This was not good.
“What are you doing over there?” he yelled. “This is private property. Don’t move.”
Jessie’s newfound confidence seemed to fly out the window. She looked at Makena. Then at Skylar. Makena and Skylar’s eyes met, and they yelled to Jessie as loudly as they could.
“Ruuuuun!”
5
Jessie took off like a rocket. Makena saw her make a drippy beeline for the rear lobby door. You couldn’t miss the squish of her wet clothes and the slap of her feet as she scurried down the path. Makena followed Skylar’s lead and slunk back into the water as the security guard trudged past.
“Hang on there!” He puffed after Jessie, not focusing on the other two girls in the hot tub.
“Let’s go the other way,” Skylar said.
Makena and Skylar slipped out of the hot tub and ran up the path toward the parking lot, the way the guard had approached. They both peered over their shoulders to see if he was following them.
“Oh man,” Makena said, “I hope Jessie made it inside.”
“No kidding,” Skylar said. “She’d turn us in in a second.”
Makena slowed to a quick walk. The parking lot was on their left, and the hotel was on the right. Everything seemed calm. Now all she could hear was the tiny pitter-patter of water drops trailing from their shorts and hair.
“How are we going to get back in?” Makena asked.
“I say we go around the front and wait for everything to calm down. We can sneak back into the lobby and up the stairs,” Skylar answered.
The girls moved past a group of fragrant hedges encircling a light post. As they emerged from the shadows, Skylar’s eyes widened.
“Oh, lookey what we have here.”
It was a golf cart but an awesome version. There were doors on the sides, windshield wipers, headlights, and even an iPod holder. Security was stenciled in bright-orange letters across the front.
“Ever drive one of these?” Skylar asked.
“I’ve never even seen one like this,” Makena said, running her hand along the fiberglass fender.
“Get in,” Skylar said.
“Are you nuts?” Makena asked, backing away.
Skylar smiled and didn’t answer. She climbed into the driver’s seat and began fiddling with the buttons on the snazzy dash.
Makena leaned in, looked around, and said, “Skylar, you’re getting everything all wet. Let’s go.”
Suddenly, the radio came to life, startling Makena. “Canvassing rear parking lot. Over.”
Makena looked at the back of the hotel. And all the cars.
“Uh, Skylar…” she said.
“Check out these seats!” Skylar said.
“Skylar, I think this is the rear…”
“I think this is leather!”
“…parking lot!” Makena was frantic. She heard footsteps again. “Skylar, let’s go!”
Skylar didn’t budge.
The footsteps got louder.
“Skylar, someone’s coming!”
Makena looked over the roof of the golf cart and saw the guard running toward them from the front of the hotel. Makena turned to run, but Skylar kept fiddling around by the steering wheel.
“Step away from the vehicle!” a voice yelled. Makena grabbed Skylar by the arm and tried to pull her out of the golf cart. This was getting out of hand. Makena just wanted to get out of there, find Jessie, and get back in bed where they belonged.
“Get in!” Skylar yelled. Makena’s mouth hung open as she saw Skylar pull the gearshift. Beep. Beep. Beep. The golf cart began to move in reverse.
“Skylar, no!” Makena chased the cart as it pulled away.
“He’ll catch us on foot, Makena!” Skylar shouted. “Come on!”
Makena shook her head in disbelief, turned, and sprinted back up the path. She dove behind a row of hedges, too scared to do anything but watch.
“Get back here!” the guard yelled. His face was contorted with anger and exertion. Skylar took off like Danica Patrick on an Indy 500 straightaway. The out-of-shape guard bent over to catch his breath and then jogged after her into the parking lot.
He would never have caught them on foot.
A few seconds later, she heard the cart approach. Skylar was circling back. A second guard had joined the chase. Uh-oh, this guy is much faster, Makena thought. Skylar sped closer, zooming past the cars in the lot. The guard tried to block her. Makena saw Skylar grin and hook a sharp left toward the Jacuzzi. She careened smoothly away from him and headed straight for the hotel.
But Makena could tell she was going too fast. Skylar shrieked as the golf cart clipped the curb and started to spin. Makena held her breath as Skylar launched herself from the driver’s seat a second before the cart crashed into a sprinkler head. A wet rainbow of water exploded into the night sky.
Skylar took off toward the hotel, and Makena followed her, desperate to get back to her room. She could hear the guards yelling loudly, but a quick look over her shoulder told her they were too busy dealing with the broken water pipe and crashed golf cart to care about them.
Makena and Skylar snuck back inside the lobby and went quietly up the stairs. On the fourth floor, they found a frightened Jessie hiding in the stairwell.
“Makena! Skylar! Oh my God!” Jessie shrieked. “What happened out there?”
Makena started to explain about the wild golf cart chase, but before she could get the words out, Skylar started to laugh.
“Did…did…did…you see the look on that guy’s face when he was chasing me?” Skylar gasped between breaths. “Man, I thought he was going to split his pants.”
She grabbed her sides, tears streaming down her face. Her laughter was contagious. Jessie started to giggle. Despite herself, Makena started to laugh along with them, her fear releasing itself in a fit of nervous giggles.
