Chapter 6
6
“ L et me get this straight. Finn, aka the shoe ruiner, has been daring you to do things for months now, and it’s helping you to gain confidence? And I’m only just finding out about it now?” JJ arched a brow at me.
“Well…kind of? Not exactly. He knows about my, y’know, shyness, and…yeah, he dares me to do something about it. Okay, here’s an example. The dance showcase a few weeks ago. He dared me to go out there and just dance like no one was watching me. It sounds weird, but it worked. I kept his words in mind, and I just…danced.”
“Hey, if it works.” JJ smiled briefly, but then his brows pulled together. “What’s in it for him?”
Good question. I genuinely believed Finn had no ulterior motives, though. What would he have to gain?
“Nothing. I mean, I told him I’d help him out if he needed anything to do with computing, or dance help, or whatever, but he’s doing it because he’s nice?” It wasn’t supposed to come out like a question, but it had the unintended effect of chasing away JJ’s suspicion.
He gave an exaggerated sigh as we approached the training pitch. “I suppose that means I’ll have to forgive him for ruining my shoes. The sacrifices I make.” Shaking his head, he continued before I could say anything. “Don’t give me that look. I’m joking, I promise. Seriously, babe, if this is working for you, keep it up. You know I’m here for you, whatever happens. Even if I’m not with you in person, you know you can text or call me anytime.”
“I know. Thank you.” I glanced over at my friend, feeling a rush of warmth. “I never said thank you. Before. That day we first met at the uni open day, when you told me there was nothing stopping me from adding a dance module to my degree course.”
A wide smile spread across his face. “All you needed was a little push. You had it in you. You just had to believe in yourself.” Surprising me, he slung his arm around my shoulders. “Do that today, and you’ll be fine. I’ll be here.”
“I can do this.” I nodded decisively and then repeated my words in an attempt to convince myself. I’d danced in front of a packed auditorium, so why was the thought of potentially meeting some of Finn’s teammates so nerve-racking? Fucking hell, I was a mess.
We took seats on the benches at the side of the training pitch, sliding in next to Niccolò, who I guessed was there to watch his boyfriend, Bennett, who was on Finn’s engineering degree course. Finn had coached me on all the team members and any significant others who might be hanging around the pitch, so I had a general idea of who everyone was. Finn thought it would help me to feel more at ease if I at least knew them by sight, and I’d met Niccolò several times in passing, thanks to the fact he was JJ’s best friend.
JJ himself wasn’t involved with anyone on the team, other than having two footballers as housemates, but he’d come with me for moral support. I secretly hoped his boyfriend wouldn’t show up today. That man was scary. Not to mention, he was one of the LSU lecturers. But JJ had heart eyes every time Dr. Wilder was around him, and it was clear how much they loved each other, so I didn’t begrudge him his happiness. If anyone deserved it, it was JJ. My usual strategy was to find something urgent to do far away whenever Dr. Wilder appeared in my vicinity.
“Hi, JJ. Hi…JJ’s friend. I don’t think we’ve met.”
My eyes widened at the soft, curious voice coming from the formerly empty space to my right. I turned in slow motion, as if I could delay the inevitable. I could already feel my face heating, and I cursed internally.
“H-h-hi,” I managed, taking in golden-brown hair in a long, swinging ponytail and a bright smile before I lowered my gaze to my hands.
My hands…which were shaking.
I breathed out, sliding them under my thighs so they wouldn’t betray me. The girl who’d taken a seat next to me didn’t seem to notice anything wrong because she kept talking.
“I haven’t seen you here before. Who are you here to watch? I’m Sophie. First-year photography student. My older brother Nate’s on the team, but between you and me, I’m here to watch Charlie. Do you know him? He’s not on the team, but he’s training with them for one of his uni modules, isn’t that interesting?” she rushed out. “Oh, these are my friends and course mates, Daisy and Millie. Daisy’s brother Pete’s also on the team, and Millie’s here to watch cute footballers.” She laughed, and I swallowed hard. On my left, JJ pressed his thigh against mine in a deliberate movement, reminding me he was here, and I gathered my courage. Or whatever passed for courage.
“I-I’m Leo. Um. I’m in my second year. Com—computing. I’m here for Finn. It—it’s my first time here.”
“Oh, Finn! Friend or boyfriend?”
My gaze flew to hers, finding only a friendly curiosity there. Boyfriend? Where would she get that idea from? Then again, this team did seem to have an unusually high proportion of players with boyfriends, so I guessed it was a probable conclusion. Probable, but completely incorrect.
“Friend. W-we play games online.” As soon as I said the words, the colour drained from my face. Panicked thoughts whirled through my mind. Why had I said that? Was I supposed to come across as cool? Was Finn keeping his gaming a secret? Fuck, had I messed things up for him?
