It all started with a game

Chapter 11.1

Some old wounds never truly heal, and bleed again at the slightest word.
~George R.R Martin

Chapter 11.1
Ryder's POV
I dropped Beatrice off at her car before running over to the secondary lot to meet Mateo so we could walk back to his place together.

"How did things go with Maria?" I asked as I greeted him with the handshake we'd learned as kids.

He frowned. "She still hates me, maybe even more so now than usual."

"You know, there's this girl in my Spanish class who seems into you. She's pretty nice."

Mateo was not amused. "Have you met Maria? Does it look like I'm into nice girls?"

Fair enough, Maria is not what I would call 'nice'. "I'm just saying, there are plenty of fish in the sea, why settle for one? Especially one who doesn't even like you back." I shoved my hands in my pockets as we started the walk home.

"Because man, she's Maria. She's perfect, even when she's telling me how much of a loser I am."

"What do you even see in her?" All she does is push him around, use him, and then tell him how horrible he is.

"Everything. She's got a real sense of humor, and I could talk to her for hours—when she's actually talking back. And she's stunning, man. She does this little thing with her nose when she's angry; adorable."

I'm sure he sees that a lot then since she's always angry around him. "Maybe if you tried moving on, she would realize what she's missing out on."

He shook his head. "I couldn't do that. I couldn't date someone else knowing I'm still helplessly in love with Maria."

That would always be the difference between me and him. He was a good person, who cared about other people's feelings, and I was not, never would be.

I am the sole reason Mateo doesn't have any other friends. It's been that way since we were kids. Mateo was the fallen angel and I was the demon straight out of hell. He says he never minds, and that if people can't accept both of us together then they don't need to be a part of his life but I know I weigh him down, even if he won't admit it.

Maybe that's why she was so refreshing. She's probably the only person in the whole school who doesn't know me as the kid with the dead father who's angry at the world. She didn't grow up with me. She didn't hear all the rumors. She didn't have Kavinski to tell her how horrible I am. She didn't stand around the playground and watch as Kavinski and his friends beat the living daylights out of me and Mateo. She never had to see me as the weak, loser kid who only had one friend.

"I will say with your 'plenty of fish in the sea' motto, you must feel great now that you've ended the game with Beatrice," Mateo commented as we made it to his front door.

My face fell as I rubbed the back of my neck. Crap, I knew there was something I was meaning to tell him. "Yeah, about that..."

Mateo deadpanned as we headed down the stairs to his basement, or as he liked to call it, his man cave, filled to the brim with fancy electronics which I still had no clue how to use most of them. He'd tried a couple times to teach me but I usually ended up dying weighing the first few minutes. Now everytime we play it's usually Mateo keeping me from dying and me doing dumb stuff to get us killed. "You didn't end the game, did you?" Mateo asked.

I paced around his game room, the small action slightly calming my nerves since I knew he was about to castigate me for this. "Well, you see, I tried but—"

He didn't even let me finish my sentence. "We literally rehearsed the speech!"

"I know." Believe me, I knew. I don't know what happened. It was such a simple plan.