Chapter 12: Homecoming Game

After the incident with Leonardo, Olivia and Leonardo auditioned for the play their teacher made them and got the leading roles.  Usher was livid but he told Olivia since the teacher made them do it, then it was nothing he could do about it.  Usher wasn't so mad also because ever since the first day of class Olivia and Leonardo seemed to distance themselves from each other.  Usher and Jen started "studying" on Tuesdays and Thursdays since Olivia had an English class during the late afternoon.  He had enough time to "study" and go to practice without Olivia knowing anything. 

The Friday of homecoming game has finally arrived!  Usher arrived at Olivia's dorm 11 in morning.  "Good morning Sunshine."  Usher kissed Olivia on the forehead as she opened the door, still rubbing her eyes.  "I see you're just waking up."

Olivia nodded her head.  Once he opened her bedroom door he saw a beautiful breakfast waiting for him in bed.  "Surprise!"  She yelled and then hugged him.

"Wow for me?"

"Of course babe!  I believe this is the night you're going to be awesome and the couch is going to put you on the field for the second half.  I feel it in my gut!"

"How would you know?"

"Well, last week at your away game, they had you play the whole 4th quarter.  I'm pretty sure you're at least going to play the whole second half.  Especially how you made that touchdown right before the game ended."

"Oh babe, I love it when you talk football language."  He kissed Olivia on the forehead and she smiled.  He knew he didn't deserve her.  He just hopes she doesn't realize that and leaves him.

For breakfast Olivia made 3 fluffy buttery cinnamon pancakes.  On the side there was two strips of thick cut applewood bacon, gritz with sugar, scrambled eggs and a small bowl of cut strawberries, pineapples, and mangoes.  "I hope you like it babe."

"You know I love it when you cook for me."

They both sat down and enjoyed their breakfast in bed while watching the news when Olivia got a call.  She looked at it and said, "Oh it's the director for the play."  She answered, "Good morning, how are you."  Silence. "Uh huh."  Silence. "Really?"  Silence.  "It can't be another time?  What about the game?"  Silence. "I understand."  Then Olivia hung up the phone then gave Usher a disappointing look.  "Babe, I have some bad news."

"Please don't tell me you have rehearsal today.  Please don't."

"Ok.  Glad you could understand."  Olivia quickly continued to eat her food hoping that Usher wouldn't flip out.

"No, seriously O!  You're not going."

Then Olivia looked at Usher and said, "Excuse me?  Since when did you become my parent?  Last time I checked,  my parents are in Harlem.  So would you like to rephrase that last statement?"

"No!  I'm serious.  You know how important this game is to me!"

"And you know how important my grades are to me!"

"You always get A's.  You can settle for a B."

"And you can settle with me not going there, since the head cheerleader will be cheering you on!"

"Don't bring Jen into this."

"I did.  I can't believe you're friends with her and she purposely flirts with you in front of my face."

"I'm not friends with her, we just have the same classes on Mondays and Wednesdays."

"Whatever.  All I'm saying is don't tell me what to do!  We both have different priorities, and you know how much my grades mean to me."

"I don't want my girlfriend to miss my game!  I don't want my girlfriend spending the whole evening playing a role where she has to be all over the guy who obviously has a thing for you!  Everybody sees it except you.  I don't want him near you O."

Olivia could see how jealous Usher was.  It wasn't about missing the game, it was more about losing her to another guy.  "Usher, babe, nothing is going on between Leonardo and I.  Why are you so worried about that?  I love you!"

Usher looked down.  The guilt was starting to take control on his jealousy because all he could think is what if she was doing the same thing he was doing.  Then he said something that he wish he didn't, "So why haven't we had sex?"

Olivia looked at him with confusion and said, "I thought we went over this.  I'm not ready.  I'll let you know when I'm ready.  Why?  Is sex to you a big deal?"

"It's not a big deal but, " he saw that Olivia was hurt and pissed.  Wishing to take back his words he tried to hug her but she pushed him away from him.

