play with me." she says with a smile as she hugs caitlin. caitlin hates hugs. but, she's not about to tell this girl who is very pretty, let alone an incredible opponent, that she hates hugs. besides, being hugged by this girl doesn't feel as weird as it does with any of her teammates. caitlin's shock stays with her until she realizes she has yet to reply to the girl.

"yeah, thanks for being an excellent body dummy," she chuckles softly, which gets a laugh out of the girl, and a smile caitlin can't stop looking at. theres a bit of a silence before the girl speaks up again.

"well, i've got to get going, once again, thanks for the great game." she smiles softly when waving her hand, which almost seems effortless for her. as she's turning around and walking away towards the opposite side of the pitch, caitlin can't believe how much of an idiot she is. she didn't get the girls number, let alone get her name! whatever, she thinks, this is a one time thing, she won't ever meet this girl again, london's a huge city. she grabs her things and puts back on her running shoes before heading back home.

sleeping felt so much easier, she had completely forgotten about the game. now her thoughts are fixated on the beautiful girl, who effortlessly took caitlin out of her shell, and her infectious smile was all caitlin could think about as she drifted off to sleep.

-

i hope you enjoyed this chapter! it's been proofread but there may still be some grammar/spelling mistakes, i apologize for them if so. reminder, voting/commenting is optional but appreciated if you're comfortable. the next chapter will be out in a couple of days hopefully!