by Avery Wilde
Finally, minutes from the half-time whistle, Malcolm Brady—my left winger—got a lucky break when a defender slipped on the grass. I followed to back him up but Brady needed no help, deftly kicking the ball past the keeper to make it a nerve-wracking but level one-all.
The whistle sounded for half-time, and we all trudged back towards our respective locker rooms, tired and dissatisfied. A draw would mean a penalty shoot-out, which was no better than a crap shoot.
I sank onto the locker room bench and stared at the floor. I was playing my best, and it just wasn’t fucking good enough for once. Never in my life had I found myself in this situation, to know that I was matched and perhaps bettered by the people I was facing. I had no more gears to go through, no Plan B, no ideas for how to win this. I looked at my hands again. They were no longer shaking.
Great. Even my body had accepted the fact that defeat was almost inevitable today…
Chapter 19
Allison
There’s a question that a lot of sportsmen and women get asked—‘do you think it’s harder on you, or on your loved ones sitting and watching?’ Of course all the pressure is on the player, but they also have the control; their destiny is in their own hands. All the loved ones can do is sit, watch, and worry. They live and die with each moment of the game and can do absolutely nothing to affect it.
That’s exactly what was happening to me right now.
I felt as if I’d been put through the damn wringer. I’d sat down to watch the match in the media lounge with the intention of enjoying the game and writing a great report on it. It was sure to be tense—it was a final after all—but there was never any doubt in my mind that Liam and his team would win. Not even a shred.
But early on in the game, it became clear that this would be far closer than anyone could’ve anticipated. Reporters and pundits had become so consumed with the cult of Liam Croft that they’d seemingly almost forgotten that he was part of a team, or that he would be facing another team. A one-man team never worked, and although that wasn’t what this was, it was fast becoming clear that, as a team, the opposition were slightly better overall. Liam might be the best player on the pitch, but that wasn't going to be enough.
Not today.
From about fifteen minutes in, I’d abandoned the idea that I might enjoy the game, and a few minutes later the idea that I was going to write a scintillating article about it had also fallen by the wayside. My pen hung loosely in my hand, and my notebook sat on my lap forgotten. I could write from memory, or get a tape of the game perhaps, but frankly I just wasn’t thinking of that right now. In fact, I was barely thinking at all; I was actively suppressing thought—if I started thinking, then I’d start thinking ahead, either to Liam winning the game, which was tempting fate, or Liam losing the game, which was inviting disaster. I wasn’t usually what you’d call a particularly superstitious person, but I simply wouldn’t allow myself to fall into either of those two traps, just in case.
So I remained in the moment instead, focusing only on each movement of the ball, biting at my fingernails, my stomach contracting steadily into an ever-tighter knot. And with each passing minute came fresh evidence that this wasn’t going to go according to the script that the mass media had already written for it.
When the goal finally came, even though it was not from Liam’s boot, I let out a squawk of relieved excitement that made everyone else in the media lounge look around at me like I’d wandered in from the nearest mental health facility. But they understood—sports journalists weren’t supposed to get involved in games, but they wouldn’t have become sports journalists if they didn’t enjoy what they did, and with a match like this it was impossible not to get involved to some extent.
The half-time whistle finally blew, and I exhaled, feeling as if I’d been holding my breath for the last forty-five minutes and was now physically deflated from the strain. I watched Liam trudge stolidly across the pitch. I’d never seen him like this: ground down, his morale worn thin.
I had to see him.
It wasn’t easy; women, civilians and reporters were the three things definitely not allowed into the players’ locker room, and I was all three, but finally I managed to persuade the hulking but surprisingly soft-spoken doorman to let me just inside the door while he went to fetch Liam.
When I saw Liam come round the corner, my heart went out to him. His shoulders were rounded, his face creased and the perpetual spring was gone from his step. When he saw me, he forced a smile and tried to seem like his cocky, confident self, but I could all too easily see through the façade of bravado.
“I just wanted to see you,” I said with a smile. “You okay?”
“Yeah. Don’t worry, babe.” Liam tried for a dismissive laugh. “We’ll have them in the second half. It’ll be fine.”
“I don’t doubt it.”
I suddenly wondered why I’d insisted on seeing him. What was there I could do? I was completely powerless to help and yet felt instinctively that this was where I was meant to be—at Liam’s side. I wanted to say, ‘I’ll still love you whether you win or lose’, but he didn’t need to hear that now, and he probably knew it anyway, even though we’d never brought up the ‘L’ word.
Whether he won or lost didn’t matter to me, but it mattered to him, which meant that it did matter to me. Catch-22. What the hell could I say that would make even the slightest difference? Really, what was there?
“I should probably get back,” Liam said, and now he seemed unable to keep the sense of defeat out of his voice.
“Okay.” My heart broke to hear the catch in his voice; like he was already beaten. I’d never thought I’d ever see or hear Liam Croft like this. Once upon a time, when I’d first seen and heard of him in the sports gossip columns, I’d thought he was a prick, and I would’ve welcomed seeing him being taken down a peg or two…but now I regretted ever having had such awful thoughts about the man. He was a good person, and he didn’t deserve all that crap.
