Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Emily didn’t realize she was into girls until she made it to high school, but she’s honestly surprised she didn’t see it earlier. She always picked boys to have crushes on to tell her friends about, and didn’t see the appeal in holding their sweaty hands and kissing their chapped lips.

She also was surprised her parents didn’t see it earlier because looking back on it now, she definitely said some things that should have tipped them off.

Like when she insisted on wearing the color blue and never pink. And her mother asked her why she disliked the color so much she said that it wasn’t that she didn’t like the color pink. She just liked it on other girls, not herself.

Or when she would only wear her hair in a ponytail to school, never anything else. However, her dad would scold at her all the time for getting distracted looking at the other girls’ pretty curled hair during church services, not listening to a thing the preacher was saying. Afterward, her mom would always offer to do her hair like the girls’ in church, but she would always turn her down.

Her favorite one though was when she was eight and she told her mom that she actually didn’t mind if she never got married. That she would be completely content sharing an apartment with her best friend at the time (named Jenna) and neither of them getting married, but just living together for the rest of their lives.

Like how gay is that?

Sadly that specific dream was never fulfilled as she and Jenna fell out of touch when they got older, however she was basically living that dream now, she realized as she was moving her last few boxes into the apartment she and her teammate Lindsey were now sharing.

Because she would say that Lindsey was her best friend now, so eight year old Emily would probably be very excited that she was getting to do this.

But current Emily was not as thrilled.

To everyone else, including Lindsey, she was super excited. She and Lindsey had been planning how to decorate their new place for months, and had talked about their future home constantly with anyone who was willing to listen.

But deep down, Emily was terrified that somehow this would reveal the major crush she had on her best friend since joining the Thorns the year prior.

Considering said best friend was straight, and the reason they were moving into this apartment together was because Lindsey was lonely after breaking up with her ex-boyfriend, that really could not happen. So she continued putting up the excited front, and focused on getting everything into her room. She was singing to herself as she worked, one of the songs she heard on the way here stuck in her head, and she caught a glimpse of Lindsey smiling at her on the couch.

She continued singing, shaking her head as she sat the last few boxes on the floor of her room.

This might be more difficult than she thought.

---

Emily never considered herself to be an early riser, but she realized after moving in with Lindsey that she woke up at least an hour before her everyday. She actually didn’t mind the silence either, it gave her some time for her brain to be calm, before she’s wrapped up with the crush that seems to be consuming her life more and more with every little touch Lindsey makes.

And so she decided with her spare time she could make Lindsey’s coffee just the way she likes it, knowing what to put in it after years of early bus rides and camp breakfasts.

When Lindsey would come into the kitchen later that morning, eyes still blinking open trying to adjust to the light, hair all ruffled up, and the softest smile greeting Emily, she knew there really was no turning back.

Their fingers would brush when Emily handed her the mug and it always took all her focus not to let go of the mug too early, because the feeling of Lindsey’s hand against her own was like an electric shock.

The mornings quickly became Emily’s favorites, as the two of them would sit at the bar in the kitchen and eat together, discussing what they had to do that day and other meaningless topics where Emily’s goal was always to make Lindsey laugh at least once.

“So there were these two goldfish in a tank…” Emily began, getting Lindsey’s attention. “And one turned to the other and said ‘Do you know how to drive this thing? Because I sure don’t.’”

Lindsey giggles at the punchline, shaking her head.

Deciding she could do better, wanting to get a real laugh out of Lindsey, she kept it up.

“Did you know that the first French fries weren’t actually cooked in France? Cause they were cooked in Greece!”

“Sonny, they’re from Belgium,” Lindsey corrected.

Emily sighed. “I know but like Greece the country and grease the oil, get it?”

She didn’t get it. Ugh. Time to pull out the big guns.

Emily went to her alarms and set an alarm to go off in 30 seconds that was the same tone as her ringtone.

“Why do you never like my dad jokes?” Emily complained.

“Because they aren’t even funny half the time,” Lindsey said, taking a sip of her coffee.

“You like always laugh though!”

“Because it’s cute how you try.”

“Oh so you think I’m cute?”

Before Lindsey could answer, her phone went off, and Emily answered it like it was a real phone call. After a second though, she pretended to hang it up and put it back on the table.

“Who was that?” Lindsey asked, eyebrow raised in curiosity.

“This furniture store that keeps calling me,” Emily sighed dramatically. “All I wanted was one night stand but they don’t seem to get that I don’t want more!”

As soon as the joke clicked, Lindsey burst out laughing. Emily smirked proudly to herself, admiring the girl as she laughed.

“That one was good, I appreciated that dad joke,” she said as she calmed down.

“Glad to be of service.”

“Why do you like the dad jokes anyway? I mean they’re funny but you’re not a dad?” Lindsey asked.

“I don’t know, lots of girls do call me daddy.” Emily said casually, trying not to laugh.

“Jesus Christ Sonny!” Lindsey exclaimed, laughing out of surprise. “Never, ever, say that to me again, I do not need that image in my brain.”

And this time Emily just laughed because she knew that reaction was coming, but she didn’t care, because she got Lindsey to laugh, and that was all that mattered.

---

Wine Wednesdays quickly became an event in the apartment, where the two of them would spend the night sprawled out on their couch just drinking wine, talking, and watching whatever trashy rom-com movie they could find on the Hallmark channel.

Tonight it was some movie about a woman who worked herself too hard at her company and was assigned to interview this famous guy for her magazine, but she fell in love with him and his community along the way.

“She’s seriously going to lose the promotion over this guy? Like come on, he’s not even that cute,” Lindsey pointed out, grabbing some popcorn out of the bowl separating Lindsey and Emily on the couch.

As Emily watched the movie, she agreed, and not just because she wasn’t into guys. This guy was your less than average white guy, and he honestly wasn’t all that charming either. She’d had smoother guys here in Portland (before she had to let them down with the whole being gay thing of course).

“Yeah, she’s way too pretty to date him. Like come on, even I’m better boyfriend material than that,” Emily joked.

Lindsey promptly rolled her eyes and threw a piece of popcorn at Emily’s face.

While that rejection stung a bit, it was a joke, so she decided to keep playing it off as one.

“What? Am I wrong though?”

Lindsey just laughed and shook her head, giving Emily that stupid smile.

“Seriously Linds, you’d rather date him than have all of this?” Emily asked, gesturing to her body. “I’m quite the woman y’know.”

“Whatever you say Sonny,” Lindsey snorted. “But if I had to pick I guess I would pick you, I’m pretty sure he would bore me to death. At least you make my life interesting and very entertaining at times.”

Emily just laughed at her response, shoving more popcorn in her mouth to try and cover up the giddy feeling in her stomach that had arisen from Lindsey’s admission.

Lindsey had said she’d date her. Over a guy. And while this guy was bottom-tier Hallmark shit, that’s still something.

While eating her feelings away, she realized she had finished the popcorn.

“Hey Linds, do you want me to go pop another bag of popcorn? I may or may not have just eaten the end of it,” she pointed out, gesturing to the now empty bowl.

“Nah, I’m good. However I do want your blanket, I’m cold.”

Emily sat the bowl on the coffee table but pulled the blanket closer to her. “No way, I’m all nice and warm go get your own.”

“Pretty please Emily?” she pouted, and Emily about melted into the puddle between the pout and the use of her real name.

“Fine,” she grumbled, “but we’re sharing because then I’ll be cold,” she stated, holding an end of the blanket out.

Lindsey scooted over and got under, but instead of leaning back against the couch, leaned into Emily’s side. Emily had no choice but to wrap her arm around her and hold her, which in turn had her heart racing.

“Mhm,” Lindsey sighed as she snuggled closer. “You’re right, you’re all nice and warm.”

“I told you,” Emily croaked, trying to calm her heart rate down so Lindsey couldn’t tell.

“You’re always nice and warm. And you give the best hugs and cuddles. That’s why you’re my favorite cuddle buddy.”

And Emily didn’t know if it was the wine talking or what, but she took what she could get. With Lindsey she would take everything she could get.

---

As the door closed behind Lindsey, Emily knew she needed to not be alone. She needed someone to distract her, before she let all of these emotions spiral out of control.

She didn’t want to go out though, as her sweats were pretty comfy, and she didn’t want anyone to come over either.

As she scrolled through her contacts in her phone, she ended up going back to the top and calling the person who had heard every problem Emily had ever had, and was going to somehow give her advice to get her out of this mess of feelings she had.

“Hey Em, what’s up?” her twin answered, her blurry face coming through on FaceTime.

“Nothing much, just wanted to see how you were doing and stuff Emma. How’s life been?”

Her sister began to ramble on, telling her about everything. Her job, her boyfriend, and how their parents had been doing back home in Georgia.

“They keep saying they want to come fly up to Portland and visit you again. I think they had way too much fun in the city up there when they moved you and Lindsey in.”

Emily laughed lightly at the mention of her parents coming back up, also trying to not react to her sister saying Lindsey’s name.

Sadly, her twin sister knows all apparently, and did not brush past the missing fullness of Emily’s laugh.

“Seriously Em, what’s up? Do you not want mom and dad to come up or something?”

Emily shook her head. “No I would love for them to come up, that would be great. You should come up too,” she said, trying to divert her sister once again.

“If I get time off I’ll bring them up for a game soon, but if it’s not that then what is it?”

“Nothing is wrong.” She couldn’t bring herself to look at her sister when she said it, picking at her nails in her lap.

“Right, you know we have like twinepathy right? I’m not stupid Emily I know something is up.”

“We both know that there’s no such thing as twinepathy, and I’m fine,” visibly tensing as she finished her sentence.

“Do I need to call Lindsey?” her sister suggested casually.

Emily froze and her eyes snapped up to her twin’s. “Do not call Lindsey.”

“Aha, so it has to do with Lindsey. What’s up, you guys are like the best of friends, what happened?”

“She’s, well she’s on a date and well, it’s complicated,” Emily stuttered out.

“Complicated as in you don’t like the guy she’s dating? He must be fairly new considering she just got out of her other relationship like 3 months ago.”

Emily sighed. “Four months ago. And I don’t know who she’s on the date with, he’s a guy from Tinder I guess. We were at Ellie and Cait’s the other night and one of them noticed the app on her phone, but she brushed it off and said it was nothing. But then tonight…” she trailed off, thinking of what the evening had consisted of.

She had been sitting on the couch watching the evening news, when Lindsey emerged from her room wearing ripped black skinny jeans and a tighter white tank top, with a bomber jacket over it.

Her hair and makeup were all done, and she looked good. Like so good.

Emily swallowed and asked what she was up to all dressed up, and Lindsey casually responded she was going out on a date with someone from Tinder and then left before Emily could ask any real questions because apparently her roommate was running late.

So that left Emily in the apartment alone, wondering what undeserving man was on a date with her super hot roommate.

“But then tonight what?” Emma asked, bringing Emily back to the conversation.

“But then tonight she just came out of her room all dressed up and said she was going on a Tinder date and now I just feel...I don’t know, I just don’t like it.”

“Em, you know you can tell me anything right?” Emily prompted. “And I have told you multiple times in the past that you can always come to me with girl stuff? Just because I’m straight doesn’t mean I won’t get it.”

“You can tell I like her?” Emily asked.

“Of course I can Em, even if you don’t think our twinepathy is real doesn’t mean I don’t know how blushy you get over pretty girls,” she teased lightly.

“But she doesn’t know?”

“Not that I’m aware of. Besides, I didn’t even know for sure until tonight, this whole jealous act you’ve got going is making it a bit more obvious to me.”

“I’m not jealous!” she scoffed.

“Right, you just wish that Lindsey would get all dressed up and get drinks with just you on a Friday night.”

“I will end this call.”

