‘Not today. I had to give them a break. I feel like … I don’t know, they’ve been working so hard over the past few weeks. Ever since …’ She glances at me hesitantly, leaving the sentence hanging there.
Ever since we set up this competition between our teams. I wonder if she has the same worries as I do.
‘Yeah, it’s the same with my team.’ I sigh. ‘Honestly, they’re so dedicated to football, and even more so now that they have something to work towards. I don’t remember being like that when we were on the school team.’
Dina raises an eyebrow. ‘Really? Because we didn’t practise day and night when we had a match coming up?’
‘That was different,’ I insist.
We pause by the entrance to the park, turning towards each other now, neither of us making a move to end the conversation or go our separate ways.
Dina chuckles. ‘In what way, exactly?’
‘That wasn’t about football. It was about … I don’t know.’ Spending time withyou, I want to say. All those practice sessions right here in this park, or in our back gardens. I wonder if I would have been so intense about things if Dina wasn’t around. It wasn’t that I didn’t – don’t – love football. Of course I do. But with Dina there, my love for it felt even more real, more palpable. Because Dina and I understood each other, we shared the same dreams, the same goals. It was like football and Dina went hand in hand. I guess, in some ways, they still do.
‘I’m just saying, we were pretty obsessive about football back then,’ Dina says after a beat. ‘Besides, you should be happy that your team are so intense about it. It took me a while to get my girls to even care about football.’
That surprises me. When Dina had marched up to us in the park, it definitely felt like they’d all cared. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean … they didn’t really join the team because they watch football matches in their spare time. I’m pretty sure some of them had never watched a match before, or even kicked a ball. They signed up because they needed to sign up to something.’
‘So … how did you get them so invested?’
Dina shrugs, and there’s a blush creeping up her cheeks, tinging her skin with the slightest hint of pink. ‘I barely did anything.’
‘You must have done something.’
‘It’s … kind of silly.’ Dina actually sounds embarrassed as she speaks. ‘I made them watchBend It Like Beckham.’
A laugh bursts out of me.
‘I told you it was silly,’ Dina mumbles, her blush even more evident now.
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to – it’s not silly. It’s just so you.’
Dina almost looks offended. ‘So me?’
‘You were obsessed with that movie. We used to watch it like every single week. You could quote the whole thing.’
‘Yeah, because you never wanted to watch it, right?’ Dina asks sarcastically, rolling her eyes.
‘Only because you did!’
‘I wasn’t the one who had the poster in my room because I had a huge crush on Parminder Nagra. I bet you even took that thing to America with you,’ Dina retorts.
Now my face heats up with a blush because Ididtake that poster with me, carried it around from state to state. I was too embarrassed to put it up anywhere, but I kept it. It wasn’t because of Parminder Nagra, but because it reminded me of the good times with Dina. We had both felt so seen by that movie. Even if it hadn’t been about football, I think we would have watched it obsessively. We shipped Jess and Jules like nobody’s business, and it was one of the rare things that felt perfectly made for just the two of us.
‘Shut up,’ I say to Dina now, at a loss for anything to say.
Dina grins, clearly knowing she’s got the best of me. I don’t even feel annoyed about it like I might have at one time. Because this feels like going back in time, to before I went away, before everything went wrong with us.
‘You were always so sensitive about that crush,’ Dina teases, poking me lightly in the ribs.
‘At least I could admit it, unlike you reading your smutty fan fiction of Jess and Jules in secret,’ I say accusingly.
‘I havenoidea what you’re talking about. And if Idid, I would say that you didn’t have a problem with fan fiction when you were asking me for recommendations.’
I’m suddenly aware of the fact that the two of us have moved dangerously close to each other in the midst of all of our teasing. That the rest of the world has somehow faded away into nothing. It’s just me and Dina, her dark brown eyes boring into mine. And I’m sure that she can hear the thud of my heart thumping in my chest.