Liam kissed my forehead, then turned and walked back towards the locker room.
“Liam!” I called out after him.
He turned back, and he seemed almost ashamed to look at me now; a shell of his usual self.
“If you don’t score today…”
Liam held up his hand—he’d heard it all before. “I know: you’ll still like me. And I’ll still lo…err, I’ll still like you right back.”
“That’s not what I was going to say,” I replied, making my expression a blank mask as I fought to keep the mischievous smile off my face. “I was actually going to say, if you don’t score today, then you’re not going to score tonight either, if you know what I mean…”
Liam looked almost shocked by my words, staring vacantly back, and I held my poker face for as long as I could before it started to crack into a teasing grin. And as I smiled, so did Liam—as I knew he would at my silly joke. More than that; he seemed to grow, breaking out of the defeated shell and once again looking like Liam Croft. As we stared at each other, neither of us willing to break eye contact, we both started to laugh; sharing the joke and sharing the moment.
When our chuckles stopped, Liam smirked, raised his chin, and finally delivered his verdict. “We’ll fucking see about that!”
***
While the end of the first half had seen a very different Liam Croft to that which the public knew, the beginning of the second saw the old Liam return with a vengeance. He seemed to be playing out of his mind; he always wanted the ball. No matter if he had a shot at the goal or not, he was making a clear statement with his actions—he would try, he would let the opposition know that he was just going to keep coming and, sooner or later, he would score.
As his confidence grew before our very eyes, that of the opposing team seemed to wane. No matter what they did or what they tried, he was always there to meet them with that infuriating smirk plastered across his face. He bounced across the pitch with impossible energy, reinvigorating his team and reawakening the sl
umbering crowd, who’d suddenly seemed to remember that football could be fun. They roared with approval and excitement each time Liam took the ball, and merely shrugged when he failed to score: never mind, he’ll get it next time. Throughout the season Liam had made winning seem like an inevitability against teams who were plainly inferior, but today he made it seem inevitable against a team that really ought to win, given their overall superior lineup.
The crowd loved him for it, his team loved him for it, and up in the media lounge, all pretense at impartiality long-forgotten, I loved him for it.
Oh, yeah….I damn well loved every inch of him.
Liam had made a goal seem so inevitable that when it finally came, the crowd might’ve been blasé about it. But not this goal. A goal like this could never be seen as inevitable. It was Malcolm Brady who passed the ball, landing it perfectly at Liam’s feet. I was watching closely, and for a moment, I felt like I was there on the pitch with him; that I could see right into his face and know his thoughts. He was nowhere near the goal, a ridiculous distance from it, but from the slight narrowing of his eyes, I knew he’d seen a line, an impossible arc that led from where he was to the back to the net. I felt like I actually saw the moment of decision, and I shared it with him.
Do it. Score, I willed him silently.
Liam kicked the ball.
It soared over the heads of that unbeatable defense, who knew that at this distance it couldn’t possibly find its mark. The entire stadium held its collective breath, except the goal keeper, who dived high and wide and was rewarded with a close-up view of the ball gracefully passing just beyond his fingertips.
The moment of silence was broken only by the soft sound of the ball hitting the net, and then the stadium erupted.
Yes!
He’d done it! He’d scored…and now there were just three minutes left in the game.
It wasn’t over yet.
Chapter 20
Liam
It was all a blur to me. A big fucking blur. Nothing existed but that ball. It was as if the whole world had faded away and a thin curved line of pin-sharp reality was all that remained—me balanced on one end, the goal on the other.
And then the stadium erupted.
The rest of the match just kinda happened. It must’ve done because you don’t stop with three minutes to play just because someone has scored a bit of blinder that will be on highlight reels for years to come, although I barely realized it was happening as I played. I hoped that I did well in those final few minutes—I played at least well enough that the opposing team didn’t score again—but I couldn’t remember any of it.
After that one goal, after the crowd roared, after my teammates leapt on me to celebrate, everything was a blur. There were vague shapes around me who were presumably other players, there was a dull rushing sound like a distant ocean which was presumably the crowd, and every now and then a bright white streak of lighting fell at my feet and I kicked it to one of the shapes. I was living in a dream world, playing on autopilot, which my long history of playing allowed me to do without screwing up. The time passed in a blink of an eye for me. One minute I was scoring that near-impossible goal, and the next I heard the final whistle blow, and again the stadium erupted, again my teammates grabbed me, and finally the reality of the situation sunk in for me.
We’d won. We’d actually fucking won.
Skidding to a halt on the grass, I dropped back, landing flat on the ground and gazing up at the sky and the floodlights above me, the roar of the crowd deafening in my ears.
I punched my fist in the air. “Fuck yeah!”
It seemed the only appropriate thing to say.
Suddenly there were hands on me, and I felt myself being lifted up off the ground and onto the shoulders of my teammates, all cheering me. I punched the air again, shouted back congratulations at the men around me, and then I waved to the crowd, who were now on their feet, screaming my name. My eyes turned to the broad window of the media lounge. It was too far away for me to see clearly through the glass, but I was sure I knew who was standing there, and I waved enthusiastically and blew a kiss. There was a cameraman nearby, trying to record the action without getting caught up in it, and I saw the camera lens turn to me.