“Don’t doubt it sis. Now, do you want to watch the episode of Survivor I have DVR’d through FaceTime with me or…” her sister offered, flipping the camera to show the episode all queued up on the TV.

“Nah, I’ve got my own shows to catch up on. I’ll call you soon?”

“Sounds good. Tell Lindsey I say hi,” she teased.

“You’re the worst.”

“Love you!”

“Love you too I guess. Bye Em,” she smiled, pressing the red button on her screen to end the call.

Deciding she deserved some ice cream, she grabbed the tub and settled in on the couch, turning on the current show she was binging on Netflix.

And when Lindsey came in halfway through the episode, Emily could tell by the look on her face and the brevity of time she was gone that the date did not go well. So she handed her the tub of ice cream and the spoon and didn’t ask questions. Instead she cracked jokes and threw in as many sexual innuendos as she could, until she got her best friend to laugh again.

That was easy, it was what she was good at. So that was what she would do, she decided, just focus on making Lindsey happy, not on the fact that she was dating again.

But that was easier said than done.

---

Before they knew it, the two girls had packed their bags and were on their way to camp. After sitting through the welcome meeting and catching up with everyone, they saw the roommate assignments.

Emily was with Mal, which was great and all, but she wasn’t Lindsey.

“Are you going to be able to make it the next few days without me?” Lindsey asked as she scanned the list, nudging Emily in the shoulder.

“I think the real question is if you’re going to be able to make it without me. Because Kelley is definitely not as good at making coffee as I am,” she said.

“Aw shit, I didn’t even think about that. I don’t even know if I remember how to make coffee anymore.”

“You don’t know how to make coffee roomie? What are you talking about?” Kelley asked as she approached the pair.

“And that’s my cue to go find Mal, I’ll let you handle this one Linds,” Emily said, spotting Mal across the room.

The two of them headed upstairs, claimed their beds, and then headed out for the team meeting.

Nothing exciting happened at the meeting, and dinner passed with the same uneventful style. I mean, it was fun to catch up with everyone and all, but Emily was really just focused on trying not to focus on Lindsey too much, directing her energy at Rose and Kelley.

After the meal, Mal invited Lindsey to watch a movie with them in their room, and so Kelley tagged along by default.

She shared a bed with Kelley, and the two defenders poked fun at the cheesiness of whatever rom-com Mal had decided on throughout the movie.

The movie ended, and Mal immediately rushed Lindsey off to her and Kelley’s room. Something about Lindsey getting new makeup and Mal helping her try it out, if Emily was paying attention to what they were saying instead of trying to avoid staring at her too obviously.

See at home, it wasn’t an issue because Lindsey was too oblivious to notice Emily’s staring. But now that they were at camp, she knew that she wasn’t going to be able to get by with it anymore, someone would figure her out.

That happened way sooner than she thought though, because as soon as Mal and Lindsey closed the door, Kelley was already asking questions.

“So, Lindsey huh?”

Emily raised her eyebrows, attempting to show confusion. “Lindsey what?”

“That’s fine, pretend like you don’t know what I’m talking about. I’ll get it out sooner or later.”

“Kell, what are you talking about? Did you hit your head already? We haven’t even gotten out to the fields yet,” Emily joked.

Kelley just rolled her eyes and tried again.

“So, you hadn’t had a roommate for a while. Is it fun living with Lindsey or were you happier alone?” Kelley asked casually, but Emily wasn’t stupid. She knew what Kelley was playing at.

“It was definitely different at first, but Lindsey’s easy to live with so it’s not bad. I mean I’m living with my best friend, it’s been awesome but I wasn’t expecting it to be bad or anything.”

“That’s good,” Kelley nodded. “So Lindsey tells me you make her coffee every morning?” Kelley asked.

Emily’s face was getting red, she could feel it. “Is this how you’re making your move Sonnett?”

“I’m not making any moves because she’s my straight best friend, and there are no feelings involved.”

“Right, so when you look at her like she’s God’s gift to women that’s just like one of your best friend things.”

Emily promptly launched a pillow at Kelley’s face. “Hey, watch the money maker Sonnett!”

As Emily scoffed and rolled her eyes, Kelley sat up and Emily could tell this conversation was about to get even more serious, which was not one of her favorite things to do.

“Look Sonnett, I want you to answer this question honestly, knowing that I would never judge you for anything. Got me?”

Emily nodded, taking a deep breath.

“Do you have feelings for her beyond friendship?”

And Emily wouldn’t say she cried often, but this time, she couldn’t stop the tears rolling down her cheeks as she fell into Kelley’s arms. She couldn’t even respond, she just nodded her head as she sobbed.

“Hey Sonny, it’s okay kid, I got you, I’m right here,” Kelley said softly, rubbing the defender’s back and pulling her closer, holding her tight.

She started to catch her breath again, and regained her voice. “I just- It makes me feel so disgusting. Like I’m using her or preying on her when I’m not I swear! I swear I’m not but I just love her so freaking much and-”

“Woah, hey look at me Sonnett.” Kelley instructed, tilting her head off of her shoulder and making Emily look her in the eyes. “Never, ever feel ashamed for who you like, you got me? Loving someone like that is beautiful, not disgusting. And you aren’t using her, if anything she’s using you, even though she doesn’t even know it. You are such a good person Sonny, please don’t forget that. Promise?”

“Promise,” Emily whispered.

Kelley wrapped her arms around her again, letting Emily have a moment to feel loved and to just relax.

“Besides, from one lesbian to another, we can both agree that there’s no way that girl is straight, right?”

“I don’t know Kell, she went on a fucking Tinder date the other night,” Emily snipped.

“She did what?”

“Yeah, we were hanging out at Cait and Ellie’s the other day and one of them noticed she had a Tinder notification pop up. So they called her out on it and all she would say was that she was over him and ready to put herself back out there.”

“That’s weird. I mean good for her for being over him I guess, I just think it’s a little fishy that she wouldn’t say anything else. How did you know she was going on the date?” Kelley asked, rubbing Emily’s back again to help calm her rising anger (aka jealousy).

“Well, I was on the couch getting ready to watch TV and she had been in her room for a while, but I didn’t think anything of it, until she came out looking drop dead gorgeous and yelling that she was going on a Tinder date as she walked out the door.”

“Like not even like a ‘Heydoes this look good? Or what should I say?’”

“Nope. No information about who or where, she just left. And so I called Emma and talked with her for a bit because I was obviously jealous and didn’t want to recognize it, and she helped distract me. But she eventually had to go and so I grabbed some ice cream and turned on a show and like halfway through the episode, she came in crying. It was clear she didn’t want to talk about it, so I gave her the ice cream and just made jokes until she stopped crying.”

“Did you guys talk about it ever?”

“No because I don’t want to be the asshole to bring it up, and she hasn’t said anything about it to anyone, as far as I know.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah.”

The two sat in silence for a moment, Kelley taking in everything she just heard, Emily’s mind swirling with the possibilities and what this meant for her and her best friend.

“Hey Kell?” Kelley hummed to acknowledge the question. “What do I do now?”

The vetran sighed. “Sonny, I really have no idea. Right now, my suggestion is to keep being her best friend, but don’t be afraid to flirt every once and awhile. Look Sonny, she cares about you more than anyone else on this team, and probably on the Thorns too. I’m no mind reader, but to me, I think deep down you could have a chance with her, but I don’t wanna give you any false hope bud. Just keep being you dude, that’s my advice.”

“Okay, I can do that.”

“Well I’d hope so, otherwise who else would you be?” Kelley teased, sitting up a bit and stretching.

“I don’t know how to tell you this without hurting your feelings Kell, but I’m coming for your brand and I’m just going to become you.”

Kelley snorted. “Good luck with that, can I have your good ankles then?”

“If I could give them to you I would, but sadly I can not.”

“Fine, I guess I’ll make do with mine. In other news, wanna help me scare Mal and Lindsey after practice tomorrow? I need someone to help me film it.”

“I would love nothing more than to help you with your pranks.”

“That’s what I like to hear.”

Lindsey and Mal came back into the room then, with Lindsey’s makeup all done.

“How does she look?” Mal asked. “Do you think I did good?”

Emily smiled and nodded, not wanting to over compliment Lindsey and make things weird.

“You look great Lindsey, Mal didn’t do too bad,” Kelley replied. “Right Sonny?”

“Yep, looks good!” Emily replied, mentally thanking Kelley for helping her out of that one.

“Alright, well we better head out Horan, it’s curfew. See you two later, and remember what I said Sonny!” Kelley said, climbing off of Emily’s bed.

“You got it dude,” Emily replied as she waved goodbye.

Just be herself. Not hard at all.

Chapter Text

Moving in with Emily was honestly the best thing that came from the breakup.

When Lindsey had shown up at Emily’s place after she had caught him cheating with tears streaming down her face, her teammate had pulled her into a tight hug, got her a tub of her favorite ice cream that was conveniently always there, and kept her talking to distract her from the mess her life had turned into within the past hour.

With time Lindsey started doing better, she really did. But the one thing that always got her was being in her apartment alone. She didn’t like not having someone to be there when she woke up, or when she was going to bed. She didn’t even miss the romantic or even the sexual parts, she just missed having someone there to talk to.

And so when Emily hosted a movie night at her house for some girls on the team she was excited to get out of her apartment for a while. It was a fun movie, and her friends were good company.

However, sitting there talking with Emily, Lindsey realized she was the only one who hadn’t left yet after the movie. So she knew she needed to go back to her apartment. But then Emily poured her another glass of wine and kept talking to her, about what Lindsey can’t even remember, but it felt so good to be with someone for once that she didn’t want to go home.

So maybe it was the wine talking, but when Lindsey confessed to Emily how lonely she had felt at her apartment, she broke down in tears. Emily held her on the couch, and somehow in their slightly drunk state the two of them decided that they should just find a place and move in together.

“I mean we spend so much time at each other’s places, and besides then the rent will be cheaper right?” Emily pointed out.

“Right,” Lindsey agreed, wiping up the last of her tears. “And then it can be a sleepover every night!”

“Exactly,” Emily replied, and suddenly Lindsey was smiling again.

She eventually got an Uber back to her place, which felt a little less lonely because she knew that soon she wasn’t going to be alone.

Months later, Emily was singing while she carried the last of her boxes into her room and Lindsey couldn’t help but have that stupid smile on her face again. Few people got her to smile like this, but Emily seemed to be able to do it without even trying. Lindsey just blamed it on the fact that they were best friends though, of course her best friend would make her happy.

There was no other reason why she would make her feel like this. Right?

---

The teammates had been living together for the past month or so, and it had been great so far. They rarely fought over anything, and Lindsey was feeling a lot better about the breakup, especially since Emily always kept her busy and laughing. There wasn’t even a moment to think about the rocky ending to the relationship.

And Emily was truly the sweetest. Lindsey knew she was a great friend before, but she also knew she definitely put up a front with the people she wasn’t as close with, using sarcasm and dance moves to make her seem tough.

But it made Lindsey’s day when she rolled out of bed and stumbled into the kitchen every morning and Emily handed her a piping hot cup of coffee, just the way she liked it.

Lindsey didn’t know how she always got it to be the perfect temperature, or how she knew how to put the exact amount of creamer in the beverage, but she did know that she liked it so much, and it made her feel so cared for.

Or when she would just ask what kind of take-out food Lindsey wanted, and then order the exact meal she loved without even asking. She just knew what to get her, sometimes when Lindsey didn’t even know what she wanted.

It made her feel, well, special. And she loved it.

The attention was addicting, and she soaked up all that Emily was giving her.

She also loved the days when they had nothing to do, and Emily would drag her out of the apartment and all over Portland, to places she didn’t even know existed.

This Saturday they didn’t have anything going on, so when Emily handed her coffee over, she also instructed Lindsey to get changed into comfy athletic clothes.

