Page 11 of Five Things I See in You

Again, she nods without a single question, and with her other hand she pushes the wet hair off her forehead.

“You don’t have to decide now, of course. Tessa will get you her information. If you’d rather see someone here, Valeria is still available whenever you need her and…”

“Okay, okay, I get it. I’m too much of a mess for your program,” she adds with a look of disappointment.

“That’s not what I said.”

“Is it because of what happened in the car?” she asks very quietly, and I freeze.

“It’s because… it’s about doing things right.”

“Right, so you’d rather not have me near you. Well, thanks for telling me in person,” she replies. “And thanks for Wednesday.”

She smiles. The same smile I saw at the party. Polite, and nothing more.

Then she leaves the office and closes the door very slowly, so carefully that it doesn’t make a sound.

I would have slept better if she’d slammed the door.

Chapter 8

Noa

When Thursday’s training session ends, I stay behind taking free kicks until the equipment guy picks up the cones around me and gives me a dirty look. If I miss one, I keep taking it until I score. It’s not that I miss a lot, it’s that being out here alone keeps my mind busy, and that’s better than going into the locker room with everyone else.

I’ve been like this all week. I’m the first one at the complex every day. The security guard has known me for a while now.

I’m training well. I run, get open, make good passes. In the gym, I do the full sets and then some. I don’t slack off like Iris or Tina. If anyone asks me how I’m doing, I say great and walk away fast so they can’t push. Nobody can complain about me this week.

The Jordan Hayes thing is something else entirely.

I don’t look at her. I’ve made up my mind not to look at her, and I don’t. She’s made it very clear that I’m a problem for her.

But I always know where she is.

She sits at a table in the corner of the cafeteria, usually with Tessa and Zoe, sometimes by herself. Now I’ve decided to eat with my back to that table, without looking up from my plate. And I eat fast. The worst part is that I hate knowing why.

On Tuesday I see her at the end of the hallway talking to Valeria, and I cut through the gym to avoid her. Any normal person would have walked right past her and said a slightly curt “hi.” And something inside me stops me from doing it.

She won’t work with me anymore. She told me politely, carefully, with all the right words. But she made it very clear: I’m too much of a mess.

We both know what happened in the car. We didn’t cross any forbidden line, but the feelings were there. There’s no use denying it. In her office I gave her the chance to explain it, and that’s not like me. She hesitated and didn’t really answer me.

“It’s about doing things right,” she said.

The weird thing is that now I notice her absence. Like when someone gets injured and by the third day you start to notice the empty spot in the locker room. It pisses me off to miss her and at the same time see her every day. And nothing even happened between us, so I guess it’s a pretty stupid way to miss someone.

Iris is waiting for me outside the gym.

“Man, Brit, look at that face, huh? No sleep again? I told you, the first month is like this, then you never want to leave. Hey, tonight we’re having dinner at some new place Tina found. Come with us. Have a bite, then leave whenever you want. Nobody’s forcing you. Okay, I am, a little, but it’s for your own good. You in?”

“I can’t tonight,” I say a little curtly.

“Suit yourself. But one of these days you’re saying yes, got it? We’re friends now and friends have dinner together. And don’t give me that face, because if you don’t feel like going out we’ll order takeout and eat at your place. If you want, we can even watch an English league game on TV. So, yeah.”

She takes off down the hallway before I can answer, shouting for Tina and Jade, who are almost at the exit.

***