Chapter Eighteen #2
She turned to go, and it was wrong, it all felt wrong. Sammie had lied, Sammie had been lying, keeping the most exciting thing happening in her life from her best friend. She needed to trust that Ivy cared, that her friend wouldn’t hold her feelings for Kieran against her.
“Wait!” Sammie reached out, grabbing Ivy’s wrist. Ivy turned back quickly, her signature dark ponytail flying through the air. “We still on for tonight?”
Ivy hesitated, and Sammie could still see some measure of hurt in her eyes. A tiny seed that Sammie needed to suffocate quickly, before it grew into something terrible, roots shattering what they held between them.
“Of course,” Ivy said, her smile returning. “See ya in the stands!”
Sammie swore she saw hope in that smile, and it made the rocks settling in her stomach feel all the heavier.
Ten minutes later, Sammie was settling into her seat next to Kai.
“You’re drinking a light beer,” Kai observed, eyes flicking from his phone to the drink in her hand.
“Yep.” She took a long pull from her plastic cup.
“Wanna talk about it?” His eyes were still glued to his phone.
“Nope. Is my brother ready for tonight?”
Kai glanced up, finally meeting her gaze. “He’s pretty nervous.” Sammie nearly sighed with relief when he didn’t pry further about her questionable beverage choice. Kai looked out toward the court, where both teams were warming up on their respective sides of the net.
“He’ll be fine,” Sammie said, finding the number three on her brother’s jersey before she found his face in the crowd of players.
He did look nervous, his charming smile pulled taught, his eyes scanning with precision as he set the ball for Bowen, who hit it with a fraction of the power he would once the game began.
Atticus bounced on the balls of his feet afterward, shaking the pent up energy from his limbs.
“Kieran looks off.” Kai’s words had Sammie scanning the rest of the court, searching for familiar strawberry blonde curls.
Kieran stood at the side line close to the Cats’ bench, his expression vacant as he watched his team.
Only his profile was visible to Sammie, but she could still make out the tension creeping along the line of his shoulders, the stiff way he held himself.
Coach Rodriguez was next to him, chatting with his assistant and a woman Sammie vaguely remembered being introduced to as the team’s statistician.
The coach sent the other two members of his staff away, turning toward Kieran, who seemed to be waiting.
They exchanged some quick words, faces close.
Sammie couldn’t make out what was being said, but she could tell by the thin line of Coach Rodriguez’s lips and the sharp nod of his head that what Kieran was saying wasn’t good.
“Something’s wrong,” she said. Kai glanced back and forth between her and the conversation happening below them. He anxiously twirled a lock of his hair, the pink ends tumbling past his shoulders.
“Did something happen between the two of you?” His wide eyes were serious, a worry shining in them that Sammie had never seen directed toward her before. For her. Even as her own anxiety swelled, the fact that she’d crept her way into Kai’s closed-off heart in any measure warmed her.
“Not anything bad.” Sammie’s cheeks heated even as relief softened Kai’s features. He smirked.
“But something did happen.”
Sammie shoved him gently with her shoulder. “He was fine when I saw him last night.” Her thoughts raced, searching for a clue, for anything she might have missed that would explain the tension gripping Kieran clear as day.
“Maybe it’s just game day nerves.” Kai pushed his shoulder back against Sammie’s, the gesture comforting. They watched as Coach patted Kieran on the back, sending him out onto the court with the rest of his teammates.
Sammie couldn’t shake the feeling that something more was off.
“Maybe.”
Three sets in, and Kieran was flagging.
Tension was high on the court. Both teams wanted the win, but the Sharks were playing like it was their final chance.
Kieran guessed it sort of was. His team would have one more game after this, one more shot at the tourney, but the Sharks needed this win to secure their spot on the bracket.
They were playing like they were hungry for it, ravenous, and each rally had them circling their prey.
Cats don’t do well in water.
Three sets in, and Kieran’s team had yet to take one. If they didn’t win this set, the game would be over. It was early in the third, though, and they’d just scored, a shocking spike from Atticus on the second touch.
Renji Satō was up as a pinch server for the Cats, and the start of play was signaled before Kieran had a chance to catch up.
The ball was flying back toward their side of the net before he was ready, straight toward him.
Kieran knew Carpenter wouldn’t get there in time, so he dove for the ball, just getting a fist under it before it could slam against the floorboards.
His chin smacked the ground, his teeth crashing together, but the ball flew into the air.
He’d known it would be a tough win to earn.
His old team played a hard defense. One of their middle blockers, Kane Dametto, was ranked best in the league.
Kieran knew his old teammate was being eyed for a spot on national team, and he’d been living up to his reputation all night.
