Page 37 of Offside

Everything just fucking sucked right now.

“Sammy?” my mom asked, poking her head into my room cautiously. “You ready to eat, baby?”

Fuck.

Today was Christmas.

Maybe I’d have known that if I had left my room since my parents got here, but aside from being pried out twice by Ben, my ass was attached to my bed.

My mom tried coming in and asking me what was wrong, but I just kept lying to her about not feeling well. I kind of felt like maybe she knew it was a lie, but that she was giving me enough privacy to not push it–she was always good like that.

Maybe that was where my lack of social skills came from–I never got forced into things by my parents.

“Sure,” I mumbled, sliding out of bed and following her out to the dining room.

I’d at least found enough will to wear the matching pajamas they got me, but that was the extent of my Christmas Spirit.

My dad and brother acted like I was a ghost, shutting up and moving more slowly around me like they were afraid they’d spook me.

Ben had been telling them for the last week how I'd been scurrying to the room every chance I got, which was only proven when they showed up the other day…because I told them I wasn’t coming home for my four-day break for Christmas.

That wasn’t odd–I usually didn’t, if we had away games right after the break.

Though this was the first time they hauled their asses to wherever I was for my break.

“You alright, bud?” my dad asked, making my mom wince at the question.

But I had lies prepared and on deck.

“Yeah, just been a weird week,” I mumbled, shoveling enough mashed potatoes into my mouth to make my mom not question me when I was magically done eating in a few minutes. “My D partner got hurt last week, and they have me with someone new, and it’s not going well–”

“Yeah, Marks–I saw that,” Ben interrupted my lie, paying no mind as he packed his mouth with turkey. “Looked bad, but I saw his mom or some lady that looked like him forcing him to walk around a little bit yesterday, so maybe he’s coming back soon.”

He saw Landon?

I'd ask why he didn’t mention it, but to mention it, I'd have had to come out of my room and interact with him.

And also, why the hell would he mention it to me?

As far as he knew, we were just teammates.

We were just teammates–Knight was the man I was seeing, not Landon.

“He lives in the building?” my mom asked, waiting for my hesitant nod to go on. “Oh, you should bring him something, Sammy. I’m sure he had plenty of food with his mom there, but maybe you could bring him some cookies or something? Get out of the house for a minute?”

She was being hopeful that this would get me out of my funk, but she had no idea that was just opening a can of worms. I couldn’t even say no without having to actually explain myself, because if one thing was true, the Karters were very friendly neighbors.

Except this Karter.

Except when forced by the other Karters.

Once the idea was in my mom's head, it was stuck there. She let me finish eating, but as soon as I was done, she was picking through cookies to find the best-looking ones for Landon.

“He’s allergic to peanuts,” I mumbled, stopping her from grabbing a few of the ones with peanut butter in them.

Well, Knight was allergic to peanuts.

“Such a good friend,” my mom cooed, pinching my cheek for a second. “Let's take these over, baby.”