"Why would I have sex with you anyway?  You had unprotected sex with Maciah and got her pregnant.  Have you even contacted her to see if she's keeping the child or not?  Or you if you just go MIA that you don't have to be accountable for the actions you've done?  And why are you bring up sex anyway?  You think I'm having sex with Leonardo or something?"

"No babe.  I don't know why I said it.  It's just hard for me sometimes."

"But you know how I am Usher.  You're the one who wanted to work things out.  Like fuck Usher!  I understand that you've already had sex, and plenty of it, but I'm not ready to lose my virginity.  And no offense, especially to you.  You've cheated on me for half of our relationship.  Then you get jealous about Leonardo, when it's you with the insecurities because you should know that I would never do anything to hurt you.  What you're doing is self reflecting your issues and problems out on me.  I don't appreciate that shit.  You're supposed to be my other half, yet you're treating me like I'm yours and you can do whatever the fuck you want and tell me what I can or can't do.  I don't know why you're acting like this, like I'm your property.  But I don't like it and it needs to stop.  And since you wanna mention sex so bad, how come I have never been inside your dorm, but you've always been in mine?"

Usher put his head down, "I told you babe, they won't let the players bring girls to the dorm to make sure we stay focus.  Once the season is over, you could come as much as you want."

Olivia looked at Usher. What am I going to do?  What if he breaks up with me because we're not having sex.  But in my heart, I feel like I shouldn't have sex with him. What if he starts cheating on me again?  Or what if he could tell that I'm starting to have feelings for Leonardo.  "Usher, I'll ask to work on my scene first so I won't miss the whole game."

Usher looked up at Olivia and kissed her on her forehead.  "There's a party happening my dorm's main hall for the homecoming game.  Just in case I don't see you at the game, just meet me there."

Olivia took Usher's hand and told him, "I'm going to make it to your game.  Even if it's the last minute of the game."  She smiled at him and he smiled back.  Usher thought to himself, I don't deserve this girl.  She's amazing.




Leonardo was in the living room, waiting for Usher to leave so Olivia and him could go over their lines.  Olivia distance herself from him ever since he kissed her and they basically confessed how they felt about each other.  The part that's making things worse is, Olivia won't make direct eye contact with him anymore except when during rehearsal. Usher came out of Olivia's room and they looked extremely happy. Maybe they had morning sex and that's why they look so happy.  Usher is so lucky to have a girl like Olivia.  She loves him so much she pushed me away.  It's killing me.  Why does she have to do this to me?  I just want to kiss her soft lips again.  Usher gave Leonardo a look before he headed to the door, kissed Olivia good bye and told her he'd see her later.  "Wow, Prince Charming loves me."

Olivia ignored his joke and said, "So did you wanna run lines?"

Leonardo rolled his eye and sad, "Sure."  He started running his lines, "Elizabeth, I don't want to let you go.  I don't want to stop seeing you.  I love."

"Love have nothing to do with it.  He proposed to me last night."

"And"

"I accepted."  Leonardo stared at his next lines.  Olivia was waiting for him to say them and then repeated, "I accepted."

"Olivia, why did you push yourself away from me."

Olivia did not want to have this conversation.  "I don't know what you mean."

"You know exactly what I mean.  All of a sudden you're too busy for movie night, you're too busy to talk, you're too busy for anything!  So I want to know what's the deal."

"Nothing Leonardo!"

"Live, you're not even calling me Leo anymore.  So tell me the truth, what's going on?  Do you not want to be friends anymore?  Let me know because I'm sick of hoping things would go back to normal."

"Leonardo...I mean Leo, I really don't want to talk about it."

"Why?  What are you afraid of?"

"I'm afraid of you!  I've pushed myself away from you because it's hard to just be friends with you after that kiss."

"If I known that you would distance yourself away from me then I would have never done it."

Olivia looked down, "That's not why I distanced myself from you."

"Then why Live, tell me why!"

"Because I WANTED YOU TO!  That's why.  I wanted you to kiss me.  I wanted to finally feel your lips on mine.  Once I finally got it, all this guilt came on me.  I got what I wished for and now I cheated on Usher."

"You didn't even kiss back, it's not cheating."

