23

it was now Monday, the first days of training camp had gone well, yesterday's public practice with fans at the stadium had been very good and Joe liked seeing how many people were supporting the Bengals.

He still hadn't run into Elle. He had seen her once or twice from a distance, chatting with Paul and the others on the sidelines, but by the time he was done with training, she was untraceable.

He heard from Sam and Logan that she was keeping them pretty busy in strength and conditioning training and was playing bad cop and even badder cop with Todd. Every time they thought the challenge from one of them to do even better was enough, the other would join in and yell some more. Sam even said he now understood what the nickname hell was all about.

On Monday morning, Nick came into the treatment room all upset, where Joe was already waiting for him, as he was going to look at his knee to see if Joe could continue to train like this with a brace or if he would have to skip it again.

"Joe, I don't know why you need to talk to Elle and it's not really any of my business, but you need to clear it with her, she wants to leave" it blurted out of Nick as he pressed down on Joe's knee.

"She wants to leave?" Joe asked confused. "Yeah, I overheard her talking on the phone yesterday.I don't know with who, but if I had to guess, I'd say with the coach of the college team she interned with" Nick sighed.

"how do you know she wants to go? Maybe he just wanted to check on her, you know ask how she's doing" Joe tried to come up with a plausible explanation.

"I don't think so. She was talking about thinking about an offer and getting back to him. Joe, I really don't want to get into your business, but if you know that this might have something to do with you, please clear it up, okay?" Nick was literally pleading with him.

Everything was spinning in Joe's head. Was he maybe really right and Elle was avoiding him? But was he really to blame for her wanting to change jobs? After all, it was only a kiss and that didn't mean she had to leave, did it? In any case, he knew he had to talk to her.

By chance, Joe got word that Elle was taking over Mike's treatment, a routine checkup, since he was feeling a twinge in his thigh.

Well, Paul had announced that through the walkie-talkies that the atheltic trainers used to communicate with each other and other staff members. Nick had just been standing near Joe at the time. Joe wasn't quite sure if he might not have even done that on purpose, but he had been given the time and place that way.

He felt like a stalker as he paced back and forth outside the room waiting for Mike to finally come out, but he knew it might be the only way to talk to Elle without her avoiding him directly. Nervously, he kneaded his hands and ran his fingers through his hair dozens of times.

Finally the door opened and Mike came out, greeted him briefly with a handshake, and continued down the hall.

When Elle made no effort to get out of the room, or perhaps had magically disappeared already, Joe mustered all his courage and stepped up to the doorframe. Elle was standing against the wall reading a file, hadn't noticed him yet.

"Hey" he tried to lean against the door frame as casually as he could, while Elle winced in fright and lifted her gaze. "Oh, it's you" she mumbled, folding the file closed and shouldering her backpack.

"Yes, it's me. You tell me, I can't shake the feeling that you're kind of avoiding me. How long were you going to keep this up?Until you start your new job?"

Elle looked at him, confused. "How...how do you know about that?" she stammered. "Nick, he told me" Joe sighed "Come on Elle, if it had anything to do with the kiss,...."

"Wohoo, wait a second, you think I want to change jobs because we kissed?" Elle interrupted him. "I...I...don't know, is that it?" Joe stammered.

Elle laughed wryly. "You really think you're the best, don't you? The great Joe Burrow, do you really think I'm going to give up this job because of you?" Elle sounded pretty pissed off and there was a fury shining in her eyes just waiting to be released.

"But...if not for the kiss...then why?" Joe, a bit intimidated by Elle's look, asked. "You won't understand" Elle grabbed her jacket and was about to leave the room, but Joe stood in her way. "Then explain it to me. Explain to me why you're avoiding me, Elle"

"I'm not avoiding you, okay? Do you know how exhausting my last few days have been? And don't you dare say it's exhausting for you too. I know you guys work out a lot and especially with your injury it's not easy, but you get home no later than ten, get here no earlier than six the next morning, but we don't, ok?" Elle had to take a breath before she could continue talking.

