9 Innings of Love: A Savannah Banana's and Party Animals Love Story

Chapter 1

Olivia's POV:

I woke up to the sound of my phone blaring. I groaned and rolled over to check who was blowing up my phone at 7 am. It was my favorite cousin (not at the moment though), Dalton. I answered because I knew he would keep calling until I picked up. "Dalt, its 7 am what could you possibly want from me?" "Well good morning to you too sunshine. Did you forget what day it was?" He said through the phone. I rolled over again to look at my calendar. It was Saturday January 30th, and written in big red letters said "LEAVING FOR SAVANNAH WITH DALT" I groaned again as I put my face into my pillow. I then heard Dalton on the phone. "Yep you definitely forgot, are you at least all packed?" "Yeah, I finished packing two days ago. I don't know how I forgot today was the day we leave." "Okay well get up and I'll be there in about 30 minutes" "Ugh fine, be careful I'll see you soon."

I got up and went to get ready. I still had to pack the things I knew I would need in the morning. I quickly did my morning routine and threw everything into my luggage bags. I hope Dalton has enough room in his truck for all my bags that I'm going to make him carry for me. I lost track of time, and didn't realize Dalton was here until I heard the doorbell ring. I opened the door to see Dalton holding my favorite Starbucks drink and a chocolate croissant. "You know you're my favorite cousin right?" I asked as Dalton nodded. "Yeah I know, I figured you wouldn't have time for breakfast since you forgot today was the day we leave." Dalton and I then started to pack up all my bags, and we were on the road to Savannah in no time.

This year I'm staying in a host families house with Savannah Alaniz. We became super close with each other as soon as I started my internship last year. "I'm so excited to see Sav, I missed her so much." I said as I looked over to Dalton who was singing one of his songs he had playing. "I bet! I know you two were basically glued at the hip last year on tour. I'm glad you found someone who you're super close with that's not one of my teammates, or on The Party Animals." I looked over at him and gave him a sour look. "Dalton don't tell me you still have that rule for me that I'm not allowed to be close with any of your teammates or the Animals."

Without missing a beat he paused the music and gave me a stern look. "Olivia, I just don't want anything to be awkward between me and the guys. I know you have a boyfriend. What you don't understand is that you're an attractive young woman, who is going to be surrounded by a bunch of guys for a long amount of time. I don't want to get in the middle of anything, or have there be any drama between the guys. Also, I don't want to have to break anyone's arm if they hurt you." He turned to look at me with another stern look.

He had the same stern face as his Dad, but I wasn't going to tell him that. We usually don't mention his Dad, we haven't since we were little. It was like one of those unspoken rules that we knew not to bring it up. "Dalton you know I love Kevin, and it's not fair that you don't want me to be friends with any of your teammates. Like you said, I'll be with you guys the entire tour, so it would be kind of stupid if I can't be friends with them. What do you want me to say "sorry Dalton doesn't want any drama so I can't be friends with any of you. We can only be coworkers and that's it." That's just not possible. Plus, you know that Garett and Noah are basically my male best friends already whether you like it or not."

He groaned as he kept his eyes on the road. "Okay, fine. Just don't cause any waves and we'll be fine. You know I'll always have your back." He said as he tapped on the steering wheel. "Yeah, I know. Hey look on the bright side though, there's one person I can guarantee you that I definitely won't be friends with this season." I smirked as I looked over to him to see a nasty look on his face. "Olivia, you know Tanner is my best friend. I don't understand why you don't like him so much. What has he ever done to make you feel that way about him?"

I rolled my eyes and stared out the window taking in the view. "Dalton he was literally so arrogant on and off the field last year. He thinks he's the best player ever and is so cocky. I just can't stand the way he acts. Whenever he's around me, I'm instantly in a bad mood." I looked over to see his face after I finished. I know that Tanner is Dalton's best friend and roommate, but he just doesn't see him the way I do. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad Dalton has someone he's so close to, but I just wish it wasn't Tanner. He's close with the other guys on the Banana's, but not as close as he is with Tanner. I'll also never tell Dalton, but I maybe had a teeny tiny crush on Tanner when I first came to Banana Land. Lucky for me though, Savannah is the only person who knew about that, and I swore her to secrecy. Those feelings soon changed when I saw how cocky and arrogant he was. Some people would say to just give someone another chance, or maybe I caught him on a bad day. I don't know, maybe this season will be different, but I doubt it.

