Castles Crumbling

Only the young (Chapter 8)

Ottilia's POV

Viv cooked dinner for the three of us as soon as I got home. It was delicious, it always was.

After dinner I gave my mom a call. She always called me Sparks, her nickname for me througout my entire life and football career. We talked about the day and all my time here at Arsenal. I left out the getting drunk part and also my chat with Leah. There are some things in life your mother does not need to know. Things about my sex-life and also things about my youth. She does not need to know what I was doing at 16, getting drunk and making out with a lot of people. That would be a fun conversation to have with my mother.

I was never really a fun teenager. I studied a lot and when I didn't study, I played football. But I still managed to party during some parts of my youth. It was mostly when I was in a relationship with my first girlfriend. She convinced me to go to a lot of parties and I mostly did it to be with her. We drank and I practiced or had games the day after. It was not a pleasant experience but at that time I did everything to be with her. I sacrificed so much for our relationship, and she sacrificed nothing. That is not how a relationship should work, it can't be one-sided. That only made people feel bad. When we broke up after about half a year of being together she blamed everything on football.

I dated more during the years, but it was mostly just hookups. Back in Barcelona I dated a girl for two years. She broke up with me because I wanted to move to London and play for Arsenal. Another relationship falling apart because of football. Maybe I was the problem. Not sacrificing enough for our relationship and putting my dream before her. Which now that I'm thinking about it is making me sound like an asshole.

My mental health always took a turn for the worse after a breakup. Especially after my first break-up. During high-school I had a really hard period of my life. I barely had friends in school and the ones I had never really prioritized me. I would spend the weekends alone at home or at a game while they would hang out without me. Several times I had asked them to see me, and they were always unavailable, until the same day when everyone hung out without me. When you had problems since before, they didn't exactly get better. Everything spiraled downwards during my first year and got worse than ever before. I would stay home from school and then attend practice just because I couldn't face everyone in the class. I was never bullied, just never enough for them.

Everything took a turn for the worse during the start of my second year. I hate thinking about what I did, and it is even worse talking about it. People would say that I'm strong for still being here, but that doesn't excuse what I had to go through. No person should have to go through that and being forced to live with the pain of what happened. Knowing that everything could have changed if someone offered a kind word. Sometimes a hello is enough, inviting people even though you prefer the company of others.

All of this after barely having recovered from my childhood. I never got to spend much time with my parents. My dad was very abusive to me from a young age. He was even worse to my mom, but she never complained. Not until everything went downhill.