Only a Sweet Dream (3)
Life never hands you what you need right on time.
Only when the studs of an opponent’s boot slammed diagonally into my shin guard did my focus finally surge to its razor-sharp limit.
I deliberately let my center of gravity collapse. Trying to brace against the force would have only invited a catastrophic injury. As his knee clipped the outer edge of my thigh, sweeping my lower body toward the left, my upper torso naturally tilted in the opposite direction.
A second impact followed almost immediately as my elbow drove down into his body. The player who had lunged into the sliding tackle had slid directly beneath me from sheer momentum. Since his torso absorbed the brunt of my forearm, my sole concern was keeping my pelvis from striking the turf first. Landing on the meat of my glutes was the safest bet.
Thud—
The instant I landed, I immediately ran a damage assessment. Upper body—shoulder joints and elbow were intact. A dull ache throbbed along my right ribs, but after a collision that violent, that was hardly surprising.
Now came the lower half.
The moment I looked down toward my leg, Pedri rushed up beside me and let slip an uncharacteristically vicious Spanish curse. Blood was seeping thick through the weave of my sock.
Well.
Still, it wasn't as bad as what my imagination had conjured. My mind had briefly flickered to a horrifying image—a joint bent backward into some grotesque, broken symmetry. Judging by the intensity of the pain and the outward appearance, it looked like nothing more than a severe laceration.
Just to be certain, I needed to check the bone. With cautious fingers, I reached down to peel back the bloody sock—
“Kim! Don’t touch it!”
“...”
“Let me examine it. Keep the leg still and just lean your torso back.”
Before I even realized he had arrived, Dr. Bolaños, our team physician, slapped my hands away. With a pair of medical shears, he began snipping briskly through the fabric. A low, grim grunt escaped his lips the moment he took in the sight of my mangled shin guard.
Furious shouts and curses erupted all around us. Yellow and blue shirts swarmed in an angry, shoving mob, but my entire attention remained riveted to Bolaños’s mouth. Silently, he finished disinfecting and staunching the wound, then carefully palpated my knee joint and the muscles along my shin.
By the time the referee flashed a red card at Le Normand for the reckless challenge from behind, Bolaños finally broke his silence.
“Rate the pain for me. Zero is nothing, ten is unbearable.”
“...Around a one. Can’t say for certain.”
I answered with a heavy dose of wishful thinking. Without a word, the physician pointed toward the stretcher—a clear message that the rest of his evaluation would happen off the pitch.
A moment later, once the stretcher was set down beyond the touchline, Bolaños put me through a battery of quick biomechanical checks. Wiggling my toes, flexing and extending the knee. I held my breath, waiting for the verdict.
“Joints and muscle tissue seem intact. You got lucky.” He flashed an ‘OK’ signal toward the dugout. “Even so, the second you feel any sharp pain, you have to tell me immediat—”
Suddenly, all sound cut out cleanly.
A prickle of unease made me stare at Bolaños. His lips were still moving, forming words I could no longer hear. Giving an imperceptible nod, I bought myself time to think as I strapped on a fresh guard and pulled on a clean sock.
Ah.
That familiar silence. That steady, monotonous hum.
The high-pitched tinnitus nesting deep inside my ear canals scolded me with comfortable familiarity—chiding me that barely any time remained on the clock, that my body was in absolute shambles. A strange wave of satisfaction and hollow exhaustion surged within me all at once. Only when shoved into the most sickening, wretched corners did I ever truly ready myself to shine.
It was the absolute worst... yet not entirely terrible, either. Right on that fine edge.
I stepped back onto the pitch in the fortieth minute of the second half. Las Palmas had been awarded a goal kick, giving the referee the window to wave me back into the fray.
While Aythami circulated the ball along our backline, an overwhelming flood of sensory information rushed into my head. The gouged patches of turf, the ragged gasps of exhausted lungs, the faint, acrid stench of sweat. The exact coordinates of every Real Sociedad and Las Palmas player registered with crystalline clarity.
Finally, I felt back where I belonged.
With both Mantovani and Le Normand sent off, it was ten against ten. Las Palmas pushed their defensive line high, switching to an aggressive, all-out attacking shape. Operating in the hole, I peeled between the opponent's midfield lines to carve out open space.
Their defensive midfielder stuck tight to my back, but the split second my eyes locked with Íñigo's, I feinted and cut sharply to the right. That sudden burst of directional change bought me half a beat of separation.
Sprinting toward my calculated destination, I had intentionally placed an opposing midfielder between Íñigo and myself. He would either switch play to the opposite flank... or chip it over the top.
Good.
The ball cut through the air, sailing toward my chest. Riding the momentum of the pass, I wheeled toward the goal and accelerated into the open pocket. Cushioning the dipping delivery on the instep of my left foot, I killed its bounce dead. Harnessing my razor-sharp focus, I surveyed the landscape the exact instant I made contact.
Only three teammates were up in support.
On the right wing was the unfamiliar new signing; on the left was Pedri. Trailing up through the center was Íñigo. By contrast, Real Sociedad had five defenders marshaling their defensive third alone. Assuming our new winger dragged their fullback wide, that still left four men to beat.
The deafening ringing blocking out my ears drew up the blueprint for me. I needed a bit of magic—something audacious enough to bait the defense into a fatal miscalculation.
Suddenly, their defensive midfielder lunged in from my left. Careless of his angles, his desperate body language screamed an intent to grab my jersey and drag me down at all costs. I ratcheted up my dribble, slipping away by a hair's breadth. He hounded my heels, trailing less than two paces behind.
Left foot, then right foot again.