“You do? What do you play?” Millie leaned around Sophie. “I play Lesath Legends sometimes, and so does Daisy. Sophie even joins us occasionally, although she prefers The Sims .”
“You play Lesath Legends ?” For once in my life, my shock pushed aside my shyness. These girls were gamers?
“Don’t get her started on the hot vampire character.” Sophie rolled her eyes, although she was smiling. “Tell you what. I’ll just switch seats with Millie, and she can tell you all about it.”
Oh, fuck. No. I wasn’t ready to have an actual conversation. Before I could, I dunno, run away and hide behind the nearest building, Sophie was rising to her feet, and Millie was sliding along the bench into her vacated space. I could feel my heart rate picking up, and I was struggling for breath.
Why am I like this? Please, please don’t freeze up , I begged myself.
“Leo! You came.”
The breath whooshed from my lungs at the sound of the warm voice. I looked up to see a slightly out-of-breath Finn clad in his blue LSU football kit, studying me with concern in his eyes, although he had a smile on his face.
“Did you run here?”
“Yeah.” He shrugged. “Saw you sitting over here, and I thought I’d come and say hi.” His eyes were radiating everything he wasn’t saying aloud, and I’d never felt more lucky in that moment to have a friend who instinctively understood me the way he did.
Thank you , I mouthed, and he grinned at me, relaxing.
A delicate cough sounded next to me. “Hi, Finn. I’m Millie, and you probably already know Daisy and Sophie. Leo was just telling us that the two of you play Lesath Legends . Me and Daisy play, too. We should arrange a quad campaign.”
Finn’s brows rose as he stared at me before he finally tore his gaze away, turning his attention to Millie and Daisy. From the appreciative look on his face, he liked what he saw. I could see why, although I was sure he was appreciating them in a whole different way to me. Attraction seemed to work differently for me than it did for the other people I knew. As in, I didn’t feel it. I knew what it was supposed to feel like, but I hadn’t personally experienced it. Or at least not properly. There was a girl at school I’d been friends with for a while, and I started to feel something for her—I wasn’t sure exactly how to describe it, but there was something there that wasn’t there with anyone else. It never went anywhere, though. She got a boyfriend, and we ended up drifting apart.
But back to Finn and the girls. Finn was now giving Daisy a flirty smile, and I knew even before he opened his mouth that Millie’s suggestion was going to happen.
Except he glanced back at me, a question in his eyes. I gave him a tiny nod. I needed to push myself, and this seemed like a good opportunity. It was Lesath Legends , after all.
“Yeah, sounds good. We’ll be online later, if you’re around. Want my number? You can text me your usernames, and we’ll add you when we get back to mine.”
“Yes, please.” Daisy whipped her phone out of her bag, thrusting it into his hand. As he was inputting his number, a whistle blew from the other side of the pitch, and he swung around before spinning back to her.
“Gotta go. Leo and I have plans after practice, but we’ll speak to you online later. Sophie, nice to see you again. I’ll tell Charlie you said hi.” He shot Sophie a smirk as he handed the phone back to Daisy, and she laughed as he jogged away to join his teammates and manager.
I settled back to watch the team while the girls talked among themselves in low voices, gesturing towards the players on the pitch every now and then. Once I’d worked out the identities of everyone from the research Finn had made me do, my focus returned to my friend. He looked completely at home, going through the drills with ease, glancing over at me intermittently and shooting me a quick grin every time I caught his eye.
The team lined up close to us, ready to do cone drills. Millie cleared her throat, leaning into me, the scent of something citrusy hitting my nose. “The guy that’s up first? That’s Nate, Sophie’s brother. He’s in his final year of uni. The guy behind him is Charlie, although I guess you know that already? I think he’s got a bit of a thing for Sophie. They’ve been flirting, anyway. Not sure how her brother’s gonna take it, but?—”
“I can hear you, you know. Stop gossiping about me. My brother doesn’t get to decide who I do and don’t see, either. Not that he’d have a problem, if I liked Charlie, which I’m neither confirming nor denying.” Sophie shook her head in mock disappointment. “Terrible gossips, these girls. Whatever they say about me, it’s all lies.”
“As if we’d gossip about our queen,” Daisy interjected.
“Guys, please stop with the queen thing. That whole prom king and queen thing was ridiculous.” Sophie tossed her ponytail over her shoulder, huffing. She turned to me. “They’re calling me that because we all went to the same school, and in sixth form, I somehow ended up as prom queen. Probably because these two put my name up for it, and no one else could be bothered to campaign. They still haven’t let me forget it.”
“And we never will.” The girls smirked at each other, and a little of my tension disappeared because it didn’t seem as if they expected me to reply. I studied Sophie’s brother as they began talking among themselves once again. Tall, dark hair, tanned, he was yet another one of those effortlessly cool, confident guys that I longed to be like.
