Chapter Eight
1617 Words
After school the next day, Lizzie and Elle walked toward the football field to watch Deon at practice.
“Do you really want to watch a bunch of jocks running around the field and hitting one another?” Elle asked, her nose wrinkled.
Lizzie frowned and shook her head, saying, “Not really, but I do want to see Deon.”
Elle shrugged and said, “Then it’s off to the football field.”
They walked to the field, and Lizzie looked toward the players already on the field, looking for Deon.
Before she could spot him, Elle nudged her in the ribs and muttered, “Don’t look now, but the Toxic Twins are here, too.”
Lizzie looked up into the bleachers and saw Tasha and Sabrina sitting about halfway up. She groaned and shook her head.
“What are they doing here?” she asked.
Elle shrugged and asked, “Maybe they’re trying to curse the team?”
“That would be something they would do,” Lizzie said, rolling her eyes.
“Let’s sit as far away from them as we can,” Elle said.
Lizzie nodded, and they sat down on the first row of the bleachers nearest the aisle.
Looking out onto the field, Lizzie tried to find Deon again. She finally found him as he sprinted across the field and leaped into the air to catch the ball.
“Good catch, Deon!” she heard from behind her.
She froze in place for a moment as her heart stopped.
“Was that Sabrina?” Elle asked, glancing over her shoulder to look at the two girls.
Lizzie glanced over her shoulder as well and saw Sabrina and Tasha waving out at the field. Frowning, she turned back around to see Deon jogging off it in her direction.
She watched him as he looked at her and grinned. She grinned back.
“Glad you could make it,” he said as he stopped in front of her.
“Glad I could too,” she told him.
He looked at Elle and asked, “Elle, wasn’t it?”
At her nod, he told her, “I’m glad you came too.”
She gave him a small smile, then glanced over her shoulder at Tasha and Sabrina once more.
“Jeffers!” the coach yelled. “Say goodbye to your fan club and get back over here with the rest of the team.”
“Sorry,” Deon told her. “Gotta go. I’ll be back after practice.”
Lizzie watched him run back onto the field with a smile on her face.
“The Twins didn’t like that one bit,” Elle muttered to her. “Can’t you feel the hate in their glare from here?”
Lizzie shot a quick glance at them over her shoulder, then looked back at Elle.
“I think they’re trying to fry us with their laser stares,” she said, wiggling her eyebrows up and down.
Elle burst out in giggles, and Lizzie couldn’t contain herself any longer. They huddled together as they tried to keep quiet so as not to interrupt the practice.
“I think they could concentrate better if it wasn’t for you two laughing hyenas,” they heard a voice say from behind them.
They turned to see Sabrina and Tasha scowling down at them, their hands on their hips in identical poses.
“I doubt they can hear us over the noise of practice,” Lizzie told them coolly.
“Well, we can hear you, and it’s distracting us from watching the team,” Sabrina said, looking out onto the field.
“Go, Deon!” she yelled, causing Lizzie to whip her head around just in time to see him catch the ball and run down the field with it.
“But you don’t think yelling at the players is distracting?” she asked, turning back around.
Sabrina smiled at her and said, “I’m just letting Deon know that I’m cheering for him.”
Lizzie shrugged and said, “I honestly don’t think he cares.”
Sabrina scowled at her and walked down one step closer to her.
“Watch your tone, Elsabeth,” she growled. “You don’t want to get on my bad side.”
“You mean, you have a good side?” Lizzie asked, her lip curled into a snarl.
Sabrina walked one more step down. Lizzie got to her feet and turned to face her. She glared up at her with her hands curled into fists at her side.
“I’m only going to say this once,” Sabrina said in a low voice. “Leave Deon alone. He’s mine.”
“That’s funny,” Lizzie said, the same tone in her voice. “He never mentioned you before.”
Before Sabrina could say anything else, the sound of the coach’s whistle distracted them. Turning to look, she saw practice was finished, and the team was coming off of the field.
Lizzie smiled as she saw Deon getting closer to them with a confused look on his face.
“Hey, Lizzie,” he called out.
“Hey, Deon,” she called back, grinning at him.
“Who’s your friends?” he asked as he stopped in front of her and looked up at Sabrina and Tasha.
“Them? Oh, they were just lost and asking for directions,” she told him.
Reaching down, she helped Elle to her feet and grabbed her backpack. Slinging it over her shoulder, she hooked her arm through Deon’s.
“Let us walk you over to the locker room,” she said.
“Sure,” he said, uncertainty in his voice.
As they walked away from the bleachers, he looked over Lizzie’s shoulder at the two girls watching them leave. Lizzie looked back and wiggled her fingers at them. Elle waved, giggling.
Once they reached the lockers, Deon told them, “I’ll be out in a few minutes.”
“We’ll be waiting,” Lizzie told him.
After he went inside, she and Elle burst into giggles.
“Did you see the looks on their faces?” Elle choked out.
Lizzie nodded, still laughing.
“They were so pissed!”
After laughing for a few more moments, they sobered.
“I just hope it doesn’t come back to bite us in the behind,” Elle said, gnawing on her lower lip.
“I’m not worried,” Lizzie said, then added, “Much anyway.”
Deon was the first out of the locker room.
“That was fast,” Elle said.
“I had an incentive to hurry,” he said, looking at Lizzie, who smiled and looked down at the ground.
“How are you going to get home?” he asked as they walked toward the parking lot.
Lizzie and Elle looked at one another, then shrugged.
“Walk, I guess,” Lizzie told him.
He shook his head and said, “Not on my watch. I’m sure my dad will take you home.”
“Since we live almost next to each other, he’ll only have to drive to one of our houses,” Lizzie told him.
After confirming it was okay with Mr. Jeffers, they piled into the car, Lizzie and Elle sitting in the backseat and Deon in the front with his father.
They pulled up to Elle’s house, and the girls got out of the backseat. Deon got out, too.
“Lizzie, can I ask you something before you go?” he asked.
Lizzie looked at Elle, who nodded and headed up the sidewalk after saying her goodbyes.
“What did you want to ask?” Lizzie asked him.
He reached for her hand and asked, “Would you like to go out with me this weekend? We could go see a movie or something.”
She smiled at him and said, “I’d love to go to a movie with you. Give me your phone, and I’ll put my number in it.”
Unlocking his phone, he gave it to her. She added herself to his contacts and handed it back.
“I’ll call you to discuss the details later,” he said.
“Sounds good,” she told him.
He got back in the car and waved at her as it pulled away. She walked to her house, a dreamy smile on her face.
When she went inside, her parents were setting the table.
“Well, you look like you had a good day today,” her mother said.
Lizzie nodded and said, “It was the best day! A boy asked me to see a movie this weekend! Can I go?”
Her parents exchanged a worried look. Her mother went to the calendar on the wall to look at it, then nodded.
“It should be okay,” she said.
“What does the calendar have to do with my going out on a date?” Lizzie asked, confused.
Her mother smiled and shook her head.
“Nothing,” she said. “I was just making sure we didn’t already have plans.”
Lizzie glanced at the calendar, then back at her mother. She didn’t know why she felt as if her mother was lying to her.
- Writer
