Rookie Mistake
I thought I saw her there, but I wasn’t sure. But now that I am pulling up to my building, I see that it is indeed a real thing. Her Honda Civic is parked in the visitors parking at the front of the building. I take a deep breath before flashing my lights twice. She gets in my car, and I drive into the parking garage. Neither of us says anything until we enter my condo.
“You want something to drink?”
“Water if you have it.” She looks around my place. I’m not sure what she’s expecting to see. Nothing has really changed since she gave back the keys five months ago.
“The kitchen is in the same place. You can grab it yourself. I’m gonna put my bags up.”
I take my time putting my gear away. I hear her moving around the kitchen. It’s weird having her here. Familiar, but still different, I guess. I hate to admit it, but I’ve been hoping that she would come back. Maybe tonight is the start of that. I head back into the living room and I see that she’s taken a seat on the couch. She’s sitting with one leg curled underneath her. The sight looks familiar. Right.
“I’m surprised that you're still in town. Don’t you have class tomorrow?”
“I don’t have any classes on Monday, so I’m actually flying back tomorrow afternoon.”
“And you chose to spend your last night of Spring Break in town at a basketball game?”
“Playoff game,” she said with a smile.
“My dad invited me to stay and watch the game and I am glad that I did. You looked great out there.”
Even after everything that went on between us, I still leave two tickets for her dad in case he ever wants to catch a game. I've seen him a few times.
“Just doing what I do.”
“I actually forgot how well you do it.”
“Is that right?"
“Yeah.”
“You know I saw you, but I wasn’t sure if it was you. When coach pulled me after that third foul and I was walking to the bench, I thought I saw you.”
“I didn’t even see you glance my way.”
“I thought I was tripping, so I didn’t look that way for the rest of the night.”
“But you played like you knew I was watching,” she said with a smirk.
“You dropped fifty tonight! That’s major, Antonio.”
I couldn’t fight the smile on my face. We got the win and my girl was there to see it. Starting to feel like old times.
I stood up from the couch and winced a little as pain began to move through my legs. They were still a little tight from the game, but I guess with all the adrenaline I wasn’t paying much attention to it.
“You okay?” She looked concerned.
“Yeah, I’m good. Muscles are a little sore that’s all. Didn’t really want to take an ice bath after the game. Fifty points is hard work.”
She patted the couch cushion.
“Sit back down.”
When I did, she grabbed my leg and pulled it across her lap. She started to massage my calf muscle. She worked her way from my calves to my lower thigh. I was trying to be cool. There wasn’t anything sexual about it, but I have seen her naked so, it was kind of hard
not to imagine…
Her hands continued to travel a little higher and then drift towards the part of me that I was trying to keep under control. She brushed her hand over it, causing me to tense up a little, then reached for my other thigh and started to massage it. The smirk on her face told me that she knew what I was thinking.
“Why are you being weird?” She smiled, teasing me.
“I’m not being weird. You’re being weird.”
“Feeling better?”
“Much.” I flinched and grabbed her hand when she hit a particularly sore spot. There was a nice sized bruise there. She stopped for a second and then brushed her lips across the spot on my leg. The action felt familiar. Right. I leaned forward and tilted her chin up to look at me and I kissed her. I kissed her like I never wanted to let her go. And deep down, I didn’t.
When we finally broke apart for air, she looked me in the eyes and asked one question.
“Where’s Nico?”
It made me laugh. She was always weird about having sex with him in the house. Like he was going to walk in on us and be scarred for life.
“He and Tyrus have a research project due in the morning, so he went over there after the game to finish it.”
I looked at her lips and then back into her eyes. I stood from the couch and reached for her hand, leading her to my bedroom.
“How are your legs?”
“I’ll let you tell me afterwards.”
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The next morning, I rolled over and woke up to an empty bed. My place was quiet. Too quiet. Like empty quiet. I didn’t hear the shower running and I didn’t smell any bacon frying.
I walked around and found that my condo was completely empty. It’s like she was never even here. The glass that she used last night had been cleaned and placed beside the sink. She was definitely here. She said she was leaving later this afternoon, so there wasn’t a need for her to rush out of here. I went in search of my cell phone because I wanted some answers.
I found it between the sofa cushions. Before I could get to my text messages, there was a knock at my door. Maybe she went to get breakfast, I thought to myself. But when I opened it, it wasn’t Eva on the other side. It was Dani.
“Hey, handsome.” She leaned in and pecked me on the cheek.
“Did we have plans today?”
“Nothing major. I just thought since I wasn’t able to make it to the game last night, we could have a celebratory breakfast this morning.” It was then that I noticed she was holding a large, insulated food bag.
“I texted you after the game. And I sent you another one on my way over.”
I looked down at my phone. Sure enough, there was a text from Dani about breakfast. Then a text from me confirming and telling her to hit me up in the morning. Followed by another this morning saying she’d be at my place in an hour.
“I thought we were going to meet up some place.” I lied. Whenever she had the opportunity to actually cook for me, she did. We rarely went to restaurants. We hadn’t seen each other in a few weeks because we were grinding out the last few games of the season and her food truck was keeping her busy. So, she never really stressed me about us not spending a lot of time together. I took the bag from her and brought it into the kitchen.
While she was setting the table, I decided to go in my room and make a quick call. The phone rang twice and went to voicemail. Eva was ignoring my calls. I tried again. Two rings. Voicemail. Then I got a text notification.
Last night was fun, but it looks like you had plans for this morning.
I’ve gotta change the lock code on my phone from her birthday.