No Pads… No Helmets… Just Memories!

I was perched at the island slowly scooping rather larger spoonfuls of Lucky Charms into my mouth. I wasn’t even half done the bowl when Rian appeared in the doorway scratching at the back of his neck; we hadn’t spoken about what happened yesterday. after Alex left and I finished wallowing in my own self-pity, I pulled myself together in time for our mom in dad to come home from running errands with arms full of plastic bags bearing food and pizza boxes. I ate silently, chocking up my lack of words which I was usually teeming with and overflowing with energy to being tired from the plane and with every lie I told about my behavior Rian’s glare grew deeper and deeper.

“You okay?” he finally spoke causing my eyes to lift from the bowl as he walked forward taking a bar stool across from me.

I let out a slight shrug, “I've been better but I'm nowhere close to doing badly.” I said with honesty.

“I'm happy your back you know” he spoke, “Alex will come around, I think it’s good you guys let off some steam.”

“I don’t hate Alex you know.” I said, and Rian looked almost as surprised from the words that just came from my mouth as I was, did I mean that? I mean of course I didn’t hate Alex, after I left I was mad, sure. I hated what he did to me but not him. Never once had I told myself I hated Alex and meant it when thinking about him. I never told him I hated him yesterday, hell I cried, I haven’t cried in 4 years about anything emotional, I’d say at all but with a few soccer balls to the nose sometimes it happens.

“You don’t?” Rian asked.

“I mean no, not really,” I shrugged again; “I'm just kind of upset he could cut me off like that is all.”

“Awh look at you not being sarcastic and having feelings!” Rian laughed pointing a finger at me.

“Yeah, yeah, get your finger out of my face before I bite it off!” I laughed, and with that there was a strange knocking pattern at the door. I raised a brow at Rian who did the same before he got off of his stool and walked backwards towards the entryway, "you expecting someone?"

I shook my head no, "you?"
Rian puffed out his bottom lip slightly in thought as he shook his head no and headed towards the door, my attention now diverting to the slightly soggy bowl before me. “Okay where is she TELL ME EVERYTHING Jasey!” a voice boomed and I all but climbed over the island shuffling to my feet.

“Cass!” I screamed running into the girls arms.

“Babe how are ya?” she laughed still hugging me tightly.

“I'm good girl how are you?” I asked laughing pulling out of her embrace.

“Oh darling I'm fine, Jack told me about seeing you yesterday, Alex didn’t take it well I heard, you holding in there?” she asked in a motherly like tone and I let out a groan as we walked back into the living room.

“I mean I'm fine it was nothing really, just digging up old memories that should have been left alone is all!” I told her plopping down on the couch.

“Well don’t sit down kiddo where going for coffee!” she sang and I let out a hitched chuckle raising a brow at her.

“Cass you know I don’t drink coffee.” I blatantly said.

“And you know I don’t go out with people if they look like you do right now so we will compromise!” she cheered and I let out a light laugh knowing I looked like shit with my hair in a bun and I was still in sweats and a baseball styled tee.

“fine.” I moaned getting up on my feet, “Let’s go!”

“Okay actually I can’t let you leave looking like that, at least put on some shorts!” she said shooting me a smile and I let out another distressed groan before letting out another “Okay fine!”

And with that I shuffled up the stairs leaving my hair and lack of makeup as is sliding out of my gray sweats and swapping them for a pair of black denim shorts id be thankful I slid on because of the heat that particular day, I ran my tongue over my teeth as my eyes scanned over the few pairs of shoes I could wear anywhere and basically the only shoes I wore and settled on my black and maroon vans to at least make the shirt I was wearing look like it was a planned part of the outfit with the matching maroon sleeves instead of what I just happened to throw on last night. After slipping the sneakers over my small feet I bolted back down stairs to rejoin my friend before we left the house bidding my brother a goodbye and to have him tell our parents we’d be back.

