Sierra

The sun shines brightly through my closed off windows and I still stare at the I love you wrinkled piece of paper on my bedside table. It's 9 o'clock on a Saturday and I only got up to brush my teeth and to wash my face.

It's been a couple days. Championships are right around the corner and coach has been putting in afternoon practices every day till six. I get up to open my blinds and my phone starts to ring. After closing up the blinds, I quickly stride on over to my bed and plopped down to see who it was.

Kaydon.

I hesitate on answering, but I suck it up and pressed answer. His morning hair makes its way on my screen and I can't help but laugh as he lays on his stomach with only the top of his head to the camera. "Hey, Kay." I say and he immediately looks up to meet my eyes through the camera . His eyes have a flash of relief and he cracks a lopsided grin.

"Hey, Si. Told you it wasn't goodbye," he leans on his right palm and I can see that he's wearing a black dress shirt with only the too few buttons unbuttoned. His sleeves are rolled up to his elbows and he fixes his hair as I continue to gaze over his face. "Done staring?" I bet my ears are red at tips right now.

I roll my eyes, "Sure. Anyway, how's life going back there?" My heart still aches about the thought of him all the way there and not with us. He won't be back to see our championship game. He sighs and runs a hand down his face.

"Harry is making me go to all of these conferences about football and shit," he sits up and leans back against his headboard. "I have to dress formally and talk to all of these scouts for hours." his lips form a frown and I can see the visible exhaustion in his face.

Even though its been a couple days, Harry doesn't give a shit about that. He'll make him go to every meeting if possible. Hell, he'll make Kaydon play football in dress pants and shirt. There's no such thing as breaks when it comes to Harry. Breaks are for the weak, he used to say.

I nod slowly, understanding his frustration. "I'm sorry. I wish things could he different, you know?" he looks deep in thought and I fiddle with the drawstrings on my shorts.

"How's the group?" he asks, breaking the silence. I smile to myself as I remember yesterday when Blake yelled at our APUSH teacher for yelling at me because I didn't answer a question. Blake basically went up to his desk and went all crazy.

I retell the story to Kaydon and he laughs, a real one. I hadn't heard that in a while.

"He's fucking crazy," he mutters with a grin and I agree. Both Blake and our APUSH teacher.

Kaydon scoots up on his bed and he messes with his hair. My hands urge to run through his brown locks and I stop myself from smiling.

"I wish you were here," I whisper and his eyes twinkle with guilt. "It's not your fault."

He exhales, "It sort of is. I didn't get to tell you myself. Look, I promised you the whole universe that I'll come back to you, right? I'm keeping that damn promise for you, angel." he gives me a grin to assure me that he's saying the truth.

"I hated leaving without goodbye." he says and I just stay quiet as he keeps on going. "I hated every moment of those last minutes and I'm sorry for the way I acted. There's no no excuse-"

I cut him off. "It's okay, Kay. You're doing your own thing and I'm working on volleyball. We'll see each other again." I try and give him a reassuring smile and he returns one back. Before I could continue with a lighter conversation, my door opens and Kaydon laughs at my startled face.

Parker jumps next to me, raising an eyebrow at the phone.

"Hey, Kaydon!" she says and Kaydon laughs.

"Hey, Park."

She nudges me with her shoulder and I see that she's in a loose t-shirt and spandex. Her long hair is in a tight ponytail and I groan when I see the kneepads down at her ankles.

I groan and face planted to my comforters. I do not want to go to practice this early. I'm betting that Parker suggested this.

I hear Cameron walk in and snicker when she sees me face planted into the comforters. "Kaydon, hey! The guys miss you playing basketball." she says and I lift my head up. Hair is all over my face and Parker fixes it into a ponytail.

He smiles at the thought of the guys and my heart warms. "Tell them that they'll be fine, I suck ass anyway," he looks up at something and I see his expression falter to a scowl and his whole demeanor changes to anger.

"Alright, I gotta go. Talk you later Sierra, stay safe." then he hangs up. I put my phone down and Cameron sighs, throwing to me a black t-shirt and my spandex. Knee pads hit my face as I scoop them up in my arms.

"Do we have to do practice this early?" I ask and Parker nods with a wicked grin.

"Championships is in a couple days, Si. We gotta win this!"

Cameron shoves me to the bathroom and I get changed. I splash water on my face to wake
me up and I turn off the lights while walking out. Parker is right. We all want this really bad and I guess it'll be good practice. Parker wants to go into college with volleyball but Cameron and I are hesitating on it. Parker pushes herself to the edge with volleyball and sometimes she passes out from exhaustion.

I grab my bag and we all stand up to walk down the stairs. Cameron and Parker stop by the living room to talk to Tanya and I see my mom in the kitchen. I walk to the pantry to grab a couple granola bars for me and the team.

