Forward

by Abby Wambach

  I believe in my heart that every one of you can and will make that commitment to one another, that no matter what you will do whatever it takes to experience that moment together. It will be supreme and I would love nothing more than to see that happen. I hope you all feel that you are ready for that.

  By the time I type that last period, I’m sweating and slightly out of breath. I’m not finished, and my fingers start tapping again; I want to address each teammate personally, one by one.

  I tell Nicole Barnhart that while we all might mercilessly mock her compression socks, she’s clearly the toughest chick on the team.

  I tell Heather Mitts what I’ve been thinking since our days in college—that she has the best legs I’ve ever seen and that she is the most consistent player. Plus, she never lets me beat her during drills, and fuck, does that piss me off.

  I tell Pearcie what she already knows: She’s been my rock the past few years. She’s solid, loyal, kind, strong, stubborn, and keeps secrets better than anyone I know.

  I marvel at Rachel Buehler’s fearlessness. I laud Lindsay Tarpley for her impeccable work ethic. I tell Natasha Kai that her passion is inspiring. I admire Shannon Boxx’s willingness to attack every opportunity. I thank Amy Rodriguez for enduring my lengthy ruminations when we roomed together last year in China. I praise Heather O’Reilly’s huge heart and six-pack abs. I get metaphysical on Aly Wagner and tell her, “Your being is special.” I call Carli Lloyd the most gifted player I’ve ever known, and admonish anyone who dismisses her just because she’s from New Jersey.

  I note that Tobin Heath is wise beyond her years, and the most “going-the-full” person in history. I acknowledge Stephanie Cox’s willingness to have uncomfortable conversations. I call Kate Markgraf the most underrated player in the history of this national team. I appreciate that Angela Hucles has a perspective on life that is so perfectly and uniquely her own. I tell Lori Chalupny—“Chupes”—that she always brings two words to mind: most solid. I am blown away by Briana Scurry’s strength, and I ask her to share her valuable secrets with all of us.

  I thank Lauren Cheney for stepping in to replace me, and tell her it’s her time now—her turn. I apologize to Hope Solo, admitting that our World Cup disaster forced me to do some soul-searching. Instead of being honest and compassionate, I was controlling and manipulative. And in moving forward, I promise to get past my own ego and learn to trust. I tell her not to be afraid to show the world her softer side. I know it’s there, I say, because I’ve seen it.

  By now I’m crying again, and aching for Vicodin, and the laptop lies hot across my thighs. My stiff fingers push to conclude:

  “So that’s it,” I write. “I’m sorry this has been so long, but it’s important for me to express my thoughts clearly, and I know I even failed at that. I guess I’ve said it all. I love you all so fucking much and I’m so sorry I’m not there with you physically. I am with you, though. If you make a mistake or you’re scared or you don’t know what to do, just know that I am with you. Just feel me by your side. I am there. Open your hearts and you’ll know. If you do, you will be champions. But it has to be a commitment from everyone. You can do this. You can win. I just know it. Good luck and play your hearts out. I’ll be watching.”

  I’m watching from my couch when we play Norway on August 6. We look lost out there, timid and defanged, and I scream at the TV through my Vicodin haze: No, Jesus, no—what are you doing? Get on your mark! Move, move! Fuck, fuck! My tirade awakens my neighbor all the way from across the street. It’s nearly dawn when he rings my doorbell, and Kara jumps up to answer.

  “Can you please quiet down?” he asks.

  “Sorry!” I call from the couch. “We’ll try to be more quiet.”

  As he leaves, he lets his dog take a piss on our doorstep.

  Fuck it, I think. I’m going to be loud as I want. My boisterous armchair coaching has no effect, and we lose 2–0.

  I pop a few Ambien and sleep off my sorrow.

  We have better luck in the next few rounds, beating Japan, New Zealand, and Canada. In the semifinals we face Japan again, and for this game I fly out to New York, crutching my way through the airport and wincing at the turbulence. When I land, Are is there to greet me; he flew up from Florida so we could watch the game together. We drive upstate to the Thousand Islands, a cluster of islands that straddles the U.S.–Canadian border, where my parents own a plot of land and a secluded, ancient house.