“I’ll have brunch ready by 11:30, and then we’ll leave after, sound good?” she asked.

Lindsey nodded. “Where are you taking me today?”

“There’s this hiking spot that Kling told me about, she says the view from this one point is like totally sick. You cool with that?” Emily asked her while getting the ingredients out to start what Lindsey assumed was going to be their brunch.

“Sounds good to me,” Lindsey’s voice echoed through the apartment as she walked back to her room, coffee in hand, to get changed into something more suitable to hike in.

She got changed and the two headed out, Emily driving them to the beginning point of the hike.

The hike in itself was fun. Emily forgot her water per usual, and Lindsey gave her the extra one she packed in her backpack for this exact reason.

The trail was pretty quiet, and so the girls didn’t worry about bothering others, just goofing off and singing to themselves all the way up the trail.

When they reached the viewpoint, Lindsey was blown away. It was as gorgeous as Kling said it would be. There was a clear view of the river below, and tall trees lined the valley. It almost looked as if it went on forever.

As Lindsey reached into her pocket to get her phone out to take some pictures, she caught Emily’s face out of the corner of her eye.

And suddenly all Lindsey could think about was how beautiful Emily looked in this moment. She couldn’t stop looking at the sparkle in Emily’s eyes, and how her hair blew in the wind. She was also in luck as Emily was too entranced with the view in front of her to notice Lindsey’s stare.

“Gorgeous isn’t it?” Emily asked, eyes still straight ahead.

Lindsey took a step forward, quickly deciding that she needed to be touching her somehow, and wrapped her arms around Emily and laid her head on her shoulder.

“Yeah,” she replied, “absolutely beautiful.”

She had never felt like this before, she realized, the need to just hold Emily and have her in the moment. She had never thought about how beautiful she was either.

In the end, she attributed the feelings to the view and how exhausted they were (even though she wasn’t tired in the slightest because of her soccer workouts).

“Want me to take some pictures of you for your Instagram?” Emily asked her.

“Yeah, but I want you in them too though. I have long enough arms, we can just take some selfies.”

And so they did, and then after soaking up the view for a little bit longer, decided to hike back to Emily’s car.

Emily took her out to dinner at a cute little diner on the way back, and Lindsey was almost disappointed when she got out of Emily’s car, until she realized that this wasn’t ending. That Emily was getting out of the car too, and already yelling at her to race her up the stairs to their apartment.

She shook her head and let out a laugh, before chasing the defender up the stairs.

And as Emily opened the front door for her, a smirk adorning her face in victory, Lindsey couldn’t help but think about living with Emily forever.

She knew that Emily would probably want to move in with a future girlfriend at some point, even if Lindsey never dated again, but she couldn’t help but think about it.

Because Emily was turning out to be one of the best roommates ever. And Lindsey couldn’t be more grateful.

---

However, after the first few weeks Lindsey did discover a downside to having Emily as her roommate.

After practice, if they weren’t going out to eat or no one was coming over, Emily would often just walk around the house without a shirt on, just a sports bra, until she eventually showered after they ate.

It wasn’t a big deal at first. After all, Lindsey had basically seen all of her teammates in their underwear, as they were in and out of locker rooms.

In fact, it was actually pretty funny. Emily would dance around, jokingly pretend she was different male athletes, and work on her attempts at being able to roll her stomach.

And Emily had asked her in the beginning if it was okay, or if it made Lindsey uncomfortable. But it didn’t, and Lindsey told her exactly that, that she didn’t mind. So Emily told her that if she ever did feel uncomfortable to let her know, but Lindsey assured her that it really wasn’t a big deal.

But then it started making her feel weird.

Nothing major at first, Lindsey would just catch herself staring a second too long when Emily would reach up to put the cups away when they were unloading the dishwasher. Or the times when Emily would jokingly flex in front of her, and Lindsey would fight her blush with a laugh.

That was just natural though, right? It wasn’t like weird or anything, but she knew her best friend was in shape, and just wanted to show off the body she had worked so hard on. Her body was just so fit, that’s why Lindsey couldn’t ever seem to tear her eyes away recently. No big deal, at all.

But one day when Emily was doing some sort of dance with Rose on a FaceTime call, Lindsey looked over and watched the girl do a body roll and it was like her whole body froze.

Of course she wasn’t wearing a shirt, as their dinner was still in the oven, and of course Rose called and wanted to teach Emily this routine right now.

And now Lindsey felt like her entire body was on fire, and there shouldn’t have been any reason she felt like that. At. All.

“Linds, you sure you don’t want to get up and learn it with us?” Emily asked, catching Lindsey’s gaze.

Fuck, did she catch her staring? Or did it look like she had just been watching the dance itself, not her abs? “Uh no thanks, looks like a lot of work.”

“If you say so,” Emily replied, throwing a wink in for good measure that did not help the internal conflict Lindsey was dealing with.

“I’m going to go finish up the dinner, I’ll call you in when it’s done and stuff,” Lindsey said, dragging herself up off the couch and into the kitchen, so she could begin to calm whatever the fuck this was down.

She took a deep breath and leaned against the counter, seeing her reflection in the refrigerator, fighting the bright red color of her cheeks but clearly failing. God, she was basically drooling over her best friend, her female best friend. And suddenly Lindsey felt hot all over, having a crisis over her sexual orientation in the middle of their kitchen.

So she did the first thing she thought of, which was to stick her head in the freezer. I mean it would probably cool her down right?

“Linds, are you okay, you didn’t look so good so I thought I’d come and check up on—what are you doing?” Emily asked as she wandered into the kitchen, the phone call with Rose ending earlier than Lindsey thought.

“Uh, just trying to cool down. I think I might have a fever or something. I don’t know, maybe I just was under too many blankets on the couch,” Lindsey rambled, proud of herself for coming up with that excuse.

Because how was she supposed to explain to Emily that her doing a body roll made herself, who has been straight up until this point, feel things she had never felt before with any guy and now she didn’t even know who she liked anymore, all she knew was that she wanted to drag Emily back into her bedroom and—

“Oh no dude, that sucks. Here, let me feel your forehead,” Emily said, drawing her out of her internal dialogue and stepping in front of her.

She pressed her hand to Lindsey’s forehead, Lindsey’s eyes widened at the heat she was feeling with just a simple touch. Because now her hot best friend was touching her face, standing super close to her, and not wearing a shirt.

Luckily, the oven beeped and their dinner was done, so Emily stepped back and headed for the oven. “You feel normal, but if you want I can just put this in the fridge and we can eat it another night?”

No, she wasn’t going to ruin dinner with her freaking sexual awakening. She could do this.

“Nah, I’m feeling better already. I think it was just the blankets,” Lindsey replied, getting out the plates.

And she did get it together. They ate dinner, and Lindsey avoided checking out Emily anymore than she could help.

But that night, when she was alone in her room and struggling to fall asleep, she could only think of one person. Thinking of her abs, and how she wanted to run her hands all over them as well as everywhere else on her body.

And that person was probably asleep in the room right next door to her own, without a care in the world.

Here Lindsey was though, now restless and worked up over her freaking best friend.

Fuck, she thinks, of course she likes girls. How she missed it for this long, she doesn’t know. All she knew was that her best friend was hot and she would rather kiss her than any guy ever.

---

When she woke up the next morning, she just shrugged it off. She hadn’t been in a physical relationship in awhile, maybe that was it.

But throughout the week, the curious voice in her head kept making her notice girls on the street, and in coffee shops, and worst of all, Emily.

How did she not realize how adorable yet hot her best friend was before this?

So Thursday night, while Emily was wrapped up in some TV show, Lindsey downloaded Tinder, created a profile, and set the preferences for girls only.

She knew Portland wasn’t going to be a hard place to find women, so when she got matches fairly quickly, she wasn’t surprised. She did have to weed through some of them, the classic threesome profiles and the ones that were definitely men catfishing as women (which is creepy as fuck), and then the Thorns fans who started the conversation with “Can I have an autograph?”

But there were a couple that seemed fairly normal, and Lindsey was actually kind of excited when one asked if she wanted to get drinks with her the following weekend.

Of course she agreed, but the two hadn’t moved the conversation off of Tinder. And so when she left her phone on the table when she went to refill her drink in the kitchen when she and Emily were hanging out at Ellie and Cait’s place, she should have known it would be a recipe for disaster.

“Lindsey, your phone just went off, it’s...YOU HAVE TINDER?” Ellie squealed as she dropped Lindsey’s phone onto the couch.

Luckily, it didn’t say who’s name it was, just that she had a new chat, but she knew it was the girl.

“Since when have you been looking for victims again?” Cait teased.

“It’s not a big thing or whatever, just looking,” Lindsey tried to say casually, hoping that they would move on. She also looked to Emily, partly wanting to see her reaction but also wanting her to save her from this impending interrogation that she was not prepared for. But the girl seemed busy with her own phone, typing away.

“Have you been talking to guys, or been on any dates?”

“Ooh are you looking to get laid?”

“Look, I’m just over him and ready to put myself back out there, so I figured why not? Now can we drop it?” Lindsey said, giving them both a glare.

“Hey have you guys seen this puppy video? It’s so cute come look at it,” Emily encouraged, waving the girls over.

And as Lindsey walked over, she gave her a nod, thanking her for changing the subject, and she got a soft smile in return (that may or may not have given her butterflies).

Thank the lord for Emily Sonnett.

The day of her date finally arrived, and when she was getting ready she realized she still hadn’t told anyone about it, not even Emily. Mainly because she was scared of what people would say, especially since she herself wasn’t even a 100% sure what any of this meant.

So yeah, she felt like an ass when she ran out the door, yelling to Emily what she was doing with absolutely no context, but at least it was better than saying nothing, right?

And she was so nervous, she really didn’t want to mess this up. Especially since this was like the first time she had ever dated someone who was not a boy. Really, it had been awhile since she had been on a first date in general.

She pulled up to the bar they said to meet at, and headed inside. She spotted her right away, at a table near the bar.

Her name was Macy, and in her bio she had talked about how she liked running and dogs, as well as beer. All things Lindsey could talk about she felt like.

She approached the table, and the girl looked exactly like she did in her pictures. She was smaller, with blonde hair and bright green eyes. She spotted Lindsey and waved, giving her a hug as she sat down.

“Hey, how are you doing?” she asked, as she took a seat. “I got you a water, but the server said he’d be back soon to take your order.”

“I’m good, and thank you for the water. How was your day?”

And from there the conversation was easy. Lindsey asked her questions about running, she shared a bit about her soccer stuff, and they talked about all the dogs they had both had growing up. Lindsey even mentioned that she had never been with a girl before, and that she hoped that it wouldn’t be an issue, and Macy assured her it wouldn’t be.

“It’s never too late in life to figure out who you are babe, you love who you love. I’m glad you’re putting yourself out there, I think that’s really courageous of you.”

Lindsey smiled at that, maybe coming out to people wouldn’t be so bad after all.

By the time they had finished their food and drinks and paid the bill, it had gotten darker out.

“Alright, well I’m gonna call an Uber and head home, I have to wake up early for my run tomorrow. It was really nice talking to you Lindsey,” Macy smiled, squeezing Lindsey’s hand from across the table.

“Wait you didn’t drive here? I can drop you back by your place, don’t waste the money,” Lindsey offered, pulling her car keys out.

Macy smiled and took her up on the offer, and when they pulled into the apartment complex lot, she offered her to come up.

“I thought you had to wake up early and run tomorrow?”

“I think giving you a tour of it all would be worth being tired tomorrow, if you know what I mean,” she said lowly, leaning in closer to Lindsey and placing a kiss on her cheek.

And Macy was sweet and cute yet so sexy all at once, and the newness was so exhilarating, so of course she said yes.

