It's always you ~ stony University

chapter 5

Tony
My head still riddled with sleep I dragged myself out of bed. Yesterday I got up early for breakfast but today I had just missed it. Steve's bed was empty, so he must have had an early class. I settled back down on my bed, rubbing my head and trying desperately to wake up. The door slowly opened and was carefully closed behind the figure. Steve placed a packaged croissant (quackson) on my bedside table next to my phone. I smiled gratefully at him. The room stayed silent for ages. It was so peaceful and I almost forgot that Steve was there. "You sleep okay? You missed your alarm." I groaned. Mostly out of annoyance about missing my alarm and waking Steve, but also out of anger that I'd stayed up that late. I should have rested. Or at least tried to. It normally took me a few hours to sleep so I tried to turn off everything early. My cunning plan wasn't working. My brain still whirred late into the night, never stopping, never shutting off. We talked a little more, then headed to classes. Steve dragged me down the stairs. Again. What was with him? Why did he have an obsession with the stairs? God. I smiled as he waved goodbye over his broad shoulder. I threw up a peace sign back, the action was one I hadn't done in ages. It felt good.
The days that followed were of similar fashion. We talked a lot, about the random things. I met up with Bruce, we planned experiments, shared science memories and had a general laugh.
But this Tuesday was different. Steve was restless all night, twisting and turning and getting up. I pretended to be asleep every time he got up, but it was annoying how I hadn't been able to watch anything. In the morning he was tense, he didn't talk to me at all, not even to say good morning. I knew I had to talk to him. He was stressed. "Steve? You okay there?" He didn't even turn to me, he just mumbled in return.  He shouldn't have any big exams coming up to stress about. Maybe life was just stressful at the moment. "Steve you wanna have a coffee and talk about it after my class today?" I had a 4 hour long lecture about physics. I wasn't particularly looking forward to it. "No no no." I shrugged, turning away, his answer was quite rude. But I guess he just didn't feel comfortable talking to me. I was about to leave the room, I needed something stronger than dining hall coffee to stay awake during my long lecture. Looking around I grabbed up a big hoodie, the letters ACDC on it. Shouldering my backpack I left the dorm and headed towards the lift. "Nope." I turned round, glaring at Steve, "I do what I want." I held my middle finger up and stepped backwards into the lift. "Boom." Grimacing he grabbed the door before it closed and followed me inside. "What you got against lifts?" He shrugged, tugging at the straps of his backpack, pulling his hands through his hair. "I have tryouts today." His voice was quiet. "Oh." The lift pinged and the doors slowly opened. I stepped out, about to leave the dorms building, when Steve called out. "Come with me for it Tony. It would be better with you there." I froze. I hated football. So much. Besides I already had plans with Bruce. "Yes." I blurted out. I don't know why. "I'm in room 24 till 12:30." He let out a sigh behind me. "Okay, I'll come pick you up." "Yep. See you there." I hurried away to my class. Without my coffee. Great.
~time skip~
"Sorry Bruce, I can't make it tonight. I'm going to football tryouts." My hood was up and I had an earphone in one ear, not really bothering to pay attention to anything. My page was full of notes, scrawls really. I got bored after a while. "Football. Really Tony. You hate football." I groaned. "I know but Steve asked me to go and I couldn't say no. I need him as a friend." He raised his eyebrows but went back to his notes. He looked worse than me. Loose sweatpants and a long sleeved black t-shirt. At least I looked sort of awake. My hoodie covered most of my outfit, but my black converse and black jeans were still visible.
"Class dismissed." There was a rush to pack up, the occasional sleeping person woken up, and the clatter of feet on the stairs. I mixed in with the rest of the people, like usual. Invisible. Like usual. I crashed into Steve as I left the door, he was nervously looking around. "Heya." "How was your lecture?" I looked up at him. "Really. It was fine." We walked to the courts chatting about our days, when at the stands we bumped into a group of people. Steve seemed to know them. "Tony I have to go, just stay here, get some food, I'll be out on the fields soon." I didn't know why he just left like that, but I guess I'll just have stay here. I smiled politely at some of Steve's friends, and took a seat. The stands weren't full, just dotted with people rooting for their friends. Steve came out onto the field with the others, in gear that was, rather tight fitting. I was tempted to plug my headphones in, and after a lot of debate I finally decided to when Steve was called. He turned smiling our way, probably grinning and flirting with his new friends, but I could of sworn he was looking at me.

They got a bit boring after that. Not much happened, it only went on for ages. Steve finished and the group headed down from the bleachers to meet them again. No one really noticed me, and I bit my lip, trying not to let anyone see my hurt of Steve ignoring me. I turned on my heel and slowly started making my way back to my dorm, plugging my earphones in as I walked. "Tony!" I kept on walking. No one knew my name. No one cares enough to know my name. "Tony! Where are you going?" I felt a strong pull on my shoulder and panting as Steve caught up with me. "Tony where are you off to?" "Rooms." He sighed. "You didn't enjoy it did you." I turned to him shocked. " No no, it's not that. You did great. It was amazing, you'll make the team for sure." He raised his eyebrows, "It's not that? Then what is it?" I pulled my body away from him, growling "It's none of your business that's what it is." He took a step back, freezing. "Sorry I didn't mean to I was just trying to help." I took a deep breath. "It's okay." I turned around, placing a smile on my face again. "Look if you just wait outside the changing rooms, I'll be really quick and then we can go back to the dorms and I dunno, watch a movie or something."
"Be with your friends."
"Tony, I'm trying to hang out with you. You're my friend. Please stop shutting me out." I held back a scoff. If only he knew. "Alright. Deal." He grabbed my hand shaking it. With a quick laugh he headed off calling out behind him, "See you in 10 loser." I laughed my face lighting up with a genuine smile and turned back around, finishing my walk to the room.

Again sorry I'm not updating, I'm trying I just get distracted. Thanks for being patient, and putting up with my crappy writing. And thanks for voting and reading it means the world. Have a good day y'all.
Ali
Edit: so basically I published the order wrong, so I had to fix that by unpublishing some of the chapters then republishing them. Idk what happened. Sorry about that. Expect a new chapter soon, if you haven't already given up on this book.
Sorry again,
Ali