Page 14 of Jockstraps & Newspapers
Chapter ten
An argument of exponential ferocity
Cassiopeia
C ass stood on the track, watching Elliot jog from one side of the field to another.
The entire team had spent yesterday inside pushing weights.
She spent an hour with Coach Renner. The rest of the day whizzed by and left her in a strange headspace.
Elliott had checked in on her multiple times.
However, unlike the day before, his check-ins did not include a walk or a stretch with him.
He would lean over the bench, ensure she was breathing, flash her his charming goofy smile and simply walk away.
She didn't know whether to call him out on it or to leave it be—that night at dinner had changed something.
It was something in the way he looked at her.
Did he feel it too? Was this all in her head?
Why did she feel like they had gotten so close and then the very next day he pulled away?
He was busy. The team needed his help. She couldn't just steal all of his time and energy away from his actual job.
She put all of that anxious energy into writing.
The good thing that came out of wondering if he was angry, upset, or confused: she had enough time to finish up her write-up for the Stevie article.
That next morning, she brought her findings to Mr. Pearson.
She was quite thrilled with his reaction.
And had Elliot given her even a single word in this morning, she would have told him about it.
Yet, here she was, staring at him, watching him lead the team, and wondering if she had done something wrong.
“Hey, newsie, how is it hanging?” Coach Renner asked as his jog slowed to a stop. The older elf cocked his bald head in her direction. “Why aren't you on the field with the team?”
“Oh, well, I was just doing some observation today.” She didn't like to lie, but she also didn't want to confess to the coach that she was bemoaning her existence and the failure of her crush.
Elliot had made her feel so seen and heard.
However, it seemed he was ignoring her now, and she didn't know why.
Thankfully for her, the team broke at that moment and started to run the track with Coach Renner.
He flashed her a smile and a pair of thumbs up before returning to his light jog around the track.
For the first time all day, Elliot jogged up beside her and stood to her left.
If it weren't for the water cooler to her side, she would have imagined he came to talk.
However, he was bent over, pouring water.
She watched hungrily, eyes trailing down the side of his face with drops of sweat.
He stood up straight, tossing back a gulp of water.
“Hey, Cassie,” Elliot panted, wiping sweat off of his brow. He tucked his water bottle between his legs in order to use his t-shirt as a rag for his forehead.
“Hey, how are you?” The traitorous squeak came out like she were a rubber duck.
Cassiopeia adjusted her ponytail of ringlets.
He hadn't offered to braid it either. Burning embarrassment covered the back of her neck as she fussed with her hair.
His baby blues flashed to her. Heart fluttering, she froze in place.
His face fell before putting the water bottle down on the asphalt.
Her back broke out in goosebumps as he slid up behind her.
Elliot untucked her poof of hair. “Sweaty but good, how did hanging out with your sisters go the other night, I meant to ask but I got my head in the game yesterday and completely forgot! Sorry about that.”
She wanted to ask so many more questions.
As a journalist it was so frustrating to not feel allowed to ask.
But something had changed between when they had stared into each other's eyes and when her sister called that night.
That nagging feeling, the one currently screaming at her that she'd fucked it up, went quiet when his fingers brushed her scalp.
He wove her curls skillfully into a soft braid.
Cass sighed a heavy sigh of relief. “It went about as good as you could have imagined. Andromeda was being the absolute queen monarch as she always is. Lyra tried to spark a good old debate between everyone. It did not go well. And as always, my siblings are frustratingly perfect. How about you?”
He finished faster than he normally did and snapped her braid off with her scrunchy. She lurched toward him, like she would beg him to keep going. However, he stepped away from her and snatched up his water bottle.
“Oh, I went to go see my brother that night.
He, funny enough, doesn't think I'm overshadowing him anymore.
Not since he became the golden child, and I am no longer heir to the throne.
But he did tell me he once felt that way and I wanted to thank you for bringing that to my attention.
I know it's first child problems, but I never imagined he would feel that way.” Elliott looked somber for a moment, glancing down at his hooves.
