You Love Somebody

48 (Anna)

The next morning it was back to reality. They were picked up and taken to the tour bus, which would take them to Cardiff. Anna had a busy day on the bus, talking to physiotherapists for the team. She had video conferences with 7 candidates and in the end she went with a young man, who usually worked with football players. He wasn't attached, meaning he could travel with them for as long as Eddie needed.

Ben had been avoiding her all day, but at lunch time she cornered him in the lounge area. She sat opposite him and stared him down. He awkwardly chewed his food, and tried to avoid eye contact. In the end he gave up.

"Can I help you, Anna?" He asked, keeping a straight face.

She arched her eyebrow at him, and tilted her head. "So?"

"So what?" He said, pretending not to know what she was asking.

"Ben, you won't win this, spill..." She looked sternly at him.

He chuckled and wiped his mouth with a paper napkin.

"I mean, she's pretty great, isn't she?" He bit his lip and tried to avoid eye contact.

Anna leaned in the same direction forcing him to look into her eyes.

"I know she is, but I'm not the one we're talking about now. I need to know what friend I'll be hearing on the phone later; a sad one or a happy one?" She narrowed her eyes at him.

Ben cleared his throat. "Well, happy I would guess."

"How happy?" She asked, a teasing look in her eyes.

He chuckled and shook his head. "Don't make me kiss and tell, I really don't want to be that guy."

"You had no problem telling Eddie you kissed me..." She pointed out and shook her head at him.

He grimaced and hid his face in his hands. "Shit, I'm still very sorry about that, Anna. That was... That was messed up all around."

"Ah, don't worry about that. That's the distant past. Just promise me that you'll be kind to Alice. She's a very, very good person." She took a deep breath and swallowed hard.

He nodded and put his hand on her arm. "I promise, Anna."

Eddie came around and looked at Ben's hand on Anna's arm.

"What's going on here then?" He asked and sat down next to Anna and put his arm around her.

"You don't have to go all possessive-boyfriend, I'm just warning Ben to treat Alice nicely," she pointed sternly at Ben and he nodded in agreement.

Eddie laughed and looked at Anna. "I'm sure Ben is very scared of all 5'4" of you."

She elbowed him in the side and threatened to bite him.

"On another note, I've found a physiotherapist. He's joining us in Cardiff. Your knee sleeve is ready as well, so we should be able to send you on stage tomorrow," she smiled up at him.

"Awesome," Eddie said. "Who's the physio?"

"He worked with football players, but he wanted to try something new. His name is Chad, he's 25 years old and he seemed like a nice guy." She went through the applications and pulled Chad's out and put it in front of Eddie.

He nodded as he looked through it. "Nice looking fella."

Ben chuckled on the other side of the table and Anna looked confused from one to the other.

"What?" She asked.

"You seriously don't see how handsome he is?" Ben asked, looking amused.

Eddie lifted his eyebrows at her and chuckled. "He's like Ryan Gosling handsome," he pointed out.