I'm On Your Side

3.5 | The one where I lie to my friends

Mason's POV

I'VE ALWAYS HAD trouble opening myself up.

I mean, for the longest time I convinced myself that I was fine and I had absolutely no struggles, so there was no need to open myself up because I had nothing to say, but then reality hit me as soon as High School started and I found myself caught up in things I wouldn't regularly find myself caught up in, like my grades and the SAT. Before, I only cared about chilling with my friends and playing soccer, but when I started High School, more things came with that package and soon I found myself in this room with no exits.

I didn't know if any of my friends felt the same thing that I did with entering High School, but since no one talked about it and I didn't want to be the one to bring it up, I stayed silent... and talked about it with my sister, who, being the snitch she is, told my mom, who suggested me for a therapist, who then suggested me for a therapy group.

And here I am now―overthinking about what I did to Isha a couple of days ago and praying that God will give me a reverse button, so that I can prevent myself from even opening up to her.

Not that she isn't a bad person because, if I'm being honest, she isn't―I am.

A stupid person, not a bad person.

I should've known better than to open up about my struggles that early. I mean, who does that? Me, that's who, I think to myself. Me, my dumbass self. But, in my defense, there's no one else who I can talk to about stuff like this because my friends and I only talk about trends and school-related things, and my sister, well, I've learned my lesson about opening myself up to her.

Isha's different than them because we don't have something to relate to other than being in a therapy group, which correlates with mental health, which is why I thought if I started talking about mental health that would be our main conversation and I would have someone to confide to about my mental health and on the plus side, I would have nothing to lose compared to losing a friendship if I talked about mental health too much with my friends.

This whole thing is so complicated for my head to wrap itself around, so I get up from the bleachers and run up to Coach Smith, hoping he'll let me on the field. "Hey, Coach," I say as sweetly as possible. He turns his head around and inspects me, oddly. "I was wondering if I could play on the field." I force a smile on my lips as he wrinkles his eyebrows.

"Mason, practice is only for another five minutes," he says. My smile fades. How has time gone by that fast? I wrinkle my eyebrows. Was I seriously in my head for thirty minutes? "Are you okay?"

I look up, shaking out of my thoughts. "Yes, sir."

"Are you sure? Because I tried calling you earlier, but you seemed so caught up somewhere..." Coach's voice trails off.

"Yeah, I was sleeping," I quickly lie. Coach looks at me with suspicion when it hits me that Coach can see right through your lies. I force a smile on my face as I assure myself that Coach wouldn't even think that I was thinking about my mental health and―

"You didn't get a girl pregnant, Ferguson, did you?" he asks and I let out a loud laugh.

"No!" I say with a smile. At least that isn't a lie. "Coach, why would you even think that?" Coach seems to let out a small sigh of relief as he looks at me.

"Good, now get your ass out there and show me what you got for the last three minutes!" he hollers and I run onto the field, a wave of relief washing over me. Getting a girl pregnant is way worse than confiding in a girl too early, I think to myself, so really I don't have anything to worry about.