We walked towards the park to cut across it and reach the center of town and I couldn’t help but sneak a glance at the Gaskarth home across the street, the light in Alex’s bedroom was on, but I couldn’t make out his figure and my heart swelled at how many times I climbed out of that window and onto the roof of his porch to not get in trouble for staying over later then I should have just talking with him. Alex and I had always had an oddly close relationship and even after I left I never quite felt the same without him, like he was a brother to me and I was missing something, knowing Rian had kept in touch with me and it felt almost as if a family member had neglected to contact me. I mean Cass and I talked every single night before she had to go to bed, she said she wanted me to come back and when I did she wanted me to feel like her and I were never apart, and it did feel that way. It was if I hadn’t left, or in other words, she had come with me, she never even asked about Washington cause she had already heard every story I had to tell, and I was more than fine with that, other than the fact the only new stories she hadn’t heard were about yesterday and I knew I was in a run for my money but still, it gave me a comforting sense of normality after everyone at home having these weird distant looks on their faces like they didn’t know who I was, or how to begin to rekindle the relationships I had with them and that in its self was nerve racking enough for me, I felt kind of bad for my family, to put them in such and awkward position, maybe I just had to act like nothing was ever wrong, id done it for so long it’d be like second nature, and for everyone else’s sake it’d be easy enough to act till I slipped back into actually feeling like I belonged.

“Jasey” I was snapped from my internal mumblings by Cass’s hand waving in front of my face, “Hello, earth to Jasey, where you even listening to me!”

“Oh um yeah sorry Cass” I mumbled looking down at my feet as we continued to walk.

“God you’re so creepy when you just zone out like that!” she laughed as we reached the center finding our way onto the sidewalks.

“Yeah sorry!”

“It’s whatever!” she said as we approached the coffee shop brushing off my weird behavior and thankfully letting it go, if I told her I was thinking about me and Alex’s relationship before I left and how I felt weird being back she would never let me forget it, I knew that much. “So are you gonna join the soccer team again at Dulaney?”

“Um nah I hadn’t planned on it” I shrugged as we entered the warm way to beige coffee shop and approached the counter.

“Well that means you’ll have more time to hang out with me!” she cheered, “there’s only one issue, I may or may not have signed you up for tryouts” she mumbled the last part as her head dropped to the floor.

“YOU DID WHA-“

“Hi may I please just have a small espresso just regular, and um a salted caramel mocha for my friend here?” she spoke in a bubbly tone before smiling over at me and handing the young cashier the appropriate amount of money before pushing us off to the side.

“You did what!?” I whisper shouted again without being interrupted.

“Well I didn’t think you would quit so I put your name on the list before it got full so you would have a spot on the team!”

“Cass!” I whined and the man behind the counter handed her two white mugs as she disregarded my presence completely smiling at the man and graciously taking our mugs and shoving mine into my hands and thanking the man and shoving me off towards one of the couches in the corner of the café.

“Well now this gives you time to think about it, now you have options!” she said sitting down on the brown leathered couch as I took the opposite end and groaned. “Try outs aren’t till the end of the school week anyway!”

“Okay so that’s a plus! I have time to tell who ever I need to that I don’t want to be on the team!” –My phone went off breaking my train of thought- I said with a huge fake smile on my face and a sarcastic tone carrying my voice.

“Jasey please you love soccer don’t tell me your just going to mope around town till you graduate and leave again!” she said leaning over the arm of the couch and pulling back up a magazine and placed her mug on the small table in front of us.

That’s exactly what I was planning on doing. Everything I ever liked from that town was ruined and taken away from me by that horrible woman, before I left even little simple things like going to the Baltimore county fair had been ripped from me so yes that was exactly what I was planning on doing with my free time. I leaned over placing my phone on the table so I could comfortably sit crisscrossed when it went off again, and I noticed I had not one, not two, but four text messages from Alex. I placed it back on the table not even wanting to bother as I slowly brought the mug to my lips sipping on the warm liquid. I slowly leaned my head back closing my eyes, letting the warm cup heat my cold hands and relaxed till Cassadee’s voice rang through my head and I snapped my head up realizing I must have fallen asleep because my cup was now cold and hers empty, abandoned on the table and forgotten about.

"Why does your phone keep going off no offence but it’s kind of annoying” Cass said looking up from whatever magazine she had been flipping through while I napped.

I reached forward to see a series of unopened text messages from Alex and nearly gaged, yet again he was feeling sorry a hair to late and I was already over it, he was wasting his time apologizing for what he said yesterday, what was said was said and he couldn’t take it back now.

“It’s Alex, he's trying to apologize for two years of pretending I don’t exist and being an ass.” I muffled tossing the phone back onto the table and throwing my head back bringing my hands up to coddle my throbbing temples, I hate coffee.
“Oh don’t take it so much to heart love” she spoke taking my phone off the table, “I think it’s kind of cute he wants to be your friend again so badly.”

