rivals in the sheets

chapter nine

"Hey, Ethan. I noticed your friend transferred to this school and I find it great that you guys are getting along better," said Ava with a smirk as she sat down next to him.

Ethan was sitting on the bleachers trying to eat his lunch in the silence that the football field offered when it was empty.

Ava, of course, couldn't respect that. On the contrary, she did everything in her power to not respect it.

Ethan looked her up and down in a dramatically manner and then looked away."Who said we were getting along at all?"

"Well, I remember the time when you guys were each other's favorite person in the whole world," she muttered in an exaggerate show of empathy but gave it away by having a huge smile on her face. "What happened to those two kids?"

Ethan groaned and let out a chuckle. "You really don't have any basic decency, do you?"

"Why would you say that? I came here to talk to you because you were all alone."

"It's true that you came here because I'm all alone, but you came here to annoy me, not to make small talk. And did you even think about why I'd be all alone?"

Ava hummed and as hard as Ethan tried to ignore it, he couldn't unsee the satisfied expression in her eyes. "Maybe because Lucas is stealing your friends?"

"Yeah, he has a habit of stealing things valuable to me, doesn't he?" Ethan said making sure that the grain of salt be heard.

"Aw, are you saying I'm valuable to you?"

Ethan chuckled. "I never said I was talking about you, did I?"

With that, he sort of gained the advantage that he had lost just by her coming to talk to him.

She would try to do everything to make him feel even worse about the situation and then when he was at his worst, she would come in and get back together with him.

But then again, he wasn't the perfect boyfriend to her either.

They were pretty toxic even at the beginning of their relationship and people around them saw it as well.

Joshua had warned Ethan about it well in advance, even before he got together with Ava. He made sure that Ethan knew that the two would be toxic to each other even if they tried not to be.

And even back then, Ethan knew that Joshua was right but he was too infatuated with Ava to see that Joshua only wanted the best for him.

But the good thing was that they weren't together anymore. They could go their separate ways again and never come back together.

Even though there was the thought in the back of his head that maybe being with Ava would just be easier, would just make sense.

"I remember when we were together and you seemed so happy every time you saw me. Even though you thought I didn't see you, I knew that you were looking at me every chance you got."

It was true and there really was no point in denying it, even though the thought was tempting.

"Water under the bridge, though. And you should let it go as well, Ava."

There was an expression on her face that resembled a shock one and Ethan couldn't help but feel satisfied for getting the upper hand. Even more than he did before.

"Right," she muttered and her eyes quickly moved away from Ethan's. "So, have you thought about how you're going to stop Lucas from becoming captain?"

"What do you mean?" asked Ethan even though he knew very well what she was saying.

"He's clearly better than you and he seems way more motivated than you. It would make sense he would be the captain, wouldn't it?"

Ethan glared at her angrily. She had everything figured out and she wasn't afraid to use her knowledge against him.

She had no remorse for things like these and that made her a lot more dangerous than Hamilton could ever be.

He knew Ethan when they were kids and the things he could use against him weren't as extreme as the ones Ava could.

And she knew many, that was for sure.

"I'm not scared of losing my position, Ava. If you watched the game more carefully maybe you'd know how good I really am."

"Or maybe your skills are only obvious to you and not the people who watch you play."

She just had a way of always turning the argument around to have the upper hand. No matter how hard he tried she had a way of doing that and he hated her so much for it.

"Maybe you should come to that come and see just how good I really am at the next match," he said with a confident smile on his face that was entirely faked. "Hope you enjoy looking at an empty field now."

With that he stood up and threw the empty food packages into the bin and walked off.

He walked back inside the school and dashed straight to his locker to pick up the rest of his books needed for the afternoon.

He turned to the side as he closed his locker and saw the one who started it all.

The one who couldn't help but always start trouble, whether it be on the football field or keep Ethan from being able to have a stable relationship.

"Emmerson," muttered Lucas and lowered his eyes in a strange form of greeting.

Ethan looked back and muttered, "Hamilton." with the same enthusiasm as Lucas just before.

Then, they turned around and walked away from each other without saying anything else.

Even a simple greeting without trying to beat each other up was better than usual and Ethan could settle for that.

If only he could be sure that Lucas couldn't have an ace up his sleeve that would take Ethan down.

—————

A/N: I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter and if you did please don't forget to share your thoughts! Hearing what you think of the story is so far is really entertaining and even though I don't reply to comments I read them all, no matter how long or short they are.

Thanks for reading and I'll see you in the next chapter <3