when worlds collide [george russell]

Chapter 11

Willow went upstairs and after she had closed the door to her apartment behind her she took a second to take in everything that just went down.

She stood facing the apartment and let herself lean back against the door in an exhausted manner. Never would she have thought that them playing tennis together would end like this. George had absolutely charmed her. She had no clue how he did it but he somehow managed to completely change her attitude towards him. Before all she wanted to do was never think of him again and now she felt like she was bewitched and didn't want their time togehher to end.

She grabbed the collar of his sweater and pulled it closer to her nose to smell it. The remainder of his perfume mixed with the smell of the washing detergent amounted to a subtle but distinctive play between lavender and burnt wood. Willow would have loved to keep that sweater on for days but she didn't want his smell to disappear and be drowned out by her own smell.

As she let go of the collar after having a few more sniffs of the sultry scent she went over to her kitchen area and turned on the kettle to make a cup of tea. She put a tea bag of red berry tea in a green mug - her favorite mug - and added the boiling water. Willow had never liked black tea, she preferred fruit tea or green tea over it, but if she drank green tea now she would not be able to sleep any time soon and she could already tell she would have a hard time stopping her brain from thinking about George in order to sleep.

With the green mug in one hand and her phone in the other she made her way over to the couch. From the place in the corner of the couch, where she preferred to sit, she had the perfect view out of the window opposite from the couch above the kitchen countertop.

She looked out there, waiting for the tea to come to a temperature where she could drink it without burning her mouth. Rooftops, a few window offering a preview of a strangers life and the night sky was all she could see. Willow took a sip of her tea, placed the mug on the coffee table and grabbed her phone.

She unlocked it and stared at Georges contact and the number he had just put in. Her thumb hovered over the message button for a bit until she decided to text him the next day. She wanted to think this through a little more, sleep on it and compose a good message when she had her calendar at hand so she could propose a date and time.

After deciding that, she opened Instagram. It was time to stalk his profile. For a second she thought how bizarre it was that she decided against looking him up a few weeks earlier, unlike all the other times she encountered a boy. Normally it was her first instinct to search for them on social media. This time she was actually glad she didn't do so, because she appreciated that George was able to tell her about his not so average career himself, instead of her finding out through googling him. It would have definitely changed how things had gone down between them.

Willow typed in his name on the instagram search bar and immediately his profile popped up right on top.

A few pictures of him in the paddock - a word she had learned just a few hours ago - some pictures of him in his car on track and in between a little more personal picture now and then. The profile was very motorsport loaded which made her wonder if he had another profile with more personal photos.

She didn't give him a follow yet - partly because she thought he wouldn't see anyway since he probably gained a few hundred followers each day and partly because she didn't want him to know she had already stalked his page, she still aimed to play it cool.

After drinking the rest of her tea, which was now almost below the perfect drinking temperature, she took off Georges sweater and placed it over one of her dining chairs. She then made her way into the bathroom, finally removing the smelly sports attire and brushing her teeth and hair after washing her face.

It wasn't late. In fact, it had just turned 10 o'clock but Willow was tired and exhausted from the unexpected turn of events. She put on a light blue pair of mens boxers she had specifically bought as pyjama pants and went to bed with nothing else on as it was still warm and humid in her apartment although she had already opened the windows to let the cooler night air in.

Willow fell asleep quickly. She only thought about George for a very short time until she restrained herself from it. Her self-control had gotten quite good over the last few weeks and she managed to stop herself now before overthinking or worse, whitewashing anything.