AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Months sounded daunting enough. Memories of Beck might haunt me for years?
Three games later, girls start to climb out of the pool. I’d rather continue playing, but I’ve also swallowed a significant amount of chlorinated water.
“Room five seventeen ladies! We’ve got booze!” someone calls out, prompting some scattered cheers. I pull myself up on the edge of the concrete but leave my legs dangling in the water.
“We’re headed up.” Cressida appears beside me, already dressed. “Do you want us to wait for you?”
“No, I’m good. Go ahead,” I tell her.
She nods.
“Did Emma show up?”
Cressida frowns. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen her. We’ll swing by your room and check on our way.”
“Okay.”
A few minutes later, I’m the only one left at the pool. For the first time since finding out Beck is here, I’m all alone. The steady drip of water running off my skin and back into the pool is the only soundtrack.
I knew I would probably see him again. Eventually. There are a lot of soccer players in the world. Few at his level; the level I hope to reach.
That was meant to be some distant encounter, at a huge tournament years into the future.
Not here.
Not now.
By the time I stand, my feet are pruned and the rest of my skin is dry. I towel off and then step back into my sweatshirt and sweatpants. Sink down onto one of the lounge chairs and pull my phone out of my pocket, biting on my bottom lip as I deliberate what to say. If I should send anything. The last text I sent him was one asking what time I should come over. So, so different from the place we’re in now after a month of silence.
SAYLOR: Field twelve.
Ball is in his court. Or at his end, rather.
I smile grimly at my lame sports joke as I stand, leaving the humid air behind and weaving my way back down the hotel halls and through the lobby. No one stops me. Technically, all attendees have a curfew that went into effect an hour ago, but any authority figures will hopefully be distracted by the party happening upstairs and not me taking a walk.
The automatic doors glide open, providing me with a soundless exit—into a deluge of water. It’s not raining out—it’s pouring. I’m soaked after a few steps and debate turning back, but I press on. At least it’ll wash the chlorine out of my hair.
Everything glints under the natural light of the moon and the artificial ones lining the path that leads from the lodge to the fields, coated with a sheen of water.
I don’t stop walking until I reach the center line of field twelve. A stray soccer ball got left behind from the drills earlier. I step on it with my sneaker, a high-pitched squeak sounding as my sneaker struggles to get purchase on the slick surface.
This was dumb. I could get hypothermia or something, standing out here in the rain. It’s not that cold, but still.
My soccer career is my most prized possession. I guard it against anything. Except the first time I met Adler Beck, I put my eligibility in jeopardy so I could beat him. That should have been my first clue to stay far away. Warnings only matter if you heed them.
“No stargazing tonight?”
I spin to face him. Beck’s wearing all black, his blond hair and tan skin the only parts of him not blending in with the night.
“The grass is a little wet for it.”
“I noticed.” His clothes are soaked, just like mine, rivulets of water rolling down the chiseled planes of his face.
I stare at him and he stares back at me and it feels like eons have passed since we laid together on Kluvberg’s field and stared up at the sky. Somehow, it also feels like that was yesterday.
“You still want that rematch?” I ask.
I planned to ask him why he was here, again. But now that he’s standing in front of me, that seems less important. He’s here. The why doesn’t matter as much.
