The Little Things [Book 1]

Chapter Eight: Bench

It had been a week since that fucking dream. And Thomas still had a hard time trying to forget it. One whole fucking week. He was utterly and thoroughly exhausted at this point. Even his friends and Coach had noticed that something was up. He couldn't sleep at night- not with mister Irish McIrishman popping in every goddamn night to give him new ways for self-torment.

Three hard-ons. He had woken up three times so far with hard-ons all cause by one stupid, fucking dreamland, Mark McGregor. Fucking Mark McGregor. He was beginning to bite his nails from this bullshit.

Rachel swatted his hand away from his mouth during lunch on Tuesday.

"Whatever you're dealing with, it's not worth being this unhygienic," she told him and munched on her sandwich. Thomas just glared at her, surprised at himself for being able to see her through his dark circles. "Seriously, Thomas, what is up with you?"

"Yeah, man, are you nervous about the upcoming match? You know it's just a friendly match, right?" Blake said, sitting down next to Rachel, opposite Thomas. Thomas just shook his head and with a frown, he raised his hand to go on with biting his nails. Rachel rolled her eyes at him but didn't swat his hand away this time.

"Heissmann?" Dean tried to snap his attention. Nothing. Reaching over, Dean set his hand on Thomas's shoulder. Now that caused a reaction. Just not the one they wanted. Thomas shrugged him off and decided to stand up. This wasn't working.

"I'm fine," he said to his friends and left the cafeteria.

Behind his back, his friends shared worried looks, but no one tried to follow him. He wasn't sure where he was going, but he knew he had to get out of there. His feet led him to the volleyball field, where the female volleyball team seemed to have just finished their practice. They were all talking to someone and the closer Thomas went, he realized that they were talking to Mark.

He was holding onto his camera, which was equipped with a different lens, talking to the girls with a big smile. His gray eyes flickered to Thomas for a second and then they returned to the girls. Thomas stopped short up until the girls started to dispense and Mark went to sit on a bench and look at the pictures he had taken.

Mark knew Thomas had been wanting to tell him something for the past week. He had noticed how the other guy had been fidgety and anxious. So when Thomas showed up at the volleyball field he didn't even bat an eye. As cool as ever, he went and sat down, acting as if he had not even seen Thomas show up. He began to go through his camera, all while sucking in the smoke of his cigarette. Thomas came to sit next to him, all while biting the inner side of his lower lip and playing with his thumb. Mark didn't even turn to him.

"Are you gay?"

The question threw him off; completely off. With one dangerously raised eyebrow, slowly he turned to Thomas, waiting for some sort of elaboration. When nothing else came from the nervous guy, Mark took out his cigarette.

"Yes, I am. Is it all?" His voice was crisp and snappy. He braced himself for whatever kind of homophobic thing was going to follow that reveal. But all he was faced with was an even more nervous Thomas.

No. Now he looked as if he was scared. There was clear fear in his features. For a second Mark didn't know what was going on. Why would Thomas be scared of Mark being gay?

Thomas must have realized how he looked because he raised his hands to rub his face. After that he let out a deep breath and squared his shoulder.

"How did you know? I mean, what made you think you were gay?"

Poor guy. At once, Mark realized what was going on. Thomas had to be questioning. He must have been. Something of the same nature had happened at Mark's old school. He had noticed the closeted kids giving him awestruck gazes. He had heard of the rumors of kids coming out to their parents, inspired by him. Thinking back at that, a sudden flash of guilt cursed through him. How did those kids feel now?

"It was small hints," he started saying with a shrug, "I had never felt anything of that nature for a girl, and due to heteronormativity I hadn't considered guys. Don't get me wrong, my parents are huge LGBTQ allies, but they hadn't thought of explaining homosexuality to me when I was young. I started to think about the possibility when my best guy friend kissed me". His tone was now calm and he had even put his camera down.

"Your friend kissed you?" Thomas repeated. Mark laughed at the memory.

"Yeah, it was at a party and some girls offered us a deal. They would take off their shirts if we kissed. My friend was on me before I could even process what was happening," again he shrugged, "I didn't really mind it, though. At the very least, I ended up seeing some pretty okay boobs and I realized I liked guys".

Thomas frowned, without a doubt thinking over something Mark had just told him. He opened his mouth ready to say something, but then decided to keep it to himself. A few seconds later, though, he did speak up.

"And how do you know that you could not... that you could not be attracted to a girl? Have you ever been with a girl?"

Mark had to resist the urge to punch Thomas's teeth in. The guy is just asking. As offensive as the question was, Mark knew that Thomas was not trying to be offensive. Damn, Thomas was practically shaking. For all Mark knew, Thomas could have been raised thinking this way.

"I have," Mark admitted, shaking his head with a smile. "The girl who introduced herself to you at the diner- she and I... we've done more than just kiss. Look, it's a long story, but the short version is, I was not sure about my sexuality and she helped me figure it out. No, I was not attracted to her; no, I have never been attracted to any girl and no, I don't think I'll ever be. But, sexuality is fluid. If in five years from now I wake up and I feel attracted to a girl and I realize I am in fact bisexual, there is nothing wrong with that". Putting his camera and cigarette pack in his backpack, Mark stood up.

"Wait, Mark... I'm not..." Thomas exclaimed and also stood up to grab Mark from his jeans jacket's sleeve.

"Heissmann, relax. I don't really care about your sexuality and the last thing I give a shit about is this school's rumor mill. This conversation- as far as I'm concerned- didn't happen," Mark told him and walked off, not turning around to even as much as glance at Thomas.

Thomas fell back on the bench with a heavy sigh and stayed there all till he heard the faint sound of the bell. He drowned in his thoughts from that moment on up until he heard the Coach's whistle blow at the start of practice.

"Okay boys, so in two days we have our friendly match. Since it's only a friendly, Heissmann, you're out," Coach started forcing Thomas to snap out of it.

"Wait, what? Why?!" Thomas exclaimed. Coach never benched him, not even in friendlies.

"You've been distracted lately. I don't know why, but the additional stress won't do you any favors and we need your A-game this season. This match will just fire you up for nothing. Beck will play as our center forward and that is final," Coach explained and Beck had the audacity to give Thomas a smug look.

Dean shed a concerned glance at his friend but he didn't say anything, mostly because he agreed with Coach. For whatever reason, Thomas seemed off and tiring him with a match that played no part in the season was just bad strategy. Replacing him with Beck, though, was a completely different thing.

While most new players got pretty intimidated by Thomas's skill and stamina, and also terrified by Dean's saving skills, Christian Beck must have seen it as a challenge. For the past week, the idiot had tried to score against Dean endlessly. He still hadn't succeeded on that challenge, but it was just a matter of time. Right now, his annoyingly smug grin proved that he felt as if he had won. How arrogant.

At tryouts Coach had been tempted to cut him, but the bastard really knew how to handle the ball. And he always managed to score, just not against Williamson. Arrogance really wasn't a wanted quality, so from Coach's point of view, Beck really had to work on that before he started thinking about replacing Heissmann.

As practice started to heat up everyone could see, and almost feel, how pissed Thomas was. He didn't need this. He really didn't. After the turmoil of this past week, being benched had to be his tipping point. Playing cleared his mind. And now Coach was preventing him from even doing that.