Alex's POV:

I came home after leaving Rosie at her place. Dylan was watching a basketball game. He was stepping up this year. It showed his intentions of wanting to make it pro. However, that didn't stop me from being pissed at him. "What gave him the right to lash out at Rosie? She was just trying to help," I thought to myself, knowing I needed to talk with him about it.

I knew that it was a little bit shady of me to just go missing for a day and not show up to practice, but I needed that. Somehow, I thought that I needed to know who was on my side and who gave zero fucks about me, before the game on Saturday. Like that could change everything like it would make me more secure in my decision to continue playing. It was a weird feeling seeing that only Rosie came to check on me. My mind couldn't wrap around the fact that there wasn't anybody behind me, backing me up. Half a year earlier Matty would have come after me and he would have helped me regulate my temper. Dylan called me, yes I had a few unanswered voice messages from him, but that was it.

And even Dylan had his motives for wanting me to get better. He wanted to make it pro, I understood that and I respected it. I haven't seen him playing this hard since our first year together and I was proud of how he developed as a player. However, sometimes he forgot about the team spirit. I guess I couldn't rely on anybody anymore, just myself. It became my priority to get better, this time only for myself. And in the process, I knew everyone else would have gained something from it. Dylan would gain better chances to play and the team would gain another year of wins. But the question of what would I have gained still lingered in my mind.

I knew from the beginning that I had to give my all to this team and the people in it. And so I did, I gave them my all until there was nothing else to give. And once I was an empty bag I became expendable to them.

"Hey, glad you came back, you know we can't win without you," Dylan acknowledged my entrance as I made my way towards the kitchen for a glass of water.

"What was that? You disrespecting Rosie?" I got straight to the point.

"What do you mean?" he averted his eyes looking back at the game playing on the TV screen in front of him.

"You know exactly what I am talking about. Rosie told me everything," I was lying, she didn't tell me everything. Just barely enough for me to put the puzzle pieces together. However, from what I have gathered I knew that I wouldn't let Dylan talk to her like that.

He exhaled, "Okay fine, I might have asked her harshly what had she done with you because from what I can see, she didn't help you."

"How would you know that?" I fired back. I was done with Dylan and the rest of the team using me for their gain.

"I haven't seen a difference," Dylan ruffled his hair, "you still play, but you are absent-minded and that attitude in the last practice didn't do you any good."

"The coach was getting on my nerves. I was tired and I heard Matty talking to Laura before practice. It threw me off," I saw no point in hiding it from him.

Dylan sighed, "You have to get over her, man. She wasn't good for you then and she isn't good for you now."

I laughed, but my heart broke at the thought of her, "I know that. But I had known her since we were six. I knew that one day I was supposed to marry that girl."

The silence filled the room, I was never this honest with Dylan, not in all the years I have known him. He was the honest one in our friendship and I was the careless one. But that has begun to change in the past month.

"Look, I know we might've put too much pressure on you for the game or lack of it you have been showing for the past month. But it's not just you and your future on that team we are talking about here. My scholarship and half of the team count on you and your clear head this season," he slowly and carefully filled the silence.

I nodded. I could understand him, but I had to figure some things out. I knew that much. And after all, I didn't want Rosie to be dragged into this. I might have liked her too much for this messy world of mine to swallow her. I might have begun to like her a little bit too much for her to even help me. "We should keep our relationship strictly professional, friends at most," I thought to myself.

"I get it, so here's the deal," I proposed, "I will have a clear head this season, however, you keep Rosie out of it. No more lashing out at her. I don't care what your friendship looks like and what she puts up with from your side. I won't, for her sake."

I could still see the slight fear and disappointment in her eyes as she was talking on the phone with Dylan in my car earlier. Her blue eyes were usually curious about the world. However, at that moment they were laced with worry about others.

Dylan stood up and offered me his hand across the kitchen counter, "As long as you start acting like the team captain again, you've got yourself a deal."

I shook it, I wasn't going to lose another person who just came into my life.

"Okay I will release her of her duties as your babysitter," Dylan joked and somehow his joke didn't seem to make me laugh anymore.

"She isn't my babysitter," I remarked taking a glass of water. "Although I wouldn't mind it if that meant I would spend more time with her," I thought to myself.