Flirting with success

Chapter 11

Once I'd got back from dropping Jill off I didn't have long before Lauren was supposed to be leaving. This meant that any apologies needed to be made quickly. I pushed all my emotion aside and knocked on her bedroom door.

She ignored my request to come in. I love Lauren so much but she is really stubborn. Fortunately so am I. I barged in without hesitation which annoyed Lauren even more. "Look I'm sorry, it's not as if I didn't trust you. Just the longer it went on the harder it got to tell you."

"How long have you felt like this?" She asked slightly more calmly than I had expected

"It's always been in the back of my mind I suppose so I've never really had to talk about it before. But since moving to city it's popped up which meant I had to deal with it head on" I went on to explain how Janine came to know and then how I was prompted into telling Caroline. Lauren seemed to understand but I could still see she was hurting. With the situation calmed we decided that we would talk more about it after Lauren's back from England camp.

I left Lauren's room with a weight off my shoulders. I tried to find the excitement I would have felt the morning after a night like last night. A text to Jill should do the trick

Sophie: How long are you in Manchester for? I'm sorry the morning got cut short xx

Jill: it's okay I wasn't expecting to even see you in the morning. I leave tomorrow night :( Are you okay? xx

Sophie: Everything's fine here now, we still need to talk but will be okay. Do you want to grab a coffee in a bit?xx

Jill: I'd love that. It will give us a chance to talk about a few things too xx

Aoife wanted to make a big fuss of saying goodbye to Lauren given that she was pretty upset this morning. As she was leaving Aoife seemed to breakdown. I alway knew that she would be particularly upset on international break. She's currently out with a long term injury. At city, her physio appointments mean that she is still around all the girls but when they go off to camp I can tell she feels left behind. She asked me whether she could invite some of her rehab buddies over to have a movie marathon. I told her I didn't mind as I was going out anyway. With the excitement that I might be meeting Jill Aoife perked up.

I was apprehensive to go get a coffee with Jill. Not because I didn't enjoy her company but she scared me with her last text. What does she want to talk about? Time seemed to drag until finally it was time to go.

I was the first to arrive at the cafe. Presumably Jill had got lost, I've only known her a matter of hours but I can already tell her sense of direction is terrible. When she did arrive the atmosphere wasn't quite what I was expecting. She wasn't the same person I'd got to know after the past couple days. She's normally quite an open book but now she seems so reserved. The small talk was painful but eventually we made our way to what was upsetting her.

Jill explained that she was worried that I'm just experimenting. She went on to tell me how she'd been hurt before. I admitted that I've not done anything like this before but I want my first times to be with her. She thought I was crazy because we've not know each other long. However, she agreed that we have a connection that we can't afford to ignore. I reassured her that I know my own mind and that I won't hurt her.

We wrapped up our coffee and went for a stroll in the park across the road from my building. There was ducks in the pond and Jill was insistent on feeding them. I told her that we could nip back to mine and get some bread. We made it as far as my flat door before she kissed me passionately. Totally about forgetting Aoife and some of my teammates being there we continued the kiss as the door swung open. How embarrassing!