Chapter Nine: "Adult-Napper."

"YOU OKAY?" YASMEEN asked as she came in from the kitchen to the living room, her bag over her shoulder telling me she was about to leave for class. Jaime sat next to me on the couch, her eyes skimming words in a textbook. We'd been seated here for almost two hours doing our work. 

But why were Yasmeen's eyes only on me when she asked that question?

"Yes," I said tentatively. "Why?"

"You've been a little bit..." Yasmeen shrugged once she came into my focus, extending the Tupperware filled with carrots in her hand. She gestured for me to take one. I took a carrot as she continued, "on edge. Since I saw you come into the house this morning."

"I had a tough practice," I said, chewing on the carrot as she offered the little tub to Jay. Jay took it without breaking her concentration from her book.  

"You sure?" Yasmeen asked again as she put the carrots into her bag. 

I nodded. She didn't press any further, meaning that she wasn't going to think about it anymore. If Yas thought something was wrong, she would have asked me about the situation until I said what was wrong. To be honest, she might have missed her class for me. 

Yet when Yasmeen bid us goodbye, Jaime twisted to me, closing her textbook shut. "What's wrong with you?"

Huh? "Nothing," I said, glancing down at my watch. I needed to meet Liya at the gym soon. "What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing is wrong with me," She narrowed her gaze. "But something is wrong with you. What is it?"

"Nothing is bothering me." 

How tense did I really look anyway? I glanced down at my laptop screen. My assignment had been forgotten about half an hour ago due to online shopping. But online shopping took a pause when I started browsing through Instagram and landed on a page I didn't think I'd ever touch again. 

Benny's. 

Ugh. No wonder Yasmeen and Jay thought something was bothering me. I didn't even get here intentionally. I was looking through my feed. Then looking at my feed led to me on the search bar...of my burner account. This led me to look through a specific Marvel fan's account that was public until I started looking through his tags. And as I looked through his tags, I found multiple images and suddenly I was scowling looking through Benny's pictures. 

While looking at his account, I realized three things. One: their hockey team didn't make it to the quarter-finals of playoffs last year (Karma.). Two: he still couldn't take pictures to save his life. Three: Ashley was nowhere to be found on his account. 

"Are you sure?" Jaime asked, pulling me back to attention on her. 

I closed my laptop. No Benny. No Ashley. Apparently, no public Benny and Ashley either. "I'm sure."

"You certain?"

I patted her on the head to which she feigned a scowl as she batted my hand away, "I'm certain."

The lack of Ashley on his account did not bother me. It confused me only because in that short conversation with her, she made it seem like they were really together. I knew that if they really were together, he would have posted her. But that wasn't something I genuinely cared about. It was the conversation from a few hours ago that bothered me. Slightly.

Not out of jealousy. Fuck Ashley. Fuck Benny or whatever the hell she called him.

Bens. The thought of that nickname made me want to vomit.

I didn't keep up tabs on any of them since second year, blocking them on anything possible, removing their lives from my point of view. They were removed and will stay removed from my point of view and that's all I had wanted. 

But the issue at hand at the moment was that I had been on Benny's account for the first time since I blocked him. This only added to my irritation. I grew more agitated as I opened my laptop back up, blocked him on my burner account, and exited out of the tab. 

Never again. 

If Jaime truly didn't believe me, she didn't show it either. All she did was shrug before I told her I had to go to the gym and made my way upstairs.

But even as Liya and I were doing bench presses in one corner of the gym later that day, the conversation with Ashley, how she thought that what she did was nothing, left a bitter taste in my mouth.

By the time I finished my sets, doing more than I intended, Liya's eyes went wide. Her dark hair was up high in a ponytail and I made a mental note through the misery I was putting myself in to ask her where she bought the leggings she was wearing. "Okay, I wasn't expecting that from you."

Yeah, me neither.

"Are you nervous?" Liya asked me just as I glanced across the room. Stop it. 

I turned my attention back to Liya. Focus on her. On her. "For the tournament?" She nodded. "Um, not really. What about you?"

"Never," She confessed, that blinding smile creeping up once again. It was a big contrast from the girl I had seen earlier this morning who I was told was a little hard on herself. There was such confidence in the way she said 'never'. As if she was saying yes, she was hard on herself during practice but when it came to the game itself, she knew it was her time to shine. It was admirable, I thought. "The first tournament is sometimes the roughest for rookies but I think you'll adapt well."

"I hope so," I said as we shifted to doing dumbbell exercises. I learned a little bit about Liya in the hour we were at the gym. She was born and raised in Richmond Hill, about a half hour from Toronto. Ethnically she was Indian and spoke four languages in total. She played squash since she was a child and when she was made captain, she was completely surprised. While she told me all of this information, even while doing the exercises, she was still grinning.

