Page 34 of Last Line of Defense

“I said sit down! Now!”

And I end up sitting down because, even though I’m terrified and hurting, I still have that absurd, inexplicable need to obey her above all else. She examines my joint right there on the field, with that icy, analytical focus she uses only when she’s deeply angry and worried to death at the same time. The worst possible combination for my nerves.

She doesn’t say much. With impeccable professional detachment, she asks for an ice pack right away, secures it tightly with a compression bandage around my swollen knee, and exchanges four terse words with Hugo before grabbing my arm to take me straight back to the medical area of the sports complex.

The heavy door to the rehabilitation room slams shut behind us, and immediately, the facade of composure crumbles as she launches into her drill-sergeant lecture.

“You should have used your head and said no to Hugo the moment he asked you!” Clara exclaims suddenly, turning around, her face flushed with rage and her whole body tense to the point of unbearable strain.

I plop down onto the examination table and clench my fists, trying to hide the tremor in my leg.

“I don’t need your blessed permission to decide when I’m ready to play, Clara. I’m a professional player, not a little girl.”

“No, what you urgently need is a massive dose of common sense, maturity, and prudence,” she insists, standing a foot away from the exam table with her eyes flashing.

“Come on, don’t blow things out of proportion—it really wasn’t that big of a deal,” I reply, though I’m fully aware that I’m treading on dangerously slippery ground.

She turns toward me quickly, closing the physical distance between us.

“Don’t blow things out of proportion? Do you really have the nerve to tell me I’m exaggerating?” Her voice rises several octaves, filling the room. “I don’t know how long you’ve been doing this—blatantly lying to every doctor who’s treated you. What you have is serious, and if you keep this up… you might not be able to play anymore.”

The silence that settles between us next becomes sharp and cutting, like the blade of a scalpel. I feel my pulse quicken.

I sit up slowly on the examination table, staring her down with wounded pride.

“You don’t have the faintest idea of everything I’ve had to go through and endure to get where I am today,” I murmur in a hoarse whisper.

She takes a decisive step forward, invading my personal space to the point where I can feel the heat radiating from her tense body.

“I know far more than you realize. I know exactly how you adjust your stride when you walk through the locker room tunnel to hide your limp from everyone. I know how you shift your weight onto your right leg as soon as you think no one is watching. I know full well that your knee hasn’t been right since long before you signed the contract to come here, and I know you’re so terrified of ceasing to be the team’s indispensable star that you’d rather shatter yourself into a thousand pieces than have the guts to admit you’re human and need to stop.”

Every single one of her words hits me right where it hurts the most. She’s absolutely right, and I hate with every fiber of my being that it’s precisely her who knows me so well.

“You don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about…” I reply, but my defiance crumbles along the way, and my voice no longer sounds angry; it sounds broken and deeply tired.

Clara lets out a long sigh, relaxes her shoulders, and the hardness of her expression suddenly softens, revealing a tenderness that disarms me.

“Well then, if I’m so wrong, you tell me. Be honest with me for just once in your life.”

I have the chance to spout one of my lies, put on the mask of the untouchable women’s soccer star, and maintain the facade of a tough girl whom nothing can bring down. But the reality is that I’m exhausted and tired of pretending all the time.

So I lower my head and stare intently at the tiles on the floor of the room.

“Nobody gives a damn whether I, as a person, am okay or whether I’m hurting inside,” I confess in a low, hoarse voice on the verge of breaking. “Everyone at Ravenhill FC is only interested in me because they know exactly what I can give them when I’m on top of my game… But if I can’t step onto the field to play, if I stop being a productive machine that puts the ball in the net… I seriously doubt they’d want me around. They’d be perfectly capable of terminating my contract because of an injury without a second thought.”

I sit still, waiting for the typical cheap response, the easy consolation, or the comforting lie Bruno would usually throw my way. But none of that comes. Clara doesn’t try to smooth things over with empty words. She doesn’t give me the typical “come on, don’t say such nonsense” or promise me impossible miracles. She simply stands there, motionless by my side, listening to every single one of my words with absolute, undivided attention. As if the simple act of sharing that burden with me were more than enough.

She approaches with infinite calm until she’s right next to my legs, dangling from the examination table, and does something far more powerful and devastating than any words of encouragement I’ve ever been given: she slowly raises her hand and caresses my right cheek with infinite tenderness. Her hand—warm, firm, and astonishingly soft to the touch—glides across my skin, offering me a barely perceptible touch that is, nonetheless, utterly devastating to my defenses.

I slowly lift my gaze from the floor. Her eyes hold mine, filled with a sincerity so transparent it’s frightening.

“If you don’t set that pride of yours aside and just follow my instructions, I guarantee you’ll miss the entire season,” she whispers in an extremely sweet yet firm tone. “And I swear, the last thing I want in this damn world is to see you give up something you were born to do because of some absurd recklessness.”

My breathing becomes clumsy, rushed, and irregular in an instant. Because my brain has just processed the real meaning behind what she’s saying. She’s no longer speaking to me solely as the head of the Ravenhill FC medical team. It’s her genuinely caring about me—not the athlete, but me, the real me.

Unable to help myself, I close the distance, lean forward, and rest my forehead against her chest.

“What’s happening to me is terrifying me…” I admit in a barely audible whisper.