Suddenly

Suddenly Chapter 7

Chapter Seven

The Final

Sleep seemed to escape me the night before, my tummy was in knots, the excitement and fear of the final was getting to me and the possibility of telling Karol that I cared about her kept me tossing all night. I had never won a soccer competition before, I had come close in a few finals with teams in the past but unfortunately we hadn't gone on to win first prize. The opposition wasn't as strong as most of the other teams we had beaten already yet they had found themselves worthy of sharing the final match with us.

I had a mental scale on which I weighed everything, the game on one hand and Karol on the other and I wasn't sure which was scarier. I put on my kit and warmed up with the team, Miller was always optimistic and chirpy, Meehan was cool and calm, I tried to put up a brave front as well. The national anthem was sung and the whistle went off for the game to begin. The school population circled the football pitch and the noise was deafening.

I waited for the ball to touch my feet. I knew after that first touch my nervousness would be lost in the noise of the crowd. The rush of the game peaked and I was at my best, I pulled away from the midfield to meet a long ball, I controlled it gracefully, ran forward and smashed it on the bottom right corner. The Candy Boys were 1 – 0 ahead after a few minutes, I ran back to my class to celebrate, I bowed down at the front of the crowd and serenaded them.

The other team had a few close chances but it wasn't anything that Meehan, Len and Eric couldn't mop up. The first half had ended and we were still comfortably in the lead. In my head I was thinking about the end of the game, the aftermath, and about my conversation with Karol. The referee controlled my future with his stopwatch, when that final whistle goes I'd have to cough up my feelings for Karol. I wondered what she would say, I wasn't her usual type. I was rough around the edges and nothing special. During the game I kept thinking of her, glancing to her every few minutes kept me calm.

The whistle went for the second half, in minutes I received the ball just outside the eighteen yard box and I flat hit it with my right foot into the top right corner, 2 – 0. We were cruising, the game felt easier and it looked like another win in the bag. Things got worse for the other team when I beat their keeper and kicked the ball around him onto the right side upright and into the net for 3 – 0.

I looked at her standing on the touchline and she smiled back at me, it was the prettiest smile I had seen in a while. Quickly my mind fast forward a few days ahead and I pictured sitting with her in class, this warm sensation filled my chest cavity. I vividly remember standing next to her on the first day of school, the room was at capacity with all the grade eight students, we had not been allocated our classes at that point yet we had shared a few stares at each other. I was super chuffed when we were finally put into the same class.

Suddenly Meehan screams as he falls to the turf after a fifty-fifty tackle. He was in bad shape. I had not seen Meehan like this before. This was a reputable gangster of the school, a force to be reckoned with, and here he was in tears, hobbling on one foot as he tried to balance himself. Meehan was determined to play. He stood on one foot and insisted that he was not going off the field. Thinking back I should have stepped in and played in his position. That would have probably been the best option for us.

The other team played to our weakness and within a matter of minutes they had scored three goals which rolled pass Meehan. There was nothing we could do but just watch as the ball went in agonizingly, they were passing the ball into our net from far distances and it was sure to go in three times. Extra time had started and I had run out of steam and frankly I felt hopelessly weak. My worst nightmares were all coming true. I was a first hand witness to the crumbling of the mighty Candy Boys.

The final whistle had gone, it was over, the scores were tied at 3 – 3 and that meant that a penalty shootout would decide our fate. Miller was up first, and he pile drove the ball in with guile, I went up second and I hit my penalty low and hard, it clipped the left upright and went in. The other team had scored their three penalties and it was up to Eric to level the scores.

Eric was our best player. He had been our rock all through the three months that we had not been defeated. He ran up to the ball and kicked it to the right, the clanging sound of the upright still resonates in my head to this very day, it wasn't meant to be, Eric had kicked the ball onto the goal post and out. I hugged him and assured him that it was okay but the feeling of losing didn't feel okay at all.

The other team celebrated jubilantly. Their class ran onto the field and hugged each other. We walked away with slumped shoulders and dragging feet. I watched the tears stream down Mickayla's face and I felt this emptiness of failure, I had failed them, I didn't have what it took to win for them. The mood was ruined. My big plans of finally confronting Karol had disappeared. Why would she ever want to speak to a loser like me?

The loss had pierced me deep, deeper than I had thought it would, it meant and represented so much to me. I had scored 13 goals in 9 games yet I missed my shot with her. Karol had moved on within a few days, the head prefect had swept her off her feet, he was taller and much better looking than I, I wasn't a contender. I was second place. I often reflect back to that moment of the final and wonder to myself, would things have turned out differently if we had won that game?

It was enchantingly difficult watching her spend her breaks with him. They'd laugh and stand around. My guy friends and I would sit on the benches on the circumference of the play area and watch them together. I was turning green with envy, to mask my emotions I'd pretend to do the dialog for them almost as it was a scene from a rom-com. She didn't acknowledge my existence thereafter, I had squandered my chance. Perhaps I was always going to play the part of the underdog.