How to Sleep Together ✓

01| The Fucking Feelings

W I L D E

Some people had to look for God. Others, found it. I was born into a family that was religious. As a younger child, I thought it was normal to sit down with your family for meals, bow your head in prayer and go to church every Sunday. I liked it. I liked praying. There was always this peace I felt knowing that there was someone out there listening to me. 

I followed the ten commandments faithfully, I wrote down notes from the pastor in my book and everything. 

Then Daisy came along. 

She seemed to challenge everything I knew and followed. Her smile, her eyes, her perfect lips, her perfect everything. It was like the devil himself came to challenge me by putting her in my life. If I was David, Daisy would be Bathsheba. She was so beautiful, so smart, so amazing that everything I did, saw and all my thoughts were about her. 

"Wilde, what are you doing?" Joey asked clearly aggravated. 

Kaden turned to glance at me. We were supposed to be working on our defence which wasn't going very well. "He's right, you're off your game," Kaden said, "Need a break?"

"I'm just tired." It wasn't new for someone on the loosing side to get frustrated, but when the captain himself asked, it definitely turned heads. Troy and Edward glanced at me worried. I smiled back at them. It felt as though I was trying to move rocks with that smile, it was all I could do to smile, much less push my shoulders back. 

I moved towards the stands where a long wooden bench rested. On that bench, bags were kept haphazard. It wasn't hard locating my bag, a bright green in a sea of black, blue and dark red. Near the green bag, a bottle of water sat with my name written on it. 

My departure must have called an unofficial break. Today was one of those days our coach wasn't around leaving Kaden to take charge. It was far less hectic and more relaxed which was possibly why, I wasn't doing squats or push ups at the moment. 

I knew I was down, the mere effort it took to breath was exhausting. It was all I could do, to even come for practice. I knew it would be hard. But knowledge of the difficulty didn't mean that I knew it would make the simple act of breathing exhausting. It didn't make the need to go back to see her, run back, beg her to forgive me, less physically painful.

I knew I was down. Just, not down enough for Kaden to saunter over, eyes flickering with concern as he took me in standing drinking water. "Hey," He said, plastic water bottle in hand. Everything alright?"

"I've had better days." I tipped my head back, enjoying the feel of cool water down my throat. The weather wasn't all that warm, being near winter but relief flooded at the cool aphrodisiac. I closed my eyes trying to push aside a familiar face from my mind.  

Kaden waited for me patiently as I put the bottle back on the bench, still standing. Kaden was slightly shorter than me, but more often than not, it felt like he was taller. He had such a powerful aura around him, it's always apparent who was in charge. 

Other previous football captains weren't as fond of Kaden because he was a threat to their position. On games we went away, captains of the opposing team made a beeline to Kaden because he looked like one of the people who would be in charge. It never really sat well with our past captains but I preferred Kaden as a captain over them. 

"I know. Whenever I feel like that, I just focus on the field, the ball, the feeling. Nothing comes close and it's enough for me to well, shove the world aside." Kaden turned to look at the field. A tiny smile on his lips.