Dragons Games Chap 10-3

2729 words. 

Yet perhaps it did, the ball saying goodbye to physics at the last moment, jutting through the air at a rough angle and sailing straight through the posts, Jim matching the crowd’s enthusiasm as he pumped his fists, making sure he pointed and laughed at Erich when he could.

With the lead cemented, the Mythics played on, their morale high, and the halftime siren wailed without the Spartans gaining another point. The teams filed back to their respective changerooms, their bodies so hot and the air so cold their sweat was evaporating into mist, making it look like they were steaming. The spectators shuffled off to get snacks and drinks from the canteen nearby, taking advantage of the momentary lapse to fill their stomachs.

Jim stood in the threshold of the changeroom exit, consuming orange after orange as he scanned the crowds, his heart beating hard and fast from the prior exertion, and something else as well.

“You seen Cassidy, dude?” he asked when Isaac followed him out, the two still fighting for breath as they ate. “Or any of the other drama club?”

“Nah, she’s and them have that play thing, remember?” Isaac replied, spitting out seeds as he ate.

“Duh! Of course I remember, just… *sigh* She said she’d come down around this time, and I’ve been looking for her all match.”

“Girls say a lot of shit, dude,” his friend said. “Besides, she’s got her thing, and we got ours. Nice setup back there by the way, I think the sponsors would say the same thing.”

“One kick isn’t going to get me a scholarship,” Jim noted.

“Just keep it up and don’t let Littledick Erich get all the attention.” They were quiet for a second as they watched the crowds idle about, chuckling when an angry fan from the Spartans got into a bout with a Mythic supporter. “Look at them all,” Isaac continued. “we’re gonna be big after today. Huge, even. No more tests or exams or any Mr. Bahril. I’m gonna miss him.”

“Really?” Jim asked.

“Nah,” Isaac admitted. “It’s just something you say, you know? His scrunched-up mug’s gonna be a faded memory after tonight.”

“Hopefully. Just one mroe half to go,” Jim said, throwing the peel he was holding away. “Come on, eat your citrus and let’s head back.”

After filling their bellies with sports drinks and fruits, the electrolytes fuelling Jim with energy, he wiped his wet hair with a towel and fell in with his team, as ready for the second half as they’ll ever be. They were up in points for now, but that was just a small boost of confidence, not a definite victory, Mr. Bahril reminding them to not get cocky just yet.

Jim couldn’t help it, taking up his spot on the left wing with a big grin on his face, glancing over to see the sponsors on their lawn chairs nearby. Their critical eyes were judging each player, occasionally glancing up at the scoreboard as they wrote in their strange notebook. Were they looking for individual performance, or just overall scores? They had the best spot to watch Jim now, he’d make sure they would choose the former.

He could feel their eyes on him as the Mythics line shifted up the field, Jim coming so close he could make out the buttons on their expensive suits. Should he dial down his usual celebratory antics, or would they like the confidence of a show-off? He’d have to do something first either way, but that wouldn’t be a problem for Jim, best wingman this side of the country.

The game slowly stooped into a brawl of flinging arms and flailing legs, the players becoming desperate for a play as the minutes ticked by. The game was getting more violent with each meter lost or gained, penalties being dished out every few minutes, and each one awarded to the Spartans only made the Mythics more anxious, their opponents inching their way towards the try line tackle after tackle. As a wingman it wasn’t his job to hold the defence, he could only watch impotently as the team was pushed back.

“Keep them away guys!” he yelled in frustration. “Come on!”

Ten meters out and it was the last tackle for the Spartans. The Mythics shifted up the field until they were almost shoulder to shoulder, expecting one of the Spartans to try and force his way through as soon as the play continued. The Spartans did otherwise, passing the ball up the line, the Mythics spreading out to compensate. The ball was going further to the right side, Jim watching from a distance as he willed his teammates down there to succeed.

A Mythic came charging out to tackle the guy with the ball, but he punted it at the last second, Jim craning his neck to watch the ball fly. He drew an imaginary line in the air, judging it would come down right in the middle of the centre ranks. Thinking fast, he took off like a bullet, pushing past Erich and jumping for it.

The ball fell delightfully into his waiting arms, Jim smiling like a doofus at the solid catch. Before his feet even touched the ground, one of the Spartans tackled him through the air, Jim flipping so that his body was horizontal by the time he hit the ground.

