Chasing Sofia

Chapter 3 - Adjusting

Once I arrive, I immediately spot both of them doing drills on the field. Neither of them is hard to miss, but I find myself staring at Adrian, as mad as I am at him. He’s really good and it’s simply amazing to watch. Of course I’ve seen him play many times over the years, but I’d forgotten how incredible he is. I’m surprised a professional soccer team hasn’t snatched him up yet seeing that he is about to graduate.

I still can’t believe he’s living at my house. Even worse, I can’t believe my family didn’t think to tell me about it. I guess he’s always been considered part of the family, so naturally my dad would offer for him to live with us when his parents had to move back to Chicago for work.

Though it still feels incredibly weird for me that we are living under the same roof, and I know he certainly feels the same way. Especially with my parents gone half the time and no real adult supervision.

I pull a textbook out of my bag to get away from my thoughts. I might as well get an early start on my homework. I begin working on an assignment for Business Calculus and I already know I’m going to struggle through this class. Maybe I can talk to the teacher’s assistant to see if he can tutor me or can recommend someone for private lessons.

“Hey,” I hear a voice greet me.

I look up and see a guy standing next to me. He looks familiar and I think he might be in one of my classes.

“Um, hi,” I respond.

“Sofia, right? You’re in my calc class.”

“Yeah, that’s me. Sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

“Mike. It’s nice to meet you,” he says, extending his hand.

“Nice to meet you, too,” I respond, shaking it. He seems pretty friendly so I smile at him.

“Are you waiting for someone? Do you mind if I sit down?”

“Sure, no problem. I’m just waiting for my brother, he’s playing soccer.”

He takes a seat next to me and looks at the field. “It’s Nico, right?”

“Yeah, do you know him?”

“We had a few classes together last semester. Nice guy.”

“Well, sometimes,” I mumble. Definitely not yesterday.

“Yeah, well at least until he broke up with his girlfriend. He kind of changed after that. She goes to a different school, right?”

What? Nico broke up with Ana? They were so perfect together. When the hell did that happen? Even worse, why hasn’t he told me? I can’t believe I just found out this information through a side comment from a random person.

“Yeah. She’s in art school,” I answer, still trying to process this.

“Did you just start this semester? I don’t think I’ve seen you before,” Mike says.

“Yeah, I was in London for a bit but just moved back,” I explain. To a crazy house apparently, I might add.

“Oh, that’s cool. So I see you’re already doing homework for class, huh?” he nudges me.

He’s a bit too close to me for my liking, especially that I barely know him. I run my fingers through my hair and look at my books in front of me. “Yeah, I’m not very good at this stuff so just trying to make sense of it all.”

“I can help you if you want. I already took calculus in high school, but didn’t manage to get the college credit for it.”

“Really? That would be awesome. I was actually thinking I should get a tutor or something.”