No. Had longed to be like. I had to keep reminding myself that one day, I’d be comfortable in my own skin.
One day. I hoped.
“Proud of you,” JJ murmured, too low for the girls to hear.
“Thanks.” I knocked my shoulder against his, and he smiled.
“Crisp?” Finn shoved the bag at me, dropping a handful of salt-and-vinegar Chipsticks into his mouth.
Pulling my own handful of crisps from the bag, I nodded towards my empty glass. “I’m gonna need another drink if you keep feeding me all these salty snacks.”
“Already on it. Look at what’s next to my desk. See? I borrowed my dad’s electric cool box and filled it up. There’s bottled water, soft drinks, beer, and a couple of energy drinks if we wanna stay up late gaming.”
“You thought of everything,” I said, glancing around at our setup. Finn’s console was on and ready to go, with our controllers and headsets fully charged and connected. There was a rotating fan blowing across us,keeping us cool despite the warm breeze coming through the open window, and the bed was piled high with pillows and cushions and blankets.
The only thing left to do was to log in to the game.
Where I’d have to make conversation. Fuck.
Placing the crisp bag down, I rubbed my sweaty palms against my shorts.
“Leoooo.” Finn rolled onto his stomach, looking up at me through his lashes. “Stop worrying. It’s gonna be okay. It’s just talking online. We’ve done this with other people when we’ve played quad campaigns.”
“I know, but it’s different because I know who they are. And I think…they were probably being friendly, but I’m pretty sure Millie smiled at me in the same way Daisy smiled at you, and she was definitely flirting with you. And I?—”
He pushed himself up, lunging forwards to place his palm over my mouth. “Stop that. There’s no pressure, okay? We’ll play a couple of games, and we’re gonna have a good time. I promise.”
“Okay,” I said. It came out muffled against his hand.
“Good boy.” Removing his palm, he ruffled my hair, and I glared at him, which made him grin harder.
“Don’t call me that.”
“Sorry, little lion.”
I smacked his bare calf. “No.”
“Your name literally means lion.” Shifting to sit against the wall next to me, he nudged his shoulder against mine. “I like that we can act like this around each other. You’re fun to be around, you know.”
My jaw dropped. “I am?”
“Yeah. Don’t sound so surprised. I like hanging out with you.”
“Oh. Uh. I like hanging out with you, too.” My stupid fucking face was heating again, and I leaned forwards, hoping the fan would cool it off.
“Good.” Reaching for the controllers and headsets, he held them up. “Blue or camo?”
“Blue, please.”
He passed me the blue controller, and I settled my headset over my ears. Next to me, he did the same, and then our full focus turned to the game.
Finn’s character rapidly descended a rocky wall, and I angled my left thumbstick, sending my character scrambling after his. He laughed aloud as I misjudged the distance and slipped, my character landing at the bottom in a heap, knocking out a huge percentage of my health bar. “Want one of my medipacks? I dare you to invite Millie for a coffee when the girls join the game.”
“What? I can’t do that!”
“Yeah, you can. You haven’t backed out on a dare yet, and you know I’d never dare you to do something I didn’t think you were capable of.”
My palms were clammy around my controller at the thought of inviting someone out for coffee. Anyone who wasn’t one of my handful of friends. And a girl who might have been flirting with me?
“Finn. I don’t think?—”
He paused the game, taking one hand off the controller, turning my head to his with a light grip on my jaw. “Yes, you can.”
I studied him, noting the way his brows were pulled together, his eyes dark and serious. “Why is this so important to you?”
“Because you’re my friend, and I want you to be happy. Everything we’ve been doing has been good, right?”
“Well, yeah.” If it hadn’t been for him and JJ both pushing me out of my comfort zone, I’d—I didn’t even want to think about it. I’d probably be hiding away in my room, on my way to becoming a hermit. Honestly, the thought still sounded appealing. But Finn was right. I sighed. “Can we amend the dare? I— We’ll play for a while, and if I feel comfortable enough, I’ll do it. But you have to come, okay? You and her friend.”
A wide smile stretched across his face, warming me all over. Dropping his grip on my jaw, he wrapped his arm around my back, pulling me into a hug, and after a moment’s hesitation, I hugged him back.
“I wouldn’t leave you, Leo. Not until you were ready. I wouldn’t do that to you,” he murmured before releasing me, shifting back into his original position. “Ready to play? I wanna get this bit done before the girls join us.”
“Yes.” I turned back to the screen, still warm all over and with a smile tugging at my lips. My smile grew bigger when he opened his inventory and handed my character a medipack, restoring my health bar.
I was still scared, light years away from the lion he’d called me earlier, but maybe I could do this.
“I-I could probably help you.” Gripping the controller more tightly to mask the tremor in my hands, I forced the words out. “I’ve, uh, studied web design.”