They held hands all the way up to the apartment, and it was nice, but Lindsey couldn’t help but compare it to Emily’s and how hers was so much stronger, and safe.

That didn’t stop them though, and as soon as they made it through the door Macy had Lindsey pressed up against the wall, surprising the taller girl with her strength.

And the kiss was soft, and Lindsey knew right then that she was never going back to men because this felt so much more right.

But as it got deeper, and Lindsey let out a moan, she realized that she almost said Emily’s name, and that drew her out of the trance so quickly.

She pulled back and opened her eyes, seeing Macy’s bright green eyes instead of Emily’s blue ones, and she knew that she couldn’t do this.

“Macy, I– I can’t and I’m so sorry,” she stuttered out, stepping forward from the wall.

“Woah hey Lindsey, are you okay?” Macy asked. She led her to the couch and Lindsey was cursing herself because Macy was so freaking sweet and she was thinking of kissing her best friend instead of her.

“I’m sorry Macy, I just there’s someone and it’s just complicated, I really didn’t mean for this to happen but, fuck I messed up.”

“Hey,” Macy said softly, giving a smile, “I promise I’m not mad, it’s okay.”

“You aren’t?”

“Of course not, it’s not your fault. Like I said earlier, you love who you love honey. And it’s okay to love her, even if it’s scary.”

“Love? I don’t love her, she's my best friend and I can’t love her. Not like that,” Lindsey said.

“It’s hard to accept it sometimes, and sometimes you just need a kick in the right direction. So this is the kick, right here, me. I’m telling you, go and get your girl, because you deserve to be happy Lindsey.”

“How can you say that to me after I just basically used you?”

“You didn’t mean to, sometimes the world just works in funny ways. And I’m not worried about settling down anytime soon, I’ve got all the time in the world. If you would be okay with it, I’d love to be your friend though?”

Lindsey just laughed in disbelief. “There’s a girl out there for you, and she will be so lucky to have you Macy. But yeah, I could always use more friends. Clearly I need the advice,” she joked.

“Wonderful, I love giving advice. And thank you, I can’t wait to find her someday.”

The two exchanged numbers and a hug before Lindsey left. And as she pulled into her and Emily’s apartment complex parking lot, she broke down in tears.

Because Macy had been right, she was in love with her best friend who probably didn’t even think of her like that and there was nothing she could do about it, because you love who you love.

She wandered up to her apartment though, hoping Emily would have gone to her room by then. But when her teammate was sitting on the couch with a tub of ice cream, a blanket, and a spoon, she knew that there was only one person she wanted to be with at that moment.

And when Emily didn’t ask her anything about it, just handed her the ice cream and started cracking jokes, Lindsey fell in love a little bit more, and realized she had been falling in love since the beginning.

---

She decided her game plan for now would be to just keep being herself, and decide what to do after camp. Seeing Kelley was her roommate was exciting yet disappointing all at once, because the older player was so much fun to be around, but she wasn’t going to get Emily alone as much.

Maybe a break was for the best, get herself back on track. (but honestly she didn’t even know how to do that so…)

Camp was fun as always, and Kelley and Emily had already pranked her and Mal once with a jumpscare, so nothing out of the ordinary.

Except for the fact that she never got Emily without having someone else around. Not that she was going to do anything, but she missed having those quiet moments with her best friend, or the inside jokes from back home.

She just needed to talk to someone, she couldn’t keep these feelings to herself much longer. And Macy wasn’t there obviously, and so she knew that she needed to find someone else to talk about this stuff with.

And that’s how she found herself outside Tobin’s door an hour before curfew.

She knocked lightly, and Tobin answered the door moments later. “Hey Linds, what’s up?”

“Nothing, I was just wondering if well, I don’t know I just wanted to tell you that—“

“Tobs, who’s at the door?” Christen’s voice came from inside the room.

“It’s just Lindsey, don’t worry Chris,” Tobin replied. Christen got up and came to the door, leaning her head on Tobin’s shoulder.

“Hey Lindsey, you good?” she asked softly.

“Oh shoot, I totally forgot you guys were roommates, I’ll just head out now, I’m so sorry to interrupt—“

“Lindsey, honey are you okay?” Christen cut her off, stepping forward and grabbing her hand.

And with that question tears sprung to Lindsey’s eyes, feeling everything at once.

“Yeah, totally good. I know you guys don’t get to see each other that often though so I’ll leave, I’m sorry for bothering you,” she apologized, swallowing back tears.

“No, you’re not leaving, we were just watching a movie. Come on in kiddo,” Tobin said, wrapping her arm around Lindsey’s shoulder and guiding her into the room, Christen holding onto her as well.

They sat on the bed, Tobin setting her hand on Lindsey’s shoulder, and Christen holding one of her hands, rubbing her other hand on the younger player’s back.

“Linds, whatever it is, you can tell us, we’ll never judge you. I promise,” Tobin said.

“We’ll always love you, we just want you to be happy, and it’s clear you’re not doing so well. It’s okay to cry honey, we’re right here.”

And with Christen’s words, Lindsey let the tears roll down her cheeks, shaking her head as she began to cry. “I’m in love with her.”

“It’s okay Lindsey, it’s okay. Who is she?” Tobin asked.

“I can’t say it, it’s it’s so bad Tobin, so so bad,” Lindsey cried.

“It’s not bad love, you can tell us,” Christen said softly, brushing some of the tears off of Lindsey’s cheeks.

“Emily,” was all she could say before she buried herself in Tobin’s neck, too ashamed to even see their reactions.

But Tobin wrapped her arms around her, and Christen held her from behind, rubbing the sides of her arms, and the two just kept talking to her, telling her it was okay, and that they wouldn’t tell anyone, and that it wasn’t bad.

And she felt so safe, and so loved, that she told them everything. She told them about how amazing Emily was to her, and how those stupid sports bras made her feel, and her date and newfound friendship in Macy.

She told them that she was in love with her from the beginning, and didn’t realize it until now, and that Emily didn’t even know she liked girls so there was no way that she would even return her feelings, and then she would lose her best friend.

“Have you thought about coming out to her?” Tobin asked.

And honestly, she hadn’t. She had been so overwhelmed with it all, she hadn’t even thought about telling her.

“How would I even do it? Just be like, hey I know I told you I was straight and stuff but turns out I’m gay, crazy huh?”

Christen giggled and Tobin just shook her head and smiled. “I mean essentially yeah, but maybe phrase it a little better dude.”

“So I should come out to her,” Lindsey confirmed.

“I say go for it, the worst that happens is life continues as normal right? Besides, maybe she’ll surprise you. She always seems to be full of those,” Tobin teased, referencing the jumpscare from earlier on in camp.

“I swear if she and Kelley jumpscare me I will actually lose it,” Christen stated.

Lindsey and Tobin laughed. “Don’t worry, The Great Horan and I will protect you,” Tobin said, and Lindsey hummed in agreement.

The three sat there for a moment, Lindsey not wanting to go back to her room and answer Kelley’s questions that she knew the nosy defender would have.

And it was like Tobin could read her mind. “Do you wanna spend the night in here kid?”

“Really, could I?”

“Of course honey, it’s not like we’re using the extra bed,” Christen pointed out.

And that got Lindsey laughing again, and made her realize how much better telling them made her feel. “Thank you guys, for everything. For just being here.”

“Anytime kiddo, anytime. We are so old and wise, our advice is priceless,” Tobin said, getting up and getting ready for bed, while Christen laid there with Lindsey a little bit longer.

“You guys are gonna make great parents someday,” Lindsey said, realizing how much of a parental figure that Tobin was to her already, and how Christen was quickly becoming one.

“I call being her mom,” Christen giggled, and Tobin sighed.

“Why do you always make me the dad, first I’m Mal’s dad, now I’m Lindsey’s. I need to start working on my dad jokes,” Tobin said, taking her pj’s into the bathroom to change.

The two laughed, and then Christen turned to Lindsey. “Do you really think we’ll be good parents someday?” she asked, almost nervous.

Lindsey smiled saying, “Oh I know so, as long as I can be their cool aunt.”

“We would expect nothing less. Now come on my newly adopted daughter, let’s get you some clothes to sleep in and off to bed, we’ve got a big day of practice tomorrow,” Christen said, getting up and going through their bags to find Lindsey some clothes.

She could do this. One person at a time, no problem.

Chapter Text

Camp ended and they said their goodbyes to their national team friends, putting Emily and Lindsey back to their shared apartment in Portland.

And Emily did exactly as Kelley said, she just kept being herself. She kept making Lindsey coffee every morning and making as many dad jokes as possible.

They went on more weekend adventures, hung out with their Thorns teammates, and went on late night karaoke drives where Emily displayed her wide knowledge of music lyrics.

Everyday though, there was always some small reminder for Emily that she was screwed because she was in love with her best friend. Because Lindsey was always making her laugh, and always bringing out the best parts of life.

And lately it had been good, but not great. Because something was off about Lindsey, she like was on edge during the most random times. One morning, it happened during breakfast, the time which Emily felt was the least stressful part of the day. So obviously Emily asked her what was wrong.

“You’re all like jittery and stuff, you good dude?”

Lindsey just ran her hand through her hair. “Yeah, I just wanted to—yeah, totally good. All good.”

Emily just nodded and gave her a pat on the shoulder, starting to unload the dishwasher.

“It’s just that—you know you’re my best friend, right Sonny?”

And Emily grimaced slightly, but turned it into a soft smile before turning to face Lindsey. “Well duh, but don’t tell Emma or Kelley I said that,” she teased, trying to put Lindsey at ease.

It worked, as the taller player giggled, and so Emily felt content. Whatever it was that Lindsey needed to tell her, it could wait. Afterall, they had plenty of time as they did live together.

Emily reached up to put some cups away, and was snapped out of her internal monologue by a crash to the floor, Lindsey not in her seat at the bar anymore.

“Linds, you okay?” Emily asked, rushing around the counter.

It was there that she found her best friend facedown on the ground, with the barstool tipped over behind her.

“Yeah, I think I just ow, lost my balance or something, but I’m okay,” Lindsey said, pushing herself off the ground and rubbing her head lightly.

Emily grabbed Lindsey’s hands in her own, pulling her up. “Did you hit your head?” She knew the last thing Lindsey needed right now was a concussion, so she wanted to make sure that nothing was going to come of this fall.

As soon as she got to her feet, Lindsey’s hands went straight to her head, right above her eyebrow, pressing gently.

“Woah hey, don’t touch it,” Emily scolded, grabbing Lindsey’s hands in her own once again. “Let’s sit down on the couch and I can take a look at it.”

Lindsey seemed hesitant, but let Emily drag her to the couch anyway. “Sonny I swear I’m fine, I’m not even dizzy or anything. It’s probably just gonna bruise.”

She ignored her protests and sat down onto the couch next to her, letting go of her hands and bringing them up to Lindsey’s face. “Let me know if any of this hurts, okay?”

Lindsey’s skin felt so soft under Emily’s hands, but she pushed that thought out of her mind quickly as she investigated her teammate’s forehead. She ran her fingers over her eyebrow, and noticed that above it looked like she had skinned her head a bit, but not enough to make her bleed.

As she went higher, Lindsey tensed and inhaled quickly, and Emily drew back hastily. “Right there?” she asked, already knowing the answer to the question.

When she looked down at Lindsey for the response, her gaze flashed to the older player’s lips, and she didn’t realize how close they were until right then.

“Yeah,” Lindsey whispered, her breath hot against Emily’s skin. “Right there.”

Emily felt a jolt go through her body at the warmth of Lindsey’s exhale practically against her lips, and ripped herself away from the moment, tearing herself off the couch. “Let me go get you some ice, that will help.”

