"Ellie, I'm glad you're here", Jonas began and I couldn't help but feel anxious at his opening statement, wobbling towards the empty seat across from his desk.
"Well, you uh, asked for me", I mumbled, noticing the way his gaze softened. It had been a few days since the match against United, and even though I had replied to both Leah's and Kim's text messages, with Leah apologizing to me and Kim urging me to apologize to Leah, I hadn't seen any of my teammates since, having called off the training yesterday as the pain in my ankle was only slowly subsiding.
"Yes, that's right", Jonas replied and I shuffled in my seat uncomfortably. I hadn't been shocked when he had texted me this morning, asking me to stop by in his office before joining the physios for an assessment of my ankle, but I was still nervous. Was this about the fight? Was he going to tell me off for my attitude, the way Kim had? Was he going to kick me off the team? I had no idea. My stomach grumbled nervously.
"Well, first of all, how is the ankle?"
I nodded mechanically. "Yeah, it's okay. It's getting better, I think."
"Okay, that's good. Well, supposing Gary allows you to, I'd like to see you on the pitch in Turin this weekend, but we're going to have to see what they say."
I breathed a sigh of relief. I wasn't kicked off, at least.
"Well, I just wanted to talk to you about your confidence in this team. I know that you've had quite a rough few seasons, but we all are very glad that you are here, Ellie. If you are injured, no matter if it's your ankle, or your head, or maybe your mentality, there is no shame in letting us know if you need a bit of time off. In fact, it's what we expect of our players."
I nodded once more, taking in his words. His voice was softer than it should be, for my liking, and his eyes never left mine, despite how uncomfortable this eye-contact was for me.
"Okay", I agreed, not knowing what else to say.
"Are we putting too much pressure on you?", he asked, and despite the fact that I wanted to nod again, tell him yes, I could barely breath under the weight that was mounting on my shoulders, I remained frozen. Jonas looked at me expectantly, not taking my silence for an answer. I sighed.
"It's just, I feel like I'm letting the team down when I'm not playing", I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose. This conversation was making my head ache.
"But I think it's okay, you know? Pressure is a privilege", I huffed. He shook his head.
"It's not okay if it's making you play when you're injured and anxious when you're benched, Ellie. You can be honest with me, just like how I am being honest with you", he tried again, but I was too closed off for this conversation already.
"I know. I am being honest. I'll let you know, if I can't play. It's just- the way this club deals with these kind of things is something I'm still getting used to", I smiled, pushing my seat back slightly. For my liking, this conversation was done. Jonas seemed to accept that, as he himself got out of his chair.
"Please do let me know if there's anything I can do for you. We all want to watch you succeed here, Ellie. If there's anything you need-"
"I'll let you know", I nodded, smiling at him politely, before muttering a quick goodbye and finding my way to the doctor's office, praying that I would be on the pitch again for the match against Turin.
I spent the first half of my day icing my ankle, working on my foot's rotation and watching the team doctor pinch my skin nastily before making my way out of the building and into the cold, to watch the others train. It was difficult, not being out there, the way it had been just a few weeks ago, but I figured the break wouldn't hurt as much, as long as it didn't last too long. I wouldn't know how to deal with Leah and Kim if I was on the pitch with them, anyway. At least not yet.
The only training I joined was the one right before the match, and by then, my pain had subsided enough to make it through the session without having to grit my teeth even once.
"Good one, Ellie", Leah smiled at me as we walked towards the place we'd dropped our water bottles. I picked up the electrolyte drink from the cold grass, washing it down my throat.
"Thanks", I gave back. "You too."
Kim hadn't approached me anymore, but she wasn't awkward on the pitch either, and even though Leah and I had only talked about our fight via text messages, things between us weren't awkward either. I knew the conversation would come up at a certain point, seeing as I suspected she had told Jonas at least something about my issues with being benched, and I most definitely didn't feel grateful about it.
I did, however, keep my mouth shut as we walked onto the plane and I found my seat next to Leah's, dropping my head on her shoulder and falling asleep almost immediately, as it was nearing ten at night already.
"Which bed do you want?", Leah asked as I entered the door behind her tiredly. The sleeping on the plane had done nothing but make me even more exhausted, and I couldn't wait to fall asleep.
"Don't care", I mumbled, pulling my suitcase in and closing the door behind me, as Leah shuffled away beside me.
"How are you so tired? You've slept on me for two hours!", she exclaimed as I dropped onto the bed closest in my reach, sprawled out like a star fish. I huffed into the blanket beneath me.
