by Lulu Pratt
Even, somehow, in a stadium like this. In fact, calling the area a field was almost insulting, given what it actually was. The ULA stadium was the size of a small island, maybe larger. Officially, I was told, it could hold ninety-thousand people. Unofficially, the number was closer to a hundred-thousand. The high-powered nighttime lights that festooned the outer edges of the arena looked military-grade, like they might be strapped onto the underbellies of helicopters at the drop of a hat.
The last place I could call my home turf, the University in Boston, was nice. Fine. Decent size, decent team, decent wage. No complaints. But honestly? I knew I could do better. ULA’s stadium was my kind of soccer — big, brash, no holds barred. The task ahead was daunting, to be sure — ULA’s women’s soccer was some of the best in the country. I’d be training women who were likely to compete on the US Olympic team. They would, easily, be leaps and bounds better than the men I drilled in Boston.
I was ready for the challenge.
The call had come two days ago. A man named David Drake had called me in the middle of the night, and with no preamble, asked if I’d like to coach ULA women’s soccer.
From years of early morning practices, I was good at getting a clear head, and fast. So it only took me moments to process the magnitude of his offer, and the potential glory that came with it.
“I can give you twenty-four hours to consider it,” he’d said curtly.
“I don’t need twenty-four hours. I don’t even need twenty-four seconds,” I replied. “I’ll take the job.”
My bags were packed within moments. Growing up poor had, if nothing else, taught me how to be a light packer — when you don’t have much, there was just not much to pack. Out of habit, I took my old cleats, shin guards, knee highs, the whole kit, even though a school like ULA would provide me with whatever gear I requested. A few more items of clothing, some pictures, my camera, my Kindle, my computer… and that was pretty much everything.
All said and done, it took me fifteen minutes to pack up my entire life. A more sentimental man would find this depressing, lonely even. But, hey, it wasn’t like James Bond towed steamer trunks worth of finely pressed suits on all his international missions, so why should I?
I flared my nostrils, inhaling deeper. This was gonna be good, I could feel it.
Striding the length of the field, I thought back to my most recent boss, Carson, a prick if there ever was one. It’d kill him that I’d got this gig. Granted, being the misogynist prick he was, he’d probably scoff that I’d been assigned to ULA Women’s. But, all in all, it was still a big vertical leap for me. Coaching women was fine by me and it was the beautiful game I loved, while U of B was only giving Carson lateral moves. As in, he’d gone as far as he would ever go. Me? I was just getting started.
I’d spent — what, a year? — working under his wrathful gaze. Every damn day he’d give me a shittier job. At first, I took the taunting on the chin. Nothing wrong with a little friendly hazing. I’d even done it to guys below me, back at the various minor league teams I’d worked for in London. I can take a joke.
But things started out bad and got worse. It began with making me grab all the practice balls and put them back in the mesh bags, and escalated to the point where he was asking me to ‘fetch water’ for the players. Though of course, U of B was a serious sports school, so the soccer team had its own fucking waterboys. Our last fight, only a week back — could it be so recent? Time had flown — in our last fight, I’d called him words I wouldn’t use in front of my mum, and he’d called me words I’m not even sure we have in England, which was saying something.
He’d squashed me down until there was no room for me to succeed at U of B. I’d reckon I was mere days from quitting before ULA called. I think that was what astrologers refer to as kismet, or what my childhood mates might deem ‘great bloody luck.’
I was going to do great at ULA, I had to. I’d prove Carson wrong, and all the boys back home who said moving to America would be wretched and I’d return, tail between my legs, an even bigger arse than before. In short, I had unfinished business with America, and we were going to square it up right here, on the ULA field, with the whole country watching. Okay, maybe not the whole country, but definitely a whole school.