"I've only been home once since Wednesday, once for ten minutes to pack some stuff so I could stay here. Do you know how exhausting it is to start at five in the morning, to get everything ready for you guys so you can have a pleasant day? Then we're there at your workouts, making sure you don't hurt yourselves and doing everything right. Then in between we have to do preventative care, treatments or aftercare to make sure everyone gets back in shape as soon as possible. When you're all gone, we have to clean everything up again, disinfect because of this crappy virus, and still analyze data. I haven't had a night more than four hours of sleep, which I get either on the sofa in the player lounge or in some training room on treatment couches. I've been eating fruits and cafeteria food for almost a week now, we don't even have dinner anymore because we prefer to use that time to sleep. My working day usually ends at half past one at night before I get up again at half past four to start the new one. So I'm very sorry that I can't find time to talk to you about such an unnecessary topic as this stupid kiss" Elle's voice almost failed at the end as she gasped out of breath.

Joe just stared at her in surprise. "I...I'm sorry...I had no idea, Elle" he stammered. "How could you? You're getting spoiled and we're almost working ourselves to death" she crossed her arms in front of her chest. Briefly they both fell silent, but Elle was still too knackered from yelling to leave now.

"do you really think that kiss was stupid?" Joe asked cautiously. Elle rolled her eyes. "Really now? That's what bothers you the most about my whole talk?" she asked annoyed. "No...it sucks how much you have to work, but...well, I just want to know" he shrugged.

Elle rolled her eyes again before turning to him. "To be honest, yeah, I think it's stupid. I don't even know why you want to talk about it. We were both drunk and tired and I was just grateful to you for letting me sleep over. That's just what happened. Nothing to talk about much now" Elle shrugged.

"Elle, neither of us had been drinking much. And why would you kiss me just out of thanks?" Joe asked, trying not to look so hurt.

"First of all, you kissed me..." Elle started, but Joe interrupted her. "Fair, but the second time was from you" "yeah, ok, maybe. But honestly Joe, what do you want to hear from me? We are two grown people who just kissed once, that's it, happened a lot, nothing more"

"we both know that wasn't just a kiss Elle, so stop playing it down so easily" Elle laughed out. "What do you want me to say Joe?" "i want you to admit that it wasn't just a stupid kiss" "why?" "because it wasn't, Elle"

"why? Because it was a kiss with you and you're Joe Burrow the quarterback? You really think you're something better. But you know what, Joe? Fuck off, I need to get back to my work and please stay away from me, I don't need to have to put up with your cocky act on top of all the work" she gave him one last reproachful look before pushing past him and walking down the hallway.

Confused, Joe looked after her. What had gotten into Elle?

Almost reached the 13k reads!! Thank you so much! Also reached the 400 likes, unbelievable!!!

I don't really have a question for you again but there's something I want to talk about and you're more the welcome to comment your opinion!

I know that some of you aren't into football and are just reading this story as a fan of Joe or are into football but not a Bengals fan but you may heard that the free agency (FA) market started yesterday. The Bengals were in need of an O-Line and did some pretty fast moves on signing Alex Cappa, guard from the Buccs and Ted Karras, center from the Patriots which was a really good move and I'm happy that they're trying to get some protection for Joe. The Bengals then also resigned B.J Hill who played a great season so it was also a good decision. The thing that's breaking my heart though is the release of C.J Uzomah, he signed a three years contract with the Jets. I know I'm only a fan for almost four months now and shouldn't say something like, he was a great player, I always loved him and so on but even while being in this fandom for such a short time I noticed that C.J was a important player. You only have to go on the Instagram or TikTok accounts of the Bengals or even on YouTube and you don't have to search a long time to find videos of C.J motivating the team no matter what happened.Maybe you remember the „why not us? It is us" phrase that was THE typical sentence that everyone used to describe the Bengals in the play offs. That came from C.J.I could probably write a whole fcking chapter just with scenes and moments you can find about C.J. but that wouldnt change anything and if you're really interested just go on Insta or TikTok.I was so sad when I woke up this morning and got the news that C.J is not a part of the Bengals next season and I can't understand how the Bengals could let him go. A player who wasn't only doing great plays, scoring some touchdowns and was with the Bengals for 7 years but also was the best motivator in the locker room and on the field left the team and I have no words for that. He definitely will be missed but I wish him all the best in New York.

Sorry for this long statement but I had to write about it. Comment your thoughts and like the chapter!

WHO-DEY 🧡