"It is!  I wanted it Leo!  I've been wanting you to kiss me since the first time we actually talked after your ex stopped by.  I wanted to taste your lips.  I want to taste your tongue.  I lust for your touch!  I can't be around you without imagining what would it be like if I was with you instead of Usher.  I distanced myself from you because..."

"Because what Live?"

"Because...I'm falling for you.  I'm falling for you hard and I can't do that to Usher.  It's wrong.  So I figured this was just a phase and it'll pass.  So I decided the best thing for me is to distance myself from you."

"How is that the best thing for you Live?  You're miserable.  I see it in your face.  You're worried about Jen always flirting with Usher and hoping Usher isn't cheating on you with her.  Trust me I see how you look at her in class.  Then your conflicted because you can't admit that you DO NOT love Usher and you have feelings for me.  You want to act on how you feel but you can't because you feel guilty.  You're still with Usher because you feel obligated to be in a relationship that is already dead.  You can't admit to yourself that Usher is not the guy for you because you've had this life long crush on him.  He's your first crush, your first boyfriend, and your first.  I understand that you might cling on to this relationship because he's your first, but we're not back in the day when you had to be married to have sex.  You do not love him.  You don't want to be with him.  You need to leave him."

Olivia wanted to tell Leo that Usher wasn't even her first, but in fact she was a virgin.  But she opt not to.  She knew Leo was right.  She knew deep down inside that Usher wasn't the guy for her and maybe that's why she hasn't had sex with him.  She didn't want to give something so precious to a guy who's lied to her for over a year.  "I think we should continue to run our lines before rehearsal.  I have to try to make it to most of Usher's game."

"Live."  Leonardo gently touched Olivia's face.  He could see the confliction in her eyes, yet he admired her loyalty to Usher.  Even if he's the wrong guy for her.  He didn't want to tell her anything, but rumor has it that Jennifer the head cheerleader and the football rookie Usher are sleeping with each other.  He knew if he told Live about the rumor, she would simply say it was just a rumor and that Usher would never cheat on her...again.  "Fine.  But could we still be friends.  We don't have to hang around each other as much as we used to, but we gotta keep our Monday movie night.  Last week my Monday wasn't the same with out cha."

Olivia smiled, "Ok.  Now let's run our lines, we gotta game to go to."

"If we go to the game all I'm going to want is to see Usher get hurt."  They both laughed.

"Afterwards you could come with me to the homecoming game party."

"I don't think that's a good idea, I might run into Britney."

Olivia laughed, "What happened on your date last week?"

"So we went to the movies.  I was a dumb ass and let her choose the movie which was 'The Odd Life of Timothy Green".  It's a disney chick flick.  Ten minutes in the movie, I fell asleep.  So she gets mad at me and hits me with her purse and starts arguing with me in the movie theater!  She called me a selfish bastard and how are we together and be able to fall asleep on our date.  So I said, 'We're not together, just because we fucked a few times doesn't mean we're in a relationship.'  Unfortunately she got really mad and yelled at me even louder.  They kicked us out the movie theater.  Luckily the movie attendants know me and said I can't come with her.  EVER!  She's banned from the movie theater.  So she decides to yell at me at the movie theater, like that's going to make the situation better.  So I offer to take her home or pay for a cab and then she accused me of calling her a prostitute and that I think she's a 'stupid slut'.  After she called the cab, and the cab came, she asked me for money to get home since it is my fault this date was an 'epic fail'.  I gave her $40 and closed her cab door and came home.  It was the date from hell.  It only lasted 30 minutes."  Olivia began to laugh hysterically.  "Hey that's not funny."

"I'm sorry, but goodness that was funny."  Olivia continued to laugh.

Leonardo started tickling her and said, "Do you find that funny!  Do you find that funny!"  Olivia continued laughing until tears came out telling Leonardo to stop it.  Then in a split second, Olivia found herself under Leonardo.  Leonardo found himself not tickling Olivia and staring into her beautiful brown eyes.  They were both staring into each others eyes, intensely, hearts started racing, and their breaths were getting shorter.

