Behind the Game Face

nurse lilah

"The world is ending!"
"Take shelter!"
"I have my emergency axe somewhere here!"

The girls were running around the living room. Well, Gabby and Liv were. Emma was trying to reach into the fireplace for this 'emergency axe' she had hidden there for some reason.

I gave them a couple more seconds of screaming, jumping on the couch and throwing stuff around before I yelled.

"Okay, that's enough! Is it really that surprising I want to go to a football game?"

"Lord, catch me. I'm about to faint." Gabby murmured as she fell into Liv's arms who fanned her with a random hand fan she had.

Why did she have that?

"Sorry girl. We've been going to games without you for years now. Have been begging for you to come along for years. I mean, you just attended your first football game this semester and you've been here for three years." Liv tried explaining as she helped Gabby stand on her own. "Excuse us for thinking the world is ending."

"Well, Princeton asked me to come." I shrugged off-handedly. "It would be bad if I didn't show face so..."

"Ahhh, there it is." Gabby nodded. "I knew that could be the only reason."

"Found it!" Emma yelled, brandishing the biggest axe. It looked like something that Thor himself would carry.

"Where the heck did you get that?" I asked incredulously. She shrugged in response, cleaning the tip of the metal with her sleeve.

"I'm Russian."

"I knew there was something off with that one." Gabby faked whispered to Liv and I, knowing dang well Emma could hear her.

"Anyways, you have to go get ready and make sure you look cute!" Liv gushed as she pushed me to the stairs.

"Like that's ever a problem." Emma scoffed to herself.

"Everyone meet downstairs in an hour!" Liv yelled as she entered the kitchen. I huffed, making my way upstairs before deciding to spend the first fifteen minutes of my hour to watch film on the team we'd be playing tomorrow.

It's our first away game of the season and I was really excited. It was fun visiting other schools and seeing what the volleyball culture was like there. To me, it differentiates every year. I never know what kind of gym environment I'll be walking into when we play away games.

By the time I was done watching film and getting dressed, I laid back down on my bed before texting my brother.

me:
Thanks again for letting me take care of Layla. I hope she had fun! Miss and love you both.

big bro:
idk if i should be thanking you or returning her. she hasn't stopped talking about her weekend with you nor her other aunties and uncles lol. thanks for your help sis, much love.

ps, who's this prince she keeps mentioning?

My eyes widened at his second text before I shut my phone off, not even bothering to respond. There's no way I was going to tell Axel about Princeton cause then he'd want to meet him. And if he met him...well he'd have to come to my hometown and that was a can of worms I didn't want to bring back into my life here at college.

For a Monday night, you'd think there wouldn't be as many people at this game but you'd be wrong. It's as packed as the scrimmage, if not more.

Once again, I had no clue what was going on during the game. The only thing I knew was that I had to cheer when one of our players crossed the end goal line with the football and when Princeton would make a good throw or get the linemen off of him.