Teammates With Benefits

Chapter 17

Adrian's POV

My whole life has been just a silent suffering. I've never said shit to anyone about how sad I am, and I do not have any intention to do so. While I was never raised this way, I've always viewed emotions as a weakness. I believe them to be weaknesses because emotions are basically you showing your deepest, most unstable state. When people see you like that, they look down on you or feel bad for you. I don't like when people feel bad for me, so I think of emotions as part of being a weak person. 

Well, I must be weak as hell right now, because crying is definitely emotions. I've skipped the last two days of school as well as any team activities we do outside of school, particularly when most of the team played dodgeball over the weekend. I'm not gonna bail on the trip to San Diego though, I love any excuse to leave my fucking boring life. I would also feel bad, I just ditch the team while they have a good time. 

Skipping school is not the sad part of my life, I think skipping school is nice. You can just be alone with your thoughts, no one around to bitch around and piss you off. I had a lot of time to sleep, so that's also nice as fuck. 

I can just stay at home and think about my flaws, issues, and insecurities. I've always thought my nose was a little bit weird, no matter how much I do to change it, my jawline never seems perfect, the way Derek or Cam's is. I also think I'm on the verge of not being ripped enough to be on the football team, I'm quite a bit skinnier than damn near the entire rest of the team. 

My biggest flaw is the fact that I just can't talk about how I'm feeling. If I'm sad, I just have a bad mood, and people might ask me about it, I just don't give them a straight answer. I say something like 'don't worry about it' or 'I'm fine' when I'm 100% not doing fine. 

I've been gay for years, that's not something new to me. I'm probably not going to come out to anyone except for maybe my family and absolute tightest circle of friends, which currently consists of just Cameron and Devin, who I know will be totally fine with me being gay. My mom will probably be alright with me being gay, my dad probably won't give a shit. I just need to explain to them that nothing about me is actually changing, I'm still gonna be the same person. 

To be honest, I've been debating it ever since Aaron came out as bisexual a couple years ago, mostly because the reception to him was really supportive. No one even cares about the fact that he might be checking us out in the showers. I think everyone on the team knows they look good and they aren't insecure about it or uncomfortable with someone looking at them. 

I've been single my whole life, swooning over random guys all over the school, all of them turning out to have girlfriends. Derek was the guy I had been drooling over the most, ever since the day he walked into the school and I was introduced to him. He's just kind of the perfect guy. He's tall, ripped as fuck, his jaw is beautiful, his hair is beautiful, everything about him screams 10/10. 

But now he has a girlfriend, and I have pretty much no chance with him. I'm just gonna have to wait for college probably, that's when I'll meet new people and maybe start dating. It's not that weird that I've been single throughout high school, I mean, it's not really like I've been looking for a relationship. 

I'm not actively asking people on dates, so it's not embarrassing that I haven't been in a relationship. You have to make a move to get into a relationship, and I feel like that's a lot of work that I don't really want to do.

I haven't had a single first; no first kiss, no first relationship, no first date, no first hug or anything like that from anyone. Isn't a hug what we all need sometimes? Or just someone to be there to compliment you and give you a kiss on the cheek or temple, anything like that. I wish I had someone to tell me that everything is going to be alright. I just need someone to assure me that I'll be fine and that all of the lack of play I get is due to my lack of wanting anything instead of because of the way I look. I just wish I could feel happy and not be the most single person on the planet.