Chapter Text
“Wake up, idiot, we’re going to be late for practice.” Mel does a drive-by wake up by opening Sophie’s door and throwing her cleats onto her stomach. Sophie yelps in pain and scrambles to her feet.
“You’re such an asshole.” She snaps as she rolls out of bed right into her pile of clothes. From there she picks out her Sky Blue practice shirt and rolls it over her head. Mel’s honking her horn by the time she gets everything ready.
Most of the players are already there when they arrive. Sophie hops out of Mel’s car just in time for a ball to come flying at her head. She ducks out of the way and it bounces harmlessly off of the hood of Mel’s car.
“Sorry!” Kelley calls out from across the field where she and Jill stood. Jill had doubled over in laughter.
“They’re idiots.” Mel mutters, gathering up the loose soccer ball and punting it back towards them. Sophie glances at Mel guiltily. They still hadn’t made up from the night before, and she could tell by the way Mel refused to make eye contact that she was still angry.
“Alright ladies, hustle up. I want to make today short, simple and clean.” Jim yells across the field. The players all huddle up to him for the day’s game plan. He quickly outlines a draft line up, with Sophie playing midfield for the pinnies.
“O’Hara,” Jim calls. “You’re on defense on the non-pinnies, but don’t expect to stay there. I want to play you at both defender and forward, see where we can use you.”
“Sure coach.”
Five minutes into their scrimmage, Kelley takes Sophie out with a questionable tackle and they both go tumbling full speed over each other until they settle with Sophie’s legs tangled in Kelley’s. She’s sporting a huge cleat mark on her thigh and Kelley’s got grass and dirt smeared all over her face. She’s never seen Kelley’s freckles up close like this before. They could’ve been specks of dirt and she has an overwhelming urge to run her thumb across Kelley’s cheek just to check.
“So many.” She says absently. Innumerable.
“So many what?” Kelley asks and Sophie shakes her head to clear it.
“Fouls, O’Hara! Come on, clean tackles!” She untangles herself from Kelley and stands, brushing her shirt off even though her shirt is spotless compared to Kelley’s.
“That was clean.” Kelley mutters, wiping her face with her arm. Sophie bites her tongue and chases after the ball. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Mel shaking her head and rolling her eyes at their exchange.
~**~
Sophie doesn’t feel out of practice until lunchtime hits and she can barely get off the ground after another clean tackle from Kelley that ultimately resulted in a goal for the other team. Defeated, she lay on the ground long after the whistle blew until someone blocks the sun from her eyes.
“Come on.” She squints into the light at Mel who has an amused smile on her face. She offers a hand that Sophie takes to help herself back up.
“Are you still mad at me?” She asks as they walk back towards their stuff.
“No.”
“Ok.” Mel puts her arms around Sophie’s shoulders and gives her a little shake.
“Don’t sweat it. We both overreacted last night and besides...” She stops in mid-sentence and when Sophie looks to her to finish it, she grins. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll tell you later.” Confusion had never been Sophie’s strong suit but she lets the topic drop, not willing to start another argument when they’d just gotten over their first as roommates.
“Hey, any chance you guys are going out for lunch?” Kelley yells as she runs towards them. Mel glances over at Sophie with a smile neither of them notice.
“Uh, yeah. We didn’t have time to pack lunch so...” Mel interrupts Sophie by throwing her keys at her.
“Speak for yourself. I got up early and packed my lunch just fine.” She replies with a grin, fishing out a tupperware container of yesterday’s lunch. Sophie’s mouth falls open and she picks up the keys lying on the ground. “Go get food.”
“You mind me tagging along?” She scratches sheepishly at the back of her neck and it’s a look Sophie couldn’t reject even it she wanted to. She far from wants to.
“Yeah sure.” They hop into the car and Sophie chooses wisely not to look back at Mel.
To Kelley’s credit, she doesn’t particularly notice the fact that Mel plays god awful music in the car, or the heavy silence that comes with driving with Sophie. As a quiet person to begin with, she finds it even more difficult to come up with a topic of conversation around someone with whom she’s had limited interaction. Kelley doesn’t say anything either, choosing instead to stick her hand out the door and let the wind carry it up and down.
“I didn’t know you played a forward.” Sophie says when they’re in line to get sandwiches.
“Yup. Played pretty much until I got called up to the US team. But you know, with Alex and Abby, and A-Rod, there wasn’t a lot of room for another forward. So Pia transitioned me to a back position.”
“Do you like it?” They grab their sandwiches and head back to the car.
“It’s not as glamorous.” Kelley admits, ducking her head yet still managing to clip her forehead as she got into the car. “Ow.”
“You ok?” Sophie looks over at her and her hand reaches up to touch the small red patch of irritated skin.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
“You weren’t kidding about being as clumsy as me.” Kelley laughs.
“I have to show you the video of me eating it hard for no reason.” A calming feeling settles into the pit of Sophie’s stomach, like she’d found someone who finally resonated with her at this angle.
“You show me yours and I’ll show you mine.” Kelley waggles her eyebrows.
“Ooo, is that a promise?” Sophie laughs aloud seeing the playful, suggestive look in Kelley’s eyes. Her stomach settles even further and it’s a wonder she has to figure out later, that Kelley was able to put her in such a place where they’d already begun joking around, fake-flirting, and trading banter like they’d been friends all along.
