Alone [manxman]

fifteen: when your eyes get too big for your heart.

The Beatles, Dont Let Me Down; Pablo's piece.

comment, comment. if you havent re-read ch 12-14, i would reccommend. x

FIFTEEN: WHEN YOUR EYES GET TOO BIG FOR YOUR HEART.

There was this steak in front of me, a chateaubriand ... and a lobster tail slapped over top. It was cute how Jules insisted on ordering for us and that stopped me from telling him that I was really more surf than turf these days.

For some reason, he thought we could eat all this food. He had some bisque, a few sides, I almost immediately dished off half my plate onto his share plate.

He was mindlessly talking about a game he'd seen the night before I think and I wasn't sure what sport it was but he looked so cute.

Did he seem so excited about... basketball? It seemed like basketball.

He was making some motion that looked like a mini free-throw, it had to be basketball. And like the shuffling with his hands could have been dribbling and his lips just looked so soft.

He was stuffing his face, and he looked so carefree.

Calm and happy. Jules didn't use to stuff his face. He was always so worried about soccer and speed and pressures on body image.

He looked so healthy now.

I brought the glass to my lips, still unable to look away from those big green eyes. He was making an explosion motion now, hands brushing imaginary dust off his shoulder.

What the hell was he saying?

I wasn't sure but it was my third glass, I was drunk on him when the waiter made his way back over. Jules was smiling at me so politely now, halting when the server went to fill up his water.

"Thank you."

Glasses of grape juice at the hotel restaurant.

That's how far he'd thought of everything.

The waiter was grabbing a bottle off chill, some more weird non-alcoholic sparking grape juice into our glasses in less than a minute, and Jules was cutting into his steak.

"Dixon was out cause cleats in the calf and Danny ended up rotating to Defender."

We were definitely talking about soccer. He wanted to talk about soccer again, that was surprising.

"What game are we talking about?"

"Uh, the first game of this last season." He nodded. "We played Pepperdine. Coach put me on offense and before that game, I was stuck in defensive because it was my position freshman year." It'd been two years since then, and that was what threw me. And knowing we spent so little of those two years together should've saddened me.

But then we wouldn't have stories like this. If I was there for this, he wouldn't look so excited to tell me right now, sat across from each other in one of the upper restaurants in Chicago.

The waiters were in all-black, ties, and the bar staff were lighting drinks on fire. From the ambiance to the high ceilings, Parisian carved, my eyes were glued to the 30-foot see-through wine cellar in the center of the restaurant.

Jules shrugged.  "I didn't have enough confidence to say I'm good. But Dixon's dehydrated and the ref had a grudge against him so coach put me at midfield." He had so much pride in his eyes now and it was so sexy I almost cried. "I pulled out Blue Nance and scored the first goal in the game and it was a wrap."