Forever & Always

Chapter 20

"We don't have time to celebrate!" Liam yelled to her as Shane was quickly running towards her. 

"Son of a bitch," she yelled, ditching the ball quickly, which I jumped and intercepted. 

"Oh thank the lord that worked," I muttered and looked to see if Shane was open. Sara was trying to block, but seeing as he was taller than her, she gave up doing it fairly and jumped on his back. 

"Hey, that's illegal!" Shane said, laughing like crazy as Sara waved her arms in his face. 

"Well, I don't see any cops!" she yelled back, both of them getting red in the face from laughing, until Sara eventually fell.

Shane helped her up and turned to me, just as I threw the ball his way. He caught it and turned around, looking to the goal where Lacey had retreated to. 

Liam, however, got to him first before Shane could take a shot. He shouldered him ever so slightly and intercepted the ball from him. Taking the hint, Lacey ran down the field in my direction, trying to score. 

"Not on my watch!" I yelled jokingly to her as I ran towards her. Liam launched the ball down the field and the following events happened to me in slow motion:

It became clear very quickly that Lacey had lost the ball in the sun and didn't know where it was. She knew, however, that I was coming up behind her and that she didn't want to run into me, so she turned to see that I wasn't quite there yet, but by the time she had turned back to see where the ball was, it was making contact with her face. 

Seeing that this wasn't going well, I tried to stop myself, but I was running too fast and started to slip on the sand, having no traction under my feet and ended up running into her anyway, causing both of us to fall to the ground in a huddled mess. 

The other three ran over to us as I spread out on the sand, groaning. I had collided with her back, but I really wasn't all THAT hurt. Lacey on the other hand, had gotten smacked in the face with the tennis ball we were using. It was a tennis ball after all, but as it turned out, it hit her in the nose, and it was bleeding slightly. 

"I think that's a good place to stop for today," Liam said laughing, looking down at the two of us sprawled out on the ground. He and Shane both offered a hand to us to help us up and we brushed ourselves off, Lacey holding her nose.

"Why don't we go to my house and get you cleaned up a bit?" I suggested in a groan. I lived the closest of any of us, so I figured it would be better to get somewhere to help her bleeding nose as soon as possible. 

They all agreed and we all made our way back to Shane's car, the three of them still laughing at our wipeout. 

****

Lacey quickly stopped the bleeding of her nose and got an ice pack on her face so that it didn't start to swell. Meanwhile, I went inside and thought I would change my clothes, but decided I would take a shower when everyone left. 

I was surprised when we asked in that my mother was not anywhere in sight and her car wasn't in the driveway. It was 4:45 and she still didn't seem to be home, which was odd. My question was answered not five minutes later when my cell phone rang. Liam handed it to me and sure enough it was my mother. 

"Hey sweetie," she said over the phone, sounding stressed and tired. 

"Hey, Mom, where are you?" I asked, slightly concerned. 

She sighed on the other end. "I'm still at the office," she admitted heavily. "Today was insane and my boss just put me in charge of a presentation tomorrow for the board and I am entirely unprepared so I am staying at a coworker's house tonight who lives right by the office so that I can work later tonight and be there early tomorrow morning. I hope that's alright."