SOPHIE BROOKS:
Party, hook-up, hangover, repeat.
I don't do rules, responsibility, or monogamy.
So when the chance to sleep with the hottest Olympian swimmer in the country presents itself, you can be damn sure I take it.
And sneak out before he wa...
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Sophie positions me on the couch, and then she disappears upstairs.
I'm not entirely sure what is going on. I thought things were going really well; we were having a great date, and then suddenly, she freaked out.
I should have seen it coming, though. It's what she does; whenever things get a little too real, she pushes me away.
I take a little comfort in the fact that I can see the hallway towards the front door from my seat on the couch, so she would have to pass by if she decided to make a run for it. But a small part of me worries she might rappel down from the balcony to get out of this conversation.
I wouldn't put it past her.
A few minutes later, I hear her come down the stairs, and she appears in the archway, carrying a cardboard box of the kind movers use.
I watch her silently as she slowly approaches me, setting the box on the coffee table and instantly removing her hands like it burned her. She wobbles on her feet, the flight instinct evident in her eyes.
I brace myself for what she might do, but after a couple of seconds, she sinks down beside me.
Neither of us says anything. She's staring at the box so intensely I'm surprised it hasn't caught fire yet, wringing her hands in her lap. She casts a glance at me, takes a deep breath, and then opens up the box.
From the angle of where I'm sitting, I can't see the contents, except something that looks like the top of a blond wig...
Sophie leans forward, picking something up from the box and handing it to me.
It's a picture of two young girls wearing white dresses. They are maybe around seven years old.
One of them is a little taller with shoulder-length dark brown hair. Her smile is small and secretive, but there's a dimple on each cheek, and even in this small photograph, I can see the golden color of her eyes.
Sophie.
She has her arm around the other girl, whose curly blond hair is falling down her back. She's got baby blue eyes and is wearing a megawatt smile.
I look up at Sophie next to me. Her eyes are darker, back to the onyx brown they take on whenever she closes herself off. She's staring intently at the item in my hands, biting her bottom lip.
"You and Jen?" I ask quietly.
She nods. "At our first communion."
"You were raised Christian?"
I don't know why I'm surprised. As I gather, she and Jen grew up together, and Jen always wears a cross around her neck and goes to church every Sunday. It would be a fair assumption that Sophie also used to practice Christianity. But I simply can't picture it.
Even with this photo in my hand.
"My parents are very religious," she says, shrugging.
I return my eyes to the picture, wondering why she showed it to me when she reaches into the box and pulls out another one, handing it to me.
