The PreGame Ritual (Lynstone University Book 1) (12 page)

ava.

I couldn’t breathe.

I wasn’t sure if it was the dress limiting my oxygen intake or the fact that I was nervous beyond reason, but it literally felt like nothing was flowing.

After doing interview after interview, it was finally show time. My legs felt like noodles as they introduced the draftees by college. Lynstone was a good middle man alphabetically, so I at least didn’t have to come out first. All I had to do was smile, give a little wave, and make it to my table.

You got this, Ava.

Once my name was called, I took a limited deep breath and followed the line around the room up to my table. The lights were hot against my skin and so bright that I could hardly see in front of me. The cheers were loud though the room didn’t seem completely at capacity. I guess people were just happy to see me.

After walking the equivalent of a runway, I finally located the table of my family and friends, Miles included. He stood up to pull out my chair, giving me a light kiss on the cheek before I sat down. Though my dad wasn’t too happy about the act, my mom practically had tears welling up in her eyes.

“Sis, you
have
to let me get that dress when you’re done wearing it.”

Of course Avery could only focus on the fashion aspect. At least something other than my man was catching her interest.

“Consider it yours, Avery.” I was glad we had rebounded from our little cat fight and had actually began to grow closer from the situation. Once she understood that she didn’t stand a chance with Miles, it really didn’t take long for her to move on.

“Welcome to the 2015 Draft. We are so excited to welcome this new class of draftees and we wish all of you ladies the best of luck. Now, without further ado, I’m pleased to announce with the first pick in this year’s draft, the Los Angeles Sparks have selected…” My heart was a drumroll on its on. I watched intently as the commissioner ripped open a tiny envelope like this was the Oscars or one of those other fancy award shows.

“Ava Daniels!” I immediately started clapping until I realized…

Oh shit.

That’s me!

I stood up, trying to hold back the tears as I smoothed out my dress. I took the few steps from my seat over to my mom to give her the biggest hug. I found my dad and gave him a kiss on the cheek. Then I found Miles, who looked more excited than me about the announcement.

“Congratulations, ma.” Instead of responding, I planted a lingering kiss on his lips.

I couldn’t have written the moment any better myself.

miles.

My smile wasn’t working.

Everything about it felt fake, forced, something I hardly expected.

It was literally the happiest day of Ava’s life. She went first in the draft as she always imagined it. But I had the hardest time matching her bliss for my own selfish reasons.

Since the LA Sparks came into the draft with the number one pick, I always assumed that’s where she would go meaning we would only be an hour or two away from each other.

But then the unimaginable happened.

The LA Sparks traded her to the Atlanta Dream. Seeing her holding up the jersey of a team that was clear across the country gave me the craziest mix of emotions. I was beyond ecstatic to see her dream manifest, but I wasn’t sure what her leaving the state was going to mean for us.

Were we gonna try the whole long distance thing?

Or had our relationship simply ran its course?

It was all so confusing and though I tried to hide it as we took a million pictures and accepted even more congratulations, I could tell Ava had picked up on it. Once we made it back to our hotel room, she dug right in.

“Miles, what’s the matter with you?”

I shrugged as I draped my suit jacket over the back of a couch in our suite. “Nothin’, ma. Just thinking about some things.”

She had a hint of humor to her tone as she asked, “What kind of things?”

“Us things.”

She crossed her arms over her chest before prying deeper. “I’m gonna need a little more than that, Miles. Tell me what’s going on.”

I didn’t wanna get too deep into things, so I tried to make it sound like less of a big deal as I responded, “I guess I just never imagined you going anywhere else but LA.”

“Me neither but I knew it was always a possibility. That’s just how the league works.” It was certainly nothing new to me, but that still didn’t mean I liked it.

“Yeah I know. But I...
nevermind
. Let’s just celebrate the night.” I plopped down on the bed and started taking off my shoes and she sat down right next to me.

“No, Miles. What are you thinking?”

