Over The End Line (Chaennie)

Chapter 9

Chapter 9

NATIONAL EFFING SEMIFINALISTS mother effing bulldogs

6:42 am

yeri
me and my new best friend
Attached image
why have you guys been hiding joy from me she's like the best

seulgi
it was like they were having a sleepover in third grade
irene was the dad

Irene
Ridiculous! They were giggling and having pillow fights at eleven! We play today at eight!

seulgi
case in point

yeri
please please please can i keep her!!!

rosie
yeri! what have we said about strays??

yeri
but mooooom :(

seulgi
lmaooo

***

Let it go down in history that Jennie Kim is not a morning person. Not normally, and especially not when her body is still getting used to the time difference between Montclair and Portland. She's especially not a morning person when Rosie Park was straddling her and trying to make out with her while asleep, and now that she's awake she's acting like Jennie doesn't exist.

Joy sidles up to her as they get onto the bus at 7:00 in the fucking morning and says, "Soo? How was your night?" and she's grinning all knowingly and hopefully and Jennie just wants to cry.

Instead, she says, "Not amazing," and hides by fortifying herself by sitting in front of Jisoo and Lisa and behind Seulgi and Irene.

Rosie slides into the seat next to Joy looking miserable, and jesus, would kissing Jennie really be that bad?

What with the state they're in, Jennie hadn't imagined that their first game would go great, but she hadn't imagined that they would fucking lose.

It makes sense. Her and Rosie can't even make eye contact, and their uncertainty is trickling down to the rest of the team, and they're all in a funk. None of them are playing their best, and Jennie is inattentive at best. Somehow, Irene manages to get the ball in the net once, but they can't keep up with the opposing team, and they lose, 2-1.

It doesn't bode well for the other three games they have to play that day.

Hell, even the announcers notice that something is different, that they aren't playing to their, "Usual standard of excellence."

Jennie would like to say that their second game goes better, but she'd be lying. It's like she's watching the game happen on the television, she doesn't feel like she's actually there, like there's anything she can actually do to change their fate.

It's like she's underwater, slowly sinking and watching the game happen above the water, but nobody can hear her screaming and she can't do anything, can't move no matter how hard she kicks, how hard she tries to propel herself towards the surface.

She's playing sluggishly, reacting at a delay of at least two seconds to everything, most of her brain power dedicated to trying not to watch Rosie and failing, then giving herself shit for doing nothing but stare at Rosie.

Irene looks close to tears when she goes to take that corner kick. Jennie positions herself where she usually does for corner kicks coming from the right, the ball usually goes to Rosie in those situations because she's closer, but Jennie gets herself situated nonetheless, feeling the eyes of the defender guarding her glaring into her back. The whole team that they're playing seems to be taking it very personally that they aren't playing well, like they think that the Bulldogs decided that the team from Nebraska was beneath them and they wouldn't play as hard. Like they weren't winning, two to nothing.