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During their third week of knowing each other, Riddle learned how to dribble a soccer ball. They’d only started to teach him a few days prior, and Trey couldn’t help but be impressed by how fast he was learning, even if he still struggled with keeping it straight and tripped over his own feet sometimes. Now, every time they snuck him out through the window, Riddle would ask if Trey brought his dad’s ball so they could play.
It quickly became one of their favorite pastimes.
“Hey! Hey, Riddle!” Trey waved both arms over his head. “Pass it this way!”
Riddle paused his dribbling, casting a brief glance down to the soccer ball as he lined up a kick, only to quickly set his foot on it to keep it in place when Chenya jumped into the way. He pursed his lips, trying to back up for a different angle, but Chenya would not grant so much as an inch to work with. Even when Trey tried to run to a new spot, Chenya just looked over his shoulder and followed, constantly closing the gap to claim Riddle’s ball all the while.
Okay, new plan. Smirking, Trey pointed with both hands to his right, watching as Riddle tilted his head curiously. He feinted a run to the left then dashed back as soon as Chenya tried to copy him, at which point Riddle had caught on to his idea, and with a loud grunt he kicked the ball as hard as he could ahead of Trey’s direction. It bounced off the grass, but Trey was ready, and he popped it up into the air with the toe of his shoe before catching it on his foot.
Chenya made his approach to steal it away, and Trey hopped on one leg to turn and keep the ball safe, but their antics were broken up by Riddle’s exclamation. “Wait, how did you do that?”
Trey blinked, exchanged a glance with Chenya, then looked back to Riddle. “Do what?”
“That!” Riddle pointed at the ball balancing neatly on Trey’s foot. “You caught it like that. How did it not bounce off?”
“Oh,” he tilted his head down to look, and put his arms out to the side when the action threw off his balance somewhat and he began to tilt alongside it. “You just curve your foot and catch it.”
When he met Riddle’s eye again, he startled slightly upon being met with a pout. “That doesn’t explain much.”
“It’s like he’s got it in his hand, but with a foot,” Chenya tried, and was granted an even deeper frown from Riddle for his efforts.
Sheepish, Trey scratched the back of his neck. “I mean…he’s not really wrong though. It’s kinda like that. With the back of my hand instead of my palm, I guess?” He bent all the fingers on one hand as far as they would go backwards to show what he meant.
That finally got through to Riddle. “Oh! It’s the metatarsals, then.” The way he thumped the side of his fist into his palm, eyes and smile lighting up in turn, made Trey’s chest feel all strange and fluttery. Even if he had absolutely no idea what Riddle just said.
“Um? The what?” Chenya tilted his head. “Meta…tonsils?”
“Sorry. The bridge.”
“Uh.”
“The flat part of the top of the foot.”
Chenya clapped. “That! Yeah! He’s holding it on that.”
“It’s kinda tricky, ‘cuz you’ve gotta worry about yourself and the ball at the same time,” Trey added.
Leaning in, Chenya grinned and pointed towards his head, right between his flicking ears. “His dad can balance it on his head, y’know! It’s super neat!”
Riddle’s eyes widened slightly. “Really? That sounds hard.”
“It is. I still can’t do that yet. But he used to play soccer before he and mom bought the shop, and he’s been teaching me a bunch of stuff.” Kicking his leg, Trey launched the ball in the air, taking a few steps back with his arms out to catch it. “Wanna learn how to do that?”
He smiled when Riddle nodded eagerly, and tucked the ball under one arm to gesture at his shoes. “Okay, first, you gotta balance on one leg with your other one sticking out, like I was doing.”
Looking down at his own feet, Riddle held his arms out to the side and, as instructed, stuck his leg out. He wobbled a little, arms waving with the tiniest anxious squeak.
Chenya snickered. “You sound like a mouse, nyahaha!”
At that Riddle huffed, then screwed his face up in concentration as he fought to keep steady, brow scrunching with the tip of his tongue poking out from his lips. The effort paid off; he soon stood perfectly still on one leg. “I-I got it. What now?”
Trey approached. “I’m gonna put the ball on. Just try and keep it mostly on your shoe.” He set the soccer ball against Riddle’s foot with both hands. “Like, hold it to your leg sorta.”
“Um…” The foot angled back slightly against the ball, and the wobbling resumed.
Once it died down and Riddle appeared somewhat steady again, Trey took one hand away. “Ready? I’m letting go.”
“Ahh, wait—” He wasn’t fast enough. Trey already released the ball.
To their collective, joyful surprise, it remained in place. Trey beamed, clapping. “You got it! Just like that!”
Riddle laughed. “I’m doing it! I—woooah—!!”
Right as he opened his mouth, the ball began to list to the left, and his attempt at fixing it completely demolished any semblance of balance. His arms swung wildly, body bending to and fro in desperation, but it wasn’t enough to save him; Riddle toppled over, landing partially on his elbow before his back hit the grass with a grunt. The action launched both the soccer ball and his shoe into the air. Chenya all but dove to avoid being clobbered by the torpedoed shoe with a yelp.
Worry slammed in hard, Trey’s hands growing cold from his fingers to his wrists, and he ran up to check on him, completely disregarding the ball as it bounced and rolled a ways off. Riddle was a decently hardy kid, sure, but he got embarrassed really easily, and that was like, the king of all embarrassing moves. Totally outclassed that time Trey fell out of a tree and landed in the bushes when he was seven.
“Are you okay?!” Trey crouched slightly as he leaned over Riddle, hands on his knees and searching for any obvious damage. Please, oh please don’t let there be any blood…
Riddle didn’t try to sit up further or move at first, spread eagle on the ground, eyes clenched shut and lips pulled tight as he shook, and for a moment Trey feared that he’d really hurt himself. But then he realized that the muffled sound escaping Riddle wasn’t restrained whimpers or swallowed sobs, but giggling, which quickly erupted into full on open-mouthed cackling as Riddle threw his head back.
“How did THAT happen?!” He barked, wiggling his white-socked toes on the foot still suspended in the air, now sans a shoe.
As if on cue, Chenya trotted over with said wayward shoe in his possession. “See! See!” It was held out and shaken violently, as though the poor shoe itself had committed some horrible transgression. “This is why I say straight laces suck, meow! They don’t work! Curly laces and fasteners or bust!”
Of the three, Trey was the only one silent. He didn’t even give Chenya a cursory glance to acknowledge his anti-shoelace raving. He couldn’t will himself to turn away if he tried, stuck on witnessing the sight that was Riddle, his hair collecting stray blades of grass, cheeks a rosy pink in the sunlight as he howled with laughter, nose wrinkled up and eyes crinkled at the corners. Eventually Trey gave in too, snickers evolving as he tried to help Riddle up.
Distantly, he wondered why his face grew so warm, and stomach so knotted and weird all of a sudden.