Chapter 19
Zoe
The Championship Final in our stadium is pure madness. This year the league picks Seattle as the final site, and for the first time, we play the biggest game at home.
Our people wait for us. Green banners ripple in every section, scarves held high, chants so loud I feel the concrete tremble under my cleats.
I walk toward midfield with my heart hammering so hard I feel it in my temples, my wrists, my skin. Like my body is a drum and the crowd keeps striking it.
Starter.
Hades told me yesterday after practice. No drama. No speech. Just her usual knife-clean delivery. “You start tomorrow. Prove me right.” Then she walks off like she hasn’t just lit a fuse in my chest.
To my left, Jade rolls her hips and stretches.
We’re running the same setup we used in the second half in Portland.
All week she has avoided my eyes longer than necessary.
She hates playing as the attacking mid, even if she has to admit she crushes it.
It isn’t hostility, not quite, but I taste the resentment in the air.
She has played my spot all season, and we both know that after today, one of us might not be here anymore.
To my right, Lucía mutters something that could be a prayer or a curse. It’s probably both.
Iris bounces in front of us like she stores too much electricity for one body. Her ponytail whips her back.
“We’re going to win this shit!” she shouts.
Today Tessa stays up in the stands with Wesley. We dress him in a custom club jersey, even bring noise-dampening headphones, though he’ll care more about chewing the new teddy bear Iris gave him last week.
The first twenty minutes are hell.
They’re the surprise team of the season, with a striker who scored twenty goals this year, tied with Iris at the top of the league. And they come at us like they want to finish it before halftime. High press. Mean. Suffocating. Every time we touch the ball, two blue shirts crash in.
I try to connect with Jade in midfield, but there’s no space. Every pass is a fistfight. Every first touch is a gamble.
Minute twelve. Their right winger burns Jamie for speed, drives a low cross into the box, and their striker slips between Lucía and our center back.
She hits it hard. Our keeper stretches. Fingertips skim the ball.
Not enough.
The stands go quiet.
0–1.
Their striker sprints to the corner, slides on her knees, kisses the crest. Her teammates bury her in a long celebration.
“There’s plenty of time,” I tell our team, hands up, calm down, breathe.
The rest of the first half is survival.
Hades shouts from the sideline. We drop back, close gaps, try not to let them cut us again. They keep the ball, but they can’t build another clear chance.
Neither can we.
Iris throws her arms at the bench, at us, at the sky. But we can’t find her with their pressure choking every lane.
Minute forty-one. I win a ball in the center circle. I lift my head. I see Jade break to the right.
My pass comes clean. Thirty yards. Jade cushions it off her chest, turns, searches for Iris.
But Iris is marked by two defenders. No gap.
Jade hesitates. One second. Two.
She loses it.
They counter. Lucía heads it out for a corner.
Nothing comes from it, and we head into halftime down 0–1.
**
In the locker room, Hades doesn’t yell.
It’s worse.
She stands in front of us with her arms crossed, staring each of us down like she can read every thought, every doubt, every fear.
“Forty-five minutes,” she says at last. “Forty-five minutes for everything you worked for this year. To prove you deserve to be here.”
Silence.
“Méndez. Herrera.”
Jade and I lift our heads.
“You’re not connecting. You’re playing next to each other, not with each other. Not as a team.” She lets the pause stretch until it hurts. “Fix it.”
She doesn’t tell us how. No specific instructions. Just that look that says, you’re pros, I know there’s rivalry, solve your own mess.
Jade and I trade a glance.
“More triangles,” I say under my breath. “Short one-twos. No hero balls if it’s not there.”
“And we press together when we lose it,” Jade says. “Both of us at once. Not one waiting for the other.”
I nod.
**
The second half starts different.
I look for Jade. She looks for me. Quick give-and-goes, matched runs that scramble their midfield. For the first time all game, we keep the ball.
Minute fifty-three. I win a ball in the middle. I play it to Jade. She pops it back first touch. I carry it three steps. I feed her again. She finds Jamie overlapping on the wing.
Jamie whips a cross into the box.
Iris rises between two defenders. Header.
Their keeper punches it away. The ball drops to Jade at the top of the area and she hits it from distance.
Wide. Inches.
The stadium releases a sound that’s frustration and hope fused into one roar.
Minute seventy-seven, they start to sit back and protect the lead. They build a blue wall between us and the goal.