“I can’t believe you took his golf cart!” Makena yelled. “That was unreal!”
“You did what?” Jessie asked.
“Skylar took the security guards’ cart, and they chased her all over the parking lot!”
Jessie stopped laughing, slack-jawed. “Are you kidding me? Skylar, are you crazy?”
“Relax,” Skylar said.
“Relax?” Jessie said. “When they find us, we’re dead meat! We’ll be kicked off the team, arrested, suspended, grounded…you name it!”
“They’re not going to find us.”
Makena felt her thudding helicopter heart taking off again. What if Jessie was right?
“They’re not going to find us,” Skylar repeated, “because they aren’t going to tell anyone what happened.”
“What do you mean?” Makena asked.
“Well, for starters, do you think those two guards are going to admit that some girl stole their golf cart and made them look like idiots?”
Makena wasn’t convinced. “But what if they do? You crashed the cart into a sprinkler!”
“She what!?” Jessie lay down across three stairs and covered her eyes with her hands. “Oh no, oh no, oh no.”
Makena nodded.
Skylar didn’t blink. “There are, like, two hundred soccer-playing girls staying here. They could never prove it was us.”
Jessie looked at Makena. Makena looked at Jessie. Jessie started to giggle again. “She stole a golf cart?”
Makena smiled. “It was pretty crazy. But kind of cool.”
Skylar stood up and offered Makena a hand. “Kind of cool? It was awesome. Come on, Makena, live a little. And remember,” Skylar said, flashing Makena a big smile, “it’s only a crime if you get caught.”
6
“Hustle over, Mac!” Coach Lily called from in front of the goal. Makena fumbled with her shoelaces and tried to catch up with the rest of her team. The Breakers were already divided into
two groups and starting a warm-up game of keep-away.
“I’m here, Coach,” Makena said as she joined the closer group. She, Jessie, and Skylar shared a conspiratorial smile. So far, it seemed Skylar was right. No SWAT team had descended on the hotel in search of hot tub–loving soccer players. There was no APB out on a stolen golf cart. Nothing. The sprinkler was off. The hotel was quiet.
“Not there, Mac,” Lily said. “You’re in this group.”
“Oh,” said Makena, covering up a yawn. She moved to the second group of players. Val was in the middle of a circle trying to win the ball from the girls on the outside. It’s a good thing Val’s such a sound sleeper, Makena thought, watching her friend zoom tirelessly after the ball. The three Breakers had snuck back into the room, trying to stifle their giggles, dry off, and slip back into bed without waking Val or Jasmine’s mother in the next room over.
Makena reacted a little too late to Jasmine’s pass. As she moved for the ball, Val popped in between them and stole it.
“You’re in the middle, Mac,” Val said, giving Makena a weird look. A pang of guilt struck Makena in the gut for keeping secrets from her best friend.
Makena moved to the inside of the circle, like she’d done countless times before. Usually she could intercept a pass on the second or third try. Today the girls’ passes were really sharp.
Or she was really slow.
“Time-out,” Makena called. Her shoelace was undone again. Makena bent down and for the first time noticed how crowded the field was. Parents, coaches, and several of the other teams in the tournament were getting comfortable on the sidelines.
There was a large red-and-black sign that read, THE THUNDER IS READY TO RUMBLE. There was even a hot dog stand and ice cream truck set up by the road. Makena was noticing that this tournament was a big deal. The competitions near Brookville, a town just north of New York City, felt much smaller. Skylar was right—this really is the big time, she thought to herself.
“Do you need some kind of special invitation today, Mac?” a voice asked.
She looked up to see Coach towering above her.
“My shoelaces were untied,” she explained.
“Again?”
“Again,” Makena answered, trying to tie faster, which only caused the laces to jumble into an impressive knot.
Coach Lily sighed and knelt down next to her.
“Girls, keep passing,” she said to the Breakers. To Makena, she asked, “What’s with you today, Mac? You nervous or something?”
“No, not at all,” Makena answered. And she wasn’t. She had been so busy reliving what was by far the most thrilling night of her life that the game had barely crossed her mind.
“Listen, the Thunder is known for its passing. They’re really excellent at controlling the ball and moving it around. So you’re going to have to work hard and be patient to win the ball and feed it up to the offense.”
“OK. Got it,” Makena said, bopping back into the warm-up. She won after a few tries, but she was huffing and puffing by the time the referee blew his whistle to indicate the game was about to start. Makena searched for Jessie and Skylar but saw they were taking a water break on the sidelines. Makena took her place on the field and willed herself to focus.
From kickoff, she could tell that Lily wasn’t kidding about the Thunder. They had her going in circles. The two tall midfielders, in particular, were incredible. One seemed to have Velcro on her cleats, and the other just never missed. They passed the ball better than any team she’d ever faced, and Makena had to work constantly to even get a foot on it. Her legs were starting to feel like they were filled with sand. Skylar took a few weak shots, but they went wide. Val hadn’t even gotten the ball.
For Makena, soccer was normally the sharpest part of her life. Every minute of a match played out in her mind as clearly as crystal. The sights, smells, and noises of a game formed a rainbow of soccer joy and excitement in her memory. But today she was in a fog. Makena couldn’t get moving. She couldn’t anticipate where the ball was going. Time was flying, and she kept waiting for something to change.
