The Field (18 page)

It's game time. I jog to my end of the field, fastening my gloves. My routine in the goal is always the same. I touch the sides of the goal and the crossbar and then stand in the center and do a few jumps to get loose.
Bring it
.

The play stays in midfield for a while, both teams fighting for possession. We're pretty evenly matched. I stay alert and watch the play, calling out marks to my team. Goalkeepers often end up making good coaches because we see all of the action and patterns of play, not just one portion of the field. It's a little like being the quarterback except instead of calling plays, we direct the defense.

One of Fort Ben's strikers is cherry picking in the midfield, waiting for the pass so he can turn it toward the goal. Twice I've had to yell at my defenders to cover him. I'm about halfway into the penalty area so I can intercept a through ball, but still get back if I need to cover the goal. We've been battling for the ball on the right side of the field and our players aren't having any luck gaining control.

“Switch!” I yell to my players to get them to swing the ball to the left side, where our midfielder is wide open.

Our center mid sends the ball across, but the Fort Ben striker makes a spectacular move and leaps into the air to win the ball. He quickly settles it and takes off, sprinting towards me and the goal. The distance between us narrows. My heart starts pounding,
sending adrenaline coursing through me. If I run to meet him and he gets around me, it's a goal. Will has caught up with him and is pushing him wide left. I hold my line and cover the goal, anticipating the shot. He muscles past Will and is barreling full speed towards me.
The shot! Now! Dive!
It flashes into my head.
Make the save!

He rips off a rocket to the far post. I'm propelled by a sudden surge of power, diving right, full out. I catch the ball in my gut and wrap my arms around it. A one-pound missile. Then,
wham
, the striker plows into me and nails me with a kick right in my ribs before he flips over and lands on his back on the hardpacked ground in the goalmouth.

I'm gasping for breath—it's like all the air has been sucked out of my lungs. There's a stabbing pain on my left side, but I've still got the ball. I made the save.

I lay there for a minute to catch my breath and gather myself. I had that feeling again.
Knowing
where the ball is going before the shot is taken. But there was something more this time. In the moment when I knew where the shot was going and what I had to do, I got a jolt of adrenaline or energy, or
something
that catapulted me off my feet. Goalkeeping starts with your using head to read the play, then moving your feet and finishes with your hands. Whatever was going on in my head had let loose some powerful stuff this time.

“Are you okay?” Will is standing over me when I open my eyes.

“Yeah, I think so. Just a cracked rib, no problem,” I say sarcastically. I reach out my hand and wince when he pulls me up.

“Shake it off.” He claps me on the back. “Awesome save. That'll make him think twice before coming in close for a shot again.” Will is looking right at the Fort Ben player and says this
loud enough for him to hear. Just a little trash talk. The striker gets up off the ground and walks slowly up the field. He looks back at me warily. That's what I want to see. Fear.

I walk to the edge of the penalty box, bounce the ball three times and take the punt. I know it's good when my foot connects with the ball. It sails 70 yards across the center line into the opposite end of the field. All my pre-game nerves are gone, washed away in the surge of adrenaline and the rush of making the save. Saving the first real shot on goal is critical. It energizes the team and keeps the momentum on your side. Not to mention making me totally stoked. I still feel the power coursing through me. I barely notice my ribs, but I'm sure I'll be sore after the game when all the other bruises and contusions start to appear.

We're putting the pressure on Fort Ben, keeping the play in their defensive third. It's a physical match with a lot of pushing and shoving that the ref isn't calling. Like they didn't call the foul on the striker when he plowed into me. Paul takes a shot which is deflected wide by their keeper, giving us a corner kick. Dameon, our freshman holding midfielder takes the corner and sends it in a perfect arc towards the goal. All the players leap into the air trying to get a head on it, but Paul gets there first and heads it into the goal. The ball zooms past the keeper and into the back of the net.

GOOOOAAAAL!!

Our team goes wild, mobbing Paul. The Monroe fans are screaming. The stands are a blur of purple and white towels waiving furiously.

We keep the score at one to nothing until halftime. I'm pretty tired from making saves, but nothing I can't handle. I feel totally
on my game today. I don't need to visualize now, it's real. Fort Ben is good, but so is Monroe, and so am I.

Coach Swenson calls the team over to a shady area at the end of the field for our halftime talk. I get one more cup of water from the big cooler on the sidelines and sit on the edge of the group in the back. Brett is up front, near Coach. I'm sure it sucks for him to watch me rocking the goal, but there's not much I can do about that.

“It's a well fought game; the teams are pretty evenly matched, but we have the upper hand and the momentum, so let's keep it that way.” Coach Swenson is saying. “Offense needs to keep the pressure on and take shots. No hesitation. Don't hang onto the ball. One touch, pass or shoot. And keep switching the ball—diagonal balls are going to slice them open.” Paul and Hernando, the other striker, nod. “Defense, keep doing what you're doing. Asplunth, you're doing a good job shutting down their striker and Horton you're keeping us on top. Don't let them get one past you.”

The second half starts with Monroe taking the ball downfield and getting off a shot, but the Fort Ben keeper makes the save and punts it all the way to my penