November 1st, 2PM, Tuesday (Going to start showing the time and date like this)
Maia P.O.V
"You know, if you stare any harder at Paige, Geno might request a new photographer." I hear the comment behind me when I lower my lens, rolling my eyes slightly as I check the shot before starting to move more towards the right of the gym, snapping more pictures of the girls practicing.
"Be quiet up there before I take your glasses." My response causes Alyssa to fake gasp, the sunglasses the girl took up to wearing doing a bit of justice to ail her seemingly constant headaches, painkillers and all she would still have the thud pain of a migrane, just not as bad as it would be without. It especially got worst because of the sensitivity to light her eyes and head had at the moment, thus the sunglasses.
"So, you're trying to kill me, got it." Alyssa says from her spot on the bleachers, seemingly writing out a note in the air as she talks, causing me to chuckle.
"You're extra." I breathe out with a laugh, messing with settings on my camera to focus on Azzi as the girl takes a shot, my camera .aling a shutter sound as I snap the picture. "Alright this one's nice, definitely going on the insta." I mutter to myself as I look at the after shot, which was already great without any extra editing.
"How was practice today?" I ask the girl as I move back to the bleachers, climbing up a few steps to stand next to her. She shrugs.
"It was practice I guess. I can't do anything, Coach is having me help coach some of the girls up though, it's fun and a different perspective. I don't know how many if them are too keen about listening the a freshman though."
I let out a mixture between a short laugh and scoff at that. "Freshman or not, they should listen," I speak, before poking a finger into the girls sweatshirt. It being the championship sweatshirt they were given for winning the tournament last weekend.
"Especially after your performance helped them not only get invited to that, but also win the entire thing." She flushes at my words, I'd be dammed if anyone made my best friend feel less of herself.
"Point, blank, period." I hear Paige as she comes over to us, grabbing her water bottle that I had refilled foe her earlier. "Thanks pretty girl."
I smile at her before laughing, "Do you even know what we were talking about earlier?"
"No, but I heard win so I was assuming it was something good." The blonde admits with a laugh, drinking from her bottle before putting it next to me again, running back to her drills.
"Mmm, it's giving golden retriever, blonde hair and all." Alyssa jokes, laughing as my girlfriend goes back to practicing, the girl messing with Azzi and Nika.
"Speaking of golden retriever.." Alyssa tilts her head, "Have you talked to Nika yet?"
"How the fuck does that-"
"Don't play dumb, if it wasn't for that girl checking up on you would be a lost cause. Not to mention, you guys BOTH follow each other around." She blushes, rubbing her arm and looking away.
"Not yet, we're supposed to tonight though. I'm going to her dorm."
"And Paige is coming to the apartment, that makes more sense now."
"Why now? She's always at our place."
"True but she kept asking me to make sure you actually went out, now I'm assuming to talk to Nika." I laugh.
"Orrr she's just trying to get a taste of Maia Par-" I interrupt her, throwing my jacket at her which was next to me on the bleachers.
"You're done. Speaking privileges revoked, go to sleep, I'm going back to picture taking." I speak, my red face portraying my embarrassment as I leave the bleachers, going back to taking pictures and videos, and leaving a cackling Alyssa sitting.
_________
It was about six o'clock now and I was waiting for Paige to get back to the apartment, she had already come and picked Alyssa up to drop off at their dorm. Nika had offered but the blonde stated since she was already going to be out she could do it, plus Alyssa couldn't take my car with her concussion still.
The door opens as Paige uses my keys to unlock the door, the taller woman walking in with a grin, closing the door and then instantly coming over to me, sitting next to me on the couch before adjusting herself so that she was laying her head in my lap, making me move my laptop. "Hi Maia," Paige says with a grin, causing me to laugh.
"Hi baby," I coo back, leaning down to kiss the basketball player, smiling against her lips as Paige hums into the kiss before looking back at my laptop as I pull away."
"Operation, get Twin the girl, is now underway." Paige mumbles with a small dance while laying on me, causing me to laugh again."
"You're such a dork."
"I know you are but what am I?" She comments, moving to prop herself on her elbows, allowing me to pull my laptop back into my lap.
"Working on shots for this weekend?" I hum in acknowledgement, showing her a few of Caroline, Azzi and Aaliyah before getting to her.
"Your guys media day is coming up super quick too, so I'm taking a lot more pictures so everyone can have like their own little folder of pictures instead of just sending out the headshots and basic team photos you know?" I say, dragging Paige's pictures into a folder as I talk.
"Yeah that makes sense," She says, eyes glancing at the screen before grinning, "I don't know about the others but if I were them, I'd be jealous." She says the last word with a sing-song voice, the number of pictures in her folder being almost double of everyone else's. I blush but stay quiet, getting a laugh out of my girlfriend as she kisses my head.
