And it’s so condescending that I’m stunned.
The way he’s crooking his finger at me. Like he’s really a soccer superstar – which he is – and I’m really his overeager groupie he can just order around by simple gestures.
Okay so, I might as well be. A groupie, I mean.
But still.
He doesn’t know that.
But that’s not the end of it.
When I don’t move, he even arches his eyebrows at me, all arrogant and superior, before saying my name again in a voice that promises retribution. “Salem.”
And like the stupid, idiotic, lovestruck girl that I am, I move.
Because he called out my name.
He didn’t just call it out, Isawhim call it out. I saw his tongue peek out at the ‘le’ of it, wedged between his teeth. I saw him hiss a little bit too, at ‘Sa.’
Which is nothing new because I see it all the time when people say my name.
But I’ve never seen it fromhim.
Just like I’ve never said his name out loud in public, he’s never said my name either. At least, in front of me.
So really, it’s his fault that he’s making me do this.
That he’s making me forget my indignation – righteous indignation – and walk across the field to get to him.
“Arrow,” I say when I reach him and flinch.
Damn it.
It just slipped out and at the worst time, no less. Almost the whole school is watching. I think I heard them gasp again.
But Arrow has no reaction to it whatsoever.
“How long have you been playing soccer?” he asks in a soft voice, studying my panting, sweaty form.
I blink up at him as I answer, “Since I was like, seven or eight.”
“So you know the game pretty well, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“What position do you play again?”
“Wide midfielder.”
“And what does a wide midfielder do?”
He asks the question as if he’s asking a child and it makes me feel both embarrassed and angry.
But I can’t do anything about it, can I?
He’s my coach and I’ve already slipped up twice today.
I open my mouth to answer but I’m too late because he speaks again. This time loudly as if addressing the whole crowd but still keeping his blazing eyes on me.
