All I Never Wanted

Chapter 7

Annie and Brent both had swim practice Sunday afternoon.  Their first meet approached at the end of October and the coach was stepping up the pace.  Annie decided to focus only on diving this season but she still practiced the other events for the exercise.

Once practice was over she hoped to stop in and see how Luke was recovering.  Word was he’d been released that morning into Matt’s care.  Annie didn’t think it would go over well with Brent but she asked him if he’d accompany her to Luke’s dorm.  To her surprise he agreed.

“Sure, I’ll go over with you.  Guys got to be miserable.  I’d feel bad complaining about him while he’s down.”

Annie laughed.  “That’s big of you Brent.”

He shrugged, giving her a goofy grin.  “What can I say?  I’m a big guy.”

Annie shook her head and led the way out of the Field House.  It was a short five minute walk to South Hall and soon they were climbing the stairs to the third floor.  A couple football players greeted Annie as she passed.

“You know these guys?” Brent asked, bewildered.

Annie nodded.  “Football players.  They think I’m a goddess ‘cause I saved Luke’s ass from the bench.” She explained with a grin.

Brent snorted.  “Doesn’t matter now, does it?”

Annie shushed him as they approached Luke’s door.  Kim and Matt both sat at the desk.  Luke sat on his bed, his leg propped up on a pile of pillows.

“Hey guys, how’s it going?” Annie called.

All three looked up.  Luke in particular looked shocked to see Brent in tow.

“Hey Annie.  We’re just trying to console grumpy here.” Matt greeted.

Annie smiled.

“Brent, good to see you!” Luke called, extending his hand.  “I’d get up to shake but. . .”

He trailed off, motioning to the cast.

Brent shook his hand obviously uncomfortable with the gesture.  This was the most he’d interacted with Luke in the month Annie had been his partner.

“No problem.  I hear you took a pretty hard hit.  How’s the leg?”

“Hurts like hell. They sent me home with pain meds-”

“Which he won’t take.” Kim grunted, interrupting Luke.

Luke shot her a dirty look.  “Kim, I thought you had somewhere to go?”

Annie’s eyebrows went up at the tension between the two.  She caught the smirk on Matt’s face.  This must be a common occurrence.

“Come on Kim, I’ll walk you out.” He offered.  “And hey, Brent, while you’re here would you mind helping me unload Dukes’ stuff from my car?  They dumped it all on me when we left the hospital.”

Brent shrugged.  “Yeah, sure.”  He glanced over his shoulder at Annie as he followed Matt from the room.  Annie smiled and waved.

Once they were gone Annie turned back to Luke, pulling out his desk chair and sitting on it backwards.  She rested her chin on the back rest and studied Luke for a moment.

“Is she telling the truth?”

Luke rolled his eyes.  “I hate those pain pills.  They make me feel like crap.”

“So instead you’d rather be a bear and make the rest of us feel like crap?”

This time Luke glared at her.  “I’m injured.  Why are you being mean?”