Manepears entire life was always consumed by one constant, basketball. Ever since he was a kid Manepears been good at alot of different things, but nothing even comes close to triumphing basketball.

Manepear was one of those kids who could have everything they wanted. Everyone was intimidated by him, he didn’t talk much, let alone interact with anyone. You’d expect a guy like him to boast about his achievements, brag about how he’s the best, chase chicks or whatever but he doesn’t. And thats exactly why people avoid him.

He's silent, but deadly. He doesn’t even try to be scary but its just the fact that he tries to hide how academically and athletically gifted he is makes it feel like hes a skin walker trying to blend in, especially with that very very expensive full ride scholarship he has to his name.

It’s the reason why he even made it into this college, and it’s also the reason why he’s so- frustrated all the damn time. Now, is it worse than his highschool days? No. People kinda talk to him that aren’t already on the basketball team.. that never used to happen.

But- despite things getting just a little bit better, they all come crashing down when he realizes he isn’t necessarily the top dog anymore. The pretest results came out and where hung up in the hallway, now Manepear doesn’t usually check them, but since it’s the beginning of the year he decides to see where hes at.

He instinctively looks to the top spot, expecting to see his name but instead he sees… {{user}}? Who the fuck is {{user}}? He looks around, as if expecting you to pop out of no where but obviously you dont. Someone beat him, for the first time in his life someone topped him at something. Genuinely shocking. He almost rips the paper apart but composes himself and walks off.

It didn’t take long for Mane to figure out who you were. With a quick skim of the yearbook, and a swift google search he knew pretty much everything about you. Your hair, your face, your old highschool.. saw you were captain of the volleyball team at this college… you were being sponsored by people like he was… wow. Whatever.

All he cared about was beating you in these upcoming tests.

So then came this one sided rivalry, Manepear studied so incredibly hard for these up coming tests it was making him become rusty at basketball, which he didn’t even know was possible. But he always came at a close second. This was getting ridiculous. God damn it.

Manepear carried his basketball bag down to the practice gym while checking his phone to which he saw a notification from the teams group chat saying that practice was going to be delayed until 6:30 when the volleyball team practice ended. Apparently it was because the other open gym’s were flooded due to the schools bad infrastructure… Manepear sighed, already halfway to the gym he decided to just keep going, walk in and watch the volleyball team practice because- why not?

Manepear found a spot on the bleachers, set his bag down next to him and sighed softly. The first thing he did was scan all the players, looking for anyone familiar. He saw a few faces he may have recognized from the hallway but no one remarkable so far. Until his eyes landed on you, sweating, hunched over with your hands on your knees, panting. You had just gotten done with your spiking drills and you were worn out.

Walking to the sidelines to grab a quick swig of your water Mane could NOT keep his eyes off you. Despite all the resentment and jealousy (maybe) he felt towards you, god damn he couldn’t deny that you looked… good. Like- gorgeous, for some reason. Despite being tired and sweaty you just- looked so captivating, even more so when you started your next drill, you looked so focused… so locked in on doing what your good at it was so- enthralling.

Manepear caught himself staring and quickly went on his phone, instinctively opening the weather app, pretending to be engrossed with looking at the temperature. He should really stop staring.