Love , So Bittersweet

Open Minds

8 months prior

    A whistle blew following it a rugby ball traveling through the air . Within moments Eric held the ball running up to field preparing to take or break a tackle . With the drop of his shoulder the boy on the other team flew to his back Eric continuing on .

  Eric was a 8th man , a team captain if he hadn't preformed well he wouldn't be that captain . His right hand lower the ball to a 45° angle from his body , his posture straighting out . BOOM the ball flew into the air high , but not to far . A back on his team caught it and proceeded to score a try .

The team continued on to win the game 35-3 . The boys stayed and celebrated for maybe 30 minutes before scattering to their homes . Eric no , he stayed sitting in the bleachers his mud covered uniform still on . He sat quietly his earbuds in staring at the night sky as the night chill bit him . The air soon became steam as he exhaled .

Eric stood up and began to walk home with his player of the game ball , he has 5 balls out of 6 games . The walk was long possibly an hour walk , at 9:30 at night . The boy travelled slowly he replaced the white uniform with a hoodie , a USA rugby hoodie . The walk was blistering as the cold bit at his legs , only being distracted by the music he had playing in one ear.

  Eric felt his heart sink when he rounded a corner to see a girl , who he hadn't noticed went to school with him , getting hit by a man much larger than her . The sound of a slide loading a bullet is unmatchable . A singular moment went by , but I felt like it lasted years .

The man let our a hysterical wheeze as blunt force could be felt in his ribs , within seconds Eric had tackled him and was now fighting . The girl stood up and ran , with that Eric let loose . The fists came down on the man like a hammer . When Eric looked up the man had a red and purple face with swollen knots .

Eric stood up and began to run a pain in his shoulder getting worse and worse as he ran . His shoulder felt off , out of place . He ran : ran for a long time eventually noticing his shoulder limp . He noticed his collar bone protruding from him skin sending him into shock .

Present time

  Eric snapped out of the flashback looking into the eyes of the small female across the table . Lin was a couple months younger than Eric , though she was also 16 . Eric gave her a smile before returning to his food . The food wasn't bad , fairly good actually . Eric taught himself how to cook , him mostly taking care of himself .

  Lin was the first to speak , " Eric , babe . Don't you have a game sometime today ?" Eric looked at the clock and nodded ," yeah , in a few hours . The tournie starts at 2 ." Eric stood up and looked at her offering to throw away her trash . Eric stretched his body looking at the girl with a smile . He offer his hand to help her up , once lifted they kissed ever so softly .