"You know, you're very..." I trailed off. She was doing it again as I did bicep curls near the Smith machine. Even as she waited for me to finish my set and put down the dumbbell, she was still doing it, "Smiley."

That bright smile dropped at my response and my heart fell with it.

"It's not a bad thing." I quickly assured her. "You have a great smile and it comes with good enthusiasm, especially in the early morning practices. When I met you, your smile was the first thing I noticed, it reminds me of Nikko's. Both of you have contagious smiles and it's just refreshing to see especially considering Rhett is a moody cloud every practice, you know?" I expelled a long breath after that. She knew what I meant, right? "It's not a bad thing at all, Liya." I promised.

The corners of her lips tugged up once again. Relief flooded my system as her eyes shone with gratitude, "Thanks. I might be a bit too much but—"

"You're not," I interjected. Too much? "Who the hell told you that?"

"No one."

That was a lie. Others' perceptions about you when vocalized stayed in your head, whether they were true or not. It didn't mean those perceptions had to stay in your head forever. "Well, put it out," I said, picking up another dumbbell to hand to her. "If I smiled like you, you wouldn't ever catch me frowning for the rest of my life."

There it was. That smile was back on her face. "Thanks, Larine." She commented quietly. "And you're right, you know?"

"About what?"

"Nikko," She said, glancing across the room like I had done had been restraining myself from doing moments before. He was lingering by the leg press machine with a few other members. "His smile is pretty contagious."

I briefly closed my eyes. I did somehow put him in my little speech to her, didn't I? 

Speak of the devil. The man himself noticed us watching him from the other side of the room and came over with that big grin. Dark blue headphones were draped around his neck. His arms were showing through the tank he was wearing along with dark shorts. Involuntarily, I crossed my arms just as he approached us. 

Nikko ruffled Liya's hair. She pushed him away with a light shove before she continued the last of her workout. On the other hand, he walked toward me with open arms. Immediately, I took a step back. "No," I wrinkled my nose on the outside. On the inside, the part of me that had been eyeing him out of the corner of my eye the entire time he had been here was considering it. "I'm not hugging you until you're clean."

Nikko didn't respond to that, taking a seat on the bench I had been previously sitting on. "What are you guys doing today?"

"Arms. Push day," I said, handing him the weight. He picked it up with ease, his muscles beneath his warm skin flexing not to the full extent I've ever seen. He set the weight next to him, glancing up at me. "You?"

"Legs," He stood up, right in front of me, his scent invading. Well, not invading, more like welcoming. Pheromones had to be in effect because why the hell was I considering breathing him in deeper? "Liya's your partner on Mondays?"

"And Thursdays," I said, my voice somehow lower. I took a much-needed step backward, covering up the action by grabbing wipes nearby. 

He didn't seem to notice, "You're here on Wednesday mornings too, right?"

I cocked my head, "Did you do a deep dive into the schedule Coach Rosen posted?" 

"Maybe," He tried to play it off nonchalantly. There was nothing nonchalant about him. "You just got yourself a partner."

"So," I took a deep breath. Whether it was to be dramatic about the sentence I was about to speak or for my sanity at how close he was, I didn't know. "It's bad enough I get you during practices—"

"And Sundays at 2," He added with a pointed finger. "Don't forget Sunday running with me."

"But I also get you during the gym on Mondays and Wednesdays." 

"Hold on. Bad?" He tilted his head. "What? Are you afraid to spend more time with me?"

No. 

Instead of answering his question, I realized Liya had finished her last set. "Hey Liya, do you need a ride home?"

She shook her head, taking a swig of her water, "I'm going to head to the library but thanks!"

I dipped my head, turning my attention back to the guy...who seemed to be waiting for me to ask him the same question. More time with him?

I wiped down the dumbbells as Liya waited for me. Nikko watched me in silence and when I was done, I said, "I'll be at the doors in twenty minutes. If you're not there, I'm leaving without you."

The corners of his lips rose upward. It was too easy for me to do the same before I walked off with Liya.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As I drove to Nikko's house, I realized he was restless. I realized sometimes he needed to be doing something or else he would malfunction.  

His eyes darted across the scenery. They focused on the music coming from the radio as his fingers flipped between stations. He asked if he could push the seat back to stretch his legs (he pulled a muscle somehow earlier in the morning). 

He fiddled. He shifted. He adjusted. However, it was only when we were close to his house that he seemed to settle. He was quiet when it seemed he had decided to ask the question he truly wanted to ask since he had stepped into the car with me. "Are you okay?"

I rolled to a slow stop at a stop sign, glancing at him before checking the road, "Why?"

"You seem...I don't know, tense."

