I push harder, willing my legs to move faster. I file in behind Kaia, rolling my hands into her shorts in an uninterrupted motion, lifting her from the ground without effort to give the advantage and pocketing the ball into her arms.
That’s my girl.
It’s tricky but worth it to take possession back if we can.
Kaia off-loads the ball to me to avoid the next hit.
“Alright,” I grunt, dropping low to wrap it up into my chest to protect it from the oncoming trouble. Lacy is on a mission, but she forgets herself and her size. She may outweigh everyone else, but not me, not even soaking wet. With my shoulder in her stomach I rock her back off her feet, pushing the ball out to Margie, who’s waiting with a path. She now has the space to move the ball another twenty yards before she’s grabbed from behind and tripped into the ground hard.
Cosy is on top of it all before I can even unravel from Lacy to follow Sunday up the field as Margie extends the ball out between feet and arms. I surge forward, using every ounce of my strength to dig my cleats into the over-saturated earth. I need to catch up to Sunday. She’s fast, but she can’t outrun everyone. She needs a wall and an escape plan. I watch, still a few feet out, as Sunday launches herself sideways and skips forward through the mud into an open lane.
“Run!” Kaia screams, fueling her already insanely quick steps.
The rain makes it hard to see, but as I turn to my right, Kaia is caught off guard by a late hit that knocks her back onto the ground as Sundaycrosses the line and the clock winds down to six seconds. I move to help her but she's already shoving the forward who took the cheap shot. She raises her hand, and her expression turns vicious as Cosy yells from behind me, adding to the already intense amount of noise.
“Fuck you, Abby!” Kaia shoves, her feet sliding around in the mud as she gets up and hauls back to hit the forward in the face. The follow-through is abruptly interrupted as Abby lunges forward, wraps her up, and walks her backward aggressively before slamming her back into the dirt. They roll around the pitch as the referee jogs over to get in the middle, only to stop on her heels when she sees Kaia is involved.
The distraction gives her the upper hand; she flips Abby into the mud with a splash, pinning her there between her thighs as she continues her assault. Kaia pulls back and hits her hard; the sickening snap of knuckles meeting cheek echoes through the white noise of the rain.
“You cheap-shot-taking-cunt!” Every word is another punch. By the time she runs out of breath, Abby is bleeding from her nose as Kaia pulls back her arm with the intention of hitting her again, and I step in and wrap her up around the waist to pull her off the forward.
“Stop! She’s not even fighting back.” I hold her body tightly against my chest as she squirms violently with adrenaline. “Kaia!” I snap, and like a popped balloon, all the fight explodes from her in that instance, allowing me to see her back on the ground.
“Muzzle your damn dog, Mitchell!” Their captain barks at Cosy.
“Keep yours on a tighter leash, McKenzie!” she hollers back and flips her off, making her way over and snatching Kaia’s hand to look at it. “Locker room now,” she whispers, giving Kaia the look. Cosy’s all too good at it after three years playing on the same team with Kaia. An unspoken bond that when Cosy makes an order, she follows it. She’s probably the only person who has that type of authority over her. “You can let her go,” she says to me, and I nod, but I can feel the enraged energy that’s vibrating from her strong but small frame.
My hand snaps out, catching her by the collar of the jersey and holding her in place as she snarls a few choice insults as Abby crawls off the ground.
“Okay, well…” Cosy sighs, waving us both off. “I tried.”
“Come on, Killer,” I say to her, practically lifting Kaia off the ground by the damp fabric and directing her toward the building we use as a locker room during away games. The door slams behind us, and with it, the violent rainfall is shut out.
“That’s definitely going to get you suspended,” I say with a barely audible laugh and let go of her.
She stomps across the room, over the tiled Hillcat logo and past the row of lockers to the sinks along the back wall. She runs the faucet and shoves her hand beneath it without saying a word while I rub the palms of my hands into my eyes to clear away the water sticking to my lashes and sink to the bench with a tiny huff.
“You alright?” I ask, and before she can even answer, the door swings open, giving neither of us a second to cool off, and Coach files in with Cosy behind her. Kaia turns immediately, leaning against the sink and crossing her arms, no doubt preparing for the bad news.
“Six games,” Coach says.
“Six?” Kaia flips her lid, “What do you mean six? Abby hitmelate!”
Cosy puts a barrier between them, mostly for Coach’s sake.
“One game per punch,” Coach explains, “the ref is Abby’s sister, Kaia.”
“Boo-hoo!” Kaia groans.
“You pissed off the wrong person.” She puts her hands on her hips, “I tried to get it lowered, but they aren’t budging.”
Somehow, it had gotten worse.
The Hollow is coming apart at the seams.
It’s a rare night when it isn’t at capacity, but tonight feels different. Two very different crowds have filled the bar, creating a powder keg just begging for a spark. The hockey-game crowd is happy, drunk, dancing, flirting, finding dark corners to enjoy the night, while the first-responder crowd has just come off shift, looking to forget the horrors of a massive downtown fire.
Something has to give; I just wish it wouldn’t be inside the walls of my bar.
