Winners Don't Have Bad Days (Watty 2020 Winner, Romance)

24. #AboutButterflies, February 2018

Daya unlocked the door, sending the key a mental order to scrape quieter. Let the bag on the floor by the door with barely a sound. Tip-toed into the kitchen.

A fresh pot of the pale-green liquid was waiting for her on the counter. She grabbed the cup out of the cabinet and lifted the teapot to pour the lifesaving substance. "Oh, Mike, thank you... But you did not have to get up early, this is your day off."

A soft grumbling came from the couch in the living room. The red frizzle of untamed hair crested the cushion, but the TV was off.

She thought that the lack of sleep could be creating an extra stressor, stagnating the weight-loss, but... it sounded too stressful to tell him. Also, she was too beat to care if Mike lost a single ounce of fat ever again. Maybe his karma was to be an oasis in the sea of anxiety.

So, she poured herself a cup and scooted over to ruffle his hair. It was too familiar a gesture, but he must have just had a shower and the mop was an irresistible mess. If he would flinch, she'd apologize and would never do it again.

He did not flinch; he rolled his head back to smile at her. His eyes had a soulful cast to them. 

"What are you up to, Mike?" she asked and glanced down at the laptop screen. A couple of flow charts occupied most of the space. Circles with bows, crossed swords, explosions etc on a sliding ruler. In the far right corner, shuffled to the side, a folder spilled out a few pdfs with undigestible names.

"A new game?" she asked, leaning against the back of the couch. Her hip was sore, and her head pounded.

"The same one. I am just trying to build a different skill rotation for the Undertaker battle. I don't want to drop the difficulty down."

"Uh-huh," Daya said. "The boss would be so effing disappointed if you kill him on hard vs. nightmare."

"Devastated. So far he was handing me my behind in canape-sized pieces. But I figured out how to beat him. My new electricity-focused build should do the trick." He clicked a button, adding points to a thundercloud with a bolt of lightning, then closed the folder. "How was your practice?"

"I have all the doubles as stable as could be, but I've tried a triple T, and the jam hit the fan. Only landed it one in ten, and it was under-rotated, though Joy thinks it would pass. The coach says I'm rushing, but I need a triple, if I want to advance into sectionals in the spring."

"Uh-huh." An uncomfortable silence inserted itself between them. She thought Mike would forgive her for holding out on him about her sneaking out to skate before, but he acted distant since her confession. Purposely distant. Like right now, when she sat next to him, and he shifted a cushion between them. And he didn't want her to know he was browsing his abandoned thesis materials. 

She wished she at least was sure that she had ruined everything, but the expression that flickered behind his glasses before that cushion fell like a barricade... That expression made her just as pointedly dislodge the cushion and put it on her lap. Hey, the tea in her mug was too hot to handle, she needed it...

"Maybe the coach is right?" Mike offered, staring straight ahead.

She sipped the tea. "Maybe. But I had a vivid reminder why I quit. I'm bruised, my head is pounding, and I suck."

"You don't suck!" Mike dipped his head after raising his voice, sighed, then repeated in a normal tone.  "You don't suck."

And he still avoided looking directly at her. Would it kill him to meet her eyes?

"If I keep saying that I do, I'll sound needy." She massaged her temples. "If I say that I don't, I won't get the external validation I want. Sometimes I wish you could come and see me practice. It's foolish, I know. My sister watched me all the time, and I miss it, but you're not my brother. And my brother used to hate my skating, so... okay, I'm not sure where I'm going with it."