Drowning

Fútbol Fiends

Now Finley sucked at soccer, but the bloody nose was 100% not her fault.

It was in no way her fault that she was in a gym class with a whole lot of Cobra Kais and Miyagi-Dos and that today it had finally happened— the karate war had inevitably spilled over into a full contact game of soccer. They all were pretending that fútbol was the same thing as football. Granted they were disguising all of their violence as soccer moves, so the gym teacher didn't stand a chance. She was blowing her whistle and yelling at them to tone it down, but it wasn't helping.

Finley had done her best to stay out of their stupid rivalry, as she always did, but of course Cobra Kai didn't care that she wasn't technically Miyagi-Do. That, combined with the fact that Doug still had a little bit of a grudge match with her, meant that she was going to get injured. She had only been playing for all of 10 minutes when Doug drilled the soccer ball straight into her face.

Finley's hands flew up to her nose as pain lit up her face, most intensely by her nose and her right cheek which had taken the brunt of the impact. The shock of the hit made her hands shake slightly and tears formed in her eyes.

Demetri ran over to her and gently placed a hand on her shoulder, his voice filled with concern. "Finley are you okay?"

"Yeah." The pain was evident in her voice. "I'm fine."

"Okay, just take deep breaths through your mouth. Your body's probably in shock so you gotta focus on breathing." After a few moments of Finley trying to deepen her breaths, he spoke again. "Move your hands, let me see."

Finley squeezed her eyes shut, willing the tears to stop. She refused to admit she was crying, it was just the body's natural response to this level of pain. Slowly she let her hands move away from her face, and a curse slipped out under Demetri's breath when he saw her face. There was a lot of blood coming from her nose, and the bruising was already starting to show on her cheek.

"Keep your head tilted back." He guided her over towards the bleachers where the gym teacher had jogged over to to check on her. "Heads up, Mrs. Benadretti is up ahead."

"Do you need to go the nurse?" She asked, her voice filled with concern for the victim of this brutal soccer game.

Finley shook her head slightly. "No, I'm good."

"Are you sure?"

"Yup, I'm fine."

Mrs. Benadretti looked at her skeptically for a moment before realizing she couldn't leave the soccer game unattended this long, and she nodded her head. "Alright. Use this to help stop the bleeding. And please, go to the nurse if you need to."

Demetri took the old gym shirt from her, not questioning where it had come from, and folded it slightly before handing it to Finley. She took it from him, gently pressing it against her nose. He remained there for a moment, staring at her.

"Ya know, this is the first time I've ever seen you cry." Finley peeked around the shirt at him to see a smile tugging at his lips, and a small laugh escaped her. The smile on his face widened. "Should I take that as a sign that you'll live?"

Finley closed her eyes, her head tilted up to the sky to try and help slow the bleeding. "Yeah, I'm fine. You can go back into the kill zone."

Demetri was tempted to stay a little longer, just to make sure she was okay, but he caught Hawk's eye as the boy looked over at them. He gave Finley one last pat on the back before jogging back out onto the field. He fell in step beside Hawk, his anger at the Cobra Kais being directed specifically at Hawk as he decided what he was going to say.

"You know I wasn't making it up at Moon's party. She really did love you."

Hawk's head snapped over to look at Demetri, his brow was furrowed in confusion, but he tried to mask it with annoyance. "What'd you say?"