I pressed the gas pedal with a little more pressure than I intended, the car bucking before I grabbed a hold of myself. "I'm not tense."

"You sure?"

"I've been asked 'you sure', about ten million times today," I muttered. "I'm getting sick of that question."

"Because everyone can tell something is bothering you." 

"Nothing is bothering me."

"How many times did you say that today, you liar?" He asked. His eyes didn't waver from me as I focused on the road. If he continued to do that, I was going to accidentally bump into the curb. "You were fine during practice so whatever happened occurred after, right?"

I didn't respond to him as I entered his neighborhood. Yet the familiarity of it all only had me grip the steering wheel harder than I already was. How many times did I pass by here, looking out the window through an Uber. How many times was it during the day during a day party and again by a night party?

The memories could be replaced by new ones but the memories I had right now only made me think of what had happened earlier today.

Well, if Nikko wanted to hear it, he'd hear it, I decided.

As we approached his house, Nikko shifted next to me, reaching for his duffle bag lying on the floor of the backseats, ready to start making his way out.

I kept driving.

Nikko glanced over at his house speeding by the distance, glancing at me with a raised eyebrow, "Are you going to tell me?"

"I'm going to keep driving."

He scoffed, "I can't believe you're holding me hostage."

"I am not," I said, circling his block.

"Well, if you're holding me hostage, can we go through a drive-thru?"

"What are you craving?"

"Donut."

I pulled into a car line at TimHortons. We were seated in silence behind multiple cars, the only sound between the two of us coming from some pop song on the radio. Nikko turned off the radio, the action's silence somehow loud at the same time. "You're going to tell me."

"I didn't say that."

"You wouldn't have held me hostage in your car if you didn't."

"You realize your side of the door is unlocked," I murmured. "You can jump out if you want to."

He didn't.

When we ordered what we wanted I got myself a lemonade while Nikko got a Boston cream donut and a package of 20 different assorted Timbits, bite-sized donut balls. I didn't question the Timbits as I pulled to a stop behind a car, trapped between another behind us.

"I saw Ashley."

He didn't change his expression, "You haven't seen her since..."

I shook my head, keeping my eyes up ahead as the person two cars down reached out with their hands to fetch their order. Jesus, the person in front had ordered the entire world. "Since the day Benny and I broke up."

When we pulled up to the first window to pay, I had my debit card ready when the cashier handed me the machine to pay but with a tap, Nikko beat me to it with his own card. He waved a hand before I had time to protest, "Did she say something?"

I handed the machine back, "She made it seem like what happened was something I should just get over."

Nikko blinked, "She's kidding."

"No," I rolled my eyes, moving up to the next window to grab our orders, "She was like 'how long are you going to hold onto this for' like she had stolen my favorite toy or something."

I muttered 'delusional' under my breath and Nikko snorted, biting into his Boston cream donut as I started driving back to his neighborhood. "Was it just her?"

"Rachel too."

"Rachel?" Nikko sighed, "She follows her around like a minion."

Tell me about it. "You know sometimes with Ashley, Rachel forgets her entire identity," The memories kept rolling in my head, playing like a YouTube compilation. "Ashley got a haircut? Rachel gets a haircut too at the same place. Ashley got her nails done? Rachel gets her nails done the next day. It was suffocating to watch that on a daily basis. And then Ashley," I let out a long groan without thinking. "I can't stand her."

"Larine—"

"Nikko, I can't," I rolled to a stop by the side of his house, my head now on the steering wheel. "She was like 'you can't be nasty that we're together'—Newsflash: I don't care! I'm nasty because suddenly you're acting like you've got amnesia."

I leaned back in my seat, my hands now gripping the steering wheel. "You know what? I can be nasty. I should have been nastier to her. I could be nastier to her--I didn't even swear at her. I should have given her a piece of my mind, for fuck's sake. And she called him Bens. Bens? Nikko, that is the worst nickname I have ever heard in my entire life. I almost said 'ew' to her face." I let out a sharp exhale. "I think the worst part about today is that I went through his account which is something I have never planned on doing and me doing that made me more pissed at myself than I was towards either of them. So, to answer everyone's question for me today: yes, I was lying and yes something was bothering me. Everything I said in the past few minutes was what was bothering me." 

At the last word, I hung my head against the steering wheel of my car. If I held a hand to my heart it would have been beating rapidly beneath my palm. If I held a hand to my face, I would have felt the warmth that surely would have been accompanied by a flush from anger. 

Shit, I didn't think I was going to blow up over that. 

The anger that was bright moments ago slowly dissipated with each passing second and each passing deep breath as I tried to compose myself. 

