CHAPTER EIGHT #2
I feel that more than I should.
Coach Miller claps his hands. “Right. Tour. We have the main field, the practice net, the snack bar, the equipment shed, which is not structurally impressive but has character, and the banner, which is art according to Tyler.”
“It has movement,” I say.
Sienna looks toward the banner. “Downhill?”
Coach Miller points at her. “She gets it.”
The tour lasts twelve minutes and somehow travels through every year of my life.
Coach Miller shows Sienna the cracked bench where I used to sit after practice. He points out the old scoreboard with one burned-out bulb. He tells her the clubhouse roof leaks only when rain falls from the east, which feels like an engineering failure disguised as weather science.
Sienna listens.
Not with the reporter lean I know.
Not the one that says she’s waiting for a phrase to clip.
She listens with both hands wrapped around her notebook, pen resting still against the page until someone says something she can’t afford to lose. Then she writes quickly and looks up again before the moment disappears.
Coach Miller notices.
“Darius used to stay late,” he says, leading us toward the equipment shed. “Always collecting cones. Lining up balls. Making sure the younger kids had rides.”
“Coach,” I say.
“What?”
“You’re making me sound deeply boring.”
“You were deeply useful.” He opens the shed door, which squeals like it’s been waiting all day to complain. “Different thing.”
Sienna’s pen moves.
I hear it.
The small scratch across paper.
“Younger kids listened to him,” Coach Miller continues. “Not because he bossed them around. Because he noticed things. Like, who was standing alone. Who hadn’t touched the ball. Who was pretending not to cry because someone picked teams badly.”
A hot, uncomfortable flush creeps up the back of my neck.
I reach into the shed and grab a crate of old balls that doesn’t need moving.
Coach Miller looks at the crate. “Those are flat.”
“They’re in the way.”
“They’ve been in the way since 2018.”
“Then this is overdue.”
Sienna says nothing.
That is worse.
I carry the crate to the edge of the shed and set it down with more care than flat balls deserve.
From the field, a kid calls, “Darius, penalty shots!”
“No.”
The entire under-twelve group boos.
Very loudly.
Nathan appears in the middle of them like he’s been summoned by chaos. He holds up a pair of old cleats.
“Found these in the bin.”
I stare. “Absolutely not.”
“They’re your size.”
“They are older than Mateo.”
“They are vintage.”
“They are a public health concern.”
A girl with purple laces folds her arms. “You scared?”
The field goes silent.
Nathan’s grin turns wicked.
Coach Miller whispers, “Effective.”
I look at Sienna.
Her camera is still down.
Her eyes are not.
She’s watching the kids, not me. Watching the way they lean forward, waiting. Watching the old field turn a professional captain into someone they can dare.
This is the part of Briarwood I forgot to protect myself from.
The part that still knows where the soft spots are.
I take the cleats from Nathan. “One shot.”
The kids erupt.
“One each,” Tyler says.
“No.”
“You said one shot.”
“One total.”
“That’s not how grammar works.”
Nathan points at him. “Strong argument.”
Morgan would shut this down in seven seconds. Unfortunately, Morgan is not here. She’s at the facility making Colton do recovery work and probably sensing a disturbance in medical compliance from twenty miles away.
I sit on the bench and change into the old cleats.
They fit.
The leather is stiff, the laces frayed. When I stand, the right sole creaks.
Nathan hears it and winces. “Vintage.”
“Public health concern,” I say.
Sienna’s camera operator lifts the camera.
Sienna glances at me.
A question.
I nod once.
The camera rolls.
Not close.
Not intrusive.
Wide enough for the kids. The banner. The leaning goal. The crooked clubhouse and the late sun across the field.
A boy named Eli takes the first penalty against me because apparently the rules changed when I blinked. He is nine, all elbows and confidence, with socks pulled to different heights.
“You ready?” he asks.
“No.”
He grins and shoots before anyone blows a whistle.
The ball rolls left.
Slowly.
I step and stop it with the inside of my foot.
The kids groan.
Eli points at me. “You’re supposed to let me score.”
“That is bad development.”
“That is bad manners,” Nathan calls.
The next shot comes from the girl with purple laces. She waits for Coach Miller’s whistle, eyes narrowed, shoulders squared like she is taking a Global Cup penalty. Her shot is better. Low right. I move lightly, block it, and pass it back.
She glares.
“Again,” she says.
“That was your one.”
“I’m not done improving.”
Coach Miller puts a hand over his heart. “I have never been prouder.”
The next ten minutes dissolve into dust, laughter, and arguments about whether professional players should be allowed to save shots from children.
I do not move hard. I don’t need to. Mostly, I pass the ball back, correct a plant foot, tell Tyler to stop announcing where he plans to shoot before he shoots, and let the smallest kids score because player development has room for mercy.
Sienna keeps her distance.
The camera catches the field more than my face.
I notice.
I try not to.
Then the little girl from earlier runs after a ball that rolls toward the sideline. I jog two steps, scoop it before it hits the gravel, and bend to hand it back.
My knee catches.
A small pull.
Barely there.
But there.
I straighten smoothly.
Too smoothly.
Sienna sees it.
Her gaze drops.
Then, without looking dramatic about it, she touches Scott’s elbow and angles two fingers toward the kids celebrating near the net.
The camera moves away from me.
Toward them.
A pulse of something warm and irritating opens under my ribs.
Trust, maybe.
No.
Not yet.
Something that looks like it from far enough away.
I hand the ball to the girl.
She looks up. “You okay?”
“Yes.”
Her eyes narrow.
Briarwood children are terrifying.
“Fine,” I add.
Somewhere, Morgan probably senses the banned word and adds ten minutes to my recovery plan.
The girl accepts the ball and runs back to the group.
I look at Sienna.
She’s not writing.
Not filming me.
Not smiling like she has earned something.
She’s watching Tyler explain his penalty strategy to Scott using a stick in the dust, as if this is the real story.
Maybe it is.
Nathan appears beside me with two folding chairs under one arm and his phone in the other. He is looking at the screen like it bit him.
“What?” I ask.
“Nothing.”
Nobody says nothing like that unless it is very much something.
He turns the phone over.
Too late.
I see the name on the screen before it disappears.
Emily.
His jaw sets.
Not angry.
Not happy either.
The look cuts across his face and vanishes so fast most people would miss it.
Sienna does not.
She is twenty feet away, helping Coach Miller shift a tablecloth across the snack table. Her eyes flick once to Nathan’s phone.
Then away.
No question.
No note.
No reporter face.
Nathan shoves the phone into his pocket. “Chair emergency.”
“There is no chair emergency.”
“There will be if these chairs don’t get moved.”
He heads toward the far sideline.
I watch him go.
Emily.
There’s a story there.
An old one, judging by his shoulders.
Not mine to touch tonight.
I look back at Sienna.
She is laughing at something Coach Miller says, one hand pressed on the tablecloth to keep it from blowing away. The late sun catches the loose strands of hair near her cheek. Dust marks the toes of her sensible flat shoes.
She looks less like a threat here.
That’s probably the most dangerous thing about her.
The crowd thickens as the afternoon leans toward evening.
Parents set out lemonade. Someone starts testing the projector against a wrinkled sheet tied to the clubhouse wall.
The Kings logo appears crooked and faint in the daylight, then disappears when a kid runs between the projector and the sheet with both arms out like a plane.
Sienna finally lifts her microphone for Coach Miller.
I stand close enough to intervene if needed.
Too close, maybe.