JAMIE WAS BACK, AND KEELEY AND WILLIE MADE THEIR WAY DOWN TO THE LOCKER ROOM. Keeley had the pictures from Sam's photo shoot, and Willie wanted to be there to see how excited he was. As they walked into the room and made sure that no one was naked, the blonde girl announced their presence. "Knock knock! Sam, I think we have something you might wanna see."

"You wanna look at your photos from the Dubai Air shoot?" Willie questioned with raised eyebrows at the Obisanya man looked up at them.

"Ooh! Yes, please," he exclaimed, clapping his hands together excitedly as he made his way over to them. "Oh, God. I'm very nervous. But also very excited. That's similar to whenever Colin drives me somewhere in his Lamborghini."

WIllie nodded, knowing the feeling, even though she was usually more nervous than excited because it would be one thing if Colin could drive, but he had crashed into plenty of signs in his time. "I'm usually just scared for my life."

"Aye, it's true. It's way too much car for me," Colin agreed. The guys all came over to look at the pictures and make fun of Sam, and Willie laughed with them.

All of a sudden, Willie heard a very familiar voice that she had not heard in a while making its way down the hall. The man was talking very loudly to someone who was not responding and just letting him ramble on, and she knew immediately who it was.

"Oh, my God!" she shrieked, causing everyone in the room to look at her with confused looks. She ran over to the door and collided with the man before he even made it into the room. He almost fell over because of his slim figure that was not made to hold the weight of his sister. He hugged back once he stabilized both of them.

"It's a nice place you got here," Matthew Carlisle told her after they said hello. He then released her and looked over to the group of players that was looking sincerely confused. Well, except for Colin who immediately went to do a little bro-hug with him. "I'm sure all of you are very famous, but I do not watch football."

He said the last word in a British accent that sounded really awful, and Willie rolled her eyes. Another boy made his way into the room, and he was carrying what looked like fifteen bags. He dropped them and looked up at Matt. "You did not have to say that with an accent. Hey, Will."

"Man, are you guys moving in?" she asked, looking down at all of the bags that had rolled across the ground in shock. She reached over over so that she could hug him as well, and the blonde boy embraced her back with a smile.

He sighed as they pulled away, looking down at all of the luggage and shaking his head as he nodded to Matthew, who was rambling on to the very confused footballers. "Oh, you know your brother. He travels like a supermodel. There's a suitcase just for underwear."

"Of course," she chuckled, remembering her brother's antics. Asher knew better than anyone because he had lived with the boy for seven years now. She turned to the group of boys and Keeley. "Hey, everyone. That is my brother, Matthew, and this is our best friend from back home, Asher."

Jamie was watching Asher and Willie from his seat in front of his locker in the corner, glaring at them

They all greet each other, and Jamie frowns when he sees Asher's arm around Willie. He pushed himself to his feet and made over to the pair, and he reached his hand out to shake the blonde man's. "I'm Jamie Tartt."

"Hey, man," Asher responded, and he removed his arm from around the brunette so that it was free to shake Jamie's. The Tartt man seemed pleased as he introduced himself. "Asher Atwood."

"Bye, man," Jamie responded, putting on an American accent as he said it that made both of the actual Americans look at him in confusion as he walked away and joined the rest of the team that was low key bullying Matthew.

Asher looked extremely baffled, not expecting such hostility from a guy that came up to shake his hand. Plus, he thought that all the British people were nice, despite the fact that Willie had told him that he was wrong on multiple occasions. "Okay, what's his deal?"

"Not sure," she muttered, her eyes following the footballer as he went back to sit down by his locker since no one really wanted to talk to him. Ever since he got back, they had been giving him the cold shoulder. "Do you and Matt want to head back to my apartment? Lois should be there, and we got the couch bed set up for you guys."

"Sounds great. Thanks. Matt! Time to go, buddy," he called to his friend and roommate after whistling after him like he was a dog. Matthew gave his sister one last hug after she walked them out.

《❂》

SAM WANTED TO PULL OUT OF HIS DUBAI AIR CAMPAIGN. He had an amazing reason, too. That meant that it was going to be a very stressful day for Willie, so she did what helped her the most when she was stressed. She went outside and worked while watching practice.

She sat a couple of seats down from the therapist they hired because she was honestly scared of the woman. After a few minutes, Ted came running onto the pitch with a visor, sunglasses, and a dad power walk. He blew his whistle, causing everyone to look up at him as he started yelling. "Now listen up, you little turd birds! Practice starts at 9 o'clock. If you are not stretched five minutes early then you are minutes late! You understand me? Do you understand me?"

"Yes, Coach," Sam answered, and he was clearly as confused as Willie was.

"Okay, good! Now start touching your toes! Touch your toes! Those are your feet fingers. Let's go, dummies. Touch your toes," he ordered. They all reached down and touched their toes, looking up at him with honestly terrified looks. "And touch each other's toes! You heard me! Touch each other's toes! I don't wanna hear it. Hands on toes. Someone else's toes besides your own."

Colin put his hands on Isaac's boots while looking up at his Coach with an honestly baffled expression as he called out, "What muscle is this working?"

"Don't worry about it. The only muscle I don't wanna see working right now is your mouth, Colin," Ted answered with an eye roll. Willie giggled loudly, but when Dr. Sharon turned her head to look at her, she shut up because she felt judged.

Later, they were running a drill, and people kept messing up. Coach yelled at them every time that they did. "Rojas! Richard! Bumbercatch!"

"Sorry, Coach," Bumbercatch responded, looking down at his feet as a couple of people laughed. Willie was honestly getting no work done, but the entire practice was extremely entertaining. She was a bit worried for Ted, but watching them get yelled at like that was so funny.

"Okay, you're sorry, hey? I know y'all don't think it's a big deal messing up on these drills. But let me tell you this right now. The day we stop doing things the right way means we are one day closer to doing everything the wrong way. Then what happens after that, huh? What, you wanna make, uh, uh, this ball your girlfriend? You gonna start taking it to places under your arm? Having people compliment how y'all look together? And then what? You start caressing it and playing with, like, the little air hole nub? Yeah? Messing around with that? Making out with it. Making it your girlfriend. Is that what you wanna do? Then when? You ask it to marry you? Huh? Y'all wanna be married to a ball?"

By the end of his rant, every single person there was staring at him like he was absolutely insane. The Carlisle woman had no clue what was going on with Ted, but she knew it was over when Isaac scoffed, "No."

"Congratulations, Isaac. That smart mouth of yours just earned you and the entire team ten laps. - Let's go! - Guess what? Make it a thousand laps. That's your fault too. A thousand laps. Off you go! Let's go. Run." Ted watched them as they looked back at him with scared expressions as they began to run. "Run, run, run, run, run, run. Run! Run! Yeah, there you go. Get them knees up! Get 'em by your nipples! I hope y'all drank a lot of water today 'cause y'all are gonna be so dehydrated, that you're gonna look like one of them trees from a... from a Tim Burton movie. I'm talking any Tim Burton movie! Even Dumbo! Even freaking Dumbo."