Suddenly with my head hung over and my eyes down on my lap, a hand came out. A birthday cake Timbit was in its palm. I stared at it for a moment, in the midst of my rant, I hadn't even bothered looking at Nikko. I didn't bother seeing what the hell he thought of me but at the end of it all, he didn't say anything. Instead, he was offering me...a Timbit.

When I peered over at him, he wasn't smiling. He wasn't frowning. He was waiting. There was no judgment in his eyes. Only a man who tilted his chin in the direction of his hand for me to take the Timbit. I did as he asked, plopping it in my mouth as my heart rate went down and my adrenaline went down with it.

We sat in silence for the next few minutes. The only sound came from the birds chirping outside the window as I surveyed the neighborhood. One car passed by. There was a tree in his front yard, another car parked in the driveway, and a bike hooked up to the railing of the step at the front.

Next to me, Nikko took another bite of his Boston cream and my expression wasn't hidden because suddenly he laughed, "What? You hate Boston cream?"

"That is the worst donut they have."

Nikko shook his head, wiping his mouth with one of the napkins in his bag. "So, you're a kidnapper—"

"You are not a kid."

"An adult-napper and a hater." He tsked. "It's not a good time to be you."

He finished the donut, unbuckling his seatbelt but not getting out. He twisted, adjusting himself so the back of his head rested against the window and his body was in my direction, "They're dating today but they'll have broken up next week."

Huh? "What?"

"They've been on and off apparently," Nikko explained. "Mars' on the hockey team with Benny, remember? He's been leading Ashley on for far too long."

"Really?"

Nikko appeared thoughtful. "It's kinda sad but then I'll remember what they did to you and I don't care anymore."

I couldn't bite back the smile that was brought to my face. Nikko even reciprocated it, biting into his donut, "Are we...bad people for saying stuff like that?"

He shook his head, "Not at all. But you said you looked through his account. Are you..." 

"Into Benny? No. God, no," I rubbed my eyes. The very idea of that was starting to bring on a dull headache. "Believe it or not the whole thing with Ashley did me a favor."

"You were going to end it?" He asked quietly. "Back then?"

I would have done a million things differently back then, I wanted to admit. I would have wished I took back the first time I had ever met Benny back. But that day was also the same day I met Nikko.

I had been blindsided and regretted it ever since.

"I wanted to," I confessed. I wanted to do a lot of things. But would I have done it myself? Spoke up and changed something? Or would I have continued to go along being dragged to places I didn't want to go to? Be surrounded by people I didn't want to be surrounded by to please my partner every time?

"I don't know if I would have gone through with it." I ended up saying.

If Nikko wanted to say anything more, he didn't pressure me into it. So at 2:45 on that Monday we sat in silence in front of his house with the large trees and memories I was fond of and memories I ached could be repressed for the rest of my life.

The silence was broken when someone suddenly pulled into the driveway from behind where we were parked. Victor, one of Nikko's roommates, got out of the car, lugging a duffle bag out with him. He caught sight of us and approached with a wide smile. Nikko rolled down the window, handing him the box of Timbits. Victor's brown eyes went wide as he reached in, pulling out five squished Timbits and plopping three of them into his mouth at once. He poked his head into the car, eyes wide at the sight of me, "Larine?"

"Hi."

Victor's eyebrows creased, eyes darting between me and Nikko before he swallowed, "Hi! It's been a long time."

"Yup." I gave him a tight-lipped smile. Jesus, how much more awkward was I going to make this by staring at him when he was the one who had his head inside my car, sprinkling Timbit crumbs onto the floor of the car?

Nikko broke the momentary silence with a clap of his hand, "Victor move. L, stop being awkward."

Why did he— I nudged Nikko with my elbow as he grinned at me, "To be fair, you were."

Victor stuck his head back into the car, "You were." He concurred. 

"I didn't know what else to say!" I exclaimed. 

Victor just gave me a sheepish smile, digging his hands into the Timbits box once again before he patted the side of the car. "It was good seeing you, Larine."

"You too." I squeaked, glancing over at Nikko who had yet to make the move to leave the car. "I'm not holding you hostage anymore."

"So, you admit you were holding me hostage in the first place."

"Goodbye, Nikko." I said dryly. 

He stared at me for a beat longer. I was beginning to think I had something on my face. "What?"

Nikko moved his duffle bag to his feet before stretching his body across the console between the two of us.  My eyes went wide over his shoulder as I breathed him in. The science of pheromones was right. The scent of him, clean, body wash, and Nikko filled my senses even after he pulled away. "You said I couldn't hug you until I was clean. I took a fast shower at the gym." 

He didn't say anything more. Nikko took my hand once, placing another Timbit on there before he hopped out of the car, taking his bubbly self, his duffle bag, and everything about him away from my presence.