The Price of Discretion #3
“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.
Her hand strokes my back with infinite tenderness, calming my racing heart.
“I know that perfectly well, Alicia…” she murmurs without breaking our contact. “But get this through your head: you’re not alone in this rough patch. Not anymore.”
At this very moment, sitting on the examination table, with my left knee burning beneath the ice and my entire professional future teetering like a house of cards before my eyes, I realize that missing the season terrifies me.
That losing my spot on the roster, my successful athletic career, my image…
All of that carries enormous weight in my life.
But losing what’s just beginning to blossom between Clara and me…
That truly terrifies me a thousand times more than hanging up my cleats for good.