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I sigh. “It’s hard to be here.”
“Why?”
“Truth?” I look around the complex.
“If you want, but I’m not a therapist.” He gives me a little smile to try to lighten the mood, I think.
It doesn’t work. I swallow the lump in my throat. I can’t have another playoff season like I did this year if I want to continue my career, so maybe talking to someone about what I’m feeling might help. “She’s everywhere.”
He smiles and slowly nods a few times. “Yeah.”
I stand, needing to keep busy, I pace a straight line back and forth in front of my former coach. “Like here, there’s a million memories from her damn pigtails to when we’d sneak in the basketball courts and kiss when they were empty.”
Jamieson’s eyes widen. “What? When did you do that?”
I wave him off. “Not until we were, like, seventeen. But she’s in my house, my basement.” I close my eyes, remembering all the nights we fell asleep on the couch watching television after making out. “It feels like I can’t breathe properly when I’m home. And knowing she’s only a fifteen-minute car ride away… my body always feels overcharged with adrenaline, like it needs to go to her every damn time I’m home.”
I won’t mention last Christmas, when the last of my willpower waned and I ended up in Lake Starlight one afternoon. There are some memories I like to keep for myself.
I kick the ball into the net and of course it hits the metal frame and flies in the other direction. “Fuck, I suck.”
I lie down on the turf and Jamison holds his legs up, wrapped in his arms.
“You don’t suck. You’re having a wee moment, but regardless, you’ve had a great career. One that people like me dream of, and I played professionally. But yer thirty, and I hope you have a long career but have you thought about what yer life looks like after soccer?”
My stomach sours with the thought of not playing. I shake my head. “Soccer is my life.”
He raises his eyebrows.
“What?” My forehead wrinkles.
“Imagine having that taken away from you.”
I blow out a breath, realizing we’re circling back to Calista. “I was right by her side when her career ended. There are other avenues that would have made soccer a part of her life.”
He laughs. “You make it sound so easy, but it’s Calista we’re talking about.”
I bite my inner lip. When her soccer career was over, mine felt like it was rising. I’d just signed a huge contract and thought I’d be able to give her the life she deserved. That I could somehow replace the love she had for soccer.
When I look at him, he nods. “Believe me, I’m not one to talk. I hit rock bottom before I figured out what was most important in my life. And it took even longer before I felt as if I could do anything about it. It’s probably why I push Calista so hard to coach.”
“So, since she’s been back, nothing? No scrimmages, no women’s league, no coaching?”
Jamison shakes his head. His concern for her is apparent. I thought maybe she was a shell of the person she once was because I was back and she was hiding from me. I guess I was wrong.
“She does the books, comes in here only when there are no other activities going on. She’s pushed soccer out of her life since the day she returned to Lake Starlight.”
“But…” She knows how shitty I did in the playoffs. I guess she could get wind of that from someone else. At the time, I assumed she watched my games. Wishful thinking, I suppose.
“Listen, I can’t tell you what to do. You and Calista have a long history together, and I think a lot of people expected the two of you to be these soccer stars who would return home one day to get married and have kids. But you can’t live your life on other people’s terms. I just want to make sure you understand that one day, and no one can tell you when that is, someone is going to tell you that you can’t play soccer professionally anymore. So what do you want yer life to look like when that happens?” He stands and grabs the soccer ball. “Now get your arse up and let’s do some drills.”
No professional athlete wants to think about retirement, but they know they can’t play forever. One day, that moment in time is up—it’s either an injury, your talent declines, or you get too fucking old and poof, the dream you’ve been living dies.
Yeah, the younger guys are a little faster than me these days, but I’m still the top player and I’m not going to hang up my cleats until I absolutely have to. But listening to Jamison, he has a point. If my soccer career ended today, what do I have?
Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
My phone rings as I’m leaving the sports complex. My brother Jed’s name flashes on the screen.
