Your Eyes Tell Me What I Need to Know

With the beads of sweat covering her forehead and her body, Katrina watched as the ball sailed past the keeper and hit the net. It was a goal. The smile on her face grew. Abby threw her arms around her younger teammate in happiness. The score was 1-0 with less than a minute left in the second half. The game was pretty much over. She couldn’t believe that she had just scored. With her new teammates hugging her as they jumped up and down, Katrina couldn’t help, but feel a bit of sadness. She was the one that defeated the Sol; it was her goal that made them lose. As they made their way back to center field, she didn’t dare look into the eyes of Shannon or her former teammates. She knew if she did, she’d start to feel even worse for making them lose. With a deep breath she moved into position, they were on defense for the next minute until the whistle blew signaling that the game was over. Abby had the ball in her possession and passed it right ahead of Katrina. She sped up towards the goal and shot it towards the goal. The ball hit off the crossbar, but she couldn’t contain the smile on her face. It was a win, her first win with her new team.

Looking at the sidelines she saw Hank standing up and cheering along with Sam and Marc. She started running towards him. When she was close enough to her target, she launched herself at him and wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. “Hank,” Katrina smiled as she tightened her grip on his neck. “Can you believe it?”

“You did amazing Kitty,” Hank told her, the smile on his face, as big as the one on hers. “You are amazing.”

“I didn’t do so well earlier,” Katrina admitted. “I let them walk all over me.”

“You came back and you got the game winning goal, the only goal.”

“Thank you,” Katrina said placing her head on his shoulder and kissing the side of his neck. “Thank you for everything.”

“That was all you, Kitty,” he told her. “I don’t know why they gave you up, but I’m glad they did.”

Thankful that her face was already red so that he couldn’t tell that his words made her blush. It wasn’t everyday that a man like Henrik Lundqvist was paying her compliments, but then again there weren’t many men like Henrik Lundqvist, at least not in her life. Moving her head so that she could look into his eyes. “Would you mind staying and giving me a ride home? Abby and the girls are going out, but I’m not in the mood to get drunk, I’m way too happy. So maybe a movie, at your place?”

“Sounds great.”

Unwrapping her legs from Hank, she let him go and met Abby by the sidelines. She glanced back at Hank and gave him a smile before she and Abby headed for where the rest of the team was celebrating. Soon after she was pulled into an interview with Abby. The grins on their faces were not going away anytime soon. Before the interview could begin, Abby nudged her and pointed out Shannon who had a smile on her face. Taking off to her friend, Katrina and Shannon hugged at the center of the field. It meant so much to her that Shannon was still supporting her. “I’m sorry you lost.”

“One of us had to,” Shannon said with a smile still on her face. “It just means, we won’t go so easy on you next time. But you did amazing.”

“You weren’t so shabby yourself.”

“It looks like you have an interview to get to,” Shannon said. “Are you going out or going back to your apartment?”

“I’m going over to Hank’s.”

“He likes you, I can tell. Now go and celebrate and I’ll talk to you soon. And thanks for letting me use your place.”

“Anytime.” Katrina told her before jogging back to where Abby and the interviewer of the local sports station were waiting patiently for her.

“That’s right, I’m joined by Abby Wambach and Katrina Anderson from the New York Freedom. Although the game was a battle from start to finish, it was these two ladies that managed to put it away for the Freedom. With the pass from Abby to Katrina who scored. Have you been practicing that move?”

“We’ve been practicing different things, but that wasn’t one of them. Katrina didn’t want to be the star, so she would want to be the passer instead of the shooter.” Abby said with a smile.

“This was your first game with this team, how did it feel to be playing against your former team?”

“It was nerve wrecking,” Katrina said honestly. “I’ve played with the Sol for my whole professional career and some of the girls are my closest friends, but I’m not playing for them and at the end of the day I’m with the Freedom and these girls and I may be new to each other, but as you can see it was a team effort to take the win.”

“So your boyfriend, Henrik Lundqvist seemed happy with your playing.”

“Hank isn’t my boyfriend, he’s just one of the few friends I have outside of soccer and just because he’s a guy doesn’t mean that I’m dating him.”

“That moment looked pretty intense.”

“It wasn’t.”

“He seems really into you.”

Katrina was about to reply, but Abby got to it before she did.

“She’s a born player and the goalie from the Rangers he knows talent when he sees it. They aren’t doing anything, since neither one of them have the time for a love life, they are barely making it as friends,” Abby said with a smile she usually gave to the press. No one couldn’t say she was being disrespectful towards an interviewer. "Anyway, aren't you a sports journalist? Not a paparazzi? We're here to talk about soccer, not who may or may not be dating who."

Katrina smiled at Abby. A true friend that would stick up for her, she knew from the moment that she met Abby that they would get along pretty well. It was people like Abby and Shannon that made Katrina know that she made the right choice in her career path.

“When you face the Sol again, will you have the same nerves as you did tonight?”

“I have nerves before every game; I think its normal, when I don’t have them before a game, that’s when I’ll start to worry. Until then, I can only play each game as long as I can.” Katrina answered.

“Thank you ladies, enjoy your win.”

Walking away, Katrina didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to, but Abby knew how she was feeling. No one wanted to talk about their love life or lack of one with the new reporters who are trying to make a name for themselves. And nobody likes to be put in that position, no matter the experience of the player. The two of them headed straight for the locker rooms.

Katrina headed straight for the showers. Standing under the faucet, she started to relax. Although the game was over, she couldn’t help, but think about her contract. Her manager had brought up something that she didn’t really think about before. Although it didn’t matter much to her right now, it was nice to know that there was a possibility of that happening without bad things happening because of it. Washing the conditioner out of her hair, she wrapped the dark blue towel around her body and headed to her locker. She’d wear the black dress she brought with the white double breasted coat; Shannon had left in her guest room for her. There was a note attached telling her that she’d need this more than she realized.

With her bag in her hand she bid a good-bye to the girls before leaving the locker room. Her eyes were on her phone in her hand so that she could call Hank that she didn’t see the person in front of her. So when they tried taking her bag out of her hand, her eyes shot up as her grip tightened on the handle of the bag. Placing the phone into the pocket of her coat, Katrina gave them a smile. “What are you doing back here?”

“I parked in the players’ lot,” Hank told her with a grin as he took her bag from her and laced their hands as they started to walk towards the players’ parking lot. “Did you have a good post game interview? They named you the star of the game.”

“Really?” Katrina asked surprised. “Me? They named me the star of the game?”

“You scored the game winning goal and you played hard. Marc and Sam said to tell you congrats and she’ll call you later.”

“Sounds good.”

“How was the interview?”

“They wanted to know more about us than the game. Abby saved the interview though. I really wanted to say something to her, but Abby cut in before I had a chance.”

“You do have a bit of a temper Kitty.”

“I never said I didn’t.” Katrina stated as they walked through the back doors and to his SUV.

The ride to his apartment was quiet and slow. Especially with the traffic. Everyone was in a hurry to get somewhere, just like in Los Angeles. That was the first time Katrina hadn’t associated California with home. New York was either getting to her or she was actually starting to enjoy the difference in the cities. Closing her eyes on the way home, Katrina heard Hank kill the engine and when she looked up, they were in his parking garage of his apartment. “Are we taking your soccer bag upstairs?” he asked softly. Her only response was the nodding of her head. Getting out of the car, Hank locked it and set the alarm on it as they made their way to the elevator doors.

Once inside the apartment, Katrina went into the bedroom with her soccer bag that Hank had carried. She had tried to take it from him in the elevator, but he wasn’t having any of that. Closing the door behind her she took her phone out of her coat pocket and placed it on the bedside table by Hank’s bed. Taking her coat off she tossed it on the bed before unzipping her dress before stepping out of it. Putting it on the chair near the closet, she made her way back over to her soccer bag that was on the floor near the foot of the bed, she opened it up and pulled out a pair or gray short running shorts and a white tank top. Now dressed, she made her way into Hank’s closet knowing exactly what she was looking for and where it was. Grabbing his blue sweatshirt, she pulled it over her head and took a deep breath of it. It smelled like Hank. Sliding her soccer bag near the closet, Katrina left the bedroom. Walking to the kitchen she saw Hank had taken off his jacket and was just in a pair of tight jeans and a blue shirt with the Rangers logo on the front.

“Were you promoting your team at my game?” Katrina asked watching him take a bag of popcorn out of the microwave. “Because if that’s so then you so owe me.”

“Is that so?” Hank asked, looking at her. “Why’s that?”

“Because when I went to your game, I supported you proudly,” Katrina said, trying to hide the grin on her face. “But you can’t even support me. I see how little I mean to you.”

“You mean so much that I’m not going to complain about what movie you are going to put in and make me watch.”

“Really?” Katrina asked, her face lighting up for a moment before it dawned on her. “You don’t have any chick flicks here, Hank.”

“What a shame.” He said thoughtfully as he poured the popcorn into a bowl.

“Real shame,” Katrina said as she watched him. “I wanted to kiss you earlier.”

As soon as the words left her mouth, Katrina’s eyes closed and looked away.

“Why didn’t you?”

Looking into Hank’s eyes, Katrina looked away and started to walk out of the kitchen and towards the bedroom. She knew opening her mouth would get her into trouble if she didn’t mind what she said. Although spending so much time with Hank, didn’t mean that he felt the same for her as she did for him. She felt his hand on her upper arm and he spun her around. Katrina couldn’t understand what he would say to her besides suggesting that she needed to leave and she was already on her way to do that. Awkward silences made her want to scream, but in this situation it was her own damn fault for opening her mouth. She should have known better, should have read between the lines. It’s possible that he knew she wanted to kiss him and that he just didn’t want to. Maybe it had to do with the fact that she just wasn’t pretty enough, but whatever the reason, she wanted out. Until he did something she wasn’t expecting.