xciv

55 3 0

by ianporters

by ianporters

After the boys were done with the player meeting, Matt and Rory went to the nearest ice cream shop to their hotel to talk and get away from the competitive vibes. It was the thirty-first of August, which meant Champs started tomorrow and they would be in a certain mode that was not to be bothered.

But Matt needed a break from all that. He was so nervous that they would place as badly as they did last year, especially as the favorite over any other team. So much was riding on their backs, the ring, the trophy, and the money.

"Can I have mint chocolate chip please?" Matt put his finger up to the glass, pointing it at the flavor he wanted. The girl nodded and scooped two huge balls of it, and handed it over the counter. "Thank you."

The girl waited for Rory to speak. "Do you guys have just plain chocolate?" Rory asked as she watched Matt pay for his ice cream over at the register and stand off to the side and eat his cone waiting for her to be done so they could go back and get some rest. Rory watched her ice cream getting packed into the cone, and she went to go pay when the guy told her it had already been paid for. She caught up to Matt, walking next to him and admiring the sun going down in the sky. "You didn't have to pay for me. I have money, you know."

"I know. I just wanted to, and it's been so long since I've done that for someone." She nodded but didn't say anything back, and they walked in silence to the hotel, sneaking glances at each other just to make sure that they were actually there with them.

Soon enough, they ended up at Rory's hotel room door, and she embarrassingly fumbled for her key as Matt watched. "So I'll see you tomorrow then?"

"Yeah. Goodnight, Rors." She watched him walk away and she shut her door, sighing happily.

Rory didn't wake up until around eleven, which meant she had missed the Infused versus tK match, which she didn't really mind because she wasn't really friends with most of the people on Infused or tK.

She took a shower and then texted Matt to see if he wanted to grab brunch from a small café near the venue before they went to scrim. He happily agreed and they met up outside the Forum and walked together to the place, chattering on and on about their predictions for the day. Obviously when it came to talking about their game, Matt wasn't completely confident in the squad to get shit done and take three maps off the bat and just win.

"Yeah, I don't know. Parasite and Havok are obviously good, but Llama and Swarley to me are like wild cards. I don't know what their play style is." Matt said, sipping the black coffee, not even bothering with creamer or milk. He just liked it straight up, and Rory always thought that was so disgusting and the sight of it made her scrunch her nose up. "I'm nervous. I've never been more nervous for a tournament ever."

"I know." She looked at him with a sad smile, feeling bad that so much pressure was on him. Rory grabbed his hand over the table, moving her thumb over the base of his. "You'll be okay, I promise. Everything will go the way you want it to eventually."

"What if we don't even get into winner's bracket? God, I'll feel like such a disappointment then." He shook his head.

"Just stop worrying, alright? It will be fine." He gave a small smile to her and they went back to normal conversation.

She really wished the game went in OpTic's favor.

The series went onto a game five, and the boys still couldn't clutch up to secure their victory over CompLexity.

"Hey, you're okay, right?" Matt nodded when Rory walked up to him, the MLG lanyard swinging around her neck and her water bottle and phone being held in her right hand. "Here, drink my water."

"No, it's fine —"

"Drink it, Matt. I don't want you getting dehydrated."

"Weren't we talking about this before? Us losing?" He twisted the cap off of the bottle and drank nearly a third of the bottle.

"You don't need to bring it up if you don't want to. If you don't want to talk about it, I won't." She said, rubbing his shoulder.

"Alright." He smiled at her, realizing just how lucky he had gotten to have Aurora Müller as his number one supporter. "Ready to go?"

"Yeah, if you are." Matt took Rory's hand and they said their goodbyes, walking back to the hotel.

They were okay. OpTic had placed second i their group, and would be going on into winner's bracket.

Matt had invited Rory to his room, which he was staying alone in since Seth and Karlie had decided to get a room together, leaving him alone, which he didn't mind at all.

Rory hugged him tightly as soon as he opened the door. "Congrats, Matt!"

They soon let go, but Rory pulled him back in and squealed. She was just so happy for him.

"Thank you, Rors. I love you so much, more than you could ever know."

"Matt.." Rory trailed, looking at him. He shook his head.

"I'm so sorry, that was so not the right thing to say."

"No, no. I love you too Matt. I will always love you no matter what happens. It will always be you." She smiled and kissed him, all their memories together just coming back to her all at once, making her happy. He was making her happy.

@OpTic_FormaL: It will always be you.

5:53 pm

a/n: oh HELL ya