Freerunner Feet (Incomplete)

I've been friends with Jay for many, many years. It's weird, we're polar opposites, but somehow had always got along brilliantly. We'd known each other since pre-school and he was rambunctious and confident. In contrast, I'd always been more reserved. I was your typical nerd. Great grades, into gaming, whereas he liked sport and had not so great grades. So we hung out together, I'd give him a hand with his work and he'd always have my back. I'd play Baseball with him, he'd game with me; we were like two peas in a pod.

Jay was tanned, with short dirty blonde hair and piercing blue eyes. As we both matured, he developed an amazing physique and got into Freerunning. Being a stylised form of Parkour, it focuses more on presentation, and just looking damn cool. I retreated more into gaming but we were still as close as ever.

"Wanna come over to my place after my Freerunning session?" Jay asked one afternoon after lectures. "Sure man!" I said enthusiastically. It was always great to spend time with him, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a massive crush on him. "Cool. I finish quite late though, so we'll order food and you can crash on the sofa." Hell yeah!  Sounded like a perfect evening to me. "What time do you finish?" I asked.

"About nine." 

"Alright then, I'll be there for half past. Give you some leeway."

"Sounds good dude, gotta run." And he was off. He always had somewhere to be, but the fact that he'd made sure to make time for me put a massive smile on my face. I made my way back to the halls of residence to drop off my stuff and get myself ready for the evening.

I rocked up to his place just after 9:30pm. He lived in an apartment complex pretty close to the university, paid for by his parents I guessed. They were pretty well off after all. I pushed the buzzer to his place... no response. Eh, maybe he was in the bathroom or something. A few minutes passed and still, nothing. I pulled my phone out and gave him a call.

Voicemail.

I guessed something must have come up, so I turned to leave just as he came jogging up the street. 

"Sorry... bro..!" He said catching his breath. "We ran... later than usual and... my phone died. I got here as fast as I could." He was a mess. Sweat poured down his face and his t-shirt was absolutely drenched. I was just relieved he was okay! "Don't worry, these things happen." I reassured him. "I bet you're starving aren't you?" I asked.

"Yeah man. Order us something while I let us in."

"Anything in particular you fancy?"

"I dunno dude, get whatever." He scanned his card to let us into the building, and pushed open the door. I followed him in, thumbing through my phone trying to find somewhere that'd deliver. I expected him to use the elevator, but nope. He headed straight for the stairs. This guy just did not stop! We climbed the stairs mostly in silence as I was occupied trying to get us food. Finally, floor 8, we stopped climbing and entered the door that led into a hallway. I'd finally settled on Chinese food and was going through the menu, dropping things into the cart that sounded good. We arrived at his place and he opened the door, sighing with relief. "Come in, don't mind the mess. It's been a busy couple weeks." He wasn't wrong, the place was... disorganised to say the least. Dirty laundry was strewn haphazardly across the floor, containers of protein powder stacked up on the table, sink full of dishes and the smell... musk doesn't quite do it justice. 

"It's fine. I got us Chinese, says it'll be here in about 45 minutes." I said as he busied himself clearing the table. "Hey, go sit down man, I can clear the table." I offered.

"You sure bro?" he asked. I nodded and gently nudged him towards the sofa.

"Yeah. And maybe go shower, you stink!" I joked. Well, half-joked. He did smell of sweat, but I honestly liked it. He walked towards the sofa chuckling. "You think it's bad now, I haven't taken my shoes off yet." It's a good job he had his back to me, because I'm sure the look on my face would have said it all. I have a massive foot fetish that I've kept hidden for years. I wanted, more than anything, to bury my face in those shoes and smell all of the stink that he'd released while Freerunning. "Maybe keep them on then if you want me conscious." I laughed. He laughed too, but there was something more... sinister to it. Or was it just my imagination?

Jay slumped on the sofa and propped his feet up. I kept sneaking glances at his sneakers while I relocated his protein powder to a more permanent position. They were seriously trashed, the once white soles were stained a dingy yellow and more than a little dirt and grime had collected on them. Many months of daily use had worn down the treads considerably. "Don't worry about the sofa bro, it's old so who cares if it gets dirty." Jay said, and to emphasize his point, started lightly grinding one of his shoes on the cushion. 

I had no idea how to react. I was meant to be sleeping there, but here he was wiping his sneaks on it without thinking twice... but what led him to do that? Did he catch me looking? Does he know? What the hell sh... "Alright man?" he smirked, completely interrupting my train of thought. Still he continued grinding his shoe. "Uh... yeah. Do you, uh, treat everything in here like that?" I asked.

"Only the stuff that has no better use." He looked me up and down and his grin widened. "C'mon bro, stick the console on, let's play something!" That sounded almost like an order to me, but who was I to refuse? "S-sure!" I replied, moving over to his entertainment centre and setting everything up. 

"We'll just play whatever game is in." He said, tapping his shoe on the cushion. An invitation to sit I presumed. I passed him his controller, and he moved his feet as I sat down. "Let's have a little bet." He said, unable to contain his excitement. "Whoever wins gets to order the other around for the evening." I was fine with that. I was better at games than him so it'd be fun having him do what I wanted. "If you want me to tell you what to do, you only need to ask." I said cockily, my competitive gaming nature surfacing. He just smiled at me, not saying a word as the game loaded. I'd just realised though, that I had absolutely no clue what we were playing.

FIFA... Really? This was premeditated... it had to be. Because of all the damn games that could have been in the console it was the one I had no chance winning. Anything else and I would have been fine. Fighting, shooting, racing, strategy, the list goes on. Sports games were the ONLY ones I had no interest in, so of course that's what was in. He must have seen my face drop because as soon as the game loaded he burst out laughing. 

"It's gonna be pretty embarrassing when I thrash you." I bluffed, knowing I'd already lost. 

"Yeah yeah bro." He replied nonchalantly, going through the menus and setting up the game.

"Here we go, pick whichever team you want!" he chirped, clearly enjoying this. I knew practically nothing about football. Manchester United was a good team right? That's the team I went with anyway. He went with Arsenal, and we were off. I scored a goal pretty quickly, filling me with confidence. "1-0 mate, better get ready to do as you're told!" I laughed. Probably shouldn't have done that. It was clear relatively soon after, that he'd been overconfident at the start and that was the only reason he'd conceded. I did everything I could but he danced around me. 1-1. 1-2. 1-3. With each goal he scored, his smile widened and he grew more cocky. "Equalised! Who saw that coming?" "Uh-oh, now I'm ahead!" "Thought you were gonna thrash me?" 

Again he scored and the game finished 1-4... "Aw, and you were so close too!" He said mockingly. Then his eyes narrowed and he propped his trashed sneakers in my lap. "Ready for your first order bitch?" 

TO BE CONTINUED...