Frustrated, I cross my arms. “Who do you think is going to win? That’s all I asked.”
I don’t need to look at Hailee to know that she’s judging me so hard right now for my snappy reply. Well, sorry not sorry—okay? If Brayden gets to have an attitude, why can’t I?
“Probably the other team,” he replies with a careless shrug, “I don’t know why you’re asking me though.”
My eyebrows crease. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” he mutters, a muscle in his jaw twitching, “just forget it.”
My phone buzzes a few more times; but I ignore the sound, knowing that it’s just Hailee trying to be annoying.
“Fine,” I say, looking back at the field, “I’m sorry I even asked then.”
More buzzes erupt from my phone.
This girl better quit it before I turn around and—
“You’re not going to get that?”
I raise an eyebrow at Brayden’s question. “Excuse me?”
“Your phone is buzzing,” he states in a matter-of-fact way, “are you going to just keep ignoring it?”
I scowl at that. “Why do you care?”
“I didn’t say that I did,” he retorts, now looking at me, “but clearly someone is trying to get your attention.”
“Brayden’s right,” Haile pipes up, giving me the crazy eyes once again, “you should probably check your phone just in case it’s important.”
“It’s not important,” I tell her through clenched teeth, “so why don’t we all just watch the rest of the game in silence…all right?”
Hailee starts to frown, but thankfully doesn’t say anything else, and she doesn’t text me again either.
Finally.
As the game goes on, Kyle’s team actually manages to pull ahead, but ultimately—they end up losing. The final scores are really close though, so I’m impressed.
Mom doesn’t waste any time going out onto the field, and I’d bet some serious cash that she’s feeding Kyle the “you’re-always-a-winner-no-matter-what” line. Judging by the huge grin on his face, I’m guessing my assumption was right…and I wouldn’t be surprised if she promised some kind of “you-did-your-best” gift/treat.
So. Predictable.
And sure enough, Kyle comes running over to us while yelling, “Ice cream! Ice cream!”
Well, if I had to leave the house today even though I didn’t want to, at least I’m getting some ice cream out of it.
“And Mom says you can come too, Brayden!” Kyle exclaims, bouncing up and down. “How cool is that?”
Suddenly my appetite for ice cream is long gone.
“Uh…” Brayden trails off with an awkward laugh. “I don’t know, Kyle. I might have to take a rain check.”
Pssh, I’m not even going to get my hopes up.
Kyles stops his jumping and begins to pout instead. “But why? You like ice cream, right?”
“I do like ice cream, but—”
“Then you have to come!” Kyle interrupts him, letting out an exasperated sigh. “It’s victory ice cream! Who can say no to victory ice cream?”
Hailee mutters something about them losing, and I decide that I need to help this situation in order to benefit myself.
“Kyle,” I drawl, getting up from my seat, “Brayden probably has other plans already, okay? Why don’t we go find Dad?”
Some random bird caught his attention about ten minutes ago, and I have no idea where he disappeared to.
Kyle makes a face at my suggestion, then looks at Brayden expectantly. “Do you have plans already?”
For the love—
“I actually don’t,” Brayden replies, side-glancing at me, “but I don’t think your sister wants me to get ice cream with you guys…so it’s probably a good idea if I don’t come.”
He did NOT just try to put this off on me! Sure, he’s right, I don’t want him to come. But it wasn’t something that needed to be said out loud, especially not by him.
Kyle now turns to me, his eyes wide. “Megan! You don’t want him to get ice cream with us?”
I force myself not to glare at Brayden. “I never said that.”
“Oh good,” Hailee says, deciding to join the conversation, “then you’re okay with him going.”
Notice that it was a statement, and not a question.
“Yes!” Kyle punches the air before doing some weird dance. “I’m going to go let Mom know!”
“And I guess I’ll go find Dad,” Hailee sighs as Kyle runs back to the field, “I wouldn’t want you to get lost, Meg.”
Her stuff will be in the trash.
She starts walking in the same direction that Dad did earlier, and I make my way down the bleachers so I can go to the car—because I am NOT hanging around here with Brayden.
No. Thank. You.
Too bad he follows me though.
“Megan,” he says, moving to walk beside me, “I’m sorry about earlier. I know you’re mad that I interrupted your conversation with that guy and all, but I was just—”
“Messing around?” I offer in a dry voice. “You seriously need to grow up, Brayden.”
“Would you hold on a minute?” he retorts, now standing in front of me. “That’s not what I was going to say.”
“I don’t believe you,” I tell him with a shrug. “I meant what I said the other day…you haven’t changed. You still treat everything like it’s a joke, you still try to brush stuff off, and you still make up excuses. It’s ridiculous.”
He shakes his head with a slight curse. “Why are you getting like this? I thought we agreed to start over?”
Clearly, agreeing to that wasn’t one of my better life choices…
“You know,” he continues to speak when I don’t offer any response, “I’ve been trying to talk to you about something for days now…but I kept wimping out or blowing my chances.” He proceeds to sigh. “I think now’s a good time to finally get this off my chest though.”
I’m not really sure what the big deal is, but