  Their island has always been my favorite place, my sanctuary where I can rewind time and forget, where nothing and no one can find me. The house itself still has old half-doors, designed so that the original owner could hunt ducks from the comfort of his living room, and an intricate tin ceiling that catches and throws the light. There’s no electricity, just a generator; as kids we had no choice but to talk to each other, an extension of our strict dinnertime rules from home.

  Usually I appreciate the quiet time, the forced lack of access to television, but right now my team is about to play Japan and I could really use one. An idea sparks: We take a boat ride across the bay to a new house, a sort of rustic McMansion, and ask the owners if they’d be so kind as to let us watch the game there. We settle in on their couch, only to realize that this house is on the Canadian side of the Saint Lawrence River, and the local station is not broadcasting the American game. Are and I exchange panicked glances—shit, what are we going to do?—and we decide we’ll figure it out on the boat ride back to our side of the water.

  We dock our boat at the edge of a town called Alexandria Bay, and I hobble as quickly as I can, while Are looks out for stones that might trip me. We spot a convenience store with a TV affixed to the ceiling. From the running ticker on the bottom of the screen I can see we’re losing, 1–0, but the store doesn’t subscribe to the universal sports channel. It’s about six in the morning, too early for any bars to be open, and I am running out of options, crutch-pacing back and forth, worried about plays I can’t see. Desperate, I approach the woman at the counter.

  “Do you know anyone who has DirecTV?” I ask.

  “My son does,” she says, “but he lives a bit out of town.”

  I’m frantic enough to risk imposing on her. “Could you please take us there?” I ask, and explain who I am and why I’m not in Beijing.

  She takes pity on me and agrees, and I text my parents and siblings, telling them to come along.

  We all pile into her van. She introduces herself as the “the Mayor of Alexandria Bay,” but please, call her “the Mayor” for short. Her home is hidden away on the far side of a trailer park, and her son lives in the adjacent detached garage, a setup that reminds me of sneaking around with Teddy, my high school boyfriend. Most of the town is still sleeping, including the Mayor’s son, and she has to knock on his door repeatedly to wake him up.

  He appears, rubbing sleep from his eyes. “What’s going on?”

  “She’s on the girls’ national soccer team,” the Mayor explains, pointing at me, “and she’s injured. Her team is playing and she needs your TV.”

  This stranger invites my entire family in and, for the next hour, allows us to commandeer his house. So far Japan has scored the only goal of the game, and the play is a frenzied reel of agonizing near-misses: Heather O’Reilly’s cross-shot is repelled by a diving save; Amy Rodriguez shoots into the box but fails to find a teammate; a Japanese defender finagles the ball from Angela Hucles, flattening our momentum. Now Japan is in control, the ball bouncing from player to player, two dozen touches in a row. I brace myself, waiting for them to score again, and then . . . holy shit: Heather sprints past her defender and blasts a firecracker to Angela, alone near the box. She guides it in, and we’re tied. Three minutes later, Lori Chalupny performs a magical ballet across the field, swiveling past and through defenders, launching a shot just seconds before being cornered by another. She makes it, and we’re ahead, 2–1. After halftime, in the seventieth minute, Heather lobs a shot, merely hoping to get the ball in the box,
but it soars in just below the bar—goal! A few plays later, Angela kicks the ball from a ridiculously sharp angle—another seemingly accidental goal. Thankfully, those count, too, and now it’s 4–1. Japan manages to score once more, in the third and final minute of extra time, but we hang on to the lead. I thank our host for his hospitality, and we make the trip home to the other side of the river.

  For the gold medal game against Brazil, I’m more prepared, having confirmed with a local diner that they would be airing the game. As soon as they open we all slide into booths, with me on the end so I can stretch my leg and shake my crutch at the screen. I’m too nervous to eat breakfast, and my omelet congeals on its plate as I watch Marta, Brazil’s formidable and flashy leader, twist and spin her way across the field, looking more like a samba dancer than a forward—“Pelé with skirts,” they call her, a moniker reportedly bestowed by Pelé himself. In the eighteenth minute Pearcie closes her down, but Marta again finds her rhythm, veering around our defenders, cocking her foot, and propelling it square into the ball—a beautiful shot, I have to admit. My breath halts in the back of my throat. . . . It’s wide! A miss! I exhale.