Cass was proud that he had gone to talk to his brother.
She didn't like the look on his face but hoped that he felt he had closure.
“That's good,” she swallowed a huge lump in her throat. Elliot shifted from side to side, eyes darting up to the track. Just spit it out! She squeaked, “Look I wanted to talk about—”
“Hey, Toad, keep those knees up!”
She flushed a deep red as Elliot jumped away from her to correct some athletes in their form.
Gathering up her notepad and pen to her chest, she found the nerve to follow him onto the track.
As she grew closer to him, Elliott found another athlete to correct and skittered away from her.
She stepped back, taking a deep breath. He did return to her, but the second she opened her mouth he found someone else to correct.
She followed him a second time and when he didn't skitter away, she asked, “Are we OK?”
“Yeah, why would you ask?” He didn't look at her. Not once.
“Well, I'm trying to ask you a question, and you're ignoring me.” She eyed him suspiciously.
He spoke to her, but his attention wasn't on her.
Unlike any other time when she had interviewed him, worked with him, or even sat down with him, he always paid attention to her as if she were the only thing that existed in front of him.
She lurched to the left in order to catch his eye and found him looking away swiftly. “Elliot, why are you ignoring me?”
“I'm not,” he defended, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Then look me in the eye and tell me that you're not ignoring me.” Rage pumped through her veins like lava.
He had never treated her this way before, and suddenly she remembered why she hated people.
It was one thing if he always ignored her, his attention never sticking to her.
But he had done the cruel thing of giving her his undivided attention and then ripping it away.
The pain in her chest returned with a vicious sting. Invisible.
“Look, Cassie, I've got an entire team to get ready for scrimmage.
I want to answer your questions, I really do, but I've got important things to do.” His tone was deflective and dismissive.
It stung worse than anything he could have said.
Had Elliott Bonesaw looked her in the eye and said 'you're a waste of space', it would have hurt less than dismissing her without a single blink in her direction.
“Are you saying that this isn't important? That my job isn't important?” She could have said it nicer. Cass could have been less defensive. But life is full of could haves and would be’s, and Cass was too angry to think.
A week on the field chasing him around in the heated gaze of the sun, doing her best. And now, it wasn't important?
She did not get up at the crack of dawn every morning, chug her coffee while snarfing down a bagel on the way to this forsaken field, to have her efforts called unimportant.
She'd even driven her death trap of a car today, and worn the sneakers he'd given her.
Just another woman with a crush on Elliot Bonesaw—nothing more, nothing less.
“I'm saying some people have things to worry about that aren't you.” He finally looked at her and they both were shocked.
His mouth flapped open and shut. She stumbled back a step, clutching the notebook to her chest. It shouldn't hurt.
She didn't think herself the center of anyone's universe.
The sun did not revolve around her. Yet, it was how he said it.
Slinging it right at her like a hex, it dug deep in her chest. Invisible.
Ignorable. Not worth the time. He put up a hand like a white flag, “Cass, I didn't—”
“The world doesn't revolve around me, Elliot, but it sure does seem to revolve around you,” she scoffed, taking another step away from him.
“That's not what I said.” He followed her.
“But it's what you meant, isn't it? I'm just another person begging for your attention, and you're so much more important than me." Her face scrunched in an ugly scowl.
“Cass, I have a lot going on right now.” His face was pleading, and she was having none of it.
This is what you get for liking a person like Elliot Bonesaw.
The perfect, golden retriever that everyone fell for, and no one could have—he was the city's golden boy and a complete dickwad.
That was his real secret! The angry thoughts buzzed around her head as she shook her head in disbelief.
“And you think that I don't? I don't have to be here on the field in the stupid sun, getting sunburnt and agitated, waiting for you to give me the time of day for your interview.” She jabbed a finger in his direction.
Cass panted for air, “You know there are easier ways for me to do research which don't involve standing around and watching you sweat for hours. I was doing this for you.”