“I considered bailing, but here I am,” I laughed nervously. He laughed, too.
“Let’s go. After you.”
I walked slightly past him as he caught up to walk by my side. As we headed through the courtyard, some people had already gotten their food and were sitting around the prominent stone fountain. They watched as we passed, probably assuming that we had just arrived at the same time and nothing more. He grabbed the door and held it open for me. How chivalrous.
“So what’s your go-to in this fine establishment?” he asked, trying to be funny.
“I usually just make a salad, everything else is disgusting,” I said, and then headed for the salad bar.
“Alright, cool. I’ll meet up with you as soon as I grab food.”
I headed to the salad bar and made my usual. When I was finished, I looked across the cafeteria to see Chris talking to his soccer teammates and motioning in my direction. They all looked at me, smiled, and walked over to me. Oh God.
“Hey, Allie, so it looks like you found Chris from the other day?” said the guy that I ran into outside the locker room.
“Clearly. Thanks,” I said as I looked at Chris, who looked back at me, confused. “It’s nothing. Where are we sitting?”
“Aren’t we sitting outside?” another teammate asked Chris. It was Griffin, who was looking back and forth between us, sizing up the situation.
“You go ahead,” said Chris. “I’m going to sit with Allie today.”
They all raised eyebrows and made kissy faces at him. “Knock it off,” he said to them.
Great. Super love that.
“Don’t worry about them, they’re idiots,” he said, as he sat down and immediately took a big bite of his food.
I sat down across from him, facing the door, and could see my sister walk in with her posse. When our eyes met, her jaw dropped to see me sitting with Chris. Her group of friends’ eyes were wide, too, and they immediately started talking to one another. I knew they were talking about me. I got quiet and stared in their direction. He noticed my reaction and spun around in his chair.
“What is it?” Then he saw them and spun back around. “Allie, look at me. Ignore them. They’re just jealous. That’s a them problem.”
“I have a bad feeling about this.”
“What?” he said as he took another bite.
“Nothing. Amy’s acting weird.” I said as I shoved a bite of salad into my mouth, but he didn’t seem to hear me.
“So ladylike!” he teased.
“Shut up.”
Just then, Amy’s friend, Brooke, walked by and brushed a hand across the back of Chris’s shoulder.
“Hey, Chris,” she said with too friendly a tone. He looked up.
“Oh. Hey, Brooke,” he said in a way that said he was ready for her to move along.
“Hi, Allie,” she said in a patronizing tone with a quick glance in my direction.
“Bye, Brooke,” he replied on my behalf, then he looked back across the table at me. “What were we talking about?” Then he took another bite of his food and didn’t look at her again. She huffed and walked away.
“What was that?” I asked, pretending not to care.
“I have no idea,” he shrugged.
“Is she an ex-girlfriend?”
“Nope. She’s a soccer groupie.”