Jade gets it in the center. She scans. No clean option.
I drift into space, pulling one of their players with me, and a lane opens.
“Jade!”
The ball comes perfect. I take it with the inside of my foot. A defender steps in. I beat her with a sharp move, like I never missed a whole season.
I hit the edge of the box, lungs burning, no shooting angle.
But I see Iris.
The pass has to be perfect. Too hard and it runs out. Too soft and it gets picked off.
I strike with the inside of my foot, low and fast, through a defender’s legs.
Iris appears.
One touch.
Just one.
And the ball slams the net.
The stadium detonates.
Iris charges me and lifts me off the ground, crushing me in a hug that nearly snaps my ribs.
“Like the old days!” she yells into my ear. “Hell, you’re not that rusty after all.”
1–1.
Thirteen minutes to win a championship or we go to extra time.
The game turns into a war.
They respond, press again, hunt for the goal that puts them back ahead. Minute ninety-five, they blast one from outside the box and our keeper tips it out for a corner. A minute later, a header smashes the post.
We counter when we can. Less and less. Tired legs. Heavy air.
In stoppage time my legs weigh like lead. Cramps start to bite. Jade grabs at her calf. Even Lucía, who plays like a tank, starts to slow.
I jump for a ball, my head cracks against an opponent’s. I hit the turf. Stars burst behind my eyes, but there’s no time to stop.
Final whistle.
1–1.
Extra time.
**
The extra thirty minutes are torture.
My legs don’t answer the way they should. Every sprint is pure will. Jade looks about the same. Lucía limps a little from minute one hundred, but she refuses to come off.
They’re exhausted too. Their focus slips, their touches get loose. The match turns into a trade of mistakes, turnovers, half-chances nobody has the gas to finish.
Second period of extra time. Their striker breaks free. Our keeper charges out. They collide. They hit the ground. The ball rolls toward the goal line, slow but sure.
Jamie gets there by a hair and clears it.
Next play, Iris gets in alone on the keeper. She shoots.
Post.
“Fucking post, Jesus!” she screams as she drops to her knees, hands on her head, and the whole stadium groans one long, aching sound.
Two more minutes and it’s PKs.
Nobody wants PKs. They’re a lottery.
Last minute, we win a corner.
Lucía grabs the ball. Sets it in the corner arc. Her hands shake a little, but her face goes pure focus.
She raises her arm. The signal.
The stadium holds its breath. I hear my own heartbeat thud in my ears.
The cross comes with curl, bending toward the near post. Their keeper punches it away but doesn’t catch it. The ball pops up and drops toward the top of the box.
Toward me.
I bring it down off my chest. A defender lunges. I slip past on instinct alone.
I lift my head and I see her.
Jade ghosts to the back post. There’s a window. Small. Closing.
I don’t think. I just hit it.
Jade doesn’t trap it. Doesn’t settle it. No time.
She jumps and volleys it, her laces cracking the ball out of the air, and it rockets while she watches from the grass.
Time doesn’t slow down. I swear it stops, because every split second burns into my memory with brutal clarity.
The ball skims the keeper’s gloves.
Hits net.
Goal.
And the world blows apart.
Jade drops to her knees, hands over her face, crying from joy. Iris sprints at her, yelling something that makes no sense. The rest of the team floods in.
“Good ball,” I read on Jade’s lips.
“Great finish,” I mouth back.
Final whistle.
End of match.
Champions.
I don’t know who screams first.
Maybe me. Maybe Iris. Maybe the twenty-five thousand people filling the stadium in one single sound.
I run toward the stands. Section 112. Row 8.
There she is.
Standing, wiping tears, Wesley on her hip.
A security guard says something, but I don’t hear him. I just run.
I take the steps two at a time, fans shouting congratulations, hands reaching out, the air sharp with sweat and spilled beer and something sweet I can’t name.
I cradle her face in my hands and kiss her.
Wes stretches his hands out, demanding attention, and we both kiss his head at the same time.
“Champions,” I breathe, and Tessa wipes my tears with her thumb.
“Champions,” she repeats, then presses a kiss to my forehead.
Wesley complains between us, thumping my shoulder with his toy. I laugh. I cry. Both at once.
I lift him into my arms and hold him to my chest, and he pinches my nose with sticky fingers. The crowd keeps screaming. Down on the field I see my team celebrating.
And everything is perfect.
Absolutely perfect.