when worlds collide [george russell]

Chapter 1

„Shit, how am I missing so many shots today?" Willow let out under her breath while her trainer kept playing a tennis ball after another at her. 

"Where is your head at today?" Alex, her trainer, screamed over the court at her.

She just shrugged her shoulders, in the corner of her eye noticing the boy on the court beside her looking over. It was him who she was distracted by, which she obviously wouldn't tell Alex neither was she really admitting to herself that he was the reason. 

He was stood on the court to her right, behind the net so she could perfectly see him by just moving her eye a little to the right from where she should be looking at Alex, who just now played the next ball towards her, which she once again missed. 

"We can just stop this right now if you're not going to focus!" Alex said getting ever so slightly annoyed. Although it was an empty threat since he was getting paid to play these yellow-green balls at her, whether she hit them or not.

Willow got her act together and ripped her eyes from the tall brunette boy once and for all to focus on the remaining 35 minutes of practice, but even when she wasn't looking her thoughts were occupied by him.

When they bumped into each other 20 minutes ago in the hallway of the tennis club she immediately noticed his piercing blue eyes while they both apologized for the incident, even though it had clearly been Willows fault because she ran into him to get to the court in time after missing her bus.

Her face had been extraordinarily red from running all the way from home to the club and her forehead sweaty, while he was the impersonation of calmness, a gently smile on his face when he asked her, "you alright?" in a British accent.

Still in a hurry, Willow only brought out a single word before heading off again. A breathy "sorry".

Only now after having a few quick glances at him, while he played tennis with another guy, who seemed to be a friend, she noticed how tall he was. Definitely taller than six foot, if she had to guess.

She allowed herself to have another look when she finished her training session, just to see him walking up to the net, meeting hands with his opponent. She could hear them both saying something along the lines of "Good game!"

His long tanned legs covered to just a small amount by his yale-blue athletic shorts captured her glance for a moment too long until she noticed he was looking at her too. Moving her eyes from his legs to his face, they both gave each other a smile, remembering the incident in the hallway.

She left the court with Alex talking about some tennis match they had both watched the day before. Initially Willow had planned to get home a quickly as possible to resume working on her Bachelors thesis, she had planned to finish by the end of summer, but they got caught up in their conversation so Willow ended up leaving half an hour after they had stopped playing. She had seen the boy, she didn't know the name of or rather didn't know anything of besides the fact that she was attracted to him, leave 10 minutes earlier.

She had never seen him at the Will to Win tennis centre and she imagined she'd never see his there again. It has seemed more like a one time thing, like he just met this friend for a round of tennis. 

Willow was attracted to him and she wished to see him again, no doubt, but this resembled all the times she had fancied a guy on the tube for a few minutes until they left the tube at their station and Willow never saw them again. 

Leaving the facility she decided to walk home. It was about half an hour by foot to Bridle Lane in Soho, London, where she lived in an abnormally small flat. It was enough for her and all her stuff but nothing else fitted into that tiny apartment she called home. 

She decided on walking mainly to procrastinate working on her thesis, but told herself it was fine, because she should enjoy the sunny weather, since she hadn't left her flat the last three days and considering she lived in England a few sunny days were normally followed by rain.

The walk to her flat was filled with adoration for the beauty of Londons architecture while from time to time the tall brunette popped into her head and occupied her thoughts until she worked against it. She had a record of letting these things get to her, thinking about someone for weeks who she had only seen once, making up a whole personality around them in her head, imagining what they would be like as a couple. She knew it was obsessive and she knew it was the reason she had never been in a relationship before, because people were never like she made them up to be and she was always left disappointed when they didn't match her imagination.

Willow distracted herself from thinking of the boy, by planning out the rest of the week. It was Wednesday now, and she hadn't planned anything for today besides tennis. Maybe she'd ring a friend to go for a drink, which she would only allow herself after productively working on her thesis. Tomorrow she'd meet a friend for brunch and on Friday, she'd take the train to her families farmhouse just outside of Brackley, a 2 and a half hour train ride from London.

She got home, hit the shower since she was sweaty form tennis and walking home in the blazing sun. After she threw on a flowy summer dress, so no fabric would stick to her body and let her wet hair fall down her back as she opened her computer to finally start working on her thesis.

When she took a quick break to have a coffee and a snack she called Mica, a friend from uni, to ask her to go for a drink at 8, to which she agreed immediately.

Willow put a fiver in her phone case and slipped into her converse before heading out just 2 minutes before eight, taking nothing else with her.

Fortunately, Mica only lived a few streets down from her. They met at their favorite pub, which was located exactly in the middle from where they both lived. They had spend at least two evenings per week here, ever since they met at uni three years ago. This explains why Willow felt no need to take any ID with her, the bartenders there knew Mica and Willow better than any other costumers and knew they both were 22, making them fairly old enough to consume whatever they wanted.

On this specific occasion they treated themselves to two gin and tonics and a shot of tequila. Enough to make them both tipsy and make Willow tell Mica about the "hot brunette", as she called him, she had put an eye on earlier that day, which she specifically didn't want to tell anyone about, because she was really trying hard to get out of that vicious circle of getting to obsessed with random people.