Dalton let out a sigh, while shaking his head. "Liv, you know I love you, but sometimes you're so hard headed it drives me crazy. Please just try to play nice with Tanner this season. I'll talk to him. You never know, he could come and act like a completely different person. I don't see a problem with how he is. Maybe you just need to hangout with us more to get a better opinion about him. Just please promise me you'll try for the first half of the season, and if your opinion stays the same after the halfway point, that's fine. I just want the two most important people in my life for the next couple months to get along and have fun. This is something we might not get to experience next year, so we need to have fun everywhere we go everyday." Ugh, I hate when he tries to give one of his "older cousin speeches". All because he was born two months before me he thinks he can give me these speeches whenever he pleases. It's been that way since we were kids.

"Okay, okay fine. I'll try to be nice to Tanner for the first half of the season, but after that if nothing changes then you can't be mad at me for trying. Can we drop this now please? We only have 30 minutes until we get to mine and Sav's place and I don't want to be in a bad mood when I get there." Dalton nodded and put on my favorite singers, Dan and Shay. I immediately got a mood boost and started singing the lyrics.

Before I knew it we were at my home for the next couple months. Sav was already there so she helped me and Dalton get my bags out of his car. Once I had all my things inside I said bye to Dalton. We then started catching up since we haven't seen each other since last October. "Okay girl so spill, did Dalton give you his "Don't be friends with any of the players" speech again on the way here?" Sav said as we sat on the couch eating Oreo's. "Yeah of course he did. I told him though that his rule isn't fair, and I should be able to be friends with whoever I want. I did tell him that there was at least one person I wouldn't be friends with, so he doesn't have to worry about that."Sav gave me a side eye look before saying "Let me guess, that someone wouldn't happen to be Mr. Tinder Thomas now would it?" I rolled my eyes, I hated that he called himself that in Banana Land. Prime example of him being cocky and arrogant. "Ding you guessed it. After I told Dalton that he made a deal with me. I have to try to get to know Tanner better for the first half of the season. If my opinion is still the same after the halfway point of the tour then I can go back to disliking him. I already know though that my opinion of him isn't going to change, but I agreed just to make Dalton happy."

I looked up at Sav from my milk when I noticed she had a huge grin on her face. "What?" I said with a mouthful of Oreo's. "Oh nothing, I like this deal that you made with Dalton. I think you just got a bad first opinion on Tanner, and you never saw past it. He actually is a really good guy once you get to know him. I hope you can see that and change your opinion about him.""I can't believe you're taking Dalton's side on this, you're supposed to be my best friend. I guess I'll try my best to form a new opinion about Tanner, but I'm not promising anything." I needed to change the subject or else we would be talking about this all night. "Do you want to watch a movie before bed?" I asked as I went to put away the Oreo's since they started to give me a stomach ache. "Yeah we can" Sav said as she grabbed the remote. I heard the Disney+ sound go off from the kitchen. Sav knows I'm obsessed with all things Disney, so I hurried and ran back to the living room. I let her pick the movie this time though since I didn't want to make her watch my favorite movie "Tangled" for the millionth time. We ended up falling asleep on the couch but set alarms for tomorrow morning before the movie started. We had tomorrow to unpack, but then on February 1st we would officially start the season in Banana Land.  

Thank you so much for reading the first part of my story! This is the first story I've ever published on here so I hope you liked it! I appreciate any positive feedback you might have if you want to comment below. Please keep it positive though! 

Also, I think I might do this story in different POV's Ex: (Olivia, Tanner, Dalton etc.) What do we think about that? Let me know below!  When would you guys like to see me post and how often? I could probably try to do 2 chapters a week. I'm EST so I'm posting this around 8pm  tonight. Comment below and let me know! Have a good day/night! :)