Dance in the Rain

D.I.T.R. - 5

*Pic of Courtney on side - played by Vanessa Hudgens 

"Hannah?” I asked ecstatically when I answered the phone, walking down the road to get to the oval that Jack and Jimmy said they were training at.

“Um, no. It’s Ryan, actually and before you hang up, please just talk to me? I really want to see you.” The all too familiar voice answered.

Ryan was my cousin’s best friend’s brother. Hannah was currently living in U.S.A and has been for almost two years now. She moved there after her best friend, Jesse, and her family moved away and Hannah wasn’t ready to leave Jesse so she moved with them. Ryan was one of my least favourite people. We used to be pretty good friends before Hannah and Jesse, her best friend/Ryan’s sister, tried to get us together and always left us alone then it became really awkward. Ryan knew I didn’t think of him that way and he just had to ruin our friendship by asking me out. When I refused, he told the whole school fake stories and rumours about me and everyone thought I was the biggest bitch and avoided me. I ended up a nervous wreck and that’s when finally had enough and moved schools. Apparently they had heard about the rumours and they all treated me like dirt.

I hadn’t spoken to him or seen him since then and that was over three years ago. I had gotten over it but whenever I heard him or saw heard that he wanted to get in touch, I felt what I had three years ago all over again.

“What do you want, Ryan?” I asked in an acidic tone and the two boys gave me a weird look. I just weakly smiled at them and kept walking.

“I already said, I wanted to meet up, I heard you moved to Australia and I asked Hannah if I could come with her when she went to visit her parents and I wanted to see you.” He sounded almost desperate. I’m sure he did want to see me, after all, Hannah called me once every fortnight – we are quite close – and she tells me how much of a drone Ryan is since you moved away and is always complaining that he hates his life and wishes he never did that stuff to me. Well new flash, buddy, you can’t erase the past so you should probably think it through before you do stupid stuff.

“Look, I thought I already made it clear that I never wanted to see your sorry ass again,” I said, my tone sharp, “So why don’t you shove that suggestion up your ass.” I don’t know what possessed him to think that I’d want to see him.

“If you knew the truth, Dez, you would want to see me, but you just have to be arrogant and believe the lies that that stupid bitch told you. I wasn’t the one to spread the rumours, it was Bianca!” Oh yeah, Bianca was the school’s slut while I was still there and she’s the one that told me about the rumours that’d been spread by Ryan, “Please, Dez, you meant so much to me that I wouldn’t ruin our friendship over me being an ass and trying to make that friendship more. Bianca found out somehow.” He pleaded with me, which means he must be pretty desperate. But I’m not gullible,

“Do you expect me to believe that bullshit? You ignored me like the rest of the school, like the rest of the world besides Hannah, Jesse and my family. I don’t want to hear your lies a-“ I was about to continue but my phone was snatched out of my hand by someone. I looked around to see who’d stolen my phone and Jack was talking angrily into my phone,

“Look, who ever you are, she doesn’t want to talk to you or see you so get that into your ugly head!” Then he hung up and handed the phone back to me. I was shocked that he did that but also thankful, I was about to hang up myself but what stopped me was that he’d call back. He’d keep calling until I answered, Jesse does it all the time and I suspect that Ryan would do it too, seeming they were almost twins besides the age gap.

“Thanks,” I said, smiling at him and putting my phone into my bag

“Don’t sweat it, it’s the least I can do.” Jack replied smiling back at me. We crossed the road and came to a beach. It had no one on it besides a jogger and someone strolling up it, towards their car.

“Are we there yet?” I asked it felt like I’d been walking forever and my feet hurt from the lack of support in my ballet flats.

Jimmy chuckled and replied, “Almost. You spent the whole ten minutes of the walk basically on your phone! Who is that douche bag, by the way? Is he giving you a hard time? I haven’t been in a good fight lately.”

“His name’s Ryan and he’s a complete tool.” I didn’t really want to tell them the story since I had only really just met them. That’s when I realised my mistake; these guys could be taking me anywhere to mug me, or something. I stopped dead in my tracks and looked at both of them several times, my eyes flicking between both of them. They looked at me confused,

“What’s up?” Jack asked, worried.

“I just realised something…” I trailed off and looked at the ground, suddenly nervous. Samson had told me this morning that a friend of his, someone from Justice Crew – Emmanuel – had had his sister kidnapped by Eammon Pearce – a very feared man – and she had been missing since a couple of days ago. They lived in Sydney, though and have been searching for her ever since she left.

“What did you realise? How hot I was?” Jack asked, smirking at me. I gave him a horrified look, “What’s wrong, Desiree?” He asked, suddenly really confused and worried,

“I only met you guys today, you could be taking me somewhere to kill me or something.” My voice was shaking and they started laughing, “It’s not funny, I had a very close family friend go missing a couple of days ago and had been reported taken by a sick, sadistic psycho!” I shouted at them and they suddenly stopped,

“Oh, Desiree, I’m so sorry,” Jack said, “I didn’t realise that but the ovals just ahead.” Jimmy smiled reassuringly at me and I felt so stupid.

“Look, just forget I said anything, please. I feel so embarrassed.” I said, smiling sheepishly while looking at the path that was now moving beneath me because we’d started moving again.

“Yeah, sure,” Jimmy said as we got to the oval. It was quite large and very green. There were four goalposts each side of the field, the middle two taller than the outer two. There were some guys around my age kicking goals from their hands, not off the ground like they do in Rugby,

“Um, why are they all kicking goals from out of their hands?” I asked as we walked over to the locker room and clubroom.

Jimmy and Jack just laughed at me and I gave them all a funny look. We had to walk across the field to get to the rooms and all the players made some comment to Jack or Jimmy. Some said things along the lines of, ‘got a new girlfriend?’ or ‘you tune dog’ to Jack or Jimmy, obviously not knowing who I was coming with.

“Hey! Why don’t you just go back to playing your sissy AFL game?” I shouted at them.

“Wow, a Kiwi, boys?” One guy asked, coming up to me. He had short, straight black hair and a round, baby face.

“Don’t be so racist, there’s nothing wrong with Maoris.” I defended myself, I really hated when people called me a Kiwi. I just happen to like kiwi birds and kiwi fruit.

“How would you know? I love your accent.” He said, smiling at me.

“You’re the one with the accent here.” I replied, smiling sweetly at him. Everyone says I have an accent when really, they do.

“I’m pretty sure if you have one because most people here don’t have one and talk like me and I don’t know anyone else with a Maori accent.” He replied, cockily.

“Well, I just happen to know lots of New Zealanders who talk like me.” I replied.

“I hope so because you come from New Zealand.” He replied, laughing at me.

“Dez?” An all too familiar American accent asked from behind me. I turned around to see Ryan standing there in the same uniform as the others. He obviously played for this team. WTF? He said he was visiting with Hannah and Jesse and how did he know I was here?

"What do you want, Ryan? How did you find me?" I yelled at him. I couldn't help the tears that fell down my cheeks when I saw him.