Citrus-scented air exploded out of his lungs as he wheezed, his shoulder blades burning as he came down hard on the grass, the Spartan dropping all his weight on top of him. The back of his skull slammed down a second after, stars appearing in his vision as Jim’s head lolled about, his head feeling like it was made of mush.

The Spartan was pushed off him by a fellow Mythic, or maybe kicked off would have been more appropriate, Nate planting his boot in the Spartan’s ribs and calling him many things, none of them pleasant.

The grass was cold against his messy hair, and there was a painful throbbing sensation in his skull, Jim’s heart sinking. He wasn’t concussed again, was he? He shook his head to stop the world from spinning, and that helped a little, Jim blinking a few times as he noticed a medic coming over to support him.

“I’m fine, I’m fine!” he said when the man asked him how he was feeling. The world spun a little less when he kept still, so that’s what he did, Jim taking a knee as his teammates gathered around, some patting him on the back in encouragement.

“I hope that’s raspberry juice coming out of your mouth, dude,” Isaac asked him.

It definitely wasn’t juice, by the coppery taste Jim could feel on his tongue, but he swallowed his blood down with a shiver, licking the inside of his lip and wincing when it stung. He must have bit it on the way down, and one of his front teeth ached like a bitch, a moving sensation filling his gums when he opened his mouth. At least they got a penalty out of the stunt, the teams organising for a play on.

He staggered to his feet, hearing the crowd cheer him on like he was some kind of hero, though all he felt was a tingling sensation that would probably bite him in the butt down the line, but that didn’t matter right now. He glanced at the spot Cassidy usually stood whenever she was here to watch him play, always checking every few minutes, but found himself wanting every time he looked. He should have seen her by now, had something happened?

The Mythics pushed hard with the timely penalty, but they could only make it to the halfway mark before they were tackled out of the set, and the Spartans were soon pushing them right back against the posts. It always felt horrible when the opponents scored, but this time it was worse, Jim taking a hard hit for nothing as the Spartans pushed for a try and got one.

“You’re sleeping!” Jim yelled across the field when the Spartans barged through the line, bringing the ball down over the line. In sports you couldn’t let a bad play hold you back, but Jim couldn’t help but call them out. Didn’t they realise this was the finals? If he were a centre he wouldn’t have let them in.

The Spartans designated kicker got ready for the following goal, and now it was the Mythics turn to try and get him to mess up, each of them shouting made up words as he kicked. The angle looked good to Jim, but the shouting must have worked, since it missed the posts by a solid meter. The Spartan looked annoyed, but he wasn’t about to find sympathy in the relieved Mythics. The scores were tied up now.

The defences of each team moved up and down the field, the match time running out as a sort of stalemate was reached, where neither team could break through and score, the crowd shouting out their lungs when the final quarter of the match was reached. Whenever one team would almost break through, the other would quickly come in to stop them, Jim had never seen nor played a game like it. Usually one team would make progress after at least fifteen minutes of a lull, but the teams were giving it all they had. One side would make a mistake sooner or later, and it looked like it was definitely going to be later.

Both sides were running out of steam, constantly running and shouting for over half an hour would do that to any athlete, but if there was a time for a burst of adrenaline, it was in the last few minutes. Not just because Jim needed to win, but he had a play to get to, and each minute of overtime would only hurt his chances of making it there on time.

“I got a plan guys,” Isaac said, gathering the team before the following scrum. “I call it the Isaac play.”

“We’re not going to take a dive now, there’s no time,” Gavin replied.

“Shut the fuck up and listen, me and Jimmy are gonna win this game for us, we just need some space.”

“We do?” Jim asked, always hating it when Isaac dragged him into his shenanigans. “What’s this play anyway?”

Isaac told them. None of them liked it, especially Jim, who found himself as the backbone of the crazy plan. “You can’t be serious,” Matty said. “It’s too risky! If this doesn’t work…”

“You got a better idea fatass?” Isaac asked. “They’re getting closer and closer to our line every set, their centres are clearly better than ours, no offence guys.”

Normally they wouldn’t take such a ribbing from Isaac, but the centres were tired and out of breath, and Jim shared his opinion on them.

“I guess we don’t have a reason not to try,” Gavin relented, turning to Jim. “What do you say, Jimmy?”

