Breath of the Wild College AU fanfic │Thinking About You

Malice

The volleyball net is entwined with our legs and hands, making it difficult to move, let alone stand up. We're trapped.

"Get off!" I demand again knowing that he's already trying.

Link's strategy is much calmer than mine; instead of wiggling around like a fish in a fishing net, he's actually trying to open the knots holding us together. My hands try to separate our bodies and he stops to look at me. My stomach is fluttering and my heart falls heavily. I don't know if I'm breathless from his charming eyes plunging into mine, or from the weight of his body crushing my lungs. All I know is that I stop fighting when he looks at me in the most loving way. It calms me.

"Link," I breathe and draw his eyes to my lips. He quickly looks back up at my eyes and moves his hands.

With a wide stare of embarrassment and panic I look away and try to roll over but I just end up on top of him, more tangled up than before. His hands push my hips away from him and his calm expression changes to a mien of surprise and uncertainty.

"I'm sorry!" I cry, scared of hurting him with my weight. How did I get myself in this situation?

"Alright, class is starting," I hear the coach say and the students quiet down. "We're playing volleyball again. Let's set up the net and grab the scoreboard and some balls from the back."

    "Oh no!" We both exchange looks of dread. "Let me just..." I try to move my hand away from his chest to possibly get my foot out of the knot it's stuck in but I can't unfold my arms to reach down.

    "Sorry!" I say again, trying to hold my body up. His hands against my hips give me some support, but we're both extremely uncomfortable with it. Feeling his hands shifting from my hips to my waist and back down makes my skin tingle. I want to move my legs to the sides of his, but the coach and some of the students arrive at the equipment room and stare at us for a long second.

"What's going on in here?" The coach asks with an amused ring to his voice. I'm too ashamed to even look at them.

"What the..." I hear a girl gasp, followed by the sound of a camera shutter. Are they taking pictures? I throw an angry glower in their direction and their grin goes out like a candle in the wind.

"Holy shit," one of the girls says in disbelief. She has short, black hair with a pink strand. "You're from the Hyrulian family, aren't you?" With a rude gape, she shoots another photo of me lying on top of Link.

"Put your phones away," the coach tells his students and laughs a little. "Malice and Bellum, give them a hand, will you?"

Is the coach enjoying my humiliation? This is in no way funny! I'm lying on top of a boy, I'm mortified! So much for a good first impression. The girl with the pink strand and another guy untangle the net and free us from our agony. As Link and I separate at long last, Malice leans in to whisper in my ear.

"You're brave," she says with a nasty hint at sarcasm. "If I pulled that stunt just to get close to Link I'd be scared that people will think I'm a crazy stalker."

Is that supposed to be a warning or something? I can feel her threatening smirking at my ear and my mood just worsens.

"I didn't do that on purpose and certainly not to get close to him! I'd like to stay as far away from him as possible!"

I swiftly look at Link and find that he is watching the two of us from the court. I hope he didn't hear that. Hopefully I can avoid looking at him for the rest of the day. Malice walks to the volleyball court and with a satisfied sneer chooses the side on which Link is standing. However, he switches to the other side. My side. I don't blame him for not wanting to be on her team, but I'd rather not have him be on mine either.

"Your team gets the first serve," the coach hands Link the ball and I tense up. I don't even know how volleyball works!

"Excuse me," I say quietly and collect many looks from the students and coach. "I... I don't know the rules," I stutter.

"Oh," the coach rubs the stubbles on his chin, "I guess you weren't here when we went over the rules on Monday. You can help me with the score then and just watch the first set."

Yess, I think to myself, now I don't have to play sports. Gladly, I stand next to the scoreboard and watch Link toss the ball in the air to then run, jump, and hit it over. How can one move like that? He has so much control over his body; he doesn't make any unnecessary movements and when he hits the ball, it's as if he knows exactly what he's doing. It's like the ball just goes where he wants it to go.

I don't recall volleyball being on Impa's list of sports that Link is famous for. Is this just another one of his talents? Is there anything he isn't good at? I smirk... Communication.

As the two teams compete for points, the coach tries to explain the rules to me but even after the first set ends, with Link's side winning by a landslide, I still don't see the point of this whole sport. Or any sport if I'm honest.

"Feel ready to jump in?" the coach asks me and I tell him that I need one more set to understand it fully. I'll say anything to prevent my participation and the coach is clearly fine with it.

This time the other team is serving first and I see the mean girl glance at me with a mischievous grin before she hits the ball straight in my direction! My eyes are attached to the flying ball shooting at me like a bullet out of a gun! I can't move, my legs just won't move and I don't even have the time to cover my face or dodge the attack. Before the ball can hit me it's blocked by Link appearing in front of me. Where did he come from? He was standing at the other side of the court just a second ago!

He parries the ball with his forearms and sends it high up into the air and straight to the setter. His team gets the point and only when the coach begins to speak can I take my eyes off of Link's tense back.

"Wow, Link," the coach says to the boy shielding my body, "you'd make a great libero!"

Link doesn't even look at the coach nor does he give a vocal response, he just turns around to look at my disconcerted face.

"You okay?" He says caringly in a low volume and gains a lot of different looks from the class. Some students are still ruffled from his impressive save, others look more surprised by his use of voice, and the girls look particularly defeated.

"So sorry," Malice exclaims before I can reply to Link's thoughtful question. I know she isn't sorry but I tell her it's fine.

When I'm forced to join the game, Malice continues to strike the ball at me. Part of me wishes that her serve had just hit me in the face, maybe then she'd be pleased and leave me alone. I would like to yell and ask her what the hell her problem is, but I'm not going to give her that satisfaction. Not in front of the coach.

After forty minutes of dodging and covering my face they finally start to take down the net. I stay far away from that thing and want to go ask the coach if he has a syllabus for me because I'd like to know what the requirements are to get an A in this class. But a few feet away from him I stop walking and decide to ask him next week instead. I really just want to get changed, go home, and take a hot shower. I have a lot of classes to catch up in and I'd rather not smell like sweat all day.

I'm lucky that PE is my last class of the day, otherwise I'd have to shower at school. How do people even have time for that in between classes? I head to the locker room and hurry up before those girls can catch up.

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