  The Brazilians excel at the art of drawing fouls; one mild collision and their players fling themselves to the ground, flailing and barrel-rolling as if trying to escape flames. A Brazilian named Formiga tries this trick after colliding with Heather Mitts in the thirty-seventh minute, but thankfully the referee isn’t impressed. At halftime both sides are still scoreless, and the diner is filling up with patrons, some of whom recognize me (despite my omnipresent knit hat) and stroll over to wish me well. It’s the first time all day I feel a pinch of sadness, and I try to conjure the words I wrote to my team: You do not need me there.

  Early in the second half we look bewildered and clumsy, out of step and off-kilter, and we’re forced to play defense. The key is to contain Marta by swarming her at every opportunity. She finds an opening anyway, searing the ball toward our goal, where Hope saves us in the nick of time. Seven minutes left in regular time and we’re suddenly commanding the action: a rocket by Carli (wide, damn it!); a shot by Angela Hucles (short!); and another by Amy Rodriguez that lands in their goalie’s gloves. The clock’s dwindled to zero: we’re heading into overtime.

  Seven minutes in, Carli fires one off, and their goalie dives a bit short—goal! Twenty-three minutes to gold. I watch through splayed fingers. Both sides are playing a game of tag, back and forth, back and forth, and despite the Brazilians’ furious shooting, nothing finds the net. It’s over and we win. We won. The diner patrons clap and shout, and I hop giddily on my good leg. I switch to my bad one, craving the physical pain—anything to distract from the melancholy rage of not being there on the field.

  My phone buzzes. It’s Dez, our equipment manager, calling from the locker room. “Hold on,” he instructs, and I hear a roaring rush of screams and cheers, a celebration in absentia. I listen until I can’t stand the sound anymore; I so badly wish my voice were in that chorus.

  I hang up, terrified by the thought that they won without me.

  11

  APPRENTICE

  In the weeks following the Olympics, I exist on two settings: numbed and tortured. Kara orchestrates an intense regimen of ice and elevation and compression, which I’m convinced will break my nascent cycle of injury. She sleeps on the couch with me, her feet by my head, and a few times per night I inadvertently wake her up with a swift kick to the temple. Without complaint, she rises and reboots the system, wrapping me in fresh ice and delivering another Vicodin. Occasionally, I creep back toward consciousness, coherent enough to drag my laptop toward me and power it on. Items I have no recollection of ordering begin showing up at my door: A five-piece patio set; a new mountain bike; a meat smoker as big as a bear. I do recall ordering a guitar, which becomes a new obsession, a way to channel my boundless energy with my fingers instead of my feet. Sometimes, when I’m lucky, I sleep through the night, and for those few hours my mind lets me believe it’s all just a terrible dream.

  I temporarily shed my aversion to crying, allowing myself to sob openly and without reservation, at least from the safety of my couch. These jags are about more than another failed romance and missing the Olympics; they’re about my relationship with soccer, which, in a way, means they’re about my relationship with myself. With past defeats I insisted on accepting all the blame: I wasn’t fit enough; I wasn’t prepared enough; I didn’t want it enough, or I wanted other things more. For this Olympics, for the first time in my life, I don’t believe those reasons. For the first time in my life I believe that soccer betrayed me, and I want to know why.

  I am a novice at introspection, having spent my entire twenty-eight years focusing outward, throwing my energy into the air and seeing where it sticks. I am not sure where or how to start. Kara helps, burning incense and talking me through the basics of meditation. I try, feeling awkward and embarrassed, as if I’m on a first date with someone slightly out of my league. Woman seeking woman who doesn’t mind tobacco chew, extreme twin personalities, and long stretches of travel. A plus if you’re bisexual and unable to commit! Unsurprisingly, I can’t shut up my mind; it’s just as loud and obnoxious as my mouth. Kara tells me this is normal: the wandering mind is excavating negativity, pausing just long enough to yank those thoughts from the root. My dark thoughts have spread and twined like weeds. I wish I could hire a few freelance minds to give my own a helping hand.

