Football Boys

Intro

"Tell me the truth... what happened... are you oka—"

"I-I don't know coach... it's... I'm fine, I promise."

Looking past me, he watched as everyone looked on in curiosity, as if trying to read his lips to see what he was telling me.

"Stop promising me that you're fine when you continue to do horribly at practice," he whispered.

I slowly nodded, averting my eyes to the turf.

"Grey..."

He placed a hand on my shoulder, coaxing me to look up into his fatherly gaze.

"I don't know what's going on at home... if there's something personal going on with you or anything..."

He trailed off... seeming to rethink what he was about to say.

"Listen, I won't bench you... you're one of my best players, but you have to do your part and pick up your slack. You're fumbling the ball, tripping over your own shoes... it's stressing me out just to look at you today. And with the game being this weekend, I need you to be on your game, because this one... this one is important; it's the last game of the season."

Silent, I sucked on my bottom lip and furrowed my brows.

"Listen, if you need to talk about something... anything, come to my office whenever okay?"

I nodded, watching his smile fade as he looked past me to see everyone fooling off.

"Hey, did I say stop practicing? Get your asses back to it eh!"

Patting me hard on my back as he turned to wink at me, he laughed as I nearly fell forward because of weight of his heavy hand.

"Take five. Oh and make sure to tell Tyler we desperately need him," he deadpanned.

I nodded, walking over to sit on one of the benches near the bleachers with a plop.

The sun from the cloudless sky beamed down like the heavy hammer of Thor as I sat on a scorching bench.

Taking in a deep breath, I squinted up at the sky and sighed, letting my gaze drop to the tuft seconds later as I drifted into my thoughts.

Tyler reigned over my mind, his smile and soft features brewing up a warm sensation in my gut.

Even his name was just enough to make me speechless... thoughtless too.

One time, he surprised me with a visit at my house... brought me a gift and everything just for the heck of it. It was just a football, but it meant the world to me.

The hug afterwards was so... it was so much that I forgot where we were, what it felt like to stand on ground and... I felt safe.

On that day of practice, he'd be coming home from a trip, which of course left me as lonely as one could be.

But what made every mistake that day and every trip up, even my fall, worth it... was that I'd get to see to finally see him.

"Hey man," a familiar voice shouted, literally tearing me from my thoughts by the hair of my scalp.

I glanced up from the ground, and blinking away the sweat on my lids to squint, I saw the most annoying smirk of the most exasperating face one could ever see.

"Hey... Ellie..."

I didn't mean for my greeting to be lack luster... no wait, I did.

He sat next to me and nodded toward the cheerleaders practicing near the end of the football field.