Game, Set, Match

{23}

Trigger warning: offensive language

Nate

Who knew getting Chase to be my boyfriend would be as challenging as it was. Yesterday was emotionally draining. I hated fighting with him but I'm just glad that we can put it all behind us. Chase slept in my bed last night. I slept in his arms. And I felt like I belonged there.

When I woke up late this Saturday morning, his place in my bed was vacant but he left a message saying he would come back in a few hours to take me somewhere. I didn't realise that somewhere was a skatepark.

"We travelled an hour and a half just to go to a bloody skatepark? There's one literally 15 minutes away from your house why couldn't we just go there?"

"Because this is the skatepark where I first learned to skate. I was around 8, I needed to get away from all my family drama and this was my escape." I smile at the thought of a little 8 year old Chase skating around.

I look at the skatepark, all the different ramps and bars, all scratched up from years of use. There are people doing these amazing tricks and whenever they fall they get right back up and try again. The walls are covered in colourful graffiti, from people's names to abstract drawings.

"Come on." Chase says as he shoves a skateboard into my hands and places a helmet on my head.

"Huh." I say confused, only now noticing the duffel bag that Chase brought with him.

"You didn't really think we would be at a skatepark and not skate." He laughs.

"I've never done this before!" I say as Chase bends down to wrap knee pads on my knees.

"Oh, you'll be fine, stop worrying."

I sigh in defeat and ask if we can skate in a secluded area so I don't embarrass myself in front of everyone here.

"Fine. Follow me." 

Chase leads me through a man made hole in the fence of the skatepark, down an alley, through a little forest and there it is, an abandoned playground.

"I used to skate in this playground." Chase says as he walks around the dusty swing set. Vines have crawled their way over the climbing frames. "When the skatepark was full, I would go here to practice. That skateboard you're holding was the first real skateboard I ever had." I look at the black skateboard in my hands and turn it over to see Chase's name written in messy handwriting. I smile as I trace his name with my finger.

"The first ever skateboard I had, I stole."

"What?" I say in shock.

"Yeah, I know. It's not one of my proudest moments. But after using it for a while, one of the wheels were becoming loose. My brother noticed I was always sneaking off and when he realised it was to the skatepark and saw the state of my stolen skateboard he brought me a new one. That one." He points to me. "The first skateboard that belonged to me. That's the last gift he gave to me before going off the rails."

I look at the back of the skateboard again and see in the corner it says 'Love From Derek'. Derek must have been an awesome brother, it must hurt to see him change so drastically.

"I used to live right over this hill. It was a small house, never really felt like home."

It breaks my heart knowing that Chase had such a rough childhood. 

"Come on, let's skate." Chase says, breaking the little silence we were in. There's this new excitement to his voice that you don't hear when he's talking about football. I can tell he truly loves this.

I secure the helmet on my head, tighten my knee pads and clap my hands, determine to do well in this.

Chase laughs as he skates closer to me on his own green skateboard. He says his friends brought it for him last year on his birthday.

First, I step onto the black board and he holds my hands as he walks around the playground, I glide across the ground, wobbling only slightly.

After a tremendous amount of teaching and me falling more times than I would like to admit (I'm very grateful for the safety gear even though I looked stupid in it) Chase spends some time in the actual skatepark doing some far more advanced tricks while I sit and stare.

He performs all these tricks effortlessly, like he doesn't even need to think, he just does it. Some of them look really dangerous, especially when he jumps off the large ramps, but he doesn't seem to have a care in the world. He looks at peace. He looks happy.

Now it's getting darker, the people previously in the skatepark have left and it's just us. Well for a while at least.

"Oi Leo, aren't those the kids from Redington? You know, the ones that got into that fight right on the pitch?"

"Oh shit, it is."

Chase and I turn to see 5 guys, all on the Killsbury football team we previously had a match against, the Killer Cranes. We recognise only one of the boys, their captain Leo.

"Can you guys get into a fight again? The last video I had was blurry." One of the guys pull out there phone and pretend to record us while the others laugh.

"Fuck off." Chase says as he gets up from his seat next to me, walking up to the guy that has his phone pulled out. "You wanna see a fight? How about me and you? You wanna go?" Chase has his hands clenched by his side, and it's obvious the other guys can sense his anger.

"Woah calm down buzz cut, we were only having a little fun." The team captain, Leo, says.

"Ha just like that game." Another guy says. "It was funny you guys thought you stood a chance. It's pathetic really, especially with two faggots as captains."

Chase is teetering on the edge now. Incredibly close to being pushed off.

"Chase don't." I say, standing beside him. I can practically smell that a fight is about to unfold and even though Chase is able to hold his own, with 5 against 2, the odds are against us. "They're not worth it."

"Yeah, listen to your boyfriend." Another guy says. With one last chuckle, the boys finally walk away. Chase kicks a trash can over in rage.

"Did you hear what those fucking twats said?! They were talking shit about our team!" He says stomping around the skatepark, then he stops and faces me when he notices me laughing.

"They called us faggots." I say.

"Exactly. So why are you laughing?" Chase looks at me with confusion across his face.

"I-I don't know." I say, laughing even harder. Eventually Chase starts laughing too. When our fit is over he grabs my hand and leads us to the nearest train station.

And he doesn't let go.