old friends • tom holland

twenty four

The pages on my book were starting to fray. Hazel and Augustus would only be able to fall in love so many more times before this book fell apart, and that timing would probably correspond with when I lost my patience with the world. The life of a professional athlete tends to contain a lot of activity, and this injury was drastically changing my lifestyle-- and not in a way that I enjoyed. I was probably on my fourth read through the book when I threw it onto the coffee table. The clock read 3pm, and it was really time for me to get ready for the day.

I hobbled over to my room, slightly faster than the day before. I was getting more used to the crutches, and the physical therapy that I went to this morning had helped. Unfortunately, my knee was almost as sore now as immediately after the surgery due to the exercise it had received. I stood in front of my dresser, surveying the options. Tom was picking me up in half and hour, and although I knew that he would accept my ratty pajamas, I didn't want to risk being seen in public with them on. On the other hand, most normal pants were still out of the question with the condition of my swollen leg. One pair of joggers that I owned were mildly nicer than normal sweatpants, and they fit decently, so they earned a starting position in my outfit along with a long sleeve T-shirt and sweatshirt. Man, my lack of exposure to football was causing me to relate even my clothing to games. Hopefully today would be a reasonable distraction.

By the time that I had managed to struggle into my clothes, I only had a few minutes before Tom was expected to get to my flat. I made my way into the kitchen, sitting by Lucy on a barstool.

"Hey, look who decided to put real clothes on!" She cheered for me.

I rolled my eyes, giving her a fake glare. "Hey, my sense of style while I'm hurt has been better than yours all year, so I would watch your mouth."

Lucy had a reputation for only dressing up when it was absolutely required of her, and she only shook her head with a smile at my statement. Just as I was about to ask about how practice went, my phone buzzed.

Message from Tom Holland: Hey, I'm parked by the entrance to your building. Take your time though, I don't want you tripping on the way down. I don't have insurance for that

I smiled, typing a quick response out. Lucy handed me my crutches, which had been perched next to her on the counter. She gave me a knowing smirk. "Off for your date?"

"You know perfectly well that's not what this is," I fired back, "we're just friends."

"Mhmm," Lucy mumbled into her chocolate milk, "that's what they all say." She has been bothering me nonstop about my relationship with him over the past few days, and it took everything in me to convincer her that there was nothing going on. Clearly I had been more unsuccessful than I hoped.

"I'll see you later dude."

The journey down to the lobby of the building took a reasonable amount of time, all circumstances accounted for. I spotted a car flashing their lights at me, and I moves in its direction. When I was within a few steps, Tom got out of the drivers side and opened my door for me, grabbing the crutches out of my hand and storing them in the back seat. After ensuring that I was seated comfortably, he went back to his side and pulled away from the curb.

I looked over at him as he focused on the road. "How was filming today?"

He clenched his jaw quickly, causing his muscles to flex. "Well, it could have been better honestly. I was just distracted and kept forgetting my lines, but we got a few scenes done so it wasn't all bad."

"I'm sorry," I responded, "I'm sure that it will be better tomorrow."

"Yeah, probably. Anyway, do you want to grab a smoothie? Just to bring it back to where it started."