Post Olympic

Bodyguards

"Does her old friends mean homeless people?" Greenbean asks.

"I'm pretty sure that's what that means." I bend over and start to lace up my boots. It's going to be freezing cold. Boston in November is kinda just gross. It's cold, there's no snow, and it's overcast.

"So, are you going to do anything?" Yeti asks. I turn to look at him.

"Huh?"

"We all know you like her, it's obvious. So? You gonna do something?" He raises his eyebrows. I scoff.

"You know I can't date her. She's a coach."

"So?" Greenbean mumbles. "If you like her, you like her."

"Well, she probably doesn't like me back, so there's that." I pull my jacket over my shoulders and they conviene at the door with me.

"Well you could, I don't know, tell her you like her and go with it." Greenbean mumbles.

"And I can't be the only one that likes her, I mean."

"Well, yeah, but," Yeti shakes his head.

"Alright, let's just go, we'll see how this works out."

We meet Nico, she's got four backpacks. We each take one, as instructed. They're painfully heavy, but I hope that gets better as we go.

I walk upfront, next to her, Yeti and Greenbean hang back, chatting.

"I know you make fun of my fashion sense a lot, but yours is fantastic." I lean over to say it so nobody hears.

"Well yes," she laughs. "I got to start from scratch, so," I take a minute to appreciate it. Timberland boots, dark jeans, a wolves hoodie with a flannel over it, and her jacket over that. I never noticed that she had her ears pierced before, and I look a bit closer. I didn't pin her as several earrings person, but now that I'm looking at it, yeah, it makes sense. I'm only looking at one ear, but it's got four rings in it, two toward the top, two toward the bottom. I'm a bit obsessed with the look, now that I'm seeing it.

"Are you staring at me?" She laughs as we make our way out of the building.

"Yeah, when did you get your ears pierced like that?" I have the urge to run my fingers over them.

"Oh, yeah, my friend did them in high school, they didn't close, so I figured I'd put something back in them."

"It looks cool," I mumble. She laughs at this, we take a turn down an alley. I figure Nico is fluent in finding her way around the city.

I let her walk in front of me. Not so I can stare at her more, no, it's definitely because I want to stare at her more.

God.

Her wrists are covered in small bits of string and the watch she tells me she's had forever. The best way I can describe her hair is late-phase Captain America. Similar to the last two movies I think. Kind of blonde, kind of not. Really short, no particular style, but neat, and hot. All of her is like that, put together and fucking attractive.

If I'm not careful, I trip over my own feet obsessing over her. But who wouldn't? She's Nico.

"First stop," She points across a main road to the greenway. We follow her blindly, and she leads us to a little corner area, kind of surrounded by trees.

"Nico? Is that you?" There's two guys sitting up against a tree. They look really cold. The three of us stay back a bit.

"Yo-Yo James, Wheels! How's it going?" She sits down next to them and they look between each other.

"I know you got important, but damn, bodyguards?" Wheels points up to us. I turn red. Yeti and Greenbean shift behind me.

"No," She laughs. "This is Sauerkraut, Greenbean and Yeti. Center, left wing and right defense."

"Ah, I see," Yo-Yo James chuckles. "You're still on your nickname game then."

"Yeah, I am," She grins. "Alright, I'm trying to hit Pacman, Keller, Jackson, Arsen, you know, the crew."

"Did you get Arsen some honey? He's gonna kill you if you didn't." She reaches into her bag and retrieves two little bundles. It looks like a blanket wrapped around basic survival stuff. A reusable water bottle, full to the top, gloves, granola bars, hair brushes, toothbrushes, I can't see much else. She hands them the stuff, and laughs a bit.

"Of course I got Arsen honey," She leans in. "He'd call Bertha if I didn't. Thirty years of the silent treatment would be over 'cause he'd need her to blow me to smithereens with a variety of scented candles."

"Precisely, now run along, it's cold and you've got somewhere to be warm." Wheels tips his hat at us and I'm staring at Nico.

"See you guys!" She waves, and then leads us out of the park.