ʀᴏᴏᴋɪᴇ | ᴋᴏ ✔︎

25

"A ship is always safe when docked but that is not what it is built for."
- EINSTEIN, Albert.

Three weeks later.


| Zurrer |


"Let us in, Logan!" Hope yells through the front door of our Candian teammate's apartment.

"Go away."

"No. You need to let us in, we're worried about you." Pinoe yells as van Egmond and I hang back and let the Americans try to gain access to the respectable apartment.

"Leave me alone."

Deciding I've had enough, I push Hope and Pinoe out of the way, take the spare key that Logan gave me out of my pocket and unlock the door.

"You couldn't have done that about thirty minutes ago?" Hope grumbles as I open the door.

I don't answer as the others follow me into the freakishly quiet, but messy, apartment. It's the complete opposite from the last time I was here. There's dishes piled up on counters, garbage flowing out of the trash and onto the floor. The coffee table littered with empty bottles of beer, scotch and wine. All the drapes pulled closed, blocking out the light.

Not seeing Logan, we all venture further into the apartment, towards the bedroom door which is slightly ajar.

We hear the shower running but it's empty as Logan lies face down on her messy bed.

Clothes cover the floor, there's an empty tequila bottle on the nightstand, next to a smashed photoframe that, from memory, I knew contained a picture of her and Kelley, from happier times.

"Logan?" Pinoe finally speaks up, slightly startling the sober ones in the room. The young Canadian doesn't really answer in any form of a sentence, she just groans.

"You need to get your shit together." Hope starts, "This is getting out of control, Logan."

"Get out." She starts to sit up, letting us finally see her face. She has dark circles under her eyes, she's sickly pale and has clearly lost weight.

"Have you been eating?"

"Dunno." She answers me while she fights to keep her eyes open.

"When was the last time you ate?"

"What day is it?"

"It's Friday." van Egmond replies.

"Then I don't know."

"I can't be here." Hope breathes out as she leaves the room, losing the inner battle to contain her anger at our teammate.

Megan follows the goalkeeper and leaves me with my fellow Canadian, and the Aussie.

"When was the last time you went out for some fresh air?" I ask her as I hear the clanging of glass-on-glass, indicating the beginning of the clean-up in the living room and kitchen.

"Don't know. Just leave me alone, go train or some shit."

I leave with Emily, but only to go to the kitchen and brew a pot of coffee. Most of it for Logan, and while it's brewing I help with the cleaning.

An hour later, the apartment is mostly cleared, minus the laundry and grocery shopping. Logan finally left her bedroom and decided to stop fighting the intervention. For now.

"When did you last speak to Kevin?" Hope asks, and the light-hearted conversation we were having takes a sudden turn for the more tense and serious. She freezes.

"Don't know." She mumbles as she holds her steaming mug, almost hiding behind it.

I already knew the answer. It's been about two weeks, and it's taken its toll on her. It was Logan's fault that shit hit the fan, but it's not only  her fault.

Two Weeks Ago.

| Kevin |

Coming out of school was good, for a while.

When I first started to live with Clarissa and Alan, it was awkward. I was the new kid from the rough side of Seattle who suddenly appeared in the nice neighborhood, and the nice school.

I eventually settled after a few months and a lot of texts from Logan and Kelley, before that ship hit an iceberg.

The bullying and hazing didn't last very long, mostly because everyone found out who my sister is. I've gotten into a nice routine, and after school I always wait on the sidewalk for Clarissa.

Today was different.

"Kevin!" I hear a voice scream from down the street. It's the voice I haven't heard for almost a year. It's a voice I only ever heard when she was drunk and angry, and wanted someone to hit. "Kevin!"

I turn around to find my biological mother storming her way towards me. She looks like I remember, ratty, dirty hair and a crazed look in her eyes. She has the same dirty clothes on that she was wearing when I was taken into care.

When she reaches me she wraps her arms around me, holding me so tight that the air escapes my lungs and refuses to re-enter.

"What are you doing here?" She whispers harshly into my ear.

"This is where I go to school now." I mumble. I break free from her death-like grip and glance around to find Clarissa. She isn't here yet, but my mom's appearance has caught the attention of others around the school building.

"No. You don't belong here!" She begins to yell, gaining even more stares from my peers and their parents.

Great. So much for finally fitting in.

"Kevin?"

I simultaneously internally heave a sigh of relief and grimace at the arrival of Clarissa. She hasn't met my mom before but she's heard plenty of stories from Logan and myself. I wasn't sure what was going to happen, and just wished my sister would magically show up, scoop me up in her arms and carry me away from the most awkward situation in my life.

"Who are you?" My mom spits out as if she already knows. She probably does.

"I'm here for Kevin." Clarissa answers rather vaguely, but calm all the same. "Who are you?"

"I'm his mother!" She screams as she latches on to my arm, making me hiss in pain.

As they begin to argue, it's clear to me that they are polar opposites. My biological mother wants to fight, scream as loud as possible, and cause a scene because she simply doesn't care about anyone or anything other than herself. Whereas Clarissa is trying to calm my mom down, she's doing her best to diffuse the sitation.

"How did you find him? I was led to believe you wouldn't be informed of his whereabouts." Clarissa questions my mom. She doesn't answer, not immediately. She does wear a sickening smirk, though.

"Logan told me."

"Logan?" I interrupt, taking a step closer to Clarissa. "Logan wouldn't do that, she hates you!"

"Oh. No. No, no, no. My poor, sweet Kevin. She doesn't hate me. See, we've been bonding lately. Now that she doesn't have the time to waste on that ridiculous soccer dream she had."

"She loves soccer, she hasn't given anything up! She wouldn't!" I yell, ignoring the glances of the last few stragglers from school, only focusing on the unsettling feeling in the pit of my stomach.

"Lets just say she's come round to my way of thinking."