“No. But I kept your secret. I’m the best secret keeper you’ll ever have,” I say proudly.
Oh, he has no idea.
Secrets are my jam.
Well, as long as I don’t open my big mouth again like I did back at the library.
“Secret keeper, huh,” he murmurs with a flicker at his lips.
“Yes.”
“Well, then I’m glad.”
“About what?”
“That you were the one who wasn’t sleeping. And you’re the one who found out about my injury. And you’re the one I’m smoking in front of.”
To emphasize, he pops the cigarette back in his mouth and takes a drag, letting it out slowly, all the while looking at me with an arched look.
I narrow my eyes at him. “And why is that?”
“Why is what?”
“Why would you smoke all those times when you promised you wouldn’t?”
“Because I like it.”
“But you don’t break promises.”
“I broke this one.”
“Why?”
He throws me a flat look like I’m annoying him with my questions but I don’t care. I need to know. And when it looks like he won’t answer, I tell him in a curt voice, “Smoking is bad for your health, you know that, don’t you? Especially when you’re an athlete. It affects your lungs, which affects the way you breathe. Which in turn affects the game. And nothing should ever affect the game. Isn’t that your motto? That’s like the first rule you live by. So I don’t know why –”
“You can stop talking now,” he cuts me off and I bite the inside of my cheek to stop my smile.
Which of course he can tell, because his eyes narrow and a muscle jumps in his cheek. I blink up at him all innocently though. “I will if you tell me.”
He sighs before turning away and looking at the river. “I smoke because it helps me relax. It’s called de-stressing.”
“De-stressing from what?” I ask, looking at his profile.
His shoulders tighten. “From a big game. A big test. Whatever.”
“What?”
“The other option is that I get high or drunk. So this is no big deal, all right? It’s a simple cigarette. Takes the edge off a little.”
Is that really why he smokes?
I try to think of all the times I found him under my window, smoking. Was it always before a test or a game? Because he was stressed about it?
“And why are you smoking now?” I ask.
A breeze comes in and ruffles his hair further and I don’t know if it’s the fact that his hair is messy or if it’s my question, but Arrow seems even more tense, the set of his jaw more strained.
“Because it helps me forget,” he replies after a few moments.
I tighten my hands around the metal railing. “Forget what?”
“The fact that I’m here. Instead of where I should be, winning the fucking cup for my team.”
“But you’ll go back, right? You’ll win the next cup.”
His jaw pulses once. Twice.
“But not this one.” A third pulse ripples through his jaw. “And it’s on me. It’s on my fucking stupidity. All because I broke the first rule of soccer.”
“But you just made a mistake,” I insist like I did back at the library. “One mistake should be allowed, right? You can’t be perfect all the time.”
I mean, I knew he worked hard. He still does.
I also knew that Leah expected him to be the best. She still does. Sometimes I thought that she was being a little too hard on him. But then again, his father was a great soccer player himself and with that, comes a tremendous responsibility.
I never knew this about him though. I never knew that he is so crazy intense about all of this.
“Yeah?” Arrow asks, studying my distressed face.
“Yes,” I say vehemently. “You can’t be. No one can be. You just slipped up a little, okay? And that’s fine. You can’t beat yourself up like this, Arrow. You can’t kill yourself by smoking just because you have to sit out a season. It’s crazy. Besides, you’re already the best player they’ve got. You…”
My thoughts break when I notice his body move.
Like last night at the library, he advances on me. We were already so close though that it’s hardly an advance. It’s more like shifting, inching closer, but since he’s so big and tall and he’s got muscles for days, it feels like it.
It feels like he’s advancing on me and arranging my tiny body as he likes with the metal railing digging into my ass.
And again like last night, when he puts his hands on either side of me to cage me in, it looks like he’s doing a push-up, his chest dipped, his body curled, that silver chain swinging.
“The best,” he drawls.
I raise my chin. “Yes. You are. Everything I learned about soccer, I learned from watching your tapes and YouTube clips. And Beckham’s.”
“Beckham.”
“Yes.”
He hums. “He’s all right.”
“He’s amazing.”
“He’s okay.”