TO BE FRANK

CHAPTER TWELVE, match point

    Juliette flickers a look towards Simone who only shrugs with a frown.

     She looks around the pitch, aside from the teachers, she did not recognize anyone playing on the students team. Seniors, she presumed. None of which she was familiar with as the only one she even knows by name was sat a few rows down, smoking a cigarette with his rowdy group of boys. Simone has been strangely keeping her distance from him, yet sharing longing gazes from afar.

Juliette tosses another look over her shoulder, eyes falling onto jovial boys high in energy and practically jumping out of their seats.

     And then there was Descamps, whose expression fell flat and unreadable as he leaned against the iron fence surrounding the pitch. Although the rain was much lighter now, his hair was drenched from the hour the game had been going on for. It would only get worse the more he stood there, exposed to the elements of sprinkling precipitation as he reaches into his pocket. A box of cigarettes looked small in his rather large hands, fingers nimble as he takes one out and shoves it between with his teeth. It seems as if Dupin and Vergoux were more enamored in the game than he was.

     Surprising to say the least as just yesterday he seemed excited to watch. Perhaps his wet coat and lack of umbrella was the cause of his somber mood.

     Juliette tears her gaze away from Joseph as she excuses herself from Simone. With the boys' attention locked onto the game at hand, she was nothing more than another body passing by as she makes her way to the boy.

     Joseph's piercing brown eye watches her as she approaches, the cigarette hung loose at the corner of his lip. She offers him a small smile as she stands by his side, holding the umbrella between the two of them.

She does not say as much as a greeting, but rather keeps her gaze towards the game as Joseph stares down at her with curious eyes. He feigns a grin, the action oddly warming him.

     "That umbrella's not going to do much for me, unfortunately." Joseph mused with a smile. The umbrella was not meant to fit two people under it—at least not someone the size of him.

     "You're shaking like a wet dog," says Juliette as she angles the umbrella to cover him better. Her shoulder was now exposed to the rain and stained dark droplets upon her coat. "I figured I could do you a favor."

     He chuckles, fishing out a lighter from his pocket and ignited the flame with a quick flick. He cups his other hand around the fire, protecting it from the wind and rain as he held the end of his cigarette to it. Juliette watches as the embers burned and released a puff of white smoke.

     Joseph pulls it from between his lips, offering the cigarette to her as a token of appreciation.

     Juliette shakes her head, "I'm okay. I don't smoke."

     It reminded her of her father's terrible habit. Half a pack a day and nothing less. The smell of burning nicotine and tobacco was ingrained into her memory; how it filled her entire home up to the point the cigarette smoke stained the pages of the books in their collection, tainting the pages with the vice of addiction.

     "Maybe you need to," Joseph murmurs as he tilts the umbrella back over Juliette. The rain was no longer hitting her shoulder.

He smiles and the crowd erupts.

     The senior made their penalty kick, and now they were tied with tension growing thicker in the air.