Touchdown Boy

Chapter Thirty-six

                 

(A/N: smut warning)

Addison had been right about Thanksgiving. It hurt to see everyone acting like Tom and her were a real couple, seeing Tom playing the role of the perfect boyfriend as he was polite and respectful towards Addison's family. It made it seem like Tom actually cared about what Mrs. Webb thought about him, which made sense since she and Tom were friends. But Addison's mom already loved Tom and the rest of her friends; he didn't need to go out of his way to impress her, unless he wanted Mrs. Webb to approve of him as Addison's boyfriend. That's what normal boyfriends did anyway, but Tom's relationship with Addison wasn't normal. But spending Thanksgiving together had made it seem more normal, leaving Addison more confused than ever.

            Addison couldn't distinguish between the Tom she had always known, the player and jokester, and the Tom he was with her, the sweet and caring one, anymore. She couldn't tell what was just acting and what was real, so she had to tell herself everything was just an act in order to protect herself from getting hurt. Differentiating between what was genuine and what was fake was probably pointless anyway, because Addison knew she wasn't falling for Tom anymore, she had already fallen for him, hard. She had been trying to deny it, telling herself it was all just an act, and that she had fallen for Tom only because he was acting different so that she would fall for him. But it was hard to believe that she had fallen for a "different" Tom when she had seen those characteristics of Tom her whole life.

He had always cared about her; hell, the first time they met he had been trying to take care of her by lessening the pain she had been in. He had always included Addison in their friend group, noticing when she felt left out of conversations and changing the subject to something she could actually relate to. He had always written her friendly and flirtatious notes on Valentine's Day and put them in her decorated shoebox, something every student had to bring in for the holiday, during elementary and middle school, and then in her locker during high school, so she wouldn't feel alone. He had always wished her good luck when she competed at Latin forum, saying how he wished he could go to see her kick ass at Certamen. He had always made her laugh when she was having a bad day, like when she would do badly on a test or when her parents were fighting. He has always been there for her; he has always been that Tom. But that didn't mean that Tom wasn't putting on act. Even though Tom had always been kind to her, that didn't mean that he liked her as anything more than a friend.

And so Addison tried to be content with the one-sided relationship where she could delude herself into thinking Tom actually liked her back. She could convince herself that it was real. But now that she had admitted to herself that she liked Tom, when she was reminded of the truth and the bet that had started it all, it hurt her way more than when she had just been reciprocating Tom's actions and had just been making the next move in the game they were both playing; back when her emotions hadn't been involved.

Addison was tired of the pain and of the weight of the lies. She decided she needed to end this bet once and for all. And what better way to make Tom give up than to make him think they were going to go all the way, that he was finally going to win, before backing out at the last second. Addison knew that this would have to happen closer to the deadline of the bet in order to get the biggest reaction out of Tom, and that's what she wanted to do. She wanted to get back at him for all this stupid, confusing shit he put her through. She wanted to get back at him for making that fucking bet and turning her into some prize to be won. And most of all, she wanted to get back at him for making her fall in love with him.

So Addison waited. Every day she felt a stabbing in her heart that accompanied the fluttering in her stomach each time Tom smiled at her or kissed her. She waited until the weekend before exams started and the semester would end. She knew Tom would be on edge at this point, panicking about winning the bet in such short time, or at least that's what she assumed. Tom never actually showed any worry when he was with her, and he never tried to take things to the next level when they kissed in an attempt to win the bet. Addison didn't know what Tom was waiting for, maybe the same thing she was: his birthday.