Chapter 24

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

" A gain!" I shout, and everyone groans.

"We've been at this for hours!" Ursula shouts. "This is bullshit."

"This is life," I tell her. "We're down a man with no replacement. That means we need to re-work a lot of our routines."

"Or we could come up with a new one." She gives me a dirty look.

"We have a lot of good ones. Why spend all that time making up a new one? It will be easier this way. Now, let's go again."

Everyone is exhausted, and I don't blame them. I'm fucking miserable, but not because of cheer.

Things at home have been shit for the past few weeks. It started with the change in Lennox. He slowly started to distance himself from us, and when we confronted him, he got defensive.

He started fighting with Mateo because of the way Len was treating him and Rylee. It got to the point where Lennox just left. He wouldn't give us any reason as to why either.

After Lennox left, Mateo started fighting again. He doesn't care about the money, he's doing it because he needs to work out his anger. I can tell he's on edge, and he's doing his best not to take it out on us.

So, he regularly comes home with broken ribs, bloody hands, and a busted up face. I know he needs this to deal with things in his own way, but it's just adding more stress to Rylee's plate.

She's already worried about Lennox, refusing to believe that there isn't something deeper rooted to why he left. She's smart, and whatever Lennox is going through, we just wish he would trust us enough to let us help.

And now she has to deal with Mateo putting his life at risk every time he fights. But she doesn't tell him to stop, she just tends to his wounds and cleans him up when he gets home.

Donny has been going to extra therapy sessions to deal with everything. He was starting to get better, and it fucking kills me to see him depressed again for a whole new reason.

I'm trying my best to hold it together, but it's hard when my best friend is clearly going through something, my other best friends are hurting too, and Rylee is in pain.

Trevor has been a saint, coming over every day, trying to help keep everyone going. He's the only positive thing Rylee has right now, because I'm no help, and it fucking kills me.

Now the team is suffering, because not only are we missing a member, but four of the remaining members of the team have minds that are elsewhere.

I'm doing my best to hold this team together, but I'm afraid, at some point, I may have to let the coach take on more. I just hope it doesn't reach the stage where we are asked to leave the team, because that would push me over the edge.

Cheer is my life. It's the biggest connection I had to my sister. If I don't have it anymore, I'll lose a part of myself, and her.

Finding out what really happened to her, the horrific way she lost her life, it killed something inside of me. And if it wasn't for Rylee, I would have done something stupid. I don't know what, but I know I wouldn't have been able to deal with it on my own.

Sure, pissing on that monster's grave gave me a thrill, but it didn't bring her back. It didn't get her justice. Nothing will ever bring her back, and now I have to live with the fact that I'm out here with the woman I love, with amazing friends, and even though life isn't good right now, it's never been as bad as hers.

"Colton!" Mateo shouts, shooting me a sneer. "You're over here preaching about getting our heads in the fucking game while you're off in dream land."

"Sorry." I shake my head. "Alright, from the top."

The music starts and I get on the mats with them. Everything is good, up until the part when we throw Rylee in the air, then catch her. The next move is for her to do a cupie into a heel stretch, but Rylee starts to shout, "Put me down."

"What's wrong?" Donny asks.

"Put me down!" she screams. We place her on her feet safely, and Rylee takes off running toward the locker room.

"What the hell?" My brows furrow and I jog after her, the other guys following me. We're met with the sounds of puking.

"Cherry, are you okay?" Donny asks.

"No," she groans. "I think that Chinese food we had last night isn't agreeing with me."

"I knew we shouldn't have gotten food from there," Mateo grumbles. "It's got shitty ratings. But someone is obsessed with their orange chicken. I think it tastes like ass." He shoots Donny a look.

"Don't blame it on me." Donny glares at him.

"Then who else?" Mateo snaps and Rylee pukes again.

"Enough!" I shout, and they both look over at me. "Look, whatever it was, it can't be helped. Our girl is sick, so we need to take her home and make her feel better. So, fuck off with the blame game. Now, you two make sure she's okay, I'm going to tell everyone we're done here for the night."

Leaving them to help our girl, I head back out. "That's it for the day."

Everyone sounds relieved, and Serenity jogs over to me. "Is she okay?"

"We think she got sick from supper last night. She's gonna be fine. We're going to take her home."

Serenity nods. "I'm sorry, you know, about Lennox."

"Thanks."

"For what it's worth, I don't believe that he would just up and leave like that. I think there's something going on."

We all thought the same thing, but we don't know what because he refuses to talk to us. And we're almost positive he has blocked our numbers. He has blocked us all on social media too.

Mateo thinks it's the trauma from what happened to him while he was at that conversion camp. He never dealt with it, just put on a happy face and carried on with life as if nothing happened. But it has to have fucked him up. I know it would have if it was me.

Whatever it is, we're not giving up on him though. We just need to find out what's going on, and then we can help.

It's not going to be easy when he doesn't seem to want our help.