The pay raise at ULA didn’t hurt, either. It was a good chunk of change, enough that I could squirrel some away for a rainy day, and have a little left over to send to my mum. Not enough, it would never be enough, but a little. I pictured myself buying… well, I wasn’t sure really. I’d never had money as the U of B job paid the bills, but it didn’t leave a lot of extra room for pleasure pursuits. Which, to be clear, I didn’t mind. I was used to having zilch. In fact, having money made me nervous, agitated, like someone might come steal it. Is this what billionaires feel like? I wondered.
Maybe I’d get a nicer beer the next time I went down to the pub. Or the bar. Whatever. Both, neither, take your pick. Hey, maybe it was time to invest in a motorcycle, a slick old girl from the ‘70s, with wild flame decals on the side with silver finishing and fringe hand grips. No, wait, the motorcycle wouldn’t fit in an overhead bag. Never mind, I’d stick with the nicer beer.
I’d made it up the length of the field, walked across, and begun my journey down the other side. Treading the boards, as it were, learning the lay of the land. I’ve mixed up my metaphors, haven’t I? No matter, not like I was at ULA to teach English — though thus far, three different employees at Boston’s airport asked me if that was why I was moving. It was astonishing how thick people were when you got up close.
In fairness, though it is hard for me to muster any respect for that question, they asked because of my immigration status. Blah blah blah, I won’t bore you with the details, but with the heightened, er, atmosphere around immigration in the US, the folks at the airport were a bit more rigorous than before. I thought they only did this for international travel, but apparently the employees who checked over my work permit paperwork were very suspicious of my motives, and believed it prudent to grill me.
Were Americans always this rude?
I suppose it could’ve been worse. I mean, I could’ve been a person of color or someone from a country that is not an ally of the US, without this fancy accent. Then the workers would’ve really flipped their gourds.
Anyhow, the permit was squared. Now all I had to do was, was… uh, do great, I guessed. Because there was a ton riding on this job — the money, the prestige, the career advancement. And, concerning my immigration status, if I got fired, I’d lose my work permit, presumably fairly fast. I wasn’t ready for deportation, not yet. Were I to get kicked out of the US, I’d want it to be for something awesome.
There was plenty on the line — namely, the white chalk lines of the field. I tilted my chin to look back up at the sky. It gleamed with promise.
Chapter 3
Catya
Bio class couldn’t finish fast enough. I stared at the clock, willing it to move those hands at non-earth speeds. I’m not sure what we covered. The nuclei, maybe? Or perhaps it was something about syphilis.
Much to my own dismay and mild embarrassment, I spent the whole class thinking about the prospect of a new coach. Alan had been the only coach I’d known at ULA, and the man responsible for acclimating me to the school. I shied away from having an opinion on his possible affair with Melanie, but I was certain that I felt betrayal at his sudden departure. It was like he had left me, specifically, in the lurch, a captain without a coach.
Who was this guy? And what would he want?
To make us a better team, obviously, I chided myself. Why was I already getting all sniffy about him? He was probably nice, normal, fine. Bland. He’d be skillful, at the very least. Enough to help me take the team to championships. As long as he wasn’t actively bad, I didn’t give a fuck.
The seconds ticked by. Was the clock moving even slower than usual, as if to punish me for being dismissive about Nameless New Guy? How cruel.
Normally, I’d
be taking frantic notes, jotting down everything Professor Forester even glancingly mentioned. You don’t get to be pre-med without being what I’d call “very anal.” I’d had perfect handwriting since I was eight years old. I was the kid in class whose notes everybody vied to get, and also the kid who everyone hated when she aced each test. Being called a kiss ass, admittedly, wasn’t the worst thing you could be dubbed in high school. For that matter, being deemed a ‘prude’ hurt a lot more.
But my type-A personality, which spanned both my academic and extracurricular life, was what got me to a full ride scholarship. My handwriting was still perfect, my notes were still awesome and my grades were still exemplary.
