i don't belong, and my beloved, neither do you (Ted Lasso)

but the crowd in the stands went wild

Warnings for this chapter:
- Vague mentions of past trauma
- Implied abuse
- References to mental illness
- Adult language

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The unfortunate truth of it all is that Thea is quite good at avoiding people when she wants to.

In fact, she manages four days without seeing either of her flatmates without much effort at all.

Mostly by being out of the house. But old habits die hard and, without it meaning to, her bedroom becomes the only room in the flat. She refamiliarizes herself with the four magnolia walls. Retraces her steps till she has covered every inch of the old wooden floor. Reorganizes the stacks of books and unfolded washing.

And when she hears the quiet buzz of the TV at two-in-the-morning, she puts her earphones in and waits for the knot in her chest to untie itself.

But then she's heading to one of her lessons and Jamie is leaving at the same time. Coat on, gym bag under his arm, spare keys in his hand. There's no way she can turn back if she wants to be on time and no way he's not going to walk with her down to the street.

"Colin?"

"Nina," she corrects. "But an a-star for effort."

"Thanks."

They reach the entrance, and he holds the door open in a way that means she has to duck under his arm to leave. Hesitating on the pavement, she tries to work out what to do next. If she takes off running, then he's going to think she has a problem with him. But if she sticks around, then it'll be obvious that the only problem she has is the one going on inside her head.

What's that saying about a rock and a hard place?

"Come on," he says. "I'll give you a lift."

"I can't ask you to do that."

He raises an eyebrow. "You didn't."

It's an appealing offer. Not only will it save her time, but it'll also mean she gets to avoid what is going to be a very busy bus. The math says that it's worth any potential awkwardness. The problem is that Thea never has trusted math.

"Fine."

So, she gets into his stupid, shiny car and God only knows how he and Casey manage to find parking every day but they're on the road before she can question his never-ending luck.

"Thea," he says. "Did I do somethin' wrong?"

They're going fast enough that she'll probably get very hurt if she tries to jump out of the car, but she considers it for longer than she should.

"Other than waiting till I was trapped in your car to have this conversation?"

"What?" He winces. "No, that's not what I meant to do. I was tryin' to build up to it but then I offered to give you a lift. I thought I'd have more time on the stairs."

She catches his eyes in the mirror. "I live on the third floor, it's two minutes on a bad day."

"Right, I'm an idiot." He says. "Forget I said anythin'."

Thea shakes her head. "You're kidding, right? You've popped the snakes out of the can. You can't just put them back now."

"Snakes?"

"Why do you think that you've done something wrong?"

"I'm being serious, we don't have to do this right now."

"Well, it's now or never," she says. "So, you might as well tell me."

"It's just," he stops for a moment. "I feel like you've been avoidin' me."