I can just be myself around her. The thought rattles her too, but she tucks it away for further investigation when it’s just her in her dark room, ruminating on the day’s goings-on until exhaustion quiets her mind.
It’s the kind of thing that sticks with her the rest of practice. She doesn’t even mind when Kelley makes another questionable tackle, though this one a lot cleaner than the other, and they both wind up on the ground again.
They laugh this time and Sophie helps Kelley to her feet. Kelley holds onto her for a second longer, and it isn’t until Sophie hears her name being called and turns around that she realizes Kelley was holding it as a means to keep her in place. She loses the ball again, and Kelley takes off across the field. Sophie chases her and the rest of the field drowns out. She ignores Rampone’s call that she’s got Kelley marked, she ignores the screaming from Loyden to give it up. She chases Kelley down as hard as she can and slide tackles.
She’ll say it was from the side, and that Kelley veered off at the last minute. Kelley will say it was illegal and from the back. The whistle agrees with Kelley.
“Sophie, over here now!” Jim calls and Sophie jogs over, feeling very much like the kid in middle school called to the principal’s office. “Look, I know you’re not happy with Kelley, but cool it, you’re on the same team.” Sophie stares blankly at him. Not happy? We were just having fun.
“I’m not...”
“We’re a team, remember?” He places his hand on her shoulder and gives it a gentle shake and a reassuring smile that she read right through. Don’t do it again, we can’t afford to lose Kelley to some grudge, his smile says.
“Sorry, coach.” She bites the inside of her cheek and shuffles back out to the field. Kelley and Mel both give her a confused look. She stiffens her lips, unwilling to meet either of their eyes, and prepares for the free kick.
~**~
“What was that all about?” Mel asks on their drive back to the apartment. Sophie rests her knees on the dashboard, sinking further in her seat.
“He lectured me about taking it easy on Kelley.” She frowns unhappily at the thought.
“I mean, do you have a grudge against her? It didn’t look like you meant to foul her.”
“I didn’t.” And for lack of a better word, “We were just playing.” Mel snickers in the drivers seat.
“Yea, ‘playing.’” She’s really easy to be around. Sophie wants to confide to Mel, but she holds her tongue, at once not willing to give her more fuel for the fire and not sure of what exactly ‘easy to be around’ really means for her.
“Look, Soph, for all the kidding...” Mel begins before cutting herself off abruptly.
“What?”
“Nevermind. I’ll tell you when you’re older.” She winks and Sophie decides she doesn’t quite like Mel holding back on her. Mel spoke her mind; to have her play these cards close to her chest just wasn’t like her.
~**~
She lays in bed, thinking of Kelley’s freckles and the feeling of her cleats sliding on her thigh. She reaches down under the covers and touches the angry, hot scratch that came as a result and hisses in the dark when it stings as expected.
Her phone buzzes and she grapples in the dark for it. Bright on the screen reads a text from Kelley.
Hey, meet at the field in an hour. Sophie looks at the time, 10:33. What on earth was Kelley thinking of doing at the field in the middle of the night. She slides out of bed and creeps over to Mel’s room. She knocks on the door.
“Mel?” No response. “Mel?” The second time she knocks she hears a loud snore in return. Either Mel hadn’t gotten the text, or she was too far gone to care. Sophie glances at the text again and her heart quickens when she thinks maybe she was the only one to have gotten an invite. She tries to reason it out, but nothing can quell the idea that Kelley O’Hara had invited her out late at night just for a personal rendez-vous. She sneaks into the kitchen and scoops up Mel’s car keys.
~**~
The lights are on at the practice field when Sophie draws close and she parks the car. She’s so wrapped up in her own head, she fails to see the other cars parked near her, and fails to make the connection until she sees a group of her teammates gathered. Her shoulders sag in disappointment, but they lift somewhat when Kelley spots her and waves.
“You made it!” She calls out from the bottom of the stadium. Sophie waves, exhaustion making itself known once the idea of a private meeting wears off. Rampone smiles at her.
“Where’s Mel?”
“Asleep. I couldn’t wake her.” More like didn’t want to wake her. The group ooo’s and Sophie has a distinct, thankful feeling for making it out. Rampone flashes her a mischievous grin.
“We’ll deal with her in the morning then.” She says. Sophie hovers towards Kelley.
“So what are we doing here?” She whispers.
“Going for a midnight jog. A solidarity thing. Christie’s big on that stuff.” Kelley replies. Sophie nods in return. “And we get to silly string the people who don’t show up tonight.”
“I totally call Mel.”
Eventually 11:30 rolls around and Christie waits for a few more minutes to pick up any other stragglers. Their group is depressingly, though not surprisingly, small.
“Alright, let’s do this!” Christie shouts and heads off around the Rutgers campus. Sophie feels the wear and tear from the morning’s practice and her cleat mark throbs pleadingly. She bites her tongue and ignores it, though she chooses to linger towards the back of the pack.
Kelley hangs with her, and even though they don’t talk for the two mile run, Sophie can’t help but glance out of the corner of her eye at her jogging partner. She catches glimpses of freckles in the pulse of overhead streetlights.
I’m glad I came.