On impulse I looked directly into the camera and mouthed the words: ‘I love you’.
***
Back in the locker room the celebrating continued, but as much as I wanted to celebrate alongside my teammates, with whom I’d struggled to reach this point, there was only one thing on my mind right now. I switched my boots for trainers and hurried for the door—I could shower and change after I’d kept my appointment with Allison.
“Going somewhere?”
Fuck. Brian was at the door.
“Meeting someone,” I briskly replied, starting to push past him.
“Did you think I wouldn’t notice?”
“What are you talking about?”
“The camera feed is live, Liam,” he said. “I can’t slip a fifty to an editor to cut that out.”
“Cut what out?” I made a valiant attempt to keep the charade going.
“I love you.”
I feigned embarrassment. “That’s sweet of you to say, Brian, but cut what out?”
“Don’t try to be clever with me,” Brian sneered. “You said ‘I love you’ to the camera and it was seen by everyone watching. They all now know that there’s someone Liam Croft loves.”
“That was for my brother and all my fans,” I said, thinking fast. “I love them all. Their encouragement is the reason I scored that goal.”
Brian shrugged. “Not a bad excuse, we’ll probably use that when people ask. But you and I both know it’s bullshit. You were addressing that reporter.”
I met Brian’s gaze—the time had come. “Okay, hypothetically, let’s say that you’re right, and I was. What about it? What would happen?”
“No.”
“No? No what?”
“No,” Brian repeated. “Liam Croft does not have a girlfriend. He does not have someone to whom he mouths sweet nothings. That’s not who Liam Croft is.”
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed,” I snapped, “but I’m Liam Croft! I know who I am.”
Brian dismissed this with a wave of his hand. “You’re just a Liam Croft. To the public there is only one Liam Croft, and that’s the one I damn well created. I’m not going to allow you to undo all my hard work for the sake of some silly girl. You need to go out tonight with your teammates, get drunk and sleep with someone you’ve never met before. Her story will be in the tabloids before the end of the week, and I’ll have you an advertising deal with a condom manufacturer within forty-eight hours.”
I started to walk again. “This is all fucking bullshit.”
Brian’s face was like steel. “You know what I’ll do if you go up there! I’ll make the call, and her career in the journalism world will be toast!”
I stopped, torn once again. I knew what Allison’s career meant to her, and I couldn’t be the one who ruined it.
“All right,” I finally said. “Make your damn phone call. End an innocent woman’s career. But if you do, then I’ll quit the whole fucking sport tomorrow and start writing my ‘tell-all’ book about the way you operate. Never mind keeping hold of your clients…by the time I’m finished, you’ll be lucky if you stay out of prison.”
To his credit, Brian’s fixed expression didn’t even flicker, but I’d known the man a while, and I knew when he was rattled. Finally, he spoke. “There are no winners in that scenario.”
“Then don’t force my hand.”
Brian nodded, and he had the good grace to look slightly ashamed. “I’ve been treating you like a child, haven’t I?”
“You’ve been treating me like a fucking product.”
He shrugged. “Same difference. Look, I’m sorry. I get carried away sometimes. But you know, everything I’ve done…I’ve done it all to make you a success, to make you rich. And with your hand on your hear
t, I think you’d admit that I had a hand in your victory today.”
I said nothing, but tacitly acknowledged the truth in this. Brian had given me the life I’d dreamed of as a child; had sold me to clubs as an untested youngster. I was the one who’d changed, not him—but that was what people did; they grew up.
And I’d definitely grown up now.
Brian sighed. “Let’s talk,” he said. “Not now—tempers are running high, we’ve both said some things—but tomorrow, when we’ve had a chance to think. We’ll renegotiate our contract. And if we can’t come to an amicable agreement about where your career and public image ought to be heading in the future, then I’ll quit.”
I raised my eyebrows in surprise. I would’ve thought that I’d have to pay Brian off if I wanted to be rid of him, but now the man was actually making me a very decent offer. Suddenly it seemed that the problems which had been worrying me were going to clear up of their own accord after all, and neither Allison nor I had to make the sacrifice. Who would’ve thought?
“One thing,” Brian added. “You’re going up to talk to Allison now?”
“Yeah,” I said, instantly suspicious.
“And then you’re planning on celebrating with her this evening?”
“Yeah.”
“Do me one last favor. Don’t,” said Brian. He held up a hand as he saw my face change. “Go see her now, have your moment—that’s fine, I won’t say a word to her boss. It’s up to her to let her company know. But don’t abandon your teammates for a girl. If I try, I can probably sell a Liam Croft who doesn’t sleep around, a Liam Croft who’s a one-woman man, but I can’t sell a man who ditched his friends on the night of their greatest success. It makes it look as if you don’t think they had anything to do with your winning. I can sell an arrogant bastard—as you know, that’s rather my specialty—but I can’t sell that kind of arrogant bastard. You understand?”