  I read Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth and find particular resonance in the sections about ego and seeking validation from within. Next is Gary Chapman’s The Five Love Languages, which guides you to identify your preferred method of expressing and receiving affection, and I diagnose myself as a “giver.” As soon as I had the means, I began giving outrageous gifts—to my nieces and nephews, my teammates, my girlfriends and friends. I give to make people happy, of course, but beneath that motivation there’s another I am loath to admit: I give so that the recipients will like me. It’s yet another subtle, insidious way I tell myself that I’m unworthy of genuine attention and love. I vow to work on that, to see what happens if I stop giving gifts.

  When I’m not sitting perfectly still, working out my brain, I’m at physical therapy, finding my way back to my body. I’m soft and lopsided and every weighted step shoots a bolt of lightning through my bones. My right leg is a log; my left, a baseball bat whittled to its core. My doctor predicts my recovery will take a year, and mentally I chop that time in half: Six months, max. Every quad extension is as rigorous and painful as a dozen successive suicide runs. I push, add more weight, stretch, balance, walk, step, ice, compress, and repeat, cajoling the muscles back to life. I imagine myself returning to the field, sprinting its length, practicing set plays, feeling my head against the ball. Soccer has proved, to my surprise, that I am breakable, and I will find every piece I lost along the way.

  At the end of September 2008, I’m well enough to travel to Manhattan for the draft of a new professional soccer league, Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS), scheduled to launch in the spring. Despite the recession, the leagues’ organizers are optimistic about its success. This time around there’s a different business model, a grassroots approach in which seven teams operate and grow at the local level. I plan to play for the Washington Freedom, my old club team. A reporter for the New York Times asks me about missing the Olympics, and I reach for one of my new Zen mantras: “I wasn’t devastated,” I say, “because I accepted it when it happened. I try to live in the present.”

  In the first weeks of 2009, I pack up and head back east to Washington, D.C. My mala beads and Eckhart Tolle book both come with me.

  On March 1, the first day of our preseason, I’m in the locker room with my teammates, getting ready for practice. Some are old friends but there are new faces, too, including a woman named Sarah Huffman to whom I’m immediately attracted. I laugh at myself for being so predictable; of course she has a flawless body, long hair, and could easily pass for straight. I worry, the
n, that maybe she is straight, and I’m already doomed. Despite my dismal track record, I hope she’s at least bisexual, so I can convince her to give me a shot.

  I have my answer soon enough, when I overhear her reading an e-mail from an ex-boyfriend. “Can you believe this guy?” she asks, and that conversation leads to another about visiting a friend in Turkey. I note that she says “friend,” not girlfriend, as in, “I went to Turkey to visit my friend and we rode camels.” Yet her tone is clear, and in some tacit way, her words are directed at me. Why doesn’t she just say “girlfriend”? I think, but I’m relieved to know I’m not disqualified by my anatomy alone.

  At practice, I’m constantly aware of where she’s standing, and I maneuver myself to be next to her in drills. I’m nearby when she twists her leg awkwardly on the turf and goes down, flatly and swiftly, as if yanked by some unseen hand. She’s wincing, clasping her right knee, and when her eyes open they meet mine. I’m standing over her, absolutely still, holding her gaze.

  “You’re going to be okay,” I say, in the calmest tone I’ve ever used. “You don’t know what’s wrong. You don’t know what you’ve done. You have to wait for the MRI. Just take this one step at a time, and believe me when I say you’re going to be okay.”

  A few hours later the team hears the diagnosis: a torn ACL. That night, I plan to stop by her house. I assemble a care package, including DVDs, the Eckhart Tolle book, and a handwritten note telling her how sorry I am and that I know exactly how she’s feeling. When I arrive, she has her leg up and is drinking a beer, surrounded by teammates. She loves the package and my note, and we all watch a few episodes of The L Word, a show about impossibly glamorous lesbians living in Los Angeles. I sit as close to Sarah as I can and do my best to make her laugh. Over the next few days we exchange long e-mails about injuries and the infuriating lack of control that accompanies them. I nearly beg: please tell me what I can do to help you get to the other side.