Today was different. Today, I slacked like every other kid in the class — okay, that was generalizing, I guess Sheera worked hard, too. Was this what it felt like to be lazy? I tasted the word on my tongue. It was never a thing that had even nominally applied to me, and it was strange to even consider. One day off thinking and working hard couldn’t hurt, right?
Besides, I was going to have to fight like the devil in practice. No way would I let this new coach, whomever he may be, think I was anything less than terrifyingly hard working. Oh baby, I’d show him.
My phone beeped. Again, on the average day, I wouldn’t check it in class, that was a bad habit and also rude. Today? I didn’t give a shit.
I shot my eyes down to my lap, where the screen indicated that Grace was outside the building, waiting for me, so that we could walk to practice together. My foot tapped, and my gaze bore into the clock. Moments later, the clock at last, blessedly, hit three. I bolted out of my desk, slinging my backpack over my shoulder and nearly hitting the guy next to me — sorry! — and ran out of the door. I didn’t have to look behind me to know that people in class were shooting me skeptical looks. In case you couldn’t infer, I was the girl who usually stays until ten minutes past the end time, finishing up notes and asking the teacher some final questions.
But I was fleeing the classroom like the other stoners. Or, rather, the stoners weren’t fleeing so much as they were shuffling with some goal in the vague direction of the door. I digress.
Grace was, as promised, waiting on the stone steps of the building, bundled in her warm North Face, a travel mug of coffee in her hand. I’d never met someone who so earnestly and profoundly loved coffee until Grace. It was like a hobby for her.
“You excited?” I asked.
She blew on the mug, trying to play it cool. “Uh, I guess. Curious, at least.”
I rolled my eyes at her apathetic act. “Come on, you’re telling me you’re not even a little, I dunno, intrigued by the prospect of a new guy?”
Grace stared me down, then relented, dropping her Parisian artist persona.
“Okay,” she allowed. “I’m excited.”
I smiled and said, “That’s all I was looking for.”
We began walking to the gym. Generally, practice started on the field, and then we broke for some gym time if need be. Already the new coach was switching things up.
“Why gym?” Grace wondered absently, as if reading my thoughts.
“Presumably strength training,” I replied. “He may just wanna take in our sheer muscle effectiveness before seeing us out on the field.”
She looked at me sideways. “Somebody’s been thinking about this.”
I blushed. “Well, y’know. I’m just interested.”
Grace nodded, understanding. “Same.” She shifted the duffel further up on her shoulder. “Actually, I’ve been looking high and low for some hints as to who the hell he is.”
“Oh yeah? Must you know everyone’s secrets?”
“Yeah. Nada.”
This was startling. I didn’t expect Grace to turn up a whole dossier on the dude, but she did have mad sleuthing skills. Like, when you wanted to stalk a crush via the Internet, Grace was your girl. I think she would’ve been a comp sci major if she hadn’t liked spilling the tea on people so much, hence, pre-law.
For Grace to have found nothing… either he was a Luddite or a mystery or both. Intriguing.
“You don’t even have a guess?” I pressed, embarrassed by my own rampant curiosity.
“Like I said — nada.” She paused. “They didn’t tell you either, Ms. Team Captain?”
I shrugged. “Nope. I know you all think the athletic board runs everything by me, but uh, they don’t care about my opinion. So, nope, no privileged information on my end.”
Grace sighed dramatically. Everything was dramatic with her.
We made our way across campus, never once discarding the subject of coach speculation. Raking through lists of possibilities, we speculated that ULA had snatched up someone from Michigan, USC or maybe BU. At our level, everyone knows everyone, and there were only so many coaches who would make sense as a replacement. Though, that being said, we were both forced to acknowledge the chance that, on such short notice, ULA might have found a temp, a filler until the real muscle could be flown in.
It was late September, about a month into the season for both soccer and fall, and the leaves on the campus were beginning to brown and hurl themselves onto the cobblestones. Brick buildings sprouted from the earth, short, squat, with an air of academia around them — you know, that kind of vague stuffiness mixed with the homey smell of fresh coffee. The famous campus squirrels had begun preparing for the winter, and they were running to fat. I’d tried to feed them once or twice when drunk, and quickly discovered that the squirrels, while cute, were not friendly.