Olivia broke the ice and said, "Ready to run our lines."

Leo shook his head as if he was snapping back into reality. "Yea sure."






They went over their lines, meanwhile Usher was in the locker room getting ready to practice.  One of his teammates hits Usher and said "So you're fucking Jen."

Usher turns around and said, "What do you mean?"

His team mate Dwight said, "You are so dumb.  Cheerleaders talk.  And they talk to their boyfriends about everything.  So all the cheerleaders know that you two are fucking and you have a girlfriend who doesn't know."

"Hey man keep it down."

"You must not know that most of the football players in here has a cheerleader as a girlfriend, and already knows.  It's Olivia who doesn't."

"So how many people know."

"Almost anybody who's anybody at this school, except for Olivia."

"Man this feels like high school already."

"Well that's because you're a boy doing high school things."

"Whatever."

"Well you better be on your game that's all because Johnson caught the flue, so you're playing most of the game."



A  few hours later after the homecoming game started already.  Leonardo and Olivia headed to the last 10 minutes of the game.  At this point Usher has been on the field for the last two quarters.  He kept looking up in the stands where Olivia always sits and hasn't seen her.  He automatically thinks she isn't coming and becomes upset.  As soon as Olivia and Leonardo makes it to get game, Olivia tried to get to her usual seat, but it was crowded.  So they stood on the side and watched the last of the game and so Usher score a touchdown!  Excited Olivia and Leonardo went headed straight to the party but because of the crowd they made it took way long to get to the dorm.

On their way to the party, Leonardo and Olivia began talking and joking around.  It took them an hour to get to the dorm.  Leonardo didn't want it to end but it was the best time he had with her in a long time.

Usher has been drinking within Leonardo's happy hour.  Usher was upset that Olivia didn't make it, so he drank heavier than usual.  Jen sashayed to the drunken Usher and said, "So your girlfriend didn't make it to the game I see.  You most important game so far."

"It's fine.  She was busy."

"Busy what? Practicing her kissing scene with her friend."

"Shut up."

"Why don't you make me!"

"I will!"  She grabbed Jen by her wrist and lead her to his room.

Ten minutes after Usher and Jen disappeared, Olivia and Leonardo walked in the party.  "Excuse me, where's Usher?"  She asked one of his fellow teammates.

"Uhm.  I'm not sure.  I think he might have went to his room.  He was really drunk and kind of upset.  His room is on the two doors down on the left down the hall."

"Oh no."  She turned to Leonardo.  "I knew he was upset."

"Alright, let's go to him then."  Leonardo followed in the direction the football player gave them.

Olivia opened the door and saw a girl on top of a guy.  "Oops I'm sorry, I must have gotten the wrong door."  The girl looked up and it was Jen.  Right under her was, the last person she wanted to see, her boyfriend.  "Usher?"

Usher drunkenly lifted himself up and pulled up his pants.  "Yea it's me.  My girlfriend can't make it to a game because she's making out with some guy who's obviously in love with you."

"So you sleep with someone?"

"Might as well.  I'm not getting any from you."

"Fine then Usher.  Fuck you!  Don't sober up and come to me because we're over!"

"Whatever.  I was over it when you didn't make it to my game."

"I did!  I made it to the last 10 minutes of it.  Saw you make the last touch down."  Then she stormed off.

"The fuck man!"  Leonardo yelled at Usher.  "Why the fuck would you do this to her, AGAIN!  What kind of man are you!  You're still a boy!"

"Aye nigga, don't fuckin talk to me like that at my party.  Remember, I'm the star football player now."

"You're just a big headed jock.  Olivia has been so sweet and loyal to you!  She fucking loves you, and I don't know why.  You are selfish, self centered, and you only care about your penis.  God!  I wish I could have someone like her in my life!  I wish someone like her would be mine and you fuckin ruined that and broke her heart again.  Fuckin jerk!"  Leonard started to walk away until Usher grabbed his shoulder and Leonardo punched Usher in the face.  "Don't touch me.  I don't want douchebag on me."  And left to catch up with Olivia.