Family away from family

Chapter 8. Olympic Squad announcement

27-may-2021

The past few weeks went by in a blur. I was struggling with the loss of my parents. Their dead gave me an urge to be mad at everybody that tried to take care of me. There was this coldness around me and not willing to go on without them by my side. Although Lucy really tried her best to keep me going and not letting myself drift off into an even darker place.

| Flashback:

"Babe I need to get back to Manchester tomorrow, will you please go to the Arsenal game and listen to Leah. She only tries to be there for you, so please let her in." Lucy says while walking over to me in the bed and tries to give me a kiss on my forehead.

Due to the funeral of my parents at the 9 of May, which was a game day for most teams in the WSL, they postponed all the games to later that week on a Wednesday. Jonas didn't select me for the game and I also don't feel the need to be there for the team. I am a burden so why going to the game.

"I'm not going. Leave me alone, will you?" I say turning around and swaying her kiss on my forehead away with my hand. "And tell Leah she doesn't have to try." Lucy sighs and walks out the room saying she will go to the gym. Deep down I know I'm hurting her, but that's currently what I'm best at and my parents always told me to keep trying my best.

When Lucy returns I'm not in the bed anymore. Which seems like a step forward, but she will soon see it's actually a major step backwards. At first, I hear her walk out of the room, but comes back once she realizes I'm not downstairs or any other room. The door cracks open again. "Liv, you here?" I hear Lucy whisper into the room. Sounding unsure if she wants to find me.

With every step she takes she comes closer to the bathroom. She waits in front of the door deciding to go in or not. When she walks in she immediately rushes to me laying on the bathroom floor in the shower with the water running ice cold. Instead of turning the shower off, she situates herself behind me. "Please go Luce, I need to feel the cold. It's the only thing that makes me feel something." I say sounding desperate.

"I know lieverd, but let me be cold with you. Then I can hold you, both of us being cold together." She answers.

How is it that she always does what's best for me? She is always one step ahead. She knows her hugging me is a too cozy and warm feeling I can't handle right now, so she decides to suffer with me. How on earth do I deserve someone like her.

I didn't know or maybe I didn't want to believe that hugging Lucy was everything I needed. Since the funeral we haven't had any human contact because I couldn't handle it. I always swatted her away. She kept trying without overstepping to much.

She notices I'm shivering and my lip is slightly turning blue. "Are you ready to get out of the shower? We can go downstairs to the yard or back to bed." Lucy asks me being the good girlfriend she is.

"No, I-I can't go back to bed. It's too soft. I will just keep laying here." I say.

Lucy doesn't say something at first and turns off the shower. "You're catching a cold, I can't let you lay here. If you want we can try out the floor in the living-room together?" She asks me.

And that's what we did, we tried laying on every floor in the house just because the coziness of everything else reminds me of my parents. At some point Leah even joined us in just lying on the stones of front porch. How weird it may have looked, it made me feel loved and understand. |

Currently it's Olympic squad announcement day. Normally on days like this my parents would be by my side to hear the news if I got selected or not. But we all know that won't be happening this time and because I pitied myself I sent everybody away to hear it all by myself. Making the team would be a dream. If that doesn't happen I will be raging, because I think I improved myself so much last year. I took everything I learned at Lyon back to Arsenal. All those experiences from becoming champions to winning the Champions league. It made me a better player. I would be devastated if I hear I'm not going to Tokyo. So, if I hear I'm not in the team I will think they just didn't want me because I lost my parents and they think that will be in the way of my playing.