Two rapid touches pushed the ball two and a half paces out in front—an open invitation tossed directly at the center-back. If he stepped up, I would use his own momentum against him; if he retreated, I would use the cushion to accelerate. Simple and clean.
Even as the gap narrowed to a stride and a half, the center-back showed no signs of committing. I shortened my breathing rhythm. Hoo— my lungs expanded violently in ragged bursts.
The die was cast; I had to slip past before the left center-back closed the trap. Yet almost immediately, I spotted the hitch.
I hadn't accounted for how heavy my body felt.
Lacking the explosive burst I expected, no matter how many times I recalculated the angles, the window of time was too narrow. It was time to adjust the plan.
Maintaining my dribbling line, I mapped out the ensuing chain of events. Shrouded in complete silence, a fresh idea took shape instantly. Gluing the ball to my instep, I nudged it smoothly toward the right corner of the penalty box. I repeatedly lifted my chin, darting glances around as if searching for an outlet.
Dropping a gear on top of that... and the defenders' eyes flared, locking onto me.
In an instant, the center-back ahead, the holding midfielder behind, and the left-back closing in converged, collapsing the space. Three men swarming at once. I erased the markers behind and to the flanks from my mind. The center-back charging from the front was the sole key to solving this equation.
Faking a glance toward the right winger's run, I dropped my eyes to the ball, baiting the center-back into stabbing out his left leg to cut off the passing lane. Snapping the ball back with my right foot, I pivoted my torso inward toward the box.
Immediately off balance, the defender lunged forward, hands out to haul me down. I slipped a toe under the ball, nutmegging him clean through the gap, and threw my right shoulder into him to absorb his mass. The sheer disparity in physical frame made taking even a single stride an excruciating ordeal, but if I could just endure two paces, victory was mine.
The white chalk marking the edge of the penalty box.
Even as my balance crumbled halfway, I firmly established possession inside the area. Realizing a foul here meant a penalty, the defender abruptly released his grip. Bracing a palm against the turf, I salvaged just enough equilibrium from my stumbling frame. My mind was already locked onto the shooting motion.
Unstable posture or not, I had to pull the trigger before the opposite center-back arrived.
A space warped into slow motion, the ball hovering as if paused in midair. I collapsed my upper body toward the outside left, ensuring maximum weight transfer through the strike. Both the goalkeeper and I knew precisely where it was headed: the far right corner. A demanding finish requiring absolute precision and sheer power in equal measure.
The instant my foot struck leather, my balance gave out entirely. Crashing toward the turf, my eyes tracked the arc of the ball until the bitter end. Drifting wide of the woodwork, the ball caught a wicked curl, dipping smoothly inside the far post.
Hold on. Just let me rest for a second, then we go again.
A gnawing numbness hollowed out my mind; the joy of scoring failed to register. Eighty-seventh minute. Three to one. We still needed two more goals just to pull level.
Real Sociedad's wide midfielder booted the ball into touch. Several players collapsed flat onto the grass. The reality struck me: the final whistle had blown.
Three to two.
Despite tearing around the pitch like a madman in the dying minutes, I hadn't been able to prevent our defeat. Our Copa del Rey journey hadn't ended, but it was an undeniable fact: this was my first defeat since joining the Las Palmas first team.
What if I had steadied myself just a little earlier? What if I hadn't been shaken so easily?
While both sides traded customary handshakes, the ambient stadium noise steadily swelled.
“The white and blue! The ones in white and blue—!”
“Donostia! Victorious Donostia—!!”
Color crept back into my drained, colorless world as the mocking ringing in my ears faded, losing its edge. What right did my scraped right leg have to whine and sting now? The sickening, disgraceful way I had conducted myself today made the mere beating of my heart feel repulsive.
I had become the very kind of person I despised. Blinded to what truly mattered, overturning the dinner table over pathetic, petty worries. Football... of all things, football was never supposed to be treated like this.
“What's with that look on your face?”
“...”
“You bagged two goals. As an attacker, you did everything asked of you.”
“...”
“Come on, say something. What, you don't even talk to guys who didn't score? Haha.”
Castro's gruff consolation couldn't reach me. In the face of defeat, the process meant nothing.
“Couldn't you crack a smile, if only for Mantovani's sake? Guy looks ready to hang himself.”
“...”
“Tsk, fine. Let's go hit the showers. You're bleeding, right? Need to get that disinfected again.”
Pushed forward by a hand on my back, I trudged toward the tunnel.
“Excuse me...”
“Sorry, catch you next time.”
Castro stepped in to ward off the Real Sociedad players trying to approach. Not that I would have heard a single word they said anyway. A victor's words carry gracious composure; a loser's words are mere excuses. At least, that was the way I'd been taught.
“I'm sorry, everyone. That was completely on me.”
While my wound was being disinfected once more inside the locker room, a gravelly voice broke out in apology. Even without looking up, the cadence alone gave him away. Mantovani.
“We were all a mess out there, honestly.”
“Pepe's going to tear into us, no doubt.”
“First in line for the gallows is Curbelo, surely.”
“Haha.”
Led by Aythami, the veterans worked to lift the dressing room's spirits. One by one, they traded self-deprecating quips, tossing out their own blunders to lighten the mood—until, at some point, every eye in the room landed on me.
“Guess it's too much to ask from him, huh?”
“Hey, he scored a brace.”
“Ah.”
I turned Castro's earlier words over in my head. Unwilling as I was, I owed a debt to Mantovani as well. In that interview, he'd defended me, saying my style was like an owl's talons.
“I've got one too.”
“...Got what?”
“I wasn't focused properly. If I'd put two more away, we would've won.”
Worst. Just the absolute worst.