Saturday, October 10
“I’m heading over to Alex’s,” I told Scott when he came downstairs for breakfast. It was about 11, and I texted Alex without a response. I figured he was probably eating, so I wanted to surprise him.
Scott had to work after we got home last night, and I took my medicine before going to sleep. When I woke up in the morning, I struggled to take a shower, and change into my clothes.
“Ok,” he responded. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
Glaring at him, my head turned away in annoyance. “I hope you choke on your orange juice.”
I got into my car, heading out of the driveway and to Alex’s house. The drive wasn’t too long, but it was a little difficult to hold the steering wheel with my cast.
I pulled into the driveway, putting the car in park before turning the engine off and heading towards the door. I knocked a few times, and waiting. There wasn’t any answer, so I tried again. This time there were quick footsteps getting closer to the door. It opened, and I was face to face with Skyler.
“Oh!” she exclaimed. “Come in. I don’t know if Alex is awake yet, but I go check. Make yourself at home.”
I stepped inside, closing the door behind me and then looked around. The staircase was directly across from the door, with a small living room to the left, and a dining room to the right. Behind the table in the dining room was a counter with two stools tucked underneath it. There was a small island behind the counter, centering the rest of the kitchen. There was a door open going under the staircase, probably leading to the basement or something. Going over to the table, I pulled out one of the chairs and took a seat.
There was some shouting from upstairs, and a door shut loudly. It was probably Skyler and Alex talking, and Alex to her to get out of his room or something.
We had to get a pass for the day at the front desk, and then we could use any of the areas in the sport center. There were a little under a hundred rooms for all different sports from basketball to swimming. I led the way down a hallway and towards the back of the sport center. We walked passed basketball courts and volleyball courts, and I pushed double doors open to walk into a large room. There were a couple other people using one of the machines, and I went over to borrow a couple bats.
“It’s a batting cage,” Alex murmured.
“I challenge you to a duel,” I said, holding out one of the bats. “Lets see who can hit the most balls at 120km/h.”
“120!?” Alex repeated. “I can’t hit that!”
“Just try!” I said, going over to one of the machines. Alex grumbled a little before stepping in front of the one next to me.
As the machine made three beeps, the baseball came right at me. I swung my bat, hitting it towards center field. The next one came approximately ten seconds later, and I hit it towards left field. The third one was a foul, and the fourth was another hit towards left field. My bat connected with all 20 balls, and the machine shut off. I glanced over and watched as Alex swung at ait, the ball bouncing off the netting behind him.
I tried to hold back my laughter, but couldn’t for more than a few seconds.
“Oh my God you’re terrible!” I exclaimed between laughs.
“Shut up!” he snapped back, trying to his his embarrassment. “I play soccer, not baseball! I got a few hits! Why’d ya want me to do this anyways?”
I turned away, my smile fading. “Just for fun.”
The two of us returned the bats and headed towards the food section of the building, getting a small pizza and finding a table to sit at. It was crowded, and Alex seemed to know a lot of people around. Maybe it would’ve been better to go somewhere else.
“How did you get so good at baseball?” Alex asked, biting into a slice of the pizza.
I was about to take a bit of my slice as well, but paused for a moment. Sighing, I put the piece down and looked at my hands.
“I played little league when I was in elementary school, and joined a club team in middle school,” I explained. “My parents wanted me to do something athletic, so they had me choose a sport. Baseball seemed the most interesting, so they signed me up. At first, it was fun. I was still a kid, and it didn’t matter if we made mistakes. When I got to middle school, though, my parents pushed me to practice harder so I wouldn’t lose. After the falling out before high school, I quit and we didn’t really talk much after that.”
Alex didn’t say anything, and I sighed to myself. I never really liked talking about my childhood, but Alex seemed trustworthy enough. We finished the pizza and headed towards the indoor soccer field. Alex went over to the closet, sliding the doors open and taking out a ball.
“Pass it to me,” Alex said, kicking it towards me. I stopped it with my foot.
“Really?” I asked. “You want me to play soccer? I’m injured you know.”
“It’s just something to pass the time a little,” he responded. “Come on. You can’t be that bad at it.”
I sighed, but took a step back and kicked the ball with my right foot. It rolled slowly across the fake grass, and stopped before Alex’s feet.
“At least your aim is good,” he said, and I glared at him.
We continued passing the ball for a little bit, and I started getting the hang of it. I knew Alex was holding back a lot, but watching him smile with his foot on the ball made me feel an aching in my chest. He bounced the ball from his left foot to his left knee, and then to his right for and right knee. He repeated it a few times, not dropping the ball once.
He was the shining beacon of our school. The star of the team. It made sense that he wanted to hide his poor grades from the school and his friends. Only I knew how hard he was trying to bring his grades up, and then keep them from falling again.
“What do you want to do now?” Alex asked, walking over to me with the ball at my feet. “It’s around 3, so do you wanna catch a movie before dinner? Or do you want to go somewhere else?”
“There aren’t any good movies,” I sighed. “What movies do you like?”
Alex thought for a moment. “Like Marvel movies and-”
“Stop!” I put my hand up. “You’ve never seen any movies from before the 2000s?”
“I think I saw like half of The Breakfast Club.”
I inhaled sharply. “Why don’t we just head back to my house? It seems like I’ll need to educate you on old classics.”
After we arrived back at my house, I saw Scott had stepped out to go somewhere. I didn’t want to bother him because he was probably working, so I just took Alex up to my room.
“You can sit on the bed,” I said, going over to open the left drawer in the tv console.
There were a bunch of old DVDs and games that I didn’t really like. In the right drawer, there were a few old movies, and I smiled to myself. I took out two, turning around while holding them behind my back.
“Choose a hand,” I said, looking at Alex. He was holding one of my pillows against his chest, sitting with his legs crossed.
“Left,” he said, nodding towards my left hand. I revealed my two hands to him, and he squinted at the movies. “Sixteen Candles and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.”
I put Sixteen Candles back in the drawer, closing it. Sliding the disc into the DVD machine, I went over to my bedside table to pick up the remote. After turning the tv on and changing the settings, I climbed onto the bed to get comfortable.
“It’s a pretty good movie,” I said, “but I’d have to say it’s only in the top five.”
“Have you ever seen movies from this time period?” Alex asked as the movies started.
“A few. They have better quality with technology these days, but I just like the older movies better.”
“You’re kind of strange.”
I head snapped in his direction, my eyes glaring at him. “That’s rude! Take it back!”
“Shhh! The movie’s starting!”
I sighed angrily, but turn my head towards the tv, ready to watch the movie.
Comments (0)
See all