“Yeah wanna know what else is cute, your best friend lying to you face and saying he’ll always be there for you, then never even sending a single text, not one, not even a K from the kid for two years, its fucking adorable!”

"Okay then..." She spoke and I slammed my jaw shut realizing I was dragging something into today that should have been left in yesterday.

"But Jace, think about him it’s not like he can change something that already happed, he probably feels bad enough as is!"
Yeah I’m sure he felt real bad knowing I knew what he really thought about me leaving, but I couldn’t tell Cass about that. That would just cause a bunch of drama with her thinking she needs to defend me and hate Alex because that’s just the kind of friend she was, but at the same time I knew Cass liked Rian, and Rian liked Cass, I wasn’t going to cause any unnecessary issues and drag her and Rian into Alex’s and I’s issues.

“Whatever it happened” I said lifting my head, “Cant I be mad at someone without being hounded,I've been here two days and it feels like all that’s been on my mind is Alex, Alex, Alex, it’s annoying and I don’t really wanna talk about him anymore!

"Cant the two of you just be civil or something, if you guys are going to hang out with us but be slitting each other’s throats every time someone turns around I don't want you guys dampening my aura!"

"Aura, Cass really your aura?" I laughed.

“What I believe that if I'm positive and keep a good aura around me then good things will happen and you and Alex killing each other when you just got back does not make for a good aura!”

“Alright that's it!” I laughed sitting up properly pointing a finger towards my friend “You’re officially cooked!”

“I'm sorry may I offer either of you a refill?” a soft voice spoke and my head snapped to the left to look in the direction it came in, “Oh hey Cass!”

“Oh hey matt!” Cass replied, Matt, wait I knew Matt.

He’d changed so much since id last seen him. His hair was a black bushy mess on the top of his head but it looked purposely disordered and fell just above his big hazel eyes that now looked down at Cass and me. He was taller now but just as pale and scrawny as before and had added two piercings side by side on the right side of his lip, but they looked nice. Matt started as Rian's friend seeing he was a year older then I was and I was never one to really branch out of my grade, you can say I'm one of those people who for no reason at all are just intimidated by older kids, doesn’t matter if it’s one year or ten, it might just be because I'm a small kid or because I'm kind of a weird child, but it’s how I am.

“Jasey?” he said squinting to look at me though I was not even a foot and a half away.

“Hey!” I cheered getting up to pull him into a hug. Even after I moved Matt was one of my closest guy friends. Because of Rian we had gotten pretty close before I left, but he also never knew any of my issues so I liked to keep him around, he never asked questions and is and was just a genuinely happy kid and nice to be around.

“God I missed you!” he said after a moment and wrapping his arms around me.

“I missed you to Matty how are you?” I asked pulling out of his hug to look at him.

“I'm good, going into senior year, going to start looking into schools so I’m great, please tell me your back and not just visiting?” he asked with hopeful eyes.

“I'm back for good!” I cheered as he pulled me into another hug.

“Oh Matt's getting it in!” a distant voice chimed as the bell on the door rang twice. I looked behind him to see two boys one being no other then Jack Barakat himself, and beside him stood a slightly shorter kid, much more muscular then both Jack and Rian even, he had longer deep brown hair that fell a little more than midway down his forehead, the boy had a nose piercing, and soft green eyes.

“Jasey?” Jack said my name in a similar fashion to the day before and blinked his eyes roughly a few times and I let out a chuckle stepping fully from Matt’s embrace.

“JACKY!” I screamed running into his now open arms at the realization I was -in fact- me.

“Jasey what are you doing here?” Jack asked sounding surprised under his excitement.

“I'm back!” I chimed as jack put my feet back on the ground but not fully letting go of me as if he didn’t believe I were really here and that Alex lied to him about talking to me.

“Your back, like for good, not just as a joke or just visiting!?” Jack asked again steeping out of the hug.

“Yep for good!” I told him.

“That’s so cool!” the second boy who must be post-puberty Zack by his soft toned voice spoke, “You know we’re all going to watch a movie at Jack’s place tonight, you and Cass should swing by, Rian already knows the details.”

“I don’t know-“

“We’ll be there!” Cass said practically jumping over me.

“We will?” I asked hesitantly raising a brow at my friend.

“Yes we will be, it’s been nice seeing ya boys but we got to run!” she said pulling me towards the door as my mouth opened and closed trying to find any words to describe what was actually happening, I had no idea what Cass was dragging me into and if it would be for the better or the worst.

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