Get it Right

“You can’t just do nothing,” Jenna said as I was running on the treadmill in sweats. It was hardly my definition of nothing, but taking her outfit into consideration there was probably a party of some sort going on that night. She sighed, “I mean you’ve gone straight from this room to training rack to this room for the past three weeks. It’s dull and crazy, and it is quite frankly pathetic.”

“But on the bright side,” I turned off the treadmill and continued to the kitchen to grab a carrot stick, “I have completely caught up on the entire NCIS series.”

She stared at me blankly, “you’ve got way too much time on your hands.” I just shrugged and hopped on the couch and turned on the TV and smiled as I displayed that the very show happened to be on at that exact moment. “This is sad,” she turned the TV off and took the remote away, “we have one more week before we fly out for the Olympics and there is one last party and you have to go.”
I bit my lip, “I might run into you know who, so I’m going to have to say no.”

“You cannot avoid him forever,” she sighed, “I mean aside from blocking all his calls, frankly I’m surprised that you’ve been able to keep it up this long because he knows when and where you are on a daily basis and yet you somehow escape.”

“On the bright side,” Bri walked in from the other room, “I think he’s basically gotten the message, he stopped coming by the training grounds some time ago.”

I nodded, “yeah, that was good, but imagine if I ran into him what in the world would I say.”

“I was under the impression that you’d just run the other way,” Jenna said before shrugging, “besides, by being a couch potato you’ve completely ignored any chance of another connection, say with Zack Tyler.”

I shrugged tossing my head side to side in thought, “I mean that is a compelling argument.” I thought about it, probably the last opportunity for a party before leaving and after skipping every other opportunity to lock myself away in solitary the fresh air might be good for me. But then a counter argument struck me, “but that would mean I’d have to take off my sweat pants and I really don’t feel like doing that.”

The two of them looked at each other and then both grabbed a leg and did it for me, “there, they’re off, no excuse.”

I looked down and nodded, “any chance you guys want to do the rest of the changing for me as well.” They walked into the other room and grabbed one of the few dresses I had brought and threw it at me. “Thanks guys,” I smiled, “helpful as always.” I slipped into the dress and put on a pair of converse to go with them to which Jenna rolled her eyes. “This way I can run away better,” I smiled at the idea, “and I will not go without them.”

“Fine,” she said, “we’re late.” We weren’t allowed to do anything on the training center grounds, so the party was off campus and that is where they drove us. It’s not like it didn’t seem obvious when all the athletes were running off campus the same night, obviously something was going on. But hey, whatever. It was about five miles off training center ground, up in the penthouse suite of some hotel. It was definitely swanky and big, but somehow it didn’t seem big enough. Within seconds though I seemed to be alone, I turned one way and Bri and Nate were making out and the other way and Jenna was making out with some guy in a beanie. In the past three weeks of solitude Bri had finally defined her relationship and Jenna had miraculously formed one. And while both my friends were moving in some direction with their lives I wasn’t moving at all, I was standing completely still. I mean it, I literally hadn’t moved from this spot yet. I looked around to find some place to get water and finally homed in on the target.

I sighed as I held the water bottle to my lips, I hated people and seriously regretted leaving my personal oasis. “Haze,” Tyler came out of nowhere, “word is you’ve been something of a ghost the past month, I mean we heard you made the team, but no one’s seen you around.” He let out a little laugh and gulped down a sip of his drink, “after our last talk I got so desperate that I even went to Matthews to find you, but he hadn’t seen you either.”

I shrugged, “I thought I’d try something new, called focus.”

“So you isolated yourself from people,” he let out a huff, “that sounds a little extreme.”

“Lucky for me, people piss me off,” I smiled.

“All people,” he looked at me unsure.

I shook my head, “there are a select few I tolerate.” He smirked and I raised my eyebrow, “don’t get excited, it’s dawned upon me that even though we’ve been in each other’s presence for over two years, you and I don’t know each other.” I shrugged, “we’ve hardly ever even talked.”