The cold temperature of the ice pack grounded her, making her focus on the task at hand. She cursed herself for letting her feelings take over. Her best friend could have been seriously hurt and she was trying to kiss her? As she grabbed a towel and walked back out into the living room, she also realized that she may have overreacted slightly, as the bruise that was forming was small and light, and Lindsey really did seem fine.

She handed her the icepack and the towel anyway, and Lindsey pressed it to her forehead.

Emily looked on worriedly, but probably not for the reason Lindsey thought. How could she have let that happen, she really needed to get it together, play it cool. God she really needed to get over this, because much longer and—

“Son, stop looking at me like that. I promise I’m fine, it’s gonna be gone by tomorrow,” she said, patting the spot next to her on the couch.

Emily sat down, but shook her head. “No I know you’re fine, I’m sorry I overreacted. I just—with everything coming up I just got scared because—because I don’t want to do any of this without you.”

That admission felt so heavy on Emily’s part, and she was hoping that Lindsey didn’t read into it too much.

“Aw Sonny,” Lindsey smiled, “I don’t want to do any of this without you either. Because like I said before I wiped out, you’re my best friend. There is literally nothing you could do to make me mad. Except move out of this apartment, you’re stuck with me now Son, no take backs.”

“You know, there was an open apartment in the building next to us and I was thinking...” she trailed off, and Lindsey punched her in the arm.

“Not funny,” she grumbled, pressing the ice pack to the spot she hit on Emily’s arm.

“Ah cold!” Emily yelled, jumping back off the couch. “Well, I’m gonna go clean up everything you spilled when you decided to make out with the floor, try to stay on the furniture while I’m gone.”

She could feel Lindsey rolling her eyes at the remark, and she smiled proudly.

“Hey Son?” Lindsey asked, softer this time. If it had been anyone else besides the two of them, she probably wouldn’t have heard it.

“Yeah?”

“I just, well I’m—but I—” she sighed, clearly frustrated with herself. “Can I tell you later?”

And as much as Emily wanted to know what was causing her best friend so much distress, because she just wanted to fix whatever was wrong, she knew she needed to respect her request.

“Of course Linds. Like I said, I’m not going anywhere. Whenever you’re ready, okay?”

“Okay,” Lindsey sighed a breath of relief. “Yeah, okay.”

And Emily disappeared into the kitchen, cursing herself for being so helplessly in love with someone like Lindsey. Someone who had a heart like hers and, like Kelley said, cared for her more than any person on the team. Because this whole crush thing was going to ruin it if she didn’t figure out how to do this soon.

---

Lindsey didn’t know what to do. She knew that Emily knew something was off, and she was so grateful that she wasn’t pushing her about it because Lindsey didn’t have any idea how she would respond to that.

Like “Hey sorry I’ve been awkward lately, just trying to work up the nerve to come out to you but I’m too chicken to do it. Oh also I think you’re hot and you were kinda the main reason I realized I wasn’t straight.”

As Tobin would say, she needed to phrase that better. But she also didn’t want to ruin any sort of possible friendship she had left with her roommate. So she needed advice on what to do.

She contemplated calling Christen and Tobin again, but she knew what their advice would be; to be honest with her because they were best friends and Emily would want to help her through all of these new and complicated feelings. But what if she didn’t? What if she was disgusted by the fact that Lindsey was suddenly in love with her and didn’t want to be her friend anymore, let alone roommate.

And she had been texting Macy about it. But she kept saying the same thing she said that night, that she deserved to be happy and that she needed to go get her girl. That you love who you love. Which is sweet and all, but obviously too scary of a path for Lindsey to take.

So she decided she was going to drag someone else into this, and the first person she could think of that knew both her and Emily but also could keep a secret was Mal. Sending off a text that said “I need advice” and then relaxing into the couch.

The apartment was quieter than normal, as Emily had gone out to some bar tonight with Cait and Ellie and some of the other Thorns girls, but Lindsey faked a headache because she needed some alone time.

Mal texted her back pretty quickly, but asked if they could add Rose to their FaceTime because she had just called Rose.

Was she okay with Rose knowing? I mean she could be helpful, she knew Emily pretty well too, and they had similar senses of humor. And if she had Mal, she felt like she could keep the secret.

So she got on a call with both of them, moving herself back into her own bedroom in case Emily came home early.

“Hey Lindsey, what’s up?” Mal asked, tapping on her phone as she added Rose to the call.

Before Lindsey could respond, Rose popped in. “No I can’t take Wilma out right now Mom, Lindsey needs my help.”

There was muffled noise in the background as she walked down a hallway. “I don’t know what she needs Mom, that’s what I’m trying to find out. Just go on the walk without me, love you!” she yelled, as she closed her bedroom door.

“Sorry, technical difficulties. Now Lindsey, what amazing advice can I help you with today?” Rose asked, taking a seat in a desk chair.

“What can WE help you with, I’m here too!” Mal interjected.

Lindsey shook her head at her friends’ antics. “Wow, getting right into business, huh?” she said awkwardly, feeling her confidence beginning to fade.

“Well you basically texted me an SOS signal, so yeah I’m curious. What do you want advice about?” Mal said, beginning to sense that this was a bit more serious than their basic adulting advice conversations.

“Promise you won’t say a word about this to anyone. And I mean like anyone.”

Rose sat up, her mood changing from playful to more serious, and nodded her head.

“Promise Lindsey, we’re always here to listen. What’s on your mind?” Mal asked.

“I’m just going to flat out say it, and then you can ask questions, okay?” They both nodded. “I’m in love with her, well with Emily.”

“With Sonnett?” Rose clarified.

“Yeah,” Lindsey said softly, not able to bring her eyes up to the camera.

“Aw Linds, that’s adorable,” Mal cooed.

“Could you tell that I was—that that I was—“ she couldn’t even get her question out, and she knew that her face was turning bright red at her admission.

“In love with her? Or not straight?” Rose asked.

“Both, I guess.”

Mal started it off. “I don’t know, I didn’t like want to assume anything but when I first met you, I didn’t think you were straight. But then you introduced me to ‘he who must not be named’, and told me he was your boyfriend, so I just figured I read you wrong. But as for Sonnett, I don’t know I thought you were straight so I didn’t think that far into it, but you’ve always treated her a little differently. So I’m not surprised by either of them I guess. I love you no matter who you love though Linds, you’ll always be one of my best friends.”

“Not as good of a friend as Sonnett though,” Rose smirked, and Lindsey blushed, glaring at her, while Mal laughed.

“Just answer the question Lavelle.”

Rose sighed. “I don’t know, I didn’t think about either of those options, at like all. Obviously I don’t care who it is though, as long as they make you happy. And I can tell Sonnett makes you happy and all that shit. Like Mal said, you’ve always loved her a little differently so it makes sense now that I think about it. One time Sam and I caught you staring at her abs in the locker room and she joked that you were jealous of Sonny’s body, but clearly you actually just wanted her body in a different way–”

“Rose,” Lindsey warned, but the brunette did not take her warning.

“Or when Sonnett tackled you at last camp and landed on top of you! Oh my gosh you were out of it for the next couple of minutes and I thought it was just cause you got the wind knocked out of you, but clearly you were thinking about other ways you could be under her–”

“Okay! That’s enough from you!” Lindsey cut her off.

“Aw Linds, don’t get mad, she is pretty hot. I mean those abs and her nice, toned arms,” Mal teased, and Lindsey just held her face in her hands, blocking out their snide remarks.

Once they had finished teasing her about checking out Emily, Mal got them serious again.

“So you said you needed advice. I’m assuming you want to know what we think you should do?”

Lindsey nodded. “Or if I should even try, like is there any possible way she could feel the same?”

“Dude she might already feel the same. I mean you’re like her favorite person in the whole world, even if she won’t admit it, she always chooses you over anyone else on the National team.”

Well that was news to Lindsey. “She does?”

“Oh yeah,” Mal agreed. “When we had to do those drills at last camp where they let us pick a partner, she totally wanted to pick you but then Kelley came in and stole you and you could tell she was disappointed.”

“Dude she ended up with me and she literally missed the ball one time because she was watching you and Kelley. I almost called her out on it but decided that would be a little mean,” Rose admitted.

“Oh so that’s mean? But calling me out for checking her out isn’t?” Lindsey pointed out.

“Well yeah! That’s so much meaner because at that point you were still straight. It would be like me holding a treat in Wilma’s face and then not giving it to her. We already know Sonnett’s gay as hell,” Rose said.

“So what you’re saying is I have a chance?” Lindsey asked curiously.

“What we’re saying is she’s probably already head over heels for you, and if not you could easily change that with some flirting and subtle touches,” Mal said.

“I mean you’re tall, you’ve got muscles, and according to stan twitter, good hands. The other day I read some tweet that said you were every lesbian’s wet dream. Didn’t think you would ever need to hear me say that but here we are,” Rose shrugged.

“Ooh you’ve been exploring stan twitter. Please say they have a ship, that will make this so much more fun,” Mal said.

“Nope, do not answer that question! I do not want the fans to make me delusional that Sonny likes me back because I need to live in the moment and make her want to date me. Easy enough right?”

“Right.” They agreed. “We can talk about it later Mal,” Rose whispered, throwing in an overdramatic wink that Lindsey promptly rolled her eyes at.

The door to their apartment opened, and Lindsey realized she needed to get off this call before Emily came in and asked what they were talking about, because she knew that the three of them were not coming up with an excuse right now.

“She’s back, gotta go! Thanks guys,” Lindsey said quickly.

“Of course, text us updates!” Mal teased, and Lindsey ended the call right as Emily knocked on her door.

“Linds? Can I come in?”

“Yeah,” Lindsey replied, pretending to be scrolling through social media.

Emily jumped onto Lindsey’s bed, laying down at the end as she stretched her arms above her head. “How’s your head feeling?”

“Lots better,” Lindsey said, turning her phone off and directing her attention to the girl of her dreams who was currently laying in her bed. “It’s not even 11:30, you’re back pretty early. Not enough pretty girls to hit on?”

Emily rolled her eyes and lightly kicked Lindsey’s leg. “Oh shut it. And I don’t know, I was bored. Cait and Ellie were being mean and roping everyone else into it, and you weren’t there to save me,” she pouted.

“Well, how about I make it up to you with some homemade milkshakes?” Lindsey offered. “I’m kinda craving some ice cream.”

“Mhm,” Emily moaned, sending Lindsey’s brain to very inappropriate places. “That might do the trick Horan.”

“Well then I have to now, otherwise how will I get back on your good side? Now I’ll go get it started, and you go change into your pj’s,” Lindsey said, getting out of bed.

Emily got up too, but turned towards Lindsey’s mirror. “Change? What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”

Lindsey decided she might as well start now and checked her best friend out shamelessly, letting her eyes roam over her body. The girl was wearing the cutest set of overalls with a flannel on over it, and had worn her hair down for once.

Make a move, touchy and flirty. Right?

She stepped around and wrapped her arms around Emily, looking at them both in the mirror. “Absolutely nothing, but I can’t handle it when you look this cute,” she said, pressing a light kiss to Emily’s cheek before leaving her.

The redness that rose to Emily’s cheeks made the fact that her heart was pounding out of her chest worth it. Maybe Mal and Rose weren’t wrong, maybe she could do this.

---

Emily was dying.

Not literally, but she might actually explode if Lindsey touched her one more time, made a suggestive joke and threw her a wink, or gave her a compliment that was borderline flirting.

The night they made milkshakes was the beginning of it all, and it had only grown more frequent from there.

At first it seemed innocent. Lindsey would cuddle in close on the couch and they would share a blanket, nothing out of the ordinary. But then she started running her hand down Emily’s thigh, tracing shapes lightly. Or mindlessly playing with Emily’s fingers under the blanket, her gaze never leaving the screen.

On their little outings, Lindsey would always volunteer to pay for their meals, as well as share her food with Emily, which was unheard of.

