head over heels

13 ~ they know

Evan sat on the gym floor clutching a giant bottle of water like it was the only thing keeping him going. His glasses slid down his nose, he pushed them up, begrudgingly admitting to himself that he was going to have to suck it up and get a pair of contacts.

Morning practice on Tuesday had been as rough as Monday. Today however, was marginally less embarrassing.

"Better today Evan," Coach Verret encouraged. Evan doubted that. He might be making his sets technically, but he was still so behind it was almost comical. "I mean it," Verret said again.

Evan just nodded. "Okay."

Verret walked off to talk to Ethan and next to him, Kei appeared.

"Hey," Evan mumbled. Since his fantastically catastrophic meltdown on Monday, talking to Kei was embarrassing, not that he had even witnessed it, but he still felt weird.

Evan caught himself as he fell down that train of thought.

Okay, maybe he hadn't quite got over the whole hating himself thing, but he hadn't quite grasped how to just... Not. Should he be fine with the fact that he was crushing on the most violently straight volleyball player ever? He shot that thought down. He didn't know enough about Kei to be able to make that assumption anyways.

He glanced sideways at Kei as he sat down cross legged beside him on the court floor. They hadn't spoken all that much yesterday, to which Evan was in some way grateful for as it saved him from his torrential downpour of thoughts.

He also hated it. Embarrassingly, he just wanted to talk to Kei and stare at the way his hair fell gently over his dark brown eyes. Fuck. Simultaneous longing and shame sent shivers over his skin.

He was a fucking mess.

"I listened to that look about the blue aliens," Kei blurted out. "It was really good."

Evan blinked, "Already?"

Kei nodded, his energy building, "Audiobooks are cool. I listened to it at the gym."

Evan smiled, "Oh. I uh— i'm glad you liked it," he managed. It was mesmerising, how Kei wrote his emotions in bold across his eyes. His excitement, his anger, all of it. Evan just wanted to watch him.

"Did you also finish it?"

Evan nodded, "Yeah."

Kei grinned, "I really expected it to end sadly, like the two aliens get ripped apart by a cruel society or some shit, I was at the gym when it was almost done, and like I actually had to go sit in the bathroom to finish it in case it made me cry."

Kei was so animated when he talked. His hands moved constantly, tapping on his knee, brushing his hair to the side, moving around as he spoke.

"And I won't lie, it almost did make me cry, just not in a sad way. Those aliens were so fucking cute it was ridiculous."

Evan imagined that, Kei perched in a bathroom stall trying not to cry as he listened to an audio book about a love story involving blue space aliens. It made him smile. It was so out of character, yet perfectly like him.

He let out a small snort, "It was good wasn't it."

Kei nodded enthusiastically, "Do you have any more books I can read?" He paused sheepishly, "Or well, listen too."

"Audiobooks count as reading," Evan mumbled, "And yeah, probably. Do you want anything in particular?"

"What do you like?"

Evan faltered, feeling heat rise on his neck at the question, "Erm, a lot of things?"

"Ok, what's your favourite book then?"