I live on granola bars for breakfast, I'm telling you.

"Hey, sweetie! How are you feeling?" her dark brown hair meet with the sunlight from the window causing it to be a golden brown. She gives me her classic mother-smile and I kiss her on the cheek.

"I'm fine, mom. Trust me," I assure her and she rubs my shoulder. She's been by my side the past couple days and I'm so fucking grateful for that. She's my first ever best friend and she's been through hell and back. The lessons she learned she taught to me.

"Have a good practice!" she shouts as I walk back out to the living room. Tanya gives me a side hug before walking to the hallway and I blow her a kiss which she catches and clutches to her heart.

Parker sighs with a soft smile. "I love you and your family."

I laugh, "I love them too."

**

Pass.

"Good up, Laurken!" coach shouts while walking with her clipboard. We're playing a 6v6 and Parker just served right at me.

I got it up to Cameron who was on my side, thank god, and she sets it nice and high for one of our freshman right side. She's a fucking beast when she scrimmages. The ball hits the floor with two people in the back on the other side trying to get it. Coach writes things down and blows her whistle for our person to serve.

"Good location," I whisper to Kayla, the freshman right side and she gives me a proud smile.

We continue to do scrimmage and we talked about situations in the game and Elwood's plays. They tend to do dumps and try to hit near the middle of the libero and one of the other back row players. Parker gives her practice pep talk and we all did our cheer. This is almost one of the last practices we'll ever do. I grab my water bottle and quickly took off my sweaty knee pads into the bag I brought. I spray a bit of deodorant and I meet the girls who were by the gym door ready to leave.

Cameron side hugs me and Parker leads the way out to her car which we took. It was already noon and my stomach grumbles from hunger. I hop in the back seat and Cameron turns on the volume a bit for us to hear the music that was playing on the radio which was Sam Smith.

"The guys said they want to eat lunch at Melly's with us, you guys down?" Parker asks, setting her phone down and putting the car in reverse.

I nod, "I just need food before I get cramps."

Cameron laughs. "Every damn time."

It's true, I do. Every time that I would wait to eat for too long, my stomach cramps and I feel pain in my stomach to the point where I cannot eat. Sometimes I drink water too much to fill up my stomach. This isn't a daily thing, don't worry. It's mostly for these hard practices or when I have tons of homework due last minute.

We finally reach Melly's and I happily get out of the car meeting the fresh sunny air Florida brings. I pull down the spandex I have on and fixed my hair into a loose braid. Parker keeps her ponytail and Cameron has her hair down in long waves.

Parker said the boys got a table for us and we went inside strolling along to find one. As we walk around to find them, my heart still long for the little night drives here with Kaydon. He would always steal the cherries of my milkshakes and laugh at the weird questions I thought of. I would make fun of some of the late shift workers flirting with him and him getting all flustered.

Moments like those I wish would last forever instead of the limited time we have.

We find the table where they were sitting and they were all scrunched up on one side. Parker slides in, then me, then Cameron and we all have decent room. "Do you guys need another chair out here?" Parker chuckles and Blake shakes his head.

"Ty brought his fucking backpack to study while waiting for you and it's squishing my right side." he mutters and Ty rolls his eyes.

Our waitress comes up to us and basically throws the straws at me and the girls. Her uniform was a bit tight and too low on her upper half and she flips her hair to the side obnoxiously, whacking Cameron in the face. Parker was about to say something when I stopped her and smiled sweetly at the waitress named Cindy.

"Hey, Cindy! My friend here would appreciate it if you would keep your split ends to yourself and not to her face." Cindy's flirtatious expression to the guys dropped and had a very present scowl on her face while turning to me.

I see Melly walking in the back, carefully eyeing Cindy and I smile at her. She returns one back before looking down at the counter with a notepad. Cindy clears her throat and plasters on a too wide of a smile towards me.

"What can I get you?" she asks and Cameron rolls her eyes at her towards us and Blake stifles his laugh.

Cameron nods over to Melly, "You can ask her for our three's usual but the guys would want something different." Cindy rolls her eyes and turns immediately to Ty with a hand on his arm which was on the table.

I can feel the fire in Cam's blood and I pat her thigh letting her know it's alright. I really want to punch this bitch in the face. Ty looks literally unfazed and quickly moves her hand off of him.

"Can I get a Coke and just the Cajun fries in a basket?" she writes it down with a smile and looks at Blake who seems literally disgusted.

"And what about you, cutie?"

He almost visibly gags but hides it with a small grin. He fixes the hat on his head backwards and takes a sip of his own water bottle. "I would just like a small bacon-cheese burger." he says and she nods. She finally walks away and Parker lets out a breath she's been holding.