It didn’t help that Emily couldn’t take a compliment. Especially when it came from Lindsey. She would say something as simple as “nice jacket” and Emily couldn’t even look her in the eye to thank her.

The touches were the worst though. After one particular incident when Lindsey had tackled Emily to the couch in a hug when she wasn’t wearing a shirt, Emily felt like she was going to catch on fire.

Because of this, she had resorted to wearing shirts 24/7, even after practices when she was sweaty and hadn’t taken a shower yet. At this point, if a little extra laundry would stop her from jumping her best friend’s bones in the middle of their shared apartment, she would gladly take the burden.

There was only so much that cold showers could do though, and she wondered how much longer she was going to be able to take this.

After one night at the bars, she really almost gave in. Because jealousy, alcohol, and lust were not a good trio.

A week had passed since the last time they had gone out, a week since the milkshakes, a week since this had all started.

Tonight was different though, because this time Lindsey was there. She looked gorgeous per usual, but the low cut top and the tight fitting pants she had worn were not helping Emily at all.

“Want me to get you a beer?” she asked after they had found the table their teammates were at.

“That would be awesome, here let me get some cash,” Emily said, digging in her pocket.

“No, don’t worry about it,” Lindsey said, grabbing Emily’s hand. “This round’s on me,” she winked, and then left her at the table, stunned for what felt like the millionth time that week.

“Damn, did you guys pregame before you got here?” Ellie asked, scooting closer to Emily.

The other girls on the team had gone out to the dancefloor, leaving Emily to fend for herself with Cait and Ellie. She had never told her teammates about her crush on Lindsey, or even admitted it, but they knew the truth.

“No why do you ask?” Emily asked, forcing herself to draw her eyes away from Lindsey’s ass.

Ellie smirked, and she knew she had been caught. “Because I don’t know about you Cait, but I’ve never seen Lindsey that flirty on in the night.”

Emily rolled her eyes. “What are you talking about, she’s like that with everyone.”

“I don’t know man, she’s buying you a beer right now. She doesn’t normally do that unless she’s a little intoxicated,” Cait pointed out.

“Maybe it’s not the alcohol she’s drunk on, if you know what I mean,” Ellie giggled.

Lindsey walked back up before she could retaliate, and handed Emily her beer.

The four of them got to talking and catching up with each other, and with a pause in the conversation, Lindsey announced she was going back up to the bar for another drink. She offered a refill for Emily, but she wasn’t even halfway through her drink yet, apparently taking it slower than she thought.

Cait leaned in closer to Emily. “Watch this,” she whispered. “Hey Linds, can you grab me another drink?”

Lindsey shook her head as she stood up. “You’ve got your own legs and money, use them,” she replied, leaving the trio at the table again.

“Well, well, well Sonnett, didn’t realize that you didn’t have your own legs and money to get your own drinks. So sad that you have to rely on Lindsey for everything,” Ellie teased, and Emily promptly flipped her off.

“Sorry that she likes me more than you,” she muttered.

“Oh I think she more than likes you Son, I mean with the–“

“As much as I would love to continue this conversation, someone’s going to have to go up there,” Cait interrupted. “That guy’s the one that wasn’t taking the hint from Midge earlier until her boyfriend showed up. And considering Lindsey’s single, she doesn’t have a boyfriend to use as an excuse.”

Emily stood up without even thinking. “I’ll get her.”

“I bet you will, you knight in shining armour,” Ellie said as she walked off.

As she turned to the bar, she saw her very uncomfortable best friend trying to dodge this guy’s advances. Sadly, he wasn’t getting it, and kept trying to touch her. Jealousy coursing through her veins, she walked up to the bar and wrapped her arm around Lindsey’s waist, stepping in between her and the guy.

“Oh hey babe, sorry I was running late. Parking was crazy here tonight,” she said smoothly, kissing Lindsey on her cheek.

And the smile that Lindsey gave her basically made Emily’s entire year. She pushed down the thought that this could be real, knowing Lindsey was faking this because she just wanted to get rid of this guy.

Bringing herself back to the situation, she dropped her hand from behind Lindsey’s back and held it instead, facing the problem. “I am so sorry for interrupting, I’m Emily, her girlfriend.”

“Girlfriend, huh. Well then, it was nice talking to you, but I should probably go.” the guy said, stepping away, throwing a wink Lindsey’s way. “Hope to see you around babe.”

Except when he stepped away, he didn’t go far. In fact, he just walked to the other side of Lindsey, presumably waiting for another opportunity to talk to her.

And that made Emily’s blood boil because even though this was fake, Lindsey was hers. She grabbed Lindsey’s face and turned it towards her own, kissing her on...her own thumb.

She wasn’t drunk, but she did take theatre in high school, she knew how to stage kiss. And if she was ever going to get the opportunity to kiss Lindsey for real, she wanted to know that she wanted it, not just for some guy at a bar.

But when she pulled away and took her thumb off of Lindsey’s lips, she might as well have been drunk. Because the way Lindsey’s eyes seemed to be dilated, and the breathlessness to her voice was enough to kill her.

“Sorry if that was a little much,” Emily whispered, face still close. “Is he gone?” she asked.

Lindsey glanced up slightly, scanned the bar, and then stepped back. “Uhm, yeah. Yeah, he’s gone.”

“Well, mission accomplished then,” Emily said proudly.

“Thanks for saving me, he wasn’t taking the hint like at all,” Lindsey said.

Emily laughed at that. “Yeah, we could tell. So obviously I had to come and make sure that no man was stealing my girlfriend.”

Lindsey choked on her drink, and Emily realized that she had called Lindsey her girlfriend out loud, hoping it wouldn’t make the situation too awkward.

But once she had gotten it together, she seemed to be fine with it. “Well, can I buy my girlfriend a drink for saving me?”

“Why Miss Horan, another drink? Are you trying to get me drunk?”

“Oh please, you love beer.”

“That I do, you’ve got me there. However, you’re already through your second drink of the night and will probably drink a third. Someone has to drive us back to the apartment,” Emily pointed out, patting the car keys in her pocket.

“Ugh fine, I guess you’re right. But my girlfriend could still dance with me, right?” Lindsey asked. “I’ve heard she’s a pretty good dancer,” she whispered as she leaned in close, clearly feeling the strength of whatever it was she had been drinking.

And that sent a shiver through Emily’s body, but who was she to say no? Especially to dancing with her hot best friend.

“I guess she could,” Emily sighed, letting a smiling Lindsey take her out to the dance floor.

Emily didn’t even have to look back at the table to know that Cait and Ellie were probably giving her a knowing look, but what she wasn’t expecting was the looks from her other teammates on the dance floor.

And then Lindsey threw her arms around Emily’s neck and pulled her in close, and it was then she realized that she really needed to figure this out. Because this crush didn’t seem to be fading anytime soon.

Chapter Text

Another camp had rolled around, and so Lindsey was on yet another plane. She didn’t even get to sit by Tobin, AD, or Emily, so that didn’t help much either. The only good thing about this flight was that she got the window seat. So after taking her obligatory airplane window pictures to post on her instagram story, she’s already run out of things to do.

The guy in the seat next to her had passed out as soon as the plane had left the ground, and thankfully fell asleep on the guy on the aisle seat’s shoulder instead of her own.

She could watch a show she had downloaded onto her computer, or read a book on her phone, but nothing sounded fun. So she sat there in boredom a bit longer, until the flight attendant snapped her out of her trance when he asked her if she wanted a drink.

One Diet Coke later (because there was no way she was going to be able to get away with soda once she got to camp), she was officially back to being bored.

The flight wasn’t actually that long, only like two hours or so, but this was actually the second flight of the day, as they had connecting flights, so Lindsey was really eager to just get off the plane and be on solid ground.

She handed the flight attendant her cup when he came by, but before he walked off he checked her seat number and glanced back down.

“Oh and Miss, the blonde in seat 18C wanted me to give you this,” he said, handing her a folded napkin.

When she flipped open the napkin, there was a drawing of a sleeping Tobin in the aisle across from her, and a note that read:

Kinda wish I could
just fall asleep like
her and wake up
when we got there.
You as bored as I am?
-Sonny :)

She smiled at the fact that Emily was feeling equally as restless as she was, but then looked at the picture closer. It amazed her that Emily could draw something so detailed on an airplane napkin, and have it still look so clean and effortless.

Spotting a pen in the back of the seat in front of her, she uncapped it and wrote her own note on the back of it:

Same here. Why
don’t you draw me
something pretty on
the other side to
keep yourself busy?

She didn’t even bother signing it before waking the sleeping guy next to her, claiming to need to go to the bathroom. The guy in the aisle seat that he had been sleeping on gave her a gracious smile as he let her out.

Emily was also on an aisle, so she slipped the note onto the tray table, throwing her a wink and a smile as she walked past to the bathroom. When she passed by and Emily was drawing, she smiled, forgetting the restless mood she was in before.

They landed pretty soon after Lindsey made it back to her seat, and they were quickly ushered into a van and taken to the hotel, directly into the team meeting.

She greeted everyone, giving Christen a hug and jokingly calling her mom (after Tobin got to hug her first of course), and then Rose and Mal were immediately at her side.

“So? Have you made your move yet?” Rose asked.

Lindsey hushed her quickly, but shook her head. “I mean I’ve been super touchy and flirty, and there was this one night at a bar where she pretended to be my girlfriend to get this guy off my back, but guys I don’t know she doesn’t seem to be like, into me.”

Rose snorted and Mal laughed and spoke up. “Aw, that’s cute. But based on the look she gave me when I just hugged you, I’d say she’s at least a little into you.”

“You haven’t told her you like girls either, so she’s probably wondering why her straight best friend is suddenly on her ass now,” Rose pointed out, and Lindsey smacked her.

They were then called to sit down, and Lindsey was a little disappointed that Emily was on the other side of the room with Kelley and Becky, but then Christen started talking to her and she managed to keep her eyes off of her best friend.

And she was happy for Emily when roommates got announced and she heard that she got to be with Kelley, as she knew that the two were close, but she also wished she could have Emily for herself.

She shook it off when Sam gave her a room key and the two headed up to their room and got unpacked. As she put the rest of herself in the bathroom, Sam invited her to go out for ice cream with her and Abby, but Lindsey declined in hopes of finding Emily and seeing what she was up to.

As she walked down the hall to the room that she had memorized when the coaching staff read them off, Mal and Rose rounded the corner and dragged her into their own room. Of course they were roommates.

“What are you two doing, I was going to see-”

“Let me guess, Sonnett? Too bad, you’re hanging out with us because we need more details about that night in the bar, was she like super possessive over you?” Rose asked.

“Do we have to talk about it?”

“Considering Kelley and Emily just left with Sam and Abby to go get ice cream, yes, we do have to talk about it,” Mal said.

Cursing herself, and Sam for not being more specific, she sat down and ran her hand through her hair.

“Well, I was getting another drink and she had stayed back at the table, and this guy would not leave me alone. She must have noticed because suddenly she was there, kissing my cheek and telling this guy to back off. And then he continued to be a jerk about it, and Emily did that one like trick where you put your thumb on someone’s lip and she kissed it-”

“Wait, she stage kissed you?” Mal squealed, practically bouncing on her bed.

Lindsey just nodded, knowing that she was blushing at the thought of it.

“So her lips were basically on yours, and you still don’t think she likes you? Even the slightest bit?” Rose asked.

“I don’t know guys, she could have just been trying to get him to go away.”

“If she really wanted to get you out of the situation, she could have pulled some best friend crap and just brought you back to the table. Instead she chose to basically make you hers in front of the entire bar,” Rose smirked.

A shiver ran through Lindsey at those words, warmth pooling low in her stomach at the thought of Emily claiming her for real like that in front of people, of being hers.

