"I Want You"

-Kelley's POV

Something felt weird about practice. No, it wasn't the tedious drills nor the increasing number of offensive players that proved a better game than I was. Yet, maybe it was. Maybe I might be slipping. I've always proven myself when it comes to matches, so why was I thinking too much? Fuck.

Walking down the hallway from the team dinner, I hear a loud yell stopping me dead in my tracks. As I turn around to find the source of the shrill noise I was pummeled to the ground. Blinded by a mess of blonde hair and nearly suffocated to death I shriek "Sonnett get the hell off me!" "You're so slow Kevin!" she chirps, jumping off me to then run across the hallway as if she had another mission to scare the living shit out of someone else. Whatever it was, I decided to join in.

I run across the hallway as the faint noise of chattering from teammates walking towards the entrance of the hall begins to fade to complete silence. Noting that I might be victimized again, I creep up slowly towards the corner and slowly attempt to open the door of Room 142; Sonnett's room.

Entering the room ever so slowly, I scan the perimeter, noticing Emily's sweater thrown on the couch on the other side yet no Emily.

"Emilyyy...."

Before I get the chance to catch her hiding behind the hotel room door she attempts to pounce on me, ultimately failing as she hits the doorknob and falls to the floor, holding her side groaning and laughing. Unable to control myself, I fall on the bed laughing at Sonnett's pained expression.

"That fucking hurt kels", Emily groans.

"Well you decided to jump on me for the second time without thinking "hey, maybe I should close the door before breaking her back.."

"If anything, my back is the one broken right now!", Emily whines.

As much as I had wished I would have filmed her wincing on the floor in pain, I give in and decided to help her up. "How's your back?"

"I'm definitely gonna get a bruise on my side from that dumbass knob", Emily grunts walking across the room towards the fridge to find something to ice her abdomen with.

Emily takes out a frozen bag of vegetables Lindsey said she would cook a week ago, refusing the eat the vegetables they served for lunch. After realizing that she had to cook and there aren't exactly kitchens in the hotel rooms, she decided to suck it up and eat the served vegetables. Realizing that I had been staring at her
lifting her shirt up to press the bag on her side, I inadvertently ask, "Need help?"

"Well I don't think anything else would help my bruise, but a massage would ease the pain," Emily infers, raising an eyebrow towards me.

"Yea, sure", I answer, patting the bed so she could lay there on her front.

I didn't put much thought into what I was saying until it suddenly occurred to me that I'd have to massage the back of a shirtless Emily Sonnett. We had been best friends since we met in Georgia, and playing with each other on the national team only developed our relationship to a level that could only be described as.... not fucking.

The ironic thing about this is that I'm straight. Or so I think I am.

I never had a thing for girls until I had been given the task of introducing Sonnett to the team and getting accustomed to the flow of practices, training and matches. Once Abby, Shannon and Lauren retired I had taken on a role of leadership, showing the new recruits around and mentoring them throughout the stressful events. Emily was different, however. She seemed to have more enthusiasm and vigor on the backline, easing into the position quite quickly. Jill even had her start a couple of matches to get her more comfortable with the starting players, which was clearly not a problem. Every inch of emotion that she felt was passionate. A single foul would have her fuming back to her position thinking of a thousand reasons as to why that was a bullshit call. A single goal would send her charging to the fans in a heap of satisfaction, yelling out in pure euphoria. And from it all, she was attractively smart and humble. She didn't need a mentor, and to be honest, the thought was scary.