Almost Human | Jasper Hale

Part 2: Chapter 4

One week later...

"Meg? Meegggg???"

Two weeks later...

"Meg? Meg? MEG!"

The doubled-over pain you feel when getting hit with a soccer ball directly in the gut is something few are unlucky enough to experience. The feeling that comes after is hands hitting the grass as you try to not puke your guts out. Some fail. Meg luckily succeeded in preventing it. The third task is just trying to get yourself to breathe again after having your breath knocked clean out of you.

A chorus of "Ooos" played from the stadium stands. Not that cute 'ooo' like when the teacher pairs you up with your crush but the kind that happens when you witness something so harsh you're glad it wasn't you that it happened to. The people who were running all paused in their places and dropped to the grass on one knee.

Meg felt a hand on her shoulder, lifting her up to her feet again as her arms paused in a clutch around her stomach.

"Hey are you ok? I'll throw it back at them if you want." The normally loud voice of Cierra whispered as her goalie glove raised in a middle finger towards the opposite team, she was careful enough not to get noticed by the referee though.

Meg, still remembering how to breathe, nodded slowly as her eyes reopened and led her back to reality.

The coach appeared in front of the slouching girl and bent down to look into her eyes. "Are you ok? Nauseous? You were completely frozen out there Reid! That's not like you." No reply. The coach shot a glance to Cierra who backed up slowly from Meg and took the soccer ball to resume the game play.

"Hey that was a foul!" Shouted a small girl from the stadium who probably knew very little about the game. Her sneakers were heard against the metal steps of the bleachers until she was right behind the player bench that Meg was now sat at.

"Eleanor. This is the second time this has happened this game. Not everything is a foul." The coach explained to the girl who simply shrugged it off. "Listen, don't go hard on her she's going through a lot."

Meg hated being the center of attention. She hated talking about emotions so she had just been silent since Jasper left. It's not like they left on a bad note, it's just hard having your first love leave you just like that with no prior warning or anything. Especially before you were even allowed to love him. Eleanor leaned over the bench and whispered something to the Coach. Meg only bothered picking up on the words "Boyfriend....left town...." before she stopped listening all together. He wasn't even really her boyfriend.

The coach nodded knowingly before placing a hand on Megs shoulder. "If you're sure you're ok, I want you to go home. I know you care a lot about this sport but you need to care about yourself too."

"No really I'm fine." A sentence that became all too familiar with Meg these past two weeks. If she said it enough she hoped she would believe it herself.

"How's the star player?" The voice of Cam sounded from the direction next to Eleanor. He folded his arms over his chest as he tried to level his own breathing from conditioning with his own soccer team.

Meg sighed and dropped the hands from her face onto her lap. She stared onto the field, studying the players running back and forth. "Can everyone stop asking me that? I'm obviously fine." Her voice had raised more than it did that entire night which caused the people surrounding her to just stand there in dumbfounded silence.

The coach shook her head slightly and was the first to speak up after Meg had lashed out a little. "Cameron, thank you but we're alright here. You should go back to practicing with your team, you play next."