In my peripheral vision, I saw Finn’s head whip around, and I glanced over at him. Do it , he mouthed.
“Really? I only need something simple to show my photos, but I haven’t got a clue where to start. If you don’t mind pointing me in the right direction, that would be great,” Millie was saying, and I sucked in a breath. This was the moment of truth. We’d already played through two campaigns. It was getting late, and if I didn’t take the chance now, it might not come up again.
“We could meet at the library. I could, uh, look at your computer.” I shot Finn a pleading look that he noticed, even with his attention on the screen.
“Why not make it a group study session?” he suggested casually. “Daisy, you up for it? We could even get Charlie and Sophie to join.”
“Great idea!” she said instantly. “Tuesday afternoon? Or do you guys have lectures?”
Finn was the one to answer her. “We can do 4:00 p.m. if that works?”
“Perfect. Top floor, by the windows?”
He agreed for us both, and I was distantly aware of him wrapping things up while I leaned back against the wall, my head pounding and my heart racing.
“Leo. Hey. Leo.”
I blinked, refocusing on Finn’s concerned face filling my vision. He carefully lifted my headset off my head and tugged my controller from my unresisting grip, and after placing them down, he was back, cradling my head with his palms as he leaned in to rest his forehead against mine.
“Hey. You’re all good. It’s all good. You did it.”
I breathed out. “Yeah.” How was I such a fuck-up that I was stressing so much about something that would be so minor to anyone else?
“I was right. You are a little lion. I’m proud of you.” His thumb stroked across my cheek, and then he released me, clearing his throat as he slid off the bed. I caught a glimpse of a flush on his face.
“Are you okay?”
His gaze flew back to mine, his eyes wide. “Yeah. I—uh, it’s warm in here, isn’t it?” Diving for the cool box, he fished out a can of Sprite, rolling it across his cheeks.
“Maybe a bit. Blow the fan on you,” I suggested, and he nodded, turning away from me to angle the fan towards him. Staring at his broad back, I bit down on my lip, thinking hard. “Finn. Can I dare you to do something?”
His shoulders stiffened, my question clearly taking him by surprise, and I rushed to continue.
“It feels like it’s a bit uneven sometimes, that’s all. You dare me to do all these things, constantly trying to help me, getting me out of my comfort zone, and I don’t do anything for you in return.”
“It’s not a fucking transactional relationship,” he mumbled. “You’re my friend. I wanna help you out, you know this. I don’t expect anything in return. Anyway, you give me plenty. You’re fun to be around. I already told you that. I—fuck. I really like hanging out with you, okay?”
“Finn. Please look at me.”
When he finally turned around, his face was unreadable, but there was still a flush of colour high on his cheekbones. I decided to try a tactic I’d seen my housemate Connor employ that I’d never tried before.
Scooting forwards to the edge of the bed, I gave him what I hoped was a challenging look. “Don’t tell me you’re too scared to accept a dare from me.”
His brows flew up, interest sparking in his gaze, and encouraged, I continued.
“One little dare.”
He blew out a breath, scrubbing his hand across his face, and then he rose to his feet. Crossing the room, he leaned down and placed his arms on the bed on either side of me. “Go on, then. Dare me.”
I licked my lips, my nerves returning, but I’d had a lot of practice at pushing them down when it was just me and Finn, and so I held his gaze. “I dare you to let me teach you a dance routine and then for you to perform it in front of people.”
His mouth dropped open, and he twisted his body sideways, letting himself fall back onto the bed next to me, his body bouncing as he hit the mattress springs. “Fucking hell. I was not expecting that dare.”
“What were you expecting?” I asked curiously, flopping down next to him on my back, both of us staring up at the ceiling.
“I…uh. I dunno. Not that.”
“Are you going to accept the dare?”
Rolling onto his side, he lifted himself onto his elbow. His expression turned mischievous as he held up two fingers and then tapped them against my bicep. “That was two dares. Learn the dance, then perform it. I know this isn’t transactional, but maybe you should let me dare you to do something in return.”
“Wasn’t what I did earlier enough?” I raised my hand and began ticking off points on my fingers. “I played two whole campaigns and made conversation. I invited Millie to meet up with us. And I still have to go through the actual meetup. I have no fucking clue how to flirt.”
His fingers closed around mine, lowering my hand. He squeezed it briefly and then let go, letting out a loud, dramatic sigh.
“Fine. I guess I owe you one.”
“Our relationship isn’t transactional,” I reminded him, earning me a light punch to my shoulder. “Seriously, though. Can you help me be less of a fuck-up? Give me some flirting pointers or whatever?”
“Yeah…” he said slowly. “If that’s what you want to do.”
“It is.”
“Okay, then. Tomorrow night. Meet me outside the student union.”