Preath: Head In The Game [Complete]

7: You Have SUCH A Big 18-Yard Box

"Now that we have our lungs back," I began, "wanna race back to the hotel?"

Christen brought a finger to her chin as if to indicate thinking and then simply took off.

"Hey!" I said. "That's not fair!"

"Life's not fair!" she shouted with her head to the sky. I chased her down the deserted parking lot and over flower beds, up the ramp and into the front doors. Now I, however, had the keys, and, once the door was open, a head start towards the stairs. I leapt up them by twos but she pulled my shirt back.

"Hey, foul!" I said.

"Play to the whistle!"

So I whistled and she just cackled. Perhaps she really was a witch.

We raced to our door at the end of the hall and she was just a second ahead of me. She stood in front of the door and did a little victory dance.

"Do you want to get in the door?" I asked. She ignored me so I used my hand to move her waist out of the way. The key was giving me a bit of grief. "That would've totally been a red card, by the way."

"What, for a little shirt pulling?"

"No, for disrespecting the ref."

"Maybe she deserved it." She leaned down to get a better look at me trying to open the door. "Need help?"

"No thanks, I'll get it." I tried a couple more times to no avail.

"Here," she said, pawing at the key. "Let me try."

"Wha-" I said as she took it. "I was getting there."

She turned it a couple of times but it didn't work. "Crap."

"See, you can't get it either."

"Know what?" She left the key in the door and started tickling me under the ribs. "I didn't ask to be insulted."

I wanted to tell her she insulted me first but I could barely breathe. She didn't stop until there was a creak coming from behind us. Carli, one of the veteran players, stood looking slightly muzzy and visibly irked in her doorway.

"You woke me up," she muttered.

"We couldn't have been that loud," Christen said.

"Yeah," I added, "we just got in here."

"I know. I heard you through the window and my room's right next to the stairwell."

"Oh," Christen looked down at her feet. "Sorry."

Carli sighed. "Okay, maybe I was already up, but I was trying to go back to sleep and I heard you. Do you know what time it is?"

We shook our heads.

"Quarter after twelve."

"Damn," I said.

"Anyway," Carli continued, "can you get in your room?"

"We had some difficulty."

Carli shambled up to us, took the keys and opened the door with ease.

"Thanks," I said.

"No problem. G'night." Then she shut her door without so much as a nod.

Christen was giggling once we got in.

"Wow," I said. "You just got scolded by Captain America and you're laughing."

"It's the best thing I can do, really."

We changed into our sleep clothes (well, I wore shorts and a shirt, she changed into full-fledged pajamas) and turned out the lights. She insisted we keep the blinds open for light in the morning. The moonshine through the window made her sleeping silhouette distinguishable, stomach rising and falling like a slow-moving skipping rope as she slept. So what if I liked her? It'd be much easier to just accept it than to let it torment me any more than it has to.