“Alright, if you don’t believe us, we’ll just have to prove it to you, right Rose?”

Rose smirked, rubbing her hands together like some sort of evil genius out of a kids movie. “Ooh, I like that idea.”

“What are you two going to do to her? Please nothing bad,” Lindsey sighed, knowing there was officially no stopping them now.

“Don’t worry, nothing too bad,” Mal said.

Rose just smiled. “Tomorrow at practice, Sonnett won’t even know what hit her.”

Was she a bad best friend for not warning Emily about this in advance? Probably. But if they were going to prove that she had a chance with her, it would be worth it for both of them.

---

It was hot. The sun had shown them no mercy today, not a cloud in sight. And there was no wind either, not even like a slight breeze.

So when Emily peeled up her tank top to wipe the sweat off of her face, she didn’t feel like it was anything out of the ordinary.

She turned to grab a water cup, her shirt sticking to her skin and staying up. She could hear Rose and Mal giggling, and when she turned around to see what they were laughing at, Rose threw the cup of water at Emily’s stomach, effectively soaking her.

“What the actual hell guys?” Emily gasped, jumping backward and pulling her shirt down. “That water is freezing!”

“Well we needed to cool you down somehow,” Rose shrugged. “Right Mal?”

“Right, if you got any hotter, you’d set the pitch on fire.” Mal said.

“What are you talking about? We’re all hot, we’re basically playing on the surface of the sun,” Emily asked, keeping her distance in case for whatever reason they decided to dump more water on her.

“They’re joking about your abs Sonny,” Lindsey explained.

This sent Rose and Mal into giggles once again, and for some reason Emily felt embarrassed. Normally this stuff didn’t make her feel like this, she was proud of her body and what she had done to get it, but the way Lindsey was there and looking at her just made it different.

“Oh,” was all she could say.

“I bet Lindsey gets to see those all the time, huh?” Rose said, with a smirk that Emily knew didn’t mean anything good.

Lindsey snorted. “Yeah because after practices Sonnett is apparently allergic to shirts.”

Mal and Rose laugh even louder now, and Emily feels the need to defend herself.

“I thought you said you didn’t mind Linds, I can stop if you don’t like it,” Emily said, not wanting to make Lindsey uncomfortable.

“Oh I’m sure she doesn’t mind at all,” Rose muttered, Lindsey shooting her a glare and rolling her eyes.

“Just teasing Son, you don’t have to wear shirts if you don’t want to,” Lindsey said, nudging Emily’s arm as she walked off.

“Right teasing,” Emily said, mostly to herself.

Rose and Mal weren’t done though apparently, still going on about it. “Maybe keep the shirt on until it’s just you and Lindsey alone, I may be single but I don’t need to get involved in whatever relationship you two have got going on,” Rose gagged, which then earned her another glare, this time from Emily.

“What are you two even talking about?” Emily asked, starting to get defensive over whatever this joke was.

Mal stood up and pulled Rose to her feet and as the two of them headed back out to the field, she turned and whispered to Emily. “She’s just making something out of nothing Sonny, cause you and Lindsey are just friends, right?”

Emily gulped her water down, trying not to choke over the implication that there even could be something more. “Yep, just friends,” she replied, looking over at Lindsey who was already back on the field, laughing with Sam about something.

Mal smirked as she followed Emily’s gaze. “Right.”

As the afternoon went on, Emily felt like she was going to melt into the ground from the heat. In order to help prevent anyone from overheating too badly, the coaching staff had decided to give them small breaks to cool their bodies down during their breakout sessions with their position on the field.

So when they signaled for the defensive group to take a break, Emily let out of a sigh of relief. She raced Kelley over to the tent and immediately chugged a cup of water, the rest of the defensive group laughing at their antics.

The forwards also happened to be taking their break too, and so the midfielders and the goalies were the only two groups out working.

Emily had taken a seat and had begun to watch the other two groups, as everyone else had, and immediately her gaze wandered to a certain teammate of hers in the midfield group.

“Need a napkin?” Mal asked as she took a seat next to her.

Emily tilted her head at the forward. “No, why are you offering?”

“Well you’re drooling a bit, so I figured I’d ask. I mean I get it, Lindsey’s good and all but you really take the whole staring thing to the next level.”

“I wasn’t- There was no staring happening—”

“Yeah right just watch your girl, she’s next up in line,” Mal said, looking towards the field as well.

She and Rose were doing some passing drill, and once they had gone through the cycle and jogged back to the end of the line.

“They did good, wouldn’t you say so Sonny?” Mal asked, and Emily nodded in agreement. “Hey Linds, Rose!” she yelled, getting their attention.

“Mal!” Emily warned, scared of what she was going to yell across the field for the entire team and staff to hear.

“Son and I think you’re looking good!” she yelled when they looked over. And if Emily’s face wasn’t sunburned at this point, she would have probably gone bright red from the embarrassment. Why did Mal have to bring her into this?

Lindsey just flashed a thumbs up, and Rose struck a pose, dramatically flipping her hair and then flexing her arms. They laughed at her poses, but Emily’s laughter quieted quickly when Rose nudged Lindsey and encouraged her to flex.

She rolled her eyes reluctantly but did it anyway, and Emily’s throat went dry, even though she had just downed like five cups of water. Her brain ran with the image quickly, flashes of different ways Lindsey’s strong arms could be wrapped around her or pressed against her flooding her thoughts.

The other girls on the sidelines whistled and hollered at the two, as Rose had gone back to flexing as well and was trying to prove her dominance, when it was very clear that Lindsey’s arms outranked her.

“Enjoying the gun show?” Mal said under her breath, snapping Emily out of her head.

She ran her hands through her hair, pulling it back, and shoved Mal lightly.

Luckily, before Mal could tease her anymore, they called for the forwards to go back to drills, and the defenders were called over a few minutes later.

The rest of practice went well, she had been in between Kelley and Ali during drills so she was pretty distracted with talking with them and not focusing on the fact Lindsey was actually staring at her during the midfielders break.

For their last thing they were doing a scrimmage, and Emily was not on Lindsey’s team. She wasn’t too upset about it, because no matter how good she and Lindsey connected on the field, it was just a scrimmage, no big deal.

However, Lindsey was playing extremely aggressive today.

No, aggressive was not the word. She was like almost touchy? Which, with her behavior from back in Portland this past week or so, wasn’t even that surprising. But anytime Emily would tackle her it was like Lindsey would lean into her more, sliding her hands across Emily’s back and stomach to push around her, pressing her body into her to break through.

And when she finally got called for the push, Emily had fallen to the ground, so she came back and helped Emily up, a smirk painted across her face (someone also whistled in the background, and Emily didn’t even have to turn to know that it was probably Rose).

Shaking it off, and reassuring Ash that she was fine, Emily took her spot back on the line.

Emily’s team managed to pull out the win, and so after the celebrations, they all headed back to the tents and water to stretch out before getting on the buses to go back to the hotel for dinner.

After she and Crystal had done some needed dancing for the team, Emily grabbed her stuff and began to walk back to the bus, Lindsey in front of her claiming it was her turn to sit at the window seat.

Before she could even get off the field, she was tripped from behind and fell forward, bringing Lindsey to the ground with her.

And so suddenly Emily realized that she was literally on top of the girl of her dreams, who was practically panting underneath her trying to catch her breath from the surprise of the fall.

“I’m so sorry Sonnett, I didn’t mean to do that!” Mal said as she walked by, Sam laughing under her breath as she walked by with her.

Emily cursed the younger player in her head, but just shook her head and rolled off Lindsey and helped her up.

“Sorry Linds, didn’t mean to go down on you like that–shit I mean top you–fuck I just didn’t mean to take you down,” Emily stuttered out, now even more embarrassed.

“Hey Sonnett! Tell Lindsey your fantasies on your own time and get on the bus, I want dinner!” Rose yelled as she walked past them.

Oh, was she going to kill Rose Lavelle.

“Well c’mon Son, you heard the girl we gotta go,” Lindsey said, grabbing Emily’s wrist and practically dragging her toward the bus.

They sat down in the seats, and Emily was too busy plotting her murder plan to even fight Lindsey for the window seat. Lindsey handed her one of the airpods, the other one already in her ear. But before she could put it in, Lindsey whispered in her ear.

“And for the record Son, I would definitely top you, not the other way around.”

With the image of Lindsey on top of her, instead of it being like it had when she had fallen, Emily was surprised her lip didn’t start bleeding she had bit it so hard.

Yeah, she was really going to have to kill Rose.

---

The next day of practice passed, just as hot as the day before. But after this practice everyone felt a little bit lighter, because they had an off day the next day, meaning a day without running in the blistering heat.

They also could do whatever they wanted for dinner that night, so people were discussing where they wanted to go and what type of food they wanted.

When Lindsey got out of her shower, Sam was putting the last finishing touches on her makeup. She wasn’t actually going out with anyone from the team tonight, because her husband happened to be in town and was going to take her out for dinner.

“How do I look?” she asked, giving Lindsey a spin.

“Gorgeous Sammy, he won’t know what hit him.”

“Even if I didn’t look good, he’s stuck with me now!”

And with that Sam was gone, leaving Lindsey to find people to go out with. She had texted Rose and Mal, but they had already left, apologizing for not asking her before they had gone out. So she wandered down to Emily and Kelley’s room to see what the two of them were up to.

Emily answered the door, but stepped out into the hallway with Lindsey, closing the door behind her. “Alright Linds, looks like it’s just you and me. What are you thinking?”

“I hadn’t decided, I figured I’d just go wherever everyone else wanted to go. Where’s Kelley?” she asked.

Emily grabbed Lindsey’s room key out of her back pocket and walked down the hall to Lindsey’s room and let herself in, throwing herself onto Lindsey’s bed. “She went with Tobin, Christen, Mal, and Rose somewhere. I think Becky was going to go with them too actually. But they had said you were in the shower still, so I offered to stay behind. Unless you don’t want quality roommate time, then I guess I’ll figure something out.”

Lindsey smiled and kicked Emily lightly. “I guess you can stay, you dork.”

As she sat down on the bed next to Emily, she thought about the people going, and how they purposefully left Lindsey behind, unlike what Mal and Rose had said in their texts. She didn’t feel left out, because she had Emily and that was all she really wanted, but something definitely seemed fishy there.

“So, what do you want to get?” Emily asked, bringing her back to the food conversation. As soon as she finished the sentence, her stomach growled, and Lindsey laughed.

“I think you’re the one that needs to answer that question.”

“Can we just get Chinese food?”

“Takeout?” Lindsey asked, grabbing her phone to look up a place that would deliver to the hotel.

“Yeah. It’ll deliver here right?”

“Mhm. Let me call it in really quick,” she said, dialing the number to the closest place she could find with decent ratings. As she rattled off her order as well as Emily’s, she relished in how domestic this felt, even from a hotel room. She loved how it made her feel, how connected to each other they were.

As she hung up, she sat her phone on the nightstand. “She said it’ll be here in twenty minutes, and that the front desk will call us when it’s delivered.”

“Perfect. Now I was hoping this would work out to where we wouldn’t have to leave the hotel, because I really wanted to take off these jeans. Do you have a pair of sweats I could borrow?”

Lindsey grabbed the pair on top of the suitcase and threw them at her. “I better get those back,” she instructed, as Emily got off the bed.

“We’ll see about that,” Emily said, wandering into the bathroom to change. Lindsey had secretly hoped she would change out here, but that really was just wishful thinking.

Once Emily came back out and was officially comfy, the two of them caught up on how they had been doing at practices, and really on everything they couldn’t talk about because they hadn’t been alone. It wasn’t even anything deep either, just their own little inside jokes they had formed from living together.

Room service called them and Lindsey ran down to grab the food, because Emily claimed it would take her less time since she had longer legs (Lindsey threw a pillow in her face but got up and got the food anyway).

