Game Theory × NH

008 | oxygen

× Mercury

"I don't know what to do," was probably something I've never said in my entire life. I was always one step ahead of everything; my whole day planned out from when my feet first touch the floor until my head rests on my pillow for the night. The kitty calendar hanging on my wall was filled up with soccer practice times and the days I had games, when I had appointments, and which test I had to study for. It was just who I was.

So maybe that was why my friends all looked up at me confused when I spoke my mind. It had been the one nagging thought that never seemed to go away, always looming in the darkest corner of my head.

Macey's big, vibrant blue eyes found mine. She was sitting on my bed in front of me, her long, tan legs crossed as she leaned forward on her elbows. "About your English assignment? Just do what I do and bullshit everything."

"I don't think that's what she means," Jamie offered from the floor. My smallest friend put her textbook down on the ground and leaned against the wall. "You're talking about London, right?"

"I've been to London before," Emily said from the computer chair. She was tracing the tattoos on her arm with a pencil as she blew a bubble with her gum. "It's not so fantastic."

Grabbing my soda from my nightstand, I took a sip. "The school seems pretty good. There was a lot of positive feedback. And the campus is pretty. But California is my home and I can't just get up and leave you guys."

"Why the hell not?" Macey asked. "I mean, I love you guys to death, but fuck, I would leave you in a heartbeat if it meant I could go professionally."

Macey's mom was Elizabeth McGrath, one of the most famous woman's soccer players in the world. More often than not, I wondered if she only became interested in the sport because of her mother, or if she had a choice in the matter. Either way, Macey had a lot of pressure on her shoulders following in the footsteps of her mom, so I wasn't the least bit surprised she would go to London without hesitation. Anything to make her mom proud, I was sure.

But I didn't have a mom who could do fifty five different trick shots with a soccer ball.

"Did you talk to Coach Sharp about it?" Emily asked.

"No... well, kind of," I admitted. I pulled the soda tab off the tin can and flipped it over in my fingers, as if it were a coin and I didn't know which side it was supposed to land on. "She seemed really, well, bummed out."

Macey laughed, but it wasn't a humors sound. "No shit," she said, looking at me though her long lashes. "She's losing one of her best players because she couldn't offer you a better deal. Except you're not just a player to her... you're like family. And losing family can suck ass."

Family. I know that word is thrown around loosely and everyone has different definitions of the term, but for me... family was everything. It had to be otherwise I didn't think I could move on. As Macey nicely put it, losing family really does suck ass, and after losing my parents, family meant even more to me than it did before.

Coach Sharp had been part of the family for as long as I could remember. I've only known her for seven years, but I was informed that my parents and Coach went to college together, the three of them inseparable during their youth and beyond. So was she my family? Yes. I wouldn't classify her as anything else.

So now the question was, could I leave my family? My whole family?

"Am I cut out for this? Playing with the boys?" I asked, tilting my head back against the headboard and looked up at the ceiling.