Net, Balls & Nipples
Chapter twenty-seven
Declan
The ball kisses the pitch like it’s been waiting just for me.
I drop my shoulder the second it touches my boot, shielding it from the guy on my back. He’s taller, broader—too confident. I use that. Let him overcommit just a bit, then flick the ball inside my left and pivot hard.
Gone.
He lunges. Too late.
I hear their right-back barking orders, but the moment’s already mine. I don’t need to look to know I’ve got a runner peeling wide—Matteo, always dependable, dragging defenders with him like a net pulling open the ocean.
I fake the switch, let the ball roll a breath longer, then slide it into Kai’s feet instead—short, sharp, like we’re swapping secrets. He doesn’t even blink. Knows what I want before I say it. One-touch return.
Ball’s coming back.
Space’s closing.
But I see it—just a sliver between center-backs. That’s all I need.
I explode through the gap like it owes me something, dragging my cleats across the grass as if I’m carving a signature.
Their keeper sees me. Charges.
But I’ve already made the decision.
Inside of the boot. Calm. Low. Left corner.
The net ripples like it’s sighing for me.
I stumble—just for a second—because even when I clear my mind, Marlow slips in like smoke under a locked door.
So I do what Coach Saunders told me:
Breathe in.
Visualize.
Focus.
Net.
Ball.
Nipples. Shit!
Net.
Ball.
Now.
I also say a silent prayer that my wife is watching.
Then it happens. That half-second of nothing—pure silence before the sound rushes in.
The crowd erupts.
I jog back down the pitch, chest rising, lungs burning, but my mind?
Clear.
Every pass. Every step. Every fucking second of that play felt like breathing again.
“Goooooal!” echoes through the stadium, followed by a wave of laughter and chanting—“Fragilé! Fragilé!”
Some joker on the team told a reporter my last name was straight out of the movie A Christmas Story.
“Must be Italian,” the headline read. So now whenever I score, Fragilé is what they chant.
Idiots.
I wanted a cool American Nickname.
But I don’t care. Not right now.
Because in this moment, no one’s asking me to move on.
No one’s telling me to let her go.
I’m not being haunted or gutted or fucking left behind.
I’m being celebrated by people who actually want me.
The game ended in a draw. More than I could’ve asked for, considering how off I’ve been, but I try not to let it get to me.
I showed up. I scored. I breathed.
“Declan,” a reporter calls from the sidelines, Shaun Kennedy, a leech with a press badge. “You seemed to struggle a bit on the field today. What happened?”
I clench my jaw. Smile like I don’t want to throw the mic across the field.
“I scored a goal. Does that look like I was struggling to you?”
Coach Jones steps in, running interference before I say something that’ll end up splashed across every sports headline from here to Madrid.
“I think what Declan is saying,” he begins, tone careful, diplomatic, “is that we all have rough days. But even on his rough day, he was still able to perform.”
I let the words hang in the air, jaw clenched, resisting the urge to fire back at the smug press line.
He’s not wrong—I’ve been off for weeks. First touch like a brick, passes mistimed, like my body forgot how to follow my instincts.
Today is the second match in a row where I looked like a shadow of myself the moment I crossed the white line.
I’ve stopped with the stunts with Marlow. The petty games. Tried to be a grown man about it and show her I want her heart. But she’s locked me out completely. Won’t respond to texts. Won’t pick up my calls. Forces everything through the lawyers like I’m some pest she’s trying to be rid of.
And I’m tired.
If I hadn’t signed a contract, I’d have packed up and flown back to Italy weeks ago. But I’m also competitive to my core, and giving up has never been my thing.
You heard the coach—even when I’m bleeding out, I still perform.
Maybe it’s the ache of missing her. Maybe it’s the high of hearing my name shouted by a crowd that still believes in me. But right now, I make a decision. The next time I see Marlow, I’m going to remind her exactly why she said yes to me.
Why she couldn’t stop whispering that it felt right.
And why she was never supposed to leave.
Right after I get rid of this fucking reporter, that is.
“Right,” the reporter nods, smelling blood. “So again, Declan, what’s going on with you out there that you have to perform through such hard times?”
Fucking hell, Shaun. The guy’s a bloodhound for cracks in the armor. And today, I happen to be bleeding.
Shaun Kennedy has been on my ass since the day I joined the Strikers. Always digging, always needling, throwing out loaded questions like he’s got some personal vendetta I can’t quite figure out. He circles like he’s waiting for the perfect moment to pounce.
“Is it all suddenly too much pressure for you?” he asks.
My gaze snaps to him, jaw tight, the heat in my chest flaring. “No, Shaun.”
My voice is low. Controlled, but he has no idea that it’s moments before something breaks.
He doesn’t flinch. Just presses on, that smirk of his practically begging for a headline. “So, perhaps you’re homesick, then? Missing family?”
He thinks he’s clever. Thinks he’s circling in for the kill.
I turn slowly, locking eyes with the camera, letting the silence stretch, letting the tension coil tighter with every second. The world around me blurs. It’s just me and the lens now. Just me and her, wherever she is.
I take a breath. “Yes, Shaun. That’s it. Missing my family.”
His eyebrows lift, surprised he’s gotten something out of me. “Back in Italy, you mean? Your family or your teammates?”
But I don’t look at him.
I don’t look at anything but the camera when I say, deliberate and steady, “I’m missing my wife.”
Let her hear it. Let her see it. Let her feel it in her bones.
I’m not moving on. I’m not forgetting.
And this—me off my game, pissed off at the world, lost in a storm of ink and anger—this is what happens when you leave a man who was never going to let you go.
So she can run. Pretend like Vegas never happened. Pretend like we didn’t burn the world down that night and call it love.
But I remember. And I won’t be right—this team won’t be right—until my wife comes back to me.