The two ate their food in Lindsey’s bed with the evening news on but with the volume low, just as background noise, while they continued whatever they had been talking about before.

That was one of the other things Lindsey loved about Emily. There was always something for them to talk about, nothing was ever boring. And Emily told the best stories, she loved listening to any story she’d tell her, even if Lindsey was there when it happened, because for some reason when Emily told it they were a million times funnier.

They finished their meals, and Emily grabbed the fortune cookies out of the bottom of the bag, chucking one at Lindsey. “Time to open this cookie that will predict my future,” Sonnett announced dramatically as she cracked hers open.

“Mine says that I have a secret admirer. Hm, how interesting, but most likely inaccurate,” Sonnet remarked, throwing the paper to the floor and eating the cookie.

“Ew, I don’t know how you eat those,” Lindsey said, hoping her disgust would cover any sign that would reveal the truth of Emily’s fortune. She cracked hers open and slid the paper out. Upon reading it, she froze.

~Do that one thing you’ve been putting off that you’ve always wanted to do. Even if you’re afraid, take the leap.~

Emily swallowed the last of her cookie. “Linds, can I have your cookie?”

Lindsey blinked, rereading the fortune.

“Hey, earth to Lindsey. Can I eat your cookie please?”

“So uh, Emily, I’m into girls.”

The room was silent except for the low rumble of the news in the background.

“You–You are?”

“Yeah, I am. And this, this stupid fortune cookie told me to do that one thing I’ve always wanted to do so I’m going to tell you this and you have to promise not to freak out on me,” Lindsey said, looking up at Emily nervously and receiving a nod in return.

“I’m sick and tired of pretending I’m not in love with you, that I only think of you as my best friend because I don’t Em, I really don’t. All I can do is picture having a life with you where we’re more than friends, where you love me too and we live together for the rest of our lives and be happy and get a dog and have kids if you want them and take them places and go on adventures and grow old together. I want you in my life forever, and I want you to be my partner,” Lindsey admitted, passion filling her voice as she just said everything she had wanted to say for so long. She couldn’t bring herself to look up at Emily to see her reaction, but she slowed down and caught her breath before speaking again.

“Can’t you picture it Em? You and me?” she said, softer this time.

And when she met Emily’s eyes, she saw tears running down her face, and the girl crawling towards her across the bed and throwing herself into Lindsey’s arms.

“God Linds, that’s all I’ve ever wanted. That’s all I’ve ever wanted with you and you don’t even know how happy it makes me to hear you say that because I love you so fucking much, I always have.”

“Em, please just kiss me.”

And Emily did exactly that, her lips meeting Lindsey’s as they melted into each other, fortune cookies long forgotten. Emily’s hand laced it’s way into Lindsey’s hair, as Lindsey wrapped her arms around Emily’s neck. The kiss was so simple and sweet, yet so passionate and everything Lindsey had ever wanted.

The two of them just sat there on the bed, holding each other and crying. Lindsey’s tears were a mix between relief and happiness, and she assumed that Emily’s were probably the same.

Eventually, Emily pulled back and brushed her hand to Lindsey’s cheek, wiping the last of her tears away. “Look at us, crying like a bunch of babies. Who would have thought this was how it would go down, crying over some crazy fortune cookies?” she teased lightly, brushing her nose against Lindsey’s.

“Can’t say I ever thought it would happen,” Lindsey replied. “After all, I basically have been throwing myself at you for the past like two weeks and you haven’t done anything.”

“Because I thought you were straight!” Emily exclaimed, making Lindsey laugh. “And you went on a Tinder date,” she huffed, crossing her arms.

“Oh, does that make you jealous, Em?” Lindsey asked.

She softened at the nickname, and nodded shyly. “I do like it when you call me that though.”

“Em?”

Emily blushed lightly, pulling herself in close again.

“I’ll keep that in mind then. And you have no reason to be jealous, that was a one time thing. It was actually with a girl.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I was just really confused but that girl basically had to tell me that I was in love with you, so nothing really happened,” Lindsey admitted.

Emily chuckled lightly before asking “So what made you fall for me? Was it my irresistible charm, or the fact that I never wore shirts? It was the shirtless thing, wasn't it. You know I did that for you right?”

Lindsey just rolled her eyes and looked down at Emily’s lips. “Just shut up and kiss me.”

And this time, it went further, tongues exploring each other’s mouths, to the point where they were basically making out on the hotel room bed. When Emily finally pulled away, Lindsey couldn’t even tell how much time had passed, but they both knew that they didn’t want this to go any further in a hotel room.

“We should probably clean all of this up before Sam comes back and wonders why there’s Chinese takeout all over the floor,” Emily pointed out, rolling off of Lindsey.

“Probably a smart idea.”

As they cleaned up the last of it, Emily sighed and rubbed her stomach. “Honestly, probably the best takeout I’ve ever had.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. The dessert was phenomenal.”

“Dork,” Lindsey said, but the smile on her face made it clear that it was all out of love.

“Oh shoot, I keep forgetting to give you this,” Emily said, reaching into her pocket.

She pulled out what looked like a folded up napkin and handed it over.

Lindsey opened it, and on one side was the picture of Tobin sleeping from the airplane, where Lindsey had written the note on the flight here and told her to draw something pretty.

“Go ahead, flip it over.”

And when she did she almost started crying again.

Because it was a drawing of Lindsey sitting at their bar in her pj’s, coffee in hand. Underneath the picture, Emily had written a note.

You told me to draw
something pretty, and
you’re the prettiest
thing I’ve ever seen.
Will you be my girlfriend?

“Em,” Lindsey gasped, smiling so big she felt like her face was going to fall off. “Of course I’ll be your girlfriend.”

She got up and kissed her, sweetly, and then began kissing down her neck.

“You don’t think we’re rushing it?” Emily panted as she spoke, humming at the feeling of Lindsey’s mouth on her skin.

“Em, we’ve been living together for months now, and best friends for so much longer. If anything we’re taking it slow.”

And Emily just laughed and brought her lips back to Lindsey’s, smiling into the kiss.

“How did you know to write that on the napkin?” Lindsey asked curiously, holding it between them and looking at it again.

“I was going to tell you how I felt at some point during camp, but we were just never alone. And I decided on that plane that if by some wild outcome you felt the same, I needed to be prepared.”

“Well, I love you, and I am so glad you were prepared.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, cause now I can call you my girlfriend,” Lindsey remarked.

“Hm, well can my girlfriend kiss me?” Emily asked, bringing Lindsey back to the bar night when she asked Emily to dance with her in a similar fashion.

“She definitely can.”

Yeah, it was worth it. Everything was worth it.

---

With everything that had happened last night, Lindsey had forgotten how suspicious she was of the dinner plans that were made while she was in the shower.

By the time Sam got back from her dinner, Emily was long gone, having to go call her parents because she had told them she’d call them after dinner.

They had decided that they weren’t going to tell everyone or like announce their relationship, but they weren’t going to not tell them. So if they asked, they’d admit to it, but they didn’t want to make it some huge deal if it didn’t have to be.

Their free day had been fun as their little group five, Sam, Lindsey, Emily, Mal, and Rose, had gotten a van and had spent the day exploring the city and the little shops they could find.

That night, after everyone had returned from the day’s events, Mal and Rose had come by to drag Sam and Lindsey to their room for a game night.

“What games do you have? Did you pack games for camp?” Sam asked.

“You’ll see!” Mal giggled, and Lindsey and Sam exchanged worried glances. At least Lindsey wasn’t the only one who didn’t know what was going on.

When they got to the room, Emily, Kelley, Tobin, Christen, and Becky were already there, sitting in a circle. Lindsey took a seat by Christen, Sam sitting on the other side of her.

“Alrighty! Time to start truth or dare!” Rose announced, getting out a couple bottles of wine and cups that the five of them had found that day and managed to smuggle back into the hotel.

“What? I thought we were playing board games,” Sam complained.

“Well you thought wrong! Now who wants to get us started,” Rose said, passing out cups and uncorking the wine.

The game had been pretty uneventful, as they were in a hotel room, however when they convinced Becky to prank call room service Lindsey was dying laughing.

“Alright Lindsey,” Kelley asked, after just completing a successful prank call on Alex. “Truth or dare?”

“Truth,” she answered, taking a sip of her drink. Answering dare to Kelley might as well be a death sentence, because she could come up with some crazy tasks.

“Do you have a crush on anyone right now?” she asked, eliciting cheers from the other girls.

“Ooh we’re getting personal,” Mal remarked, throwing a wink at Lindsey.

Lindsey just laughed and looked at Emily, who had a mixture of a grimace and a smile on her face, knowing where this was about to go.

“I mean I guess I’ve gotta say Sonny, she is my girlfriend after all,” she answered casually.

“You like Sonny? Oooh—WAIT GIRLFRIEND?” Kelley asked, standing up out of shock.

Now they were both laughing as their teammates all shouted a billion questions at once, freaking out. Well, everyone besides Sam.

“Why are you all acting like this? You didn’t know they were dating?” she asked, like this was the most obvious thing in the world.

“How would we know, they’ve never said anything about finally admitting their feelings for each other!” Mal exclaimed.

“Well yeah, but Sonnett is literally wearing Lindsey’s sweats right now. And they live together? And are still always texting each other, like even when they’re in the same room. And they literally held hands when we walked in all the stores today.”

“I mean,” Emily started, playing with the fabric of Lindsey’s sweatpants that she had kept from the previous night, “she’s not wrong.”

“Aw, I’m so happy for you Lindsey,” Christen said, leaning over and hugging her from the side. “Way to make your mom proud,” she whispered, and Lindsey gave her a squeeze in return.

“Dude, why didn’t you tell me? Then we could’ve played something else instead of truth or dare,” Kelley said, nudging Sonnett.

“Wait, the only reason we played truth or dare was so these two would admit their feelings? Are you kidding me?” Sam exclaimed.

“Yes that was why! We planned this at dinner last night but you said you couldn’t go,” Rose said.

“That’s why you abandoned me? I mean I’m not mad because that’s when I told her, but I knew something was up there,” Lindsey said.

“Aw,” Becky cooed. “That’s actually kinda cute.”

Emily turned toward the older defender. “How did you get roped into all of this Becky? I know how everyone else did but you?”

“Kelley told me about it when she was drunk one night,” Becky admitted. “And then I was invested so I obviously needed to see how it turned out.”

“Jesus Christ you guys are insane,” Lindsey muttered.

“Hey! If you would have just told us, we wouldn’t have had to do this,” Mal pouted.

“Yeah!” Rose agreed. “And after all we did to help you Lindsey.”

Lindsey snorted. “Help is a strong word.”

“Besides, you two deserved it for making me look like a fucking idiot at practice the other day,” Emily pointed out.

“Well I am so happy for you two, but I must go and call Alex for real, she told me to tell her if it worked,” Kelley said, grabbing her phone off the table.

“You told Alex?” Emily asked.

Kelley smiled apologetically. “I may have been drunk. Again. And she’s my other best friend Sonny, how did you expect me not to tell her that you were finally admitting your feelings.”

Emily just rolled her eyes and smiled back at the veteran, waving her off into the hall. “Love ya kid!”

“So how did it happen? Who said what? Tell us everything!” Mal said, acting like a little middle school girl at a sleepover.

“No matter how it happened, you two deserve to be happy together. I’m just glad you got it all figured out,” Tobin said, standing up with Christen on her arm, giving Lindsey a pat on her back and messing with Emily’s hair as they left.

And as Lindsey looked across the circle at her girlfriend, who was smiling back at her, she couldn’t help but think the same thing.

Lindsey was so glad they got it all figured out. And Emily was glad they got to be roommates for the rest of their lives.

One might even say they were living the dream.