richpez for mae

28

Joey had a swim meet at the beginning of February and had just emerged from a stall in the changing room, his headphones in his ears as the quiet room was full of his friends and other athletes from different schools milling around and getting ready for their competition.

He shoved his belongings into his usual locker and sat on a free bench with his phone. He went through his checklist to make sure he had done everything that he usually would for a competition, ticking them off as he went along. But before he went to put his phone back in his bag, it buzzed in his hand, a message appearing on the top of his screen.

Lauren

I'm in the stands now, good luck!

Joey read her message and beamed down at his phone, knowing that she was in the crowd watching filling him with comfort. Before Christmas Lauren had told Joey that she would be at his meet since Joey went to go see her game, so he was glad that they were friends again so he could hopefully showcase his talents to her.

He sent her a quick reply and placed his phone into his locker, shutting it and heading in for a quick shower before emerging into the pool area, bunting and banners lining the walls. His coach was waiting by the opposite wall so himself and AJ made their way over to him, conversing lightly from meeting in the showers.

Their coach had some general nerve questions and words of wisdom for them, running them through the order of how the meet was running. AJ was doing 100m Butterfly, the first event, and Joey was doing 100m front crawl, the last event before the relays. He knew he would have to sit with his nerves brewing for a while, thankful it was just a freshman meet and not having every age category having to go before him. AJ left to go do some last minute warm ups before his race, and Joey leaned back against the cold wall, scanning his eyes around the crowd.

A lot of them were unfamiliar faces, but his eyes quickly landed on the girl he wanted to see. She was looking around the room, bundled up in multiple layers as he had told her to do since the room was freezing, and as soon as her eyes met his, a huge grin appeared on her face. She waved towards him, her grin only growing, and he waved back, smiling back at her. The room was cold but his heart felt so warm looking at her in the stands. The fact that she sacrificed her Sunday afternoon to go and watch him made the nerves from the race feel minuscule to the butterflies he felt looking at her again.

He exhaled, looking down and chuckling to himself.

"So that's Lauren?" Coach Donovan asked from beside him, not realising he had watched their little interaction. Joey turned to face his coach and laughed.

"Yeah. How do you know about Lauren?" Joey asked.

"I hear the gossip Joey, I know more than you think." He laughed back, still looking forward towards the pool and not meeting Joey's eye. "You two worked things out yet?"

Joey hesitated before giving his response.

"We're just friends now."

Donovan just hummed and walked away, leaving Joey stood on his own.

Joey watched from the sideline as AJ prepared himself for his race, stretching quickly before making his way onto the blocks before the gun was fired. As much as Joey was watching AJ, his mind was long gone past watching him do his race, instead, thinking about his conversation with Donovan about the girl sat in the stand 100 feet away.

He looked back up to the stand to see Lauren watching the lineup for the race, her eyes darting over to his for a split second before turning back to the pool. Looking at her and feeling the nerves of the race was making his stomach do somersaults, and he knew, as odd as it would look, the best way to calm his nerves were to speak to Lauren. Every time he had a problem, he turned to her for guidance, and this time was no different.