We passed through the main quad, an area of campus approximately the size of two football fields, with adjacent wings leading off to the other triad of rectangular land plots. Like I said — small place. On our way, I was waved down by a handful of bio kids, some of my sorority sisters, and even an old roommate from my freshman year back from when I had to live in the dorms. The constant risk of encountering an enemy or old flame — not that I had many of either — was well-documented, so generally, kids either resigned themselves to dressing in PJs and giving up, or the perfectionists among us, myself included, dressed to the nines on a daily basis. There was little in between.
“What if he’s hot?” Grace asked, breaking my stream of thoughts.
I scoffed, “Please.”
“He could be! Come on, be a little more optimistic.”
I blew some hair out of my face and glanced at the nearby chapel. The school wasn’t particularly religious — I don’t think it even had ever had religious affiliation — but if I recalled correctly, the architect responsible insisted on building a chapel. ‘Because it’ll look nice,’ he’d probably asserted.
Behind the chapel was the running trail I favored, where I’d go in the mornings to clear my head. I could use a run, I thought.
Grace, meanwhile, was mouthing a fantasy.
“And maybe,” she said, “maybe he’s sweet, and funny, and also good, I want him to be really good, but more importantly hot, and—”
“Ah, stop!” I blurted out.
“Why?”
“Because! He’s gonna be what he’s gonna be. Now we’re just obsessing over it.”
“Well,” she said, miffed, “you’re as interested as I am.”
I granted that. “Yeah, but the suspense is killing me. I can’t think about it anymore. I just want this… to be settled. Right?”
Grace was clearly still itching to voice her opinions on the subject, but managed to muffle them.
We rounded the corner onto Hawkings Street, and at last found ourselves in front of the gym. While the rest of the buildings on campus were made to look old — I mean, I suppose they were, they’re from the 1800s — the gym was shiny and brand spanking new. The exterior was all curved glass and giant steel beams while the inside was a state-of-the-art facility, home to the latest in every form of sports equipment. I was intimately familiar with the gym in the way that a normal girl might be familiar with the lines of her lover.
“Catya! Grace!” a voice called.
“Why are you waiting outside?” I shouted back. Grace and I picked up our pace, and closed in on the gang. “It’s cold.”
Sharon-Ann said, “We wanted to walk in together. Like a united front.”
“Why?” I asked.
“To show him we mean business,” Riri explained, guileless as always.
Max added, “And you were running late, so we held off.”
“I’m not late,” I replied, my tone defensive.
“Whatever, boss,” Beth chimed in.
I began again slowly, trying to decipher their meanings. “So you’re waiting outside, in the cold, for some amount of time, to show the new coach we’re a team by… walking in together? That’s the big plan?”
The skepticism in my voice was contagious, and the rest of the girls were soon infected with my insistent normalcy.
“Okay, okay,” Max replied. “Maybe we didn’t think it through but this just seemed like the moment for, I dunno, visible unity.”
Occasionally, I was reminded that no matter how many hours a day I spent with these kids, I was doomed to never fully comprehend their actions and motivations.
“All right then,” I said, dropping the subject. Pick your battles. “Thanks for waiting, I guess. I think everyone is here. Let’s go.”
We stormed into the gym, our ponytails bobbing and bags banging against one another. We’re like Amazonian warriors, I thought, then amended it to, very sheltered warriors who would look cool in armor but probably couldn’t heft a sword to save our lives. I remembered that the mythical Amazonian women warriors had to cut off one of their breasts, the better to draw back their bow and arrow, and decided I would not in fact like to join that coterie.
I took the lead, guiding them to the weight room he’d apparently reserved for the next few hours. I paused suddenly, and the group behind me banged into my back.