I knew it was the last thing I should’ve been bringing up, but I wasn’t very fond of storytelling. So instead of bullshittin’, I turned to her and politely insisted, “Ma...can we not go there tonight? I don’t wanna ruin this for you.”

Her face twisted in confusion as she questioned, “
Ruin
? Now you definitely have to tell me what’s going on.”

Don’t do it, bruh.

Don’t do it.

Shit.

“Fine, Ava. If you’re going all the way to Atlanta, what does that mean...
for us
?”

I felt pathetic as hell asking, especially when I received her nonchalant ass response of, “I... don’t know. I guess I hadn’t even thought about that.”

“Right. Which is why we don’t need to go there tonight.” I scooted to the headboard of the bed, not bothering with my slacks or my untucked dress shirt. And of course she followed me up.

“Well it’s already brought up now.”

I remained stoic. “Still don’t have to go there.”

“Miles…”

“What, ma? I’m tryna save us from this conversation but you’re steady askin’ for it.” I really didn’t wanna fight, I didn’t wanna ruin her day, and I certainly didn’t wanna come to any bad conclusions.
              “What did you expect me to do? Sit down and shut up? Let you be all...fake happy for me?”

“
Fake happy
? What are you talkin’ about, Ava? I
am
happy for you. I’m just not happy about what this could mean for us.”

Everything about her body language appeared withdrawn as she quietly said, “Maybe there isn’t….
an us
.”

Even though she spoke it sweetly and softly, that didn’t mean I was gonna sweep it under the rug. “Excuse me?”

“Miles, you’re young. You have your whole career ahead of you. I get it. I’m not gonna hold you back from that.” I couldn’t believe she had the nerve to bring up my age again like that really had anything to do with this conversation.

“Hold me back? Yo, you are for real buggin’ right now. Like where is this even coming from?”

She turned away from me, only offering me her back as she spoke, “I’ve been thinking about this for a little while now and I… I guess I’m just trying to make this whole thing easier on us. You know?”
              “No, I
don’t
know, Ava.”
              She peeked over her shoulder, catching my eyes, before quickly turning back away. Even from that little glimpse, I could tell she was struggling with what she really wanted to say. The silence lingered for a few moments before she finally spoke, “Miles, look. I wanna thank you...
for everything
. I mean these past couple months have been…”

I cut her off, “Why the fuck does this feel like a break-up speech?”

She finally turned back my way and I could clearly see the tears that had formed in her eyes. “I guess in a way, it is. I mean, you don’t think we could really pull the whole long distance thing off, do you? You’ll be here, doing your whole college thing and I’ll be clear across the country doing the exact opposite.”
              I scooted closer to her, grabbing her hands as I told her, “So what? What does that have to do with anything? When you love someone, you do what you gotta do to make it work, adversities included. Why are you giving up so easily?”

“Because
this
… this isn’t about love for me, Miles. This is about life;
reality
.” It was as though our love and her life weren’t intertwined. For me, I couldn’t do one without the other. But for her, I was just a… moment.

“Well apparently your reality is a lot different than mine. I’m out of here.” I hopped off of the bed, snatching my shoes off the ground on my way out of the room. She grabbed me by my arm just as my hand landed on the doorknob.

“Miles, wait!”

“No, Ava. I’ve already
been
waiting, all this time, for you to see how down for you I am; how much I care about you, how much I
love
you. But to know you’re willing to throw all that shit away...just like that? Nah, ma. I’m out.” She tried to hang on to my arm, but I still managed to snatch away and leave. I could hear her sobbing through the door and though it pained me to hear her crying - hurt me to the core -, turning back to get the same conclusion would’ve just hurt us both even more.

I had to go.

ava.

I sat in my room confused - bewildered really - on how things had gotten to this point. One minute we were smiling for the seemingly endless pictures as a couple; a couple truly, madly, and deeply in love. And by that night, we were done?

For a moment it made no sense, but that was only because I wasn’t willing to admit my fault.

I fucked up.

Terribly.