"My biggest fan is beautiful." She comments, the girl sitting up before sliding down the couch enough to be able to lay her head on my shoulder comfortably as I worked, her hand coming over to hold my thigh while she used the other to scroll through Instagram, the two of us being in a comfortable silence until I finished.
"Done!" I state, closing the computer after about 30 minutes, snapping Paige out of her now TikTok scrolling daze, the girl having been smirking at the screen after seeing an edit of herself.
'What's that about? Like edit 90 of the day?" I chuckle, watching as the girl's eyes shine as she shows me the TikTok.
Thank you editors for feeding my addiction to my girlfriend
Paige smirks down at me now as I blink, looking up realizing I had been watching the video on repeat for a few minutes.
"I was going to say that they like what they see I guess, but it seems like you do too." Paige jokes in that husky voice, eyes dropping down my own body.
"I like what I'm seeing too, so I guess it goes all around." She comments, causing me to smack her as she laughs, moving to get up.
"That was smooth, you can't tell me it wasn't!" She says, getting up and following me.
"That was smooth," I mock, giggling as Paige grabs my waist, pulling me back into her and kissing my cheek and then my head, "Hey, I was trying to start cooking for us tonight."
"You always cook, let's order something, take a break."
"I like cooking," I say but shrug as I do, "I won't say no to free food though." I laugh, turning in the girl's hold to hug her back."
"Hmm... How's Chinese food sound?"
"Very good," I hum as my girlfriend says one of my other favorite things to eat, besides Chipotle.
"Okayyyy," She says letting me go, not before hitting my ass as she walks past, causing me to blush and let out a fake gasp.
"Paige Madison Bueckers!"
"Hey it was right there, I couldn't help it!" She laughs, hands up as I shake my head, getting on my tip-toes to plant another kiss on her lips before going back to the couch, looking up the nearby Chinese take-out place.
"Do you want to order and then pick up? Or just go out and eat there?"
"Um, I'm down for either. It is a lot warmer in here though then outside," I laugh at my girlfriends words, as she was already starting to grab her wallet to find her card. "Ordering from home it is." I comment as she hands me her card, which I grab with a thanks.
"NIL deals go crazy huh?" I jokingly ask as Paige just rolls her eyes, plopping down next to me.
"Whatever, don't act like you don't like me having money as much as I do."
"I neither agree or disagree with that statement."
"Uh-huh, that's what I thought." She laughs before we start to talk about what to order.
"Fried rice, for sure." Paige comments, peering over my shoulder as I type on the computer.
"Shrimp or chicken?"
"Chicken." I add the item to the cart, so far it was chicken fried rice, orange chicken and lo-mein noodles.
"Do you think Alyssa is going to want anything? You can get her something and just put it in the fridge."
"She loves chicken lo-mien and egg roles."
"Alright cool, get another lo-mien with chicken and like 2 or 3 egg rolls for her. I know the like portion sizes are shareable so we can share the normal lo-mien and you and her can share the other, or since that's lowkey all she has she might just eat it all at once."
"Sounds like a plan." I hum, putting the card info in the checkout system before paying, giving the visa card back to Paige, pecking her cheek.
"Thank you P,"
"Anything for my lady," She pauses before laughing at whatever she was about to say next, "And our cripple."
I hit her, not hard but hard enough for her to laugh even more, "You are so messed up for that." I say, laughing alongside with her.
"Hey, I haven't even known her a full year and she's gotten injured twice, I think she's been crippled longer than healthy, it's a well earned name if I do say so myself."
"Don't let her hear you say that," I shut the computer with a giggle, "It said around 15 minutes for it being done."
Paige gets up, starting to stretch, "Want to start heading out then?" She says with her keys in her pocket, fishing them out. "It's about a 10 minute drive."
I nod, moving to get up. "Let me grab a jacket first."
"Take your time, I'm going to get the car started and warmed for you." Paige responds as I disappear in the hallway, the girl knowing I loved putting the heat on in our cars.
"Thank you!" I call before I hear the door shut, quickly grabbing a jacket off my bed in my bedroom before following after my girlfriend.
_________
Alyssa's P.O.V
"How much do you want to bet Paige and Maia are talking and trying to place bets on the outcome of our talk?" Nika asks semi-jokingly, trying to lighten the mood as we walk into her dorm. I laugh, instantly moving to full on lay out on the girl's bed.
"Oh a hundred percent." I nod, thanking Nika for keeping the lights on a lower setting as I take my glasses off. "Though, the result is really up to us," I mumble, starting to sit up and looking back at Nika who just looks at me with an amused expression from me collapsing on her bed.
"Hey, don't judge me, your comforter is stupid comfortable." I pout, causing her to hold up her hands while laughing.
"No judgement here." The Croatian laughs, moving to sit next to me before she starts to speak again. "Can I start?"
I just nod, and she smiles softly.
"Okay, first of all, I'm sorry. About how I reacted with the incident at first, the way I handled the aftermath of us kissing could have been.. better, to say the least." The foreign girl cringes slightly at the memory, as I just lean my head on her shoulder, starting to play with her hand, something I knew that would calm the girl down. Nika tenses before relaxing quickly, sighing.
"I panicked," She confesses, "I thought I read the room wrong, or it was a wrong time for what I had done. I didn't want to fuck up our friendship, us." She ends, her accent thickening with the swear word which I always found amusing, American swear words were always said with more of an accent then any other word since she usually swore in both languages equally, Croatian a bit more while playing basketball.
"You couldn't fuck us up by that, if anything the way the reaction happened was more of a concern for us then anything." I answer softly, moving my head to glance up at an embarrassed looking Nika.
"I know," She says, "It was a really shitty move on my part, I don't have an excuse for it besides fear."
I hum at that, before responding, "It's okay, I understand it honestly... I'm sorry for how I treated it too after for the next few days." I sigh, "I was scared that I was reading hints from YOU wrong," I laugh at that, "And with us kissing and you reacting like that... I didn't know honestly, I thought pulling away for a little bit would remove my feelings for you enough that it didn't hurt or didn't make me want to kiss you every time I saw you after that, after finally experiencing it." I pause, my eyes dropping to the girls lips in front of me before snapping out of the daze, looking back up.
"But that was really unfair for you on my part, we we're both just really acting on miscommunication that we fucked up ourselves." I end, sighing again but raising an eyebrow at a grinning Nika, "Nika?"
"So you have feelings for me?"
I blink, amusement starting to bubble within me as I see the girl's eyes sparkle as she grins at me, I let out a fake sigh of annoyance. "Jesus Muhl, I just left my heart out there in an apology and that's all you hear?" I say, a joking tone to my voice to let the other know I wasn't really mad, the action just making her grin more.
"I don't know," Nika comments, my hand still holding hers as I absentmindedly played with it now. "I'm pretty sure I've already accepted your apology wayyy before this so," She ends the comment, chuckling as I just shove her playfully.
"You ass," I say jokingly, "This was supposed to be a serious conversation and now we're joking." I laugh.
"Hey, isn't that better than being serious and nervous?" She asks and I just hum again in acknowledgement, "Plus now we both know it wasn't us not sharing mutual feelings for each other," She says, her hand gripping onto mine a bit tighter, I smile at the show of affection.
"Just a little bit of us both being idiots." I laugh as Nika echo's 'A little?' questionably, "Okay, maybe a lot."
My eyes lock with Nika's as both of our laughter dies down, Nika let's go of my hand to brush a piece of my hair back that was falling back into place. Her hand dropping down to my cheek again, a unspoken question in her eyes.
"Please do." I breathe out, Nika pulling me towards her after that, our lips connecting as I move my own hands to grip onto her waist, pulling her even closer to me. Nika laughs into the kiss.
"Eager, are we?" Nika mumbles into the kiss in her native language, making my mind fog even more at the husky voice and accent.
"Shut up." I respond in English as we separate slightly, "I didn't get to enjoy it like this last time." I mumble, pulling the girl back into the kiss, heart racing as our mouths mold together seemingly perfectly, the hands that Nika had on my face dropping to my neck, the girl playing with the hair at the nape of my neck as I let out a small moan into the kiss at the feeling, face instantly turning red as Nika pulls away at that, a shit eating grin on her face.
"Aw, is your neck sensitive?" She coos, making my face burn even brighter as I just cross my arms, pouting. Nika laughs, moving her hands to uncross my hands, putting my arms back around her waist.
"I'm just kidding, it was cute ljubav." She teases with a smile, planting a kiss on my nose which makes me smile.
"Lyz?"
"Yeah?" I hum happily, still holding the girl in my arms.
"Will you be my girlfriend?" She asks in her native tongue, suddenly looking nervous making me laugh.
"You're basically in my lap right now," She hits my shoulder as I joke, before I move my head to her neck, burying my face in the crook between her neck and shoulder , I always loved how the other girl smelt.
"I'm yours, Nika." I mumble into her neck, loud enough for her to understand me. I start smiling into her neck as she giggles, knowing me speaking when I had my head buried into her like this always tickled her a bit.
I feel a kiss on the top of my head as Nika wraps her arms around my neck, hugging me while I stayed curled into her.
"What do you say we fuck with Paige and Maia and act like we hate each other when they ask what happened?" Nika's voice states and I pull away from her to look at her amused smirk.
"You, are so evil." I laugh, "I'm down."