"I wanted to fucking punch her in the face!" she whispers loudly and we all collectively agree.

Ty shakes his hand on a napkin. "I'm fucking scared, I might as well piss my pants like back then." We all laugh and Cameron shakes her head disappointingly.

"Her split ends really did get into my eye!"

Everyone chuckles and my phone begins to ring. I flip it over to see Kaydon's facetime notification and I immediately smile. I slide to the right to answer and his adorable face pops up on the screen. He has his phone propped up on something and he's sitting at his desk with glasses on and a black hoodie. I can see him typing away at his laptop.

"Hey, Kay! What's up?" I ask and everyone turns their attention to my phone as I hold him up for everyone to greet.

"Hey guys." he says and I pan the phone around to them.

"Kaydon, man! How is it back there?" Ty asks and we hear him exhale deeply. I imagine it's been hard for him to go to all of these meetings and my heart aches for him.

"It sucks man. He's making me write this football entry thing- I don't even know what I'm typing!" he slams shut his laptop and I feel his frustration through the screen. Cameron pouts sympathetically. "Do you need help?"

He shakes his head. "No, I'm good. I'll be fine," he leans closer to the camera and gives us his usual sly smirk. "What are you guys doing today?"

Before we could respond we hear his door open and his expression changed again. It's like a whole 180 change. That glint in his eyes that were once joyous and excited are now full of anger and regret. Again, that aching feeling in my heart is getting more and more present for him.

"Sorry, I gotta go." he says and we all nod slowly.

"See you later, Kay." I say quietly and he gives me a soft smile with that boyish look on his face like he always does with me.

"See you, Si." then he hangs up. I put my phone back down in the table and I meet the eyes of all of them staring at me with smirks on their stupid little lips.

I sigh, rubbing my temples. "Guys-"

"You guys say see you later instead of goodbye?! That's fucking adorable!" Cameron squeals.

Parker rubs my shoulder, "I saw that cute little smile he gave you!"

Blake and Ty do kissy faces and I throw my crumpled up napkin at them causing them to laugh even louder. I'm pretty sure my cheeks are hot pink by now and they're hot as hell. I flip them all off and Blake does a finger heart in response. Our joy dies down as Cindy comes back with our order.

The boys' dishes were carefully placed on the table while the girls' were just slid towards us. I got Parker's order instead, Cameron got mine, and Parker got Cameron's because of that. Parker rolls her eyes at Cindy.

"If you guys need anything please ask me!" she says mostly towards the guys and gives them a wink. Before she could walk away, Blake calls for her.

She turns around with a mischievous shimmer in her eyes that Blake obviously sees, almost gagging. "Yes?" she asks sweetly. Her very badly dyed blonde hair whacks Cameron again in the face as the three of us trade our dishes.

This fucking bitch.

Blake clears his throat, pointing to her roots which were not colored correctly and grown out. "Have you been to the hairdressers lately?" Ty spits out his drink as Parker lets out a hoot of laughter. Cam and I hide our bottom halves of our faces as we laugh silently.

She glared at us and touches the top of her head. "No, does it look bad?" she rambles, trying to fix it and Blake does a nervous face and an overdramatic, uh, face.

"Do you want me to be honest?" he shrugs his shoulders and Parker snorts.

"He also doesn't like your flirting." she coughs and Cindy shoots her a mean glare. Ty nodded towards Parker.

"She's not wrong."

Cindy scoffs and rolls her eyes at us. "Whatever. You all are so fucking rude anyway!" Parker starts laughing and I put a hand on her arm to make sure she knows what she's saying before she speaks. She oats it, letting my know she's controlling herself.

"You threw straws at us and flipped 6 nasty, greasy hair at her face! You also proceeded to flirt with our friends here who are actually taken." the last part Blake shoots Parker with wide eyes and Ty tries to look not surprised.

Good thing Cindy was fed up at this point and she storms away. We all let out a breath and started laughing uncontrollably at the situation.

"Blake you really called her out with the roots?" I ask and he grins while stealing a fry from Ty.

"Well yeah! Come on, those are noticeable from 20 miles away, goddamn." he says and Ty nods.

We all just eat and made small talk for the rest of the time and in that moment I felt good about everything for once. In front me felt empty, like someone was missing and it was present. Now I feel confident and determined to win that fucking game. We're going to do it for Kaydon. I miss him so fucking much, goddamn it.

We're gonna win this for him. He'll be there to see it. I'm hoping he will be, or that'll be embarrassing.

Oh god, I don't think I feel so confident anymore.

**

a/n

unedited like no joke SO MANY MISTAKES.

words: 3069

ENJOY THIS LITTLE FILLER. im so excited for the next chapters I CANNOT WAIT! again those will take a while.

LOVE YOU.

-s