But all that changed was the score.
The Thunder went up 1 to 0 off a corner kick in the first minute of the second half.
“Come on,” Val encouraged the team before the restart. “We’ve got this.”
Skylar, Jessie, and Makena nodded like zombies.
Makena pushed herself harder. She surged forward and intercepted a pass in midfield. Val was moving down the line, and Makena sent a long pass to the corner. Skylar and Makena made runs for the goal. But this time they didn’t communicate, and they both ended up on the near post. Val’s cross went long, and there was no Breaker in place to track it.
The ball flew across the face of the goal untouched as Makena and Skylar backpedaled to chase it down. The Thunder defender moved to clear the ball but miscalculated and hit it wrong. The ball soared straight up into the air.
The tall Thunder sweeper called out, “I got it!” and moved to clear the ball with a header. But her teammates didn’t move out of the way. She collided with another girl, leaving the ball bouncing awkwardly in the box.
Val, the closest Breaker, tried to take the shot, but her half volley went spinning backward right toward the face of the midfielder with Velcro cleats. The girl raised her hand reflexively just before the ball smacked her right in the nose.
The field froze. The whistle blew.
Hand ball in the box. Automatic penalty kick.
This was the Breakers’ big chance. Maybe their only chance.
“Mac!” Makena heard Lily call from the sideline, but she was already searching for the ball. Makena always took the penalty kicks.
“You want me to take it?” Skylar offered.
“Nah, I got this,” Makena said, realizing that Skylar didn’t know Mac was the kicker.
The referee cleared the stunned Thunder players from the box, and the goalie took her place in the middle of goal. The ref gathered the ball, handed it to Makena, and said, “Wait for my whistle.”
Makena nodded. She rolled the ball in her hands, dusting off a tiny tuft of grass. She knew that the goalie was watching her. She knew that she was checking her gloves and getting ready to guess which way Makena was going to shoot. Makena knew better than to look at her. Even more importantly, she knew to never, ever look at the side you were aiming for.
Instead, Makena envisioned the shot in her head like she had done so many times before. She would go to the lower-right corner.
She placed the ball on the penalty spot twelve yards out, careful to keep her eyes down, and focused on the ball.
Makena could see just the goalie’s feet. She noticed that the girl seemed to be standing a little bit to the right of the middle of the goal.
Was the goalie crowding Makena’s shot? Did she know Makena always went right?
Don’t look, Makena told herself. Just hit it, like you always do.
But at the last second Makena couldn’t help herself. She broke her own rule. Her brain was muddled, and she stole a glance at the goalie.
Their eyes met.
Makena’s eyes darted to the right.
Immediately, she cast her eyes back down to the ground. She saw me looking to that right corner, Makena thought. Do I have to go left now? No, no. I’ll go right.
The referee drew the whistle to his mouth, and a sharp quick beep filled the expectant air.
Makena stepped forward to take the kick, a few paces to the left of the ball. She’d hit it with her instep, straight into the lower-right corner, just like she always did.
She kept her eyes down, but in her peripheral vision, she could see the goalie bouncing up and down on her line. She knows I’m going right, Makena thought.
“Play!” she heard the referee yell.
Makena stepped up to take the shot, moving d
eliberately to keep the ball low and hard. But at the last second she changed her mind and decided to go to the left corner. The problem was she was too far to the left of the ball. Her timing was wrong.
Everything was wrong.
Makena moved forward and hit the ball straight down the middle. It landed with a thud in the goalie’s stomach. She’d saved it.
Makena had missed the penalty kick.
The relieved goalie punted the ball high, and Makena moved slowly back up the field, her mental haze returning.
The rest of the game zipped by. Before she knew it, the final whistle blew.
The Thunder erupted in celebration as the Breakers walked tiredly back to the bench.
Lily was there to welcome them each with a pat on the back.
“You girls gave it your all out there. I’m very proud of you. You worked hard. Now, hold your heads high and go out and congratulate them on a good win.”
Makena trudged out to shake hands with the other team. She raised her eyes only to be faced with the jubilant smiles of the victorious Thunder. Their coaches and parents were beaming with pride from the sidelines, while the Breaker fans clapped with polite disappointment.
Makena replayed the missed penalty kick. In her mind, images of the kick mixed with images from the previous night. Guilt washed over her. She moved slowly to join her team, her head held low, eyes fixed on the ground.
Suddenly, she just wanted to go home. Soccer had never felt like this before.
7
“Three reds, five blues, and one black,” Makena told her mother, holding up a hodgepodge of mismatched soccer socks.
“All right, so let’s get rid of one blue and one red and the lone black,” her mom suggested.
“Get rid of them?” Makena asked, shocked, gathering up all the socks in her arms.
“If you toss the odd ones, you can make pairs of the others.”
“But I need all of them.” Makena gave her mother a look.
Her mother sighed and grimaced at the mess on the floor. “Mac, you’ve got to learn to let go of things. Look at these shorts. They must be five sizes too small! Put them in the donation pile.”
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