And glutton for punishment that I was, I’d taken to reading what the fine people of the internet had to say.
I shouldn’t have been looking. I knew it was going to be bad. I knew nothing good could come from seeing what people had to say on the internet. It was bound to hurt. I was only going to want to snap necks of anyone who said anything about Violet, and want to puke at the people calling to snap my neck.
I loved to pretend I was above it, that the criticism fueled me. That was one giant lie. When it was directed at me, it wasn’t as bad. But when I let my team down, especially if people shat on my team because of something I did, I was a mess.
“Don’t read that shit.” The washed-up former captain himself slumped down in the seat next to me, and yanked my phone out of my hand.
“I’m not,” I lied.
“It’s just a bunch of keyboard warriors with nothing better to do,” Sorrento said, going to the account and unfollowing it for me. “You’re welcome.”
“Hey,” I whined, snatching my phone back from him.
“Trust me, the less you read that, the better our team will be.”
“But what if they’re right?”
“So what if they are?” he shrugged.
“I mean, they’re the people who fill the seats. They have a right to be upset with me. I feel like I should say something.”
“What? Fuck no, you shouldn’t. Gimme that.” He reached for my phone again.
“Cap, everyone’s waiting for you to make an apology tour,” Royce said.
“Yeah. The people won’t rest until they have an explanation for your egregious behavior,” Owen tried.
I flipped my hand over like a maestro as the “shut up, rookie” chorus broke out around us.
“What you did wasn’t that bad,” our alternate captain Korowski said. “But I hope she’s worth it.”
Sorrento looked at me with a grimace. “How’s that going?”
“Good. Why would it be bad?”
He shrugged. “I mean, you’re not very happy since all this happened.”
In truth, it was everything. The pressure of being captain of a losing team. The losing itself. The negative media attention. And the fact that Violet wasn’t really mine to have. That we hadn’t kissed before I left. But she did show up at the airport to say goodbye, to check on me.
But no kiss, and she still wasn’t really mine.
The others had moved on to ribbing someone else, probably Owen or Royce. Sorrento’s focus stayed on me. “You know you can tell me anything, right, man? Whatever you’re going through, I’ve probably gone through it.”
He might have been right, but jealousy still reared its ugly head. When he was captain, he had a wife and kids. A beautiful family.
All I had was a fake girlfriend and the feeling like I wasn’t good enough, no matter what I did.
But I forced a smile. “Appreciate it.”
Then came the ultimate blow: my phone ringing with my dad on the caller ID.
“Hi.”Violet’s warm voice came from my phone screen. “How are you?”
It wasn’t a casual “how are you” where you don’t really want the answer. Violet was worried about me.
“I’m okay,” I said, knowing that okay meant anything but. I sat back on my hotel bed and kicked my legs up, crossing them at the ankle.
She puffed her lip out, eyes flicking over the screen. “You don’t sound okay.”
