stars || Joe Sugg

22.) chamomile tea and skinned knees

Within only about ten minutes, Ruby parks the car and sighs in exaggeration. "Oh, my God, that was, hands-down, the most nerve-racking thing I've ever done." She mutters, opening up the door before stepping out. As I get out of the car myself, I grab her around the waist while she is distracted by talking to Josh. Lifting her off the ground, she yells loudly almost in my ear.

"You said I wasn't allowed to bother you in the car." I explain to her as she continues to kick around. Being roughly the same size, it's not the easiest thing to pick her up and hold her for very long. It's not a very big surprise when we end up on the pavement; Ruby on top for me to break the fall.

"Sugg, you are, by far, the most annoying person I know, but I love you, anyways." She says before reaching a hand out to Josh to pull her off the ground. I sit there for a short second trying to not think too much about what she said. When we first started dating, we just kind of threw the word around all the time, knowing it obviously didn't mean anything yet. Neither of us had said it in over a month.

"You coming, Joe?" Jack asks, prompting me to finally pull myself off the ground. Once inside the small gated field, we all pull off our jackets. Despite it being early May, it hasn't warmed up much. Ruby is used to almost ten degrees warmer weather in Los Angeles, so she is not happy about the weather. After we've switched into actual trainers that we don't have to worry about getting muddy, unlike the bright white shoes that Jack came in, Ruby dribbles the football into the middle of the field.

"I hear Ruby plays rough." The blonde boy says, bouncing the football off his feet and knees.

"You love bragging about me, don't you?" Ruby says to me as she pulls her long hair up into a ponytail. I nod, shrugging my shoulders as if to say that it's no big deal.

"I think, I'd rather play with you than against you." Jack says to Ruby.

"That doesn't mean I won't hit you, if you make a stupid-ass decision." She jokes, stealing the ball away from him.

"So, Joe and I versus you and Ruby?" Josh suggests to Jack. There's a small collective nod across the four of us before Ruby kicks the ball towards me, popping the bubblegum in her mouth.

"Let's go." She smirks.

~

About halfway through the game, Caspar and Conor showed up in an Uber and offered to join in to which Ruby obliged, but immediately grabbed Caspar for her and Jack's team, leaving Conor for Josh and I.

Conor is not the most athletic of us, but he is pretty good at football, just not as good as Caspar. It did kind of even out the teams, though. Josh was the tall one on our team, and then they had Caspar. By the end of the game, it ended up being 4-2; Ruby's team winning by two.

I don't think anyone, including myself, actually expected Ruby to be as good as she is. It's not the fact that she's a girl, it's more that the only place we've really seen her is holed up somewhere. She doesn't look like an outside-person at all.

Ruby and I are currently sitting in the boot of Conor's car at a small grocery shop while the other four boys are inside picking up whatever they need. I only really know that Caspar ran in to find something he could use as an ice pack for his scraped elbow. We have pushed down Conor's backseat to widen the space in the back for everyone to fit when they get back. It's just something we enjoy doing, instead of going to a restaurant or back to someone's flat, we find it enjoyable to hang out in the back of Conor's SUV.

We sit next to each other against the right side of the car. I look over at my girlfriend, who is placing a third plaster over a scrap on her knee. There are grass stains on her her bright blue shorts, as well as her hands and legs. "Can you text Caspar and get him to bring me some chamomile tea?" She asks, breaking the silence in the car. I pick up the first phone I can find, which happens to be hers and text Caspar to bring some.

Ruby's piercing is beginning to get agitated after she accidentally ran into Conor with so much force to knock them both over. She hit her nose roughly on his shoulder, almost giving herself a nose bleed. Now, the pain is gone, and her piercing is just irritating her. She was already wearing the stud causing her nose to itch, but running into Conor only made it worse.

"Can we talk about something?" I ask her, cautiously. I don't know why I thought that was the best route. It clearly isn't. I've had that line said to me so many times. I hate it. Ruby obviously hates it, too, because as soon as I say it, she's turning away from me for a small second before turning back.

"You want to talk about what I said." She says. It's more of a statement than a question, as if she has just been waiting for me to ask. I didn't want to make anything awkward, but I needed to ask about it. "Well, yeah. I meant it. And, you still haven't said it back to me, you dick." She says, sarcastically, playfully punching my arm. I pull her head down to rest on my shoulder before kissing the very top of her head.

I've only told maybe two girls I've ever dated that I loved them. It's not like I'm afraid to admit my feelings or anything, just more the fact that I don't think I've ever been in love. I've never told a girl 'I love you' first. There's like a 95-percent chance that if my girlfriend says she loves me, I'll say it back. I don't ever feel like I'm lying, even though that's exactly what I'm doing. The two times I've said it, I only did it because I felt like I was almost there, like I was about to fall in love. Something always happened before I could fall for them.

But as I sit here next to Ruby in the back of Conor's SUV, I don't have to second guess myself. I don't have to worry about lying as I whisper to her, "I love you, Ruby. I love you so much." I can hear her giggle quietly as she lifts her head from my shoulder.

"If you weren't ready, you didn't have to say anything." She responds.

"No. I really do love you, babe." I reassure her as she picks at the bottom hem of my khaki shorts.

"I know Zoe said you've never fell in-"

"Oh, my God. Ruby, I love you!" I interrupt her loudly, causing her to burst out laughing.

"Well, I mean, if you are sure..." She jokes as I hear something move in the front of the car. Both Ruby and I jump to see Jack holding his vlogging camera out, moving it from where it sat on the dashboard.

"You see, the best thing about that entire cute conversation is that my camera was recording." He teases as the other three boys begin climbing into the boot of the car.

"Wait, what just happened?" Caspar asks.

"Joe just confessed his undying love for Ruby." Jack explains, moving his hands in a theatrical way before climbing over the center console to sit with the rest of us.

"It was not that Shakespearean." Ruby laughs, taking the coffee cup from Caspar. She takes the tea bag out and presses it against her nose in attempt to stop the redness around her piercing.

"I was wondering why you wanted a chamomile tea." Caspar says, taking the cup from her outstretched hand.

"It smells disgusting, doesn't it?" Jack comments as Ruby scrunches her nose up. She nods her head once before picking up the bag of crisps that Josh offers her.

"Babe, can you...?" She asks, lifting her finger off the teabag on her nose. I hold it on her nose as she pulls the bag open.

"Look at them. So precious." Conor mocks, making his voice higher with every word.