“I say screw it, it’ll come down to chance anyway in overtime. You guys set me up, I’ll win us this.”

They got into position, most of the Mythics engaging in the scrum while Jim and a few others pulled to the side, hopping on the spot as they got ready. Through the forest of legs in the scrum, Gavin rolled the ball through a pair, picking it up and tossing it to the centre. The Mythic ran forward, passing it off to Matty, who passed it to Nate. The Mythics shifted left with the ball, the Spartans copying the movement as the players slid down the field.

From Nate the ball passed to Isaac, who sprinted into the defence. Gavin took up the ball next while Isaac rotated back, now on the third tackle. Jim could just make out from the corner of his eye that the final minute was moments away.

Gavin offloaded to a Mythic, who passed it back to Isaac once more. The Spartans rushed forward, thinking he’d do the same, but instead Isaac dropped the ball to his boot, and the entire left side of the Mythics team started sprinting. There was a loud clap as Isaac kicked it as hard as he could, the ball flipping high into the air and towards the sideline, towards Jim.

He went as hard and as fast as his legs could take him, the ball arching a little too far away than he thought, didn’t Isaac say he was a machine at kicking? Jim had to run faster than he ever had in his life before it could drop.

He reached out his hands, but the ball bounced off the tips of his fingers, jumping up into the air as Jim started to fumble it like he was an amateur juggler. In a moment he was back on that fateful day all those months ago, the training session mere weeks after his breakup with Lara, the training session where he’d seen Cassidy for the very first time.

The ball bounced from his right hand to his left like it was suddenly made of rubber, Jim’s slaps the only thing keeping it off the ground. He ran with the ball, a clear opening ahead of him, and a bunch of angry Spartans giving chase behind him. The process of catching the ball trailed into the seconds, the crowd screaming in a mix of awe and frustration as he sprinted down the line, his stupid hands failing to grip the ball, as if each of his fingers was a stick of melting butter.

He'd told himself that day he wouldn’t make such a grave error again, and now here was his test, his thoughts a mess of plays and games and scholarships. From his peripheral, he could make out Mr. Bahril shouting his lungs dry as he flailed his limbs like some kind of angry cartoon character. Jim couldn’t hear the words, even as he passed the coach, it was like everything was going in slow motion, his heart pounding in his ears as his concentration lapsed.

He raced up the sideline, passing the sponers, who leaned on the edges of their seats as they watched him run by, their necks jutting as they tracked him.

Past the sponsors was the space he’d first seen Cassidy, a lifetime ago it felt like, and he looked there now as he did back then, remembering how her hips had shaken so enticingly, and how he’d promised himself he’d speak to her.

But she wasn’t there.

He’d looked all throughout the game for her, dividing his attention, and she would have made herself known if she had turned up, but she hadn’t, Cassidy had not come. And while her presence back then had distracted him, her absence now was just as bad.

He couldn’t have been staring for more than a few seconds, but it was enough time for his hands to fumble one too many times, and he watched with a stunned look on his face as the ball landed by his boot.

The referee blew into his whistle, signalling a knock-on. Jim slowed down his sprint until he just stood there, his eyes turned in the vague direction to where Cassidy should be. The cheerleaders were there, but the Garchomp was nowhere to be seen.

“What the fuck Jimmy?!” Isaac said, shoving him by the shoulder when he didn’t appear to listen. “What are you doing? You fucking dropped it!”

“Sh… She…” Jim blinked, his brain failing to process what was happening, the young man’s arms hanging limply by his sides as he heard his name being shouted from behind him.

“YOU JUST COST US THE MATCH!” Mr. Bahril roared, Jim blinking in confusion. Had he? He’d only dropped it, there was still the overtime, right? They’d make a play during then. His eyes drifted towards the sponsors, and his heart stopped when he saw they weren’t looking at him anymore.

Then it dawned on him, Jim’s eyes going wide as he turned back to the game, the Mythics scrutinising him like he was the enemy. The referee blew his whistle, louder this time, and the Mythics reluctantly moved into their positions.

Jim felt like a spectator as he watched the Spartans set up in the middle, the siren that marked full time blaring right in the middle of one of their passes.

Erich almost looked like he was going for a stroll as he drop-kicked the ball, the ball arcing between the posts. The whistle screeched once again, and the Spartans won the match.