Max's P.O.V.
Joy fluttered, and this time, I let it flutter…when I saw Nick.
He entered the gym with his usual powerful stance. He sat behind me giving me a small smile. A lot of guys and girls came around both of us; I guess he already made a lot of friends.
But once again, he looked uncomfortable. Once again, his eyes didn't cease to scan the room, and once again, he looked claustrophobic. I fought the urge to ask him why. It was a perfectly decent gym.
"Nick, you want to be in our basketball team?" Tim asked. Tim was a pretty nice guy; he was also our basketball guy. He rocked at basketball; unfortunately, I was never on his team.
I turned around and smiled at Nick wondering what he would say. But his face was unreadable, he looked confused. What was so confusing about someone asking you about basketball?
"Um…sure," he said. "But I've never played in a team," he quickly added. A girl named Lina, that stupid, annoying Lina had to butt in.
"I really hope you're in my team, Nick," she literally clung to him like…like…grape vines, or whatever.
I rolled my eyes and stared forward to the coaches. Nick must have seen me or something because he laughed uneasily with some forced chuckles. Never a full smile. Never a full laugh.
"Okay, we're going to start with basketball this week. Next week, we're doing soccer," there were some groans and 'yeah!'s as the coach said this. I remained impassive.
"Let's see…" we were then all divided into teams one by one, and guess where I ended up?
No, I didn't end up in a happily ever place where my dream guy always defended our goal for me, by catching me when I fall…
Instead, I ended up in the opposite team of Nick.
It was pretty funny.
Nick apparently, didn't know the rules at all. But his physical sense and his quick learning skills, got him to win for his team by so many goals, I couldn't count.
"You suck at basketball," he commented me as we walked out of gym, him being all sweaty, me being all pouty because I didn't get a chance at all to touch the ball.
I ignored him, giving him an incentive to talk to me again.
"Well, it's the truth. Did you see yourself?" he asked keeping up pace with me as I pretended to walk away from him.
"Come on, seriously, if you come over to my house sometime, I can teach you," he stated matter of factly. I wanted to believe this so much. I wanted to believe that he was asking me out.
But he wasn't. He said it so light heartedly that it was close to a joke.
"Where do you live?" I blurted out without thinking. It was so easy to talk to him, he gave people ease.
Forget about ease. He suddenly went rigid as my stupid locker, as were standing in front of it right now. I looked up at him to see his eyes gazing into an unknown twilight zone.
What was happening to him? Had I gone past a carefully composed line where I asked something too private? I didn't want to lose the moment we had right now. He completely ignored me. His jaws clenched together and his eyes were scanning for something. Then his eyes came up on my figure before I could say anything else.
I felt uncomfortable under his pressuring gaze up and down my body.
"Nick?" my voice crumpled a little bit. I was a total wimp.
"Fine, ignore me. What class do you have next?" I asked quickly trying to avoid this subject.
"I have English," he managed to say through his tightly set teeth. I let out a sigh of relief to know he hadn't died frozen like that.
The rest of the way, I thought of my questions carefully and managed to not freeze him again.
People stared at us in the hallway as we walked together side by side. I even saw Johnny…flirting with Hannah. Oh what the heck.
We had a lot to talk about. And somehow, we'd arrived on the topic…my least favorite topic.
"You've never gone out with anyone? Never?" he found it hard to believe.
"Yes, is that a problem?" I asked with a small grin appearing on my face.
"Hard to believe," he said. I also realized he spoke little as possible or none at all. He was a barren shield, a wall made out of bricks, hard to get through.
"Have you?" I asked. It was private, but not as.
"No," he said immediately, a little too immediately.
"I find that hard to believe." I used his previous words. "I mean, my friend Hannah is in love with you. All the girls are…" I trailed off not wanting to make the point into such priority.
"Oh really?" he seemed to have recovered himself from before. Was that a smile? "I dare you to go out with someone," he said suddenly. Hmm…he was getting difficult.
"Why?" I asked. I thought that would catch him, but he answered back as if having had this all written down.
"Because, you need a life," he said. Oh no he didn't. What did he know?
"A life? I already have a life, thank you very much. Plus, I'm already going to the beach party next week." I stated without thinking…again. But I was, now.
His dark eyebrows rose as he looked incredulously at me.
"You?"
"Why? Is that hard to believe?" I asked.
He laughed easily.
"No, you are that type." He had said that on purpose to get me mad, and I wasn't going to fall for it. Instead, I went on a different battle tactic.
"What about you?" I asked.
"I just arrived here though," he retorted. I scoffed dramatically.
"You need a life," I said.