Drew is wrong, he has to be.
Because men don’t watch you like that if you’re just a placeholder.
Men don’t show up, remember things, walk you home, sit with you at lunch, text after your matches, and look at you like that if nothing real is growing underneath it.
He came.
He’s here.
And whatever else is unfinished in him, he’ll just have to let it go.
The whistle blows.
Game body takes over.
The first twenty minutes are a knife fight.
Hard tackles.
Fast transitions.
Midfield pressure so ugly and relentless it feels like trying to breathe through denim.
I play well.
Better than well.
Mean.
That’s what Coach calls it when I’m in the exact right headspace.
Not reckless.
Not emotional.
I split lines.
Win second balls.
Cut hard enough to make defenders turn their hips too early.
Put one shot just over the bar in the twelfth minute and hear the whole front section inhale like they nearly got to watch the exact ending they came for.
At the half, we’re tied 1–1.
The locker room is all sweat and sharp voices and somebody re-taping an ankle while Coach redraws our spacing with the kind of fury that means she thinks we should already be better.
I sit on the bench, breathing through my nose, and tie my laces tighter.
One of the girls nudges me with her knee.
“Your basketball prince came.”
I look up too fast.
Bad move.
She grins.