Even though I had already been thinking about our future on my own, it definitely wasn’t fair for me to jump to conclusions. And now that the damage was already done, there was really no way for me to mend things. I mean, how do you tell someone,
“On second thought, let’s give this long distance thing a try”
after you’ve already ripped their heart to shreds?

Damn, I’ve ruined him.

There was no way he’d invest in loving another girl now that he had his heartbroken
.
At least that’s usually how guys worked
.
All it took was one girl to mess up his heart for everybody
.
Now every girl after me would get the stank treatment, forced with the terrible predicament of trying to get him to change his mind about women.

Fuck her.

Just the thought of another girl getting close to him annoyed the shit out of me.

I didn’t want there to be another girl.

I wanted him for myself.

But again...selfish.

How dare I try to stand in the way of him finding the love of his life?

You
are
the love of his life, Ava.

Got damnit, stop talking to yourself.

Thoughts of Miles were completely distracting me from the task at hand; packing up all of my stuff to move to Atlanta. Well actually, directing other people to pack my stuff for me. The league had already given me the perk of hired help for my big move.

But certain things I wanted to touch on my own, pack on my own, like the framed schedule poster from my final collegiate basketball season. The one Miles and I had flirted our way through before I even realized it was legit flirting. The picture that was taken a few shots before I had touched his dick for the first time.

Damn, I’ll definitely miss that.

Hell, I’d miss everything about him.

His calm to every one of my storms
.
His picture-perfect smile
.
The way he called me, “Ma”. The way he...
damn
, the way he loved the hell out of me before either one of us admitted it.

But I had to let him go.

For his own good.

miles.

“Bro, I mean...I know Ava is fine and all, but you’re still down over the break-up?”

Leave it to Bryson to downplay what I felt, like his ass wasn’t trippin’ over a girl that wasn’t even his. We were sharing dinner at his crib that I finally had a chance to visit now that the season was over. But nothing about being on what most would consider a vacation felt right.

“Bryson, you’re the last person that should be talkin’ about being down over a break-up. You been down for a minute over that Lexi girl and ya’ll were just friends.”

He bit the inside of his cheek, his usual reaction to someone striking a nerve, before he calmly replied, “Lexi is different though. She’s like...I can’t even explain it.”

“Trust me bro, I know the feeling. Its completely unexplainable but you can’t help how you feel.” It was driving me nuts that I couldn’t shake Ava no matter how much I tried. I mean, I even went as far as talking - yes, just talking - to other girls, but none of them were as interesting as Ava, or as fine as her, or as smart as her, or...

“Right. Exactly that. And for the record, Lexi has always been a work-in-progress.”

I grabbed another slice of pizza from the counter as I reminded him, “Yeah, her working on her relationship with Jaden while you’re working on breaking up their happy ass home.” He instantly tensed up.

“Bro, chill. Ain’t nobody breaking up happy homes. I’m just...you’ll see.” I had no idea what Bryson had in mind, but I knew it couldn’t be anything good.

“Don’t do anything stupid, man. It’s not worth it.”

“Oh, so you’re tellin’ me you wouldn’t do whatever it takes to get Ava back?” I brushed him off, knowing our situations were nowhere near similar.

“That’s different. Ava and I
just
broke up. You and Lexi were never really a thing.”

“See. That’s not true. We dated. It was awhile ago, but we dated for a little bit.”

“Whatever. All I know is I want my girl back and I’ma get her one way or another.” I wasn’t sure how I was gonna do it, but it had to happen. It wasn’t like I just wanted her, but I needed her. I wasn’t the same without her. I wasn’t... me.

“Newsflash: she broke up with you, not the other way around. Ain’t no gettin’ that back.” It was a tall task for sure, but it wasn’t impossible.

“That’s why you’re in the predicament you are now, chasing after taken women cause you don’t know how to finesse. You really need to be taking notes, big bro.”

He didn’t seem completely convinced, but he still offered, “Whatever, Miles. I’ll believe it when I see it.”