A conflicting sense of pride welled in Kieran as Dametto shut down another of Bowen’s spikes.
Playing for the Sharks had been incredible. And while Kieran was still one hundred percent sure he had made the right choice when he’d taken the offer from the Cats, the fondness for his old team had never faded.
That didn’t mean he was going to let them win.
Kieran scrambled to his feet, wiping at his chin quickly to make sure his skin hadn’t split. The last thing he needed was to be pulled to the sidelines and out of the game over a little blood.
Maybe they needed to bench him anyway. Kieran had only been able to score a handful of points so far, and the rest of the players were starting to notice.
Planting his feet firmly, Kieran shot into the air, desperate to block a quick set from the Sharks. His timing was off, and the ball smacked hard on the outer side of his arm before sailing out of bounds.
Another point to the Sharks.
“McCullough,” one of their own middle blockers, a long-time player named David Lu, shouted. “Get your head in the fucking game, man, they telegraphed that entire play!”
“Sorry.” Kieran’s heart wasn’t in the apology. Lu’s sweat-soaked dark hair stuck out wildly as he pushed it away from his face, his cheeks red from both exertion and annoyance.
“Guys.” Atticus butted in between them, pushing Lu back with a firm hand on his chest and a low, “Walk it off,” before he turned back to Kieran.
“What’s wrong, Cap?”
Atticus was grinning at him, and sure, maybe it was forced, but that smile always had been infectious. Kieran felt lighter just seeing it. “Got some bad news before the game, it’s messing with my head.”
His friend’s brows pulled together. “Your dad? You need to go?”
Kieran shook his head. “No. I talked to Coach already, it’s nothing that won’t keep til the end of the game.”
Atticus nodded. “Well,” he began, glancing around as the rest of their teammates fell back into position. “We need you tonight.” He rapped his knuckles against Kieran’s forehead, earning an eye roll that he seemed to take as a sign of a job well done. “You’re our captain, after all.”
Any levity their exchange had provided was sucked away with those words. The same pressure that had been weighing on Kieran, growing heavier through each lost set, returned tenfold.
Atticus needed him. His team needed him. His family needed him.
Kieran felt stretched thin, his limbs tied to a rack that was tugging him in too many directions.
He was reaching his limit, his joints ready to separate, his bones threatening to pull from the sockets.
Thoughts of his father, of decisions, of a future that seemed to have suddenly arrived kept him from being able to focus.
And yet, every time he found his mind wandering, every time his distraction caused them to lose another point, guilt gnawed deeper into Kieran.
If he couldn’t be there, be at his best for his team when their season was on the line, did he even deserve to play with them?
Another whistle, another play set into motion. The Sharks volleyed the ball back over the net. Carpenter was ready, hunching down for a gorgeous receive that sent the ball high into the air even as it knocked Eric on his ass, giving them all a moment to breathe.
Sweat dripped into Kieran’s eyes, burning as he tried to keep them open to watch the play. He needed to be ready. He wouldn’t let another point slip through his grasp, he owed his team that much at least.
Seattle was there waiting, a triple block that the Cats barely recovered from. The rally was going long, too long, and each breath that Kieran sucked in burned his lungs.
Lu blocked a setter dump at the last second, his quick reflexes buying the Cats another chance to take the point.
The Sharks recovered fast, and Kieran once again saw exactly what they were going to do.
They had a behemoth of an outside hitter, a new player that Kieran didn’t know, his jersey sporting the number seventeen.
Seventeen’s eyes were glued on the ball, and Kieran recognized the quiet composure dictating the man’s every movement.
“Block!” Kieran cried out, already sprinting toward the net, toward where he knew seventeen was going to spike it. There was a hole in their defense, one that Coach would absolutely tear into them for later that night.
Seventeen was in the air, arm arcing down like an executioner’s axe, sweat flying off his cool, dark brown skin. Kieran jumped, throwing himself into the block.
The ball crashed against his forearms, pain radiating from the impact, right as another body slammed into Kieran from the side.
Atticus cried out as he hit the ground, right as the ball smacked down on the Sharks’ side of the net.
No. No no no. Kieran hadn’t seen him, hadn’t seen anyone coming after he’d cried out for help with the block.
Kieran fell to his knees next to his setter. Seventeen from the other team was right next to him.
“You okay, man?”
Morris. The name on the back of his jersey was Morris. Atticus was shaking his head, his face twisted with pain as he gritted out something about his ankle. Kieran took in the worry on the opposing player’s face. What did Morris have to worry about?
The bad play had been Kieran’s fault, and Kieran’s fault alone.