He nodded, “maybe we can fix that.” He took a step and then turned back to me, “don’t go disappearing on me now, I’ll be right back.” I nodded and watched as he walked away and took another sip of my water. It wasn’t long until he came back with a key in his hand and I raised my eyebrow. “There’s no privacy in here,” he said pointing backwards, “so this guy has access to a few spare rooms, maybe we could talk in one of those.”

“That sound’s over presumptuous,” I laughed, “but right now I’m so desperate to get away that I’m willing to overlook it.” He smiled and we began walking toward the door and as soon as we were out I felt sudden relief until…

“Izzy,” Matthews came out the door and I just bit my lip looking at him. I was speechless and he looked from me to Zack Tyler, “can I get a moment?”

I looked over to Zack and he smiled, “its cool, take your time, I’m just down the hall.” He walked away and I watched as the door closed behind him, that wasn’t what I wanted by a long shot.

I looked back at Matthews and he looked down at me, “did I do something?” I raised my eyebrow and he laughed trying to take all this in good humor, “because I get the feeling you’ve been avoiding me, but it seems you’ve been avoiding everyone so I wasn’t sure if this was a strategy thing or if it was just me.”

“It’s just you,” I nodded my head and then I turned away to walk toward the room.

“Wait,” he cut me off putting his hands firmly on my shoulders to stop my forward movement, “are you going to give me any explanation or is that it?”

“Matthews,” I sighed, “please don’t make me talk to you about this, I’ve been cringing at the very thought for weeks.” He looked at me unsure and then as I tried to move past him he sustained his road blocking position along with his facial expression. “Can I please go, now,” I looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

He let go of my shoulders, but put his hands up to pause me, “I’ll let you go if you take a moment to explain what’s going on, we were normal, then you freaked out and I haven’t seen you since.”
I sighed crossing my arms over my chest, “I just can’t do this with you, but it’s not just you, I can’t do it with anyone.”

“Do what,” he said frustrated.

“You like me,” I burst out and he seemed sort of shocked, “now that’s fantastic and all, but now I’m conscious of it and I just feel bad because I don’t feel the same way.” He looked at me, “I don’t feel anything towards you.”

He started laughing, “Izzy, I don’t like you.”

“Yes you do,” I countered, “I am very intuitive, I can tell these sorts of things.”

“I think you’re mistaken,” he kept his humored chuckles to a minimum.

“It wasn’t just me,” I looked at him, “you’d have to be saying that both Bri and Jenna are delusional as well.”

“You’re all delusional,” he said bluntly.

I don’t know why it made me mad. If it were a mistake it would be appropriate to be either embarrassed or relieved, but anger didn’t seem to fit in the equation. “Fine,” I said with slight resentment, “then everything’s cool, now just excuse me so I can go sleep with Zack Tyler.” I pushed past him and headed towards the door.

“Uh,” he let out before grabbing my wrist, “fine, you win.”

“Boom,” I yelled triumphantly and he let go of my arm, then I mentally hit myself, “and now we’re right back where we started.” I hit my hands together twice and then shrugged, “so yeah I’m going to go.”

He reached back again, “come on, Izzy, Zack Tyler’s a total ass.”

“I wouldn’t know,” I shrugged, “but I’m about to go find out.”

“Seriously,” he looked at me as if I were crazy.

“Don’t get your panties in a twist, Matthews,” I shook my head, “we just wanted a private place to talk, nothing else.”

He let out a sarcastic laugh, “and you believe that.” I nodded my head and he sighed one last time and still had firm hold of my wrist. “Just let me give you something to think about,” he pulled me in and placed his lips on mine. I have to admit, it all seemed very smooth and I wouldn’t have completely minded if it went on longer. He let go and looked at my seemingly shocked facial expression and after we simultaneously caught our breath he spoke, “and that’s not how I wanted our first kiss to go.” And with that he let me go and just walked away.

As the door slammed I shook my head, “my life’s a mess.”