"M' neck hurts", I mumbled, a hand flying out to rub the sore spot. The position on the plane hadn't been the most comfortable, as my head had been lolling around on Leah's shoulder, bent at an awkward angle. It had been too late for me to realize when I'd woken up, and now I was stuck with the soreness of it. I huffed again.
"Come on, at least change into your pajamas", Leah encouraged me, but it was to no use. I was wearing sweats anyways, never bothering to dress up to travel. Instead, I shuffled up towards the pillow, my hand landing on it ungraciously as Leah laughed at me from wherever she was.
"Go to bed, Leah", I mumbled, despite the fact that we had dinner soon. I couldn't be bothered to stay up -
a) because I wasn't hungry, and
b) because I could fall asleep this very second.
"We still have to eat dinner", Leah mumbled as she came into view, sitting next to me on the edge of the bed. Her hand reached out towards my face and my breathed hitched as I watched her push a strand of hair behind my ear, my cheek fitting into her palm perfectly. My head must've unconsciously because a second later, her cold hand was laying on my cheek softly as I stared up at her. Leah's eyes bore into mine.
"I'm not hungry", I mumbled when I finally found my voice again, and at that, Leah's hand withdrew quickly. I almost winced at the loss of contact, suddenly aware of how much comfort it had given me. It seemed as though I gravitated towards her naturally.
She got up from the bed.
"You have to eat, Ellie."
I groaned.
"I get travel sick, Leah. So as long as you don't want me to throw up on you, just let me sleep", I huffed, my voice suddenly filled with anger. My statement had come out far more aggressively than I had intended it to, but my impatience was bubbling at the back of my throat.
"That's not how being travel sick works, Ellie!"
Suddenly, her voice was just as loud as mine had been, despite the fact that she was shuffling around her suitcase, and suddenly, the exhaustion left my body and I sat up, following her movements with my eyes.
"It is for me", I groaned. Even if it wasn't (which, it wasn't), how was she getting angry over this? How was it her business? How did she care so much?
"Yeah, keep telling yourself that", Leah mumbled, and if she had spoken any quieter, I wouldn't have heard her. But I did. And at once, I was up on my legs, this time actually following her as she brought some of her stuff into the bathroom.
"How are you getting angry over this, Leah? I don't want to eat, just drop it!", I exclaimed, being less careful with my words as anger bubbled in my veins. I just wanted her to drop it. I didn't want to talk about this anymore.
"Ellie, I won't just drop it!"
"Why? It's not your business!", I whined, and I wanted to take my words back as soon as they left my mouth, but I couldn't. They hung in the air between us as Leah turned to look at me, a shocked expression on her face. They stole the oxygen in the room, and it was growing harder for me to breathe.
Leah's expression changed - slowly, but I was so close to her, I couldn't miss how her mouth closed slowly, how her eyebrows lowered and furrowed, how her lips pulled into a small line.
"You're right. It's not", she huffed, and before I could blink, she was out of the hotel room, and there was nothing left for me to do except stare at the closed door, where Leah had stood just a few seconds ago, and wonder how I managed to mess everything up.
It was easy to say that sleep didn't come easy for me. My head was spinning at the thought of what the rest of the girls were up to right now, what they were speaking about over dinner, if they missed me at all, if they wondered where I were, if they saw through me they way I suspected Leah did.
So, half an hour after we were supposed to be at dinner, I rubbed my red-rimmed eyes, silently sighing as I took in the state of myself in the large mirror of our hotel room, before pulling the door closed behind me and making my way downstairs slowly. I knew that if Leah spoke, and I wasn't sure whether she would or not, I would be screwed. In every possible way. And I couldn't afford that - not after the conversation I'd had with Jonas.
So, I entered the dining room silently, filling my plate with a bit of rice and chicken, and lots of vegetables without any sauce, before pulling back the empty chair next to Viv at the end of the table, not caring about the worried looks I received from my teammates.
I couldn't focus on that. Not now.
My hands tremored as I lifted the first fork of food to my mouth, and Viv glanced at me from the side. I knew that she was struggling as well, with Beth having just gone through surgery and the rest of the team tiptoeing around the topic. Still, she spoke to me quietly as I took my first bite.
The table around us slowly started deserting as some of the girls were already done eating and soon enough, we were out of earshot of the rest of them.
"Are you okay?"
I nodded, chewing the food slowly. Viv looked at me expectedly and I gulped down a bit of rice before opening my mouth.
"Leah and I had another fight", I sighed, not even knowing why I told her this. I wasn't one the whine about things, especially not when they were about this kind of topic, but with Viv, it just came easily. She had heard about our first fight, and I knew that she wouldn't push me. In addition, my head was close to explode if I didn't get any of this out to anyone.
"Why?", she asked slowly, as if she was unsure whether this was an appropriate question. I shrugged.
"It was stupid. I wanted to sleep, and she wanted me to eat dinner. I was just tired, and she made this huge fuss about it", I sighed. That wasn't really what had happened, but in a way, it was.
I figured it was a grey zone.
"Well, to be fair, we don't see much of you eating", Viv mumbled, her Scottish twang ever so present. I shrugged again.
"It's not a big deal", I mumbled, signalizing I was done with the conversation, or, well, this part of it, at least.
"I think she's just worried. I am too. You're under a lot of pressure, I think a lot of us didn't realize that until the last match", Viv scraped her fork across her empty plate. I gazed at Leah, who was sitting with Kim on the other end of the table. They were laughing at something. At least this way, I knew that she wasn't ratting out my eating disorder to her captain. Our captain. My captain.
"I've been under pressure since I was seventeen. I don't need anyone to be worried about me. I've got it."
"It's not that you're under pressure, it's that you're putting yourself under pressure. You're young, Ellie, we don't need you to save our asses. We win and we lose as a team and-"
She halted as Leah walked past us, despite the fact that the woman didn't even glance our way as her, Kim, and Steph walked past.
"if you're injured, or have to take a mental day, it doesn't mean that you are a bad team player. It means you're human", Viv sighed, as I stared down at my plate. Her eyes were too serious for my liking.
"I know that", I mumbled. "I do, but it's just difficult, sometimes. The last thing I need is my teammate picking fights."
"Your teammate?", Viv asked as she wiggled her eyebrows. I stared at her, confusedly. I didn't know what she was being stupid for, but I didn't ask her either.
"Talk to her", Viv encouraged me as I discarded my empty plate into the drawer presented for it after having finished my meal in silence, looking up at her with raised eyebrows.
"I don't think that'll change anything", I sighed and told Viv goodnight as we walked into the hallway, and I finished the walk to our room in silence. It was only seven in the evening and Viv had promised me I could come to her and Vic's room if I needed to, but I was, at this point, far too tired to pick up our fight where we'd left off, hoping Leah would just leave me alone tonight - or, well, not attack the topic again. I did crave her presence still, and I craved the conversations we would usually have, the banter, the watching football or a movie together.
As I entered the room, Leah was laying on her bed already, the telly showing one of the other Champions League's games of the night. I didn't look up into her eyes as I grabbed a pair of pajamas for the night and got ready for bed in the bathroom.
The air was thick with tension as I got under the covers of my bed, staring at the TV the way Leah did. Bayern was leading. If things turned for the worse, we'd have to face them soon.
"They're doing well", Leah commented, nodding towards the screen as she looked at me from her own bed. I nodded.
"Yeah, two goals up. Who scored?"
Conversation didn't exactly come easy to us still, but as we kept talking, and as I kept listening to Leah's commentary of the match, closing my eyes whenever they showed Alexander and hoping she didn't notice, I felt the tension slowly fading out.
I cheered the slightest for Syd's next goal, although I should be hoping that she'd lose against Benfica, not knowing whether or not I'd be ready to play against her for the first time in my life.
"You think we'll go against them?", Leah asked when the final whistle blew. She looked over at me once more, shifting in her bed so that she was laying on her side. I did the same, placing my head on top of my elbow as I gazed back at her.
"I hope not", I mumbled, yawning. Bayern had won, and if we won the next few games as well, we would advance from the group stage the way they did. Going against them was very much a possibility, and with my luck, I'd even say it was likely.
"Yeah. They're back on track", Leah answered, alluding back to the beginning of their season. I rememberd the match we had first watched together clearly. Suddenly, I craved Leah's presence, and not the way she was laying in the other bed. Slowly, unconsciously, I pulled my blanket back and sat on the edge of the bed, unsurely. Leah gazed back at me and without having to say a word, she scooted further to the side, patting the empty space next to her.
I waddled over without thinking, laying down on the warm mattress next to her, pulling the cover to my chin.
"I don't want to play against them. I don't think I can."
The statement sat between us, and I almost feared the silence that suddenly commenced would kill me before Alexander Strauß ever could, but before my thoughts could linger on his face any longer, I felt Leah pull me closer to her body, the warmth radiating off of her.
"You don't have to, you know that, right?"
I nodded. Truthfully, I did know, with the way both Jonas and Viv were constantly reassuring me, that I could tap out any second and allow the team to face my former club without me, but I didn't know if I would allow myself to. Maybe, by the time the match came up, I would have grown.