I Can't See The Sky...

2. I'm stupid.

∆∆∆∆∆∆

(Keith's POV)

I sat there, staring at my phone.

It was six o'clock, English time, and Kylie still hadn't replied to me. This, was getting stressful. I didn't know why she kept doing this.

It seemed almost like she was ignoring me.

I shot Kylie another text, before all my teammates barged into my room, cheering.

We'd lost just one of our four games here. And we'd won two. Tomorrow, we'd play the last game and if we won that, we'd be on top of the table for the tournament.

I set my phone down, and tried to smile and make some noise, but my head was spinning with a thousand worries, and it was getting harder, and harder to keep them straight.

"Hey, Keith! We're going to the pool. Wanna come?" Ryder asked me.

"Hmm? Yeah... I don't think..." I trailed off. Sure, Kylie was my girlfriend, and I really liked her and everything, but... Call me selfish, but I wasn't about to put everything on hold for her.

Not like this at least.

"Sure. Now?"

"Now." Ryder nodded.

I forced a grinned and went to get changed.

~~~~~~

At the pool, Ryder pulled me away from everyone. And judging by the irritated/worried look in his eyes, it was about Kylie.

"Has she texted you, lately?"

A faint wave of guilt-laced anger rose up inside me.

"No. She hasn't. But, she's probably just busy or something."

I couldn't even convince myself with that. And if anything, Ryder began to look even worse.

"I'm so damn worried about her. She's..." Ryder whispered.

"I am, too. But, this is Kylie we're talking about. She's careful. She... What?" I asked him, slightly put off by the fact Ryder was looking at me like I'd just said that Péle was a cricketer or something.

"Do you even know Kylie? Do you know how reckless she is?"

I bit back a laugh.

"Kylie? Reckless? Are we talking about the same Kylie here?"

"Hey, dude. You okay? I mean I'm sorry, I thought you knew. I didn't mea-"

Suddenly, it felt like I was falling into deep, dark hole, trying to grab onto something... Anything to survive. My melodramatic emotions must have showed on my face because Ryder's expression morphed back into worry.

"No, I'm fine. It's just... How could I have missed something so glaringly obvious about Kylie?"

Ryder snorted sadly, if that was possible.

"You have no clue about that either, huh?"

"Clue about...?" I asked, feeling increasingly... Stupid and ignorant.

"Kylie. She's really good at hiding stuff. She's... I know this is probably going to drop another anvil on both our heads, but Kylie is like... She's perfectly suited to being a criminal. The brains, the looks, the sweet-talk. Hell, even the damned emotions."

A criminal.

"You're calling Kylie a criminal?!" I asked through gritted teeth.

"No, I'm not calling anyone anything. I'm just saying... Actually, scratch that. It was a stupid observation."

I didn't say anything.

"Let's just drop this for now. We're here to enjoy ourselves, let's do that."

Ryder nodded, and walked away. It seemed like he was about as eager to discuss Kylie as I was.

Could I blame him though?

~~~~~~

I patted my filled stomach and laughed along with my teammates.

Everyone seemed happy and excited for tomorrow's game, and as team captain it was my job to keep up that morale. Especially since tomorrow would decided our table-postions for the first half of the tournament.

"...And so, she's like, "You're so dumb, Jus." And then she giggles and blushes. And..." Justin continued talking after that, but I zoned out, and stayed zoned out till the end of dinner.

"Okay, boys. Time to hit the hay." Coach said, sometime later.

I nodded, grateful for the dismissal. I wished the rest of the boys a good night before I headed back to mine and Ryder's shared bedroom where I collapsed on the bed as soon as I'd brushed my teeth.

It was still a little early for me to fall asleep, so I picked up my phone and decided to burn sometime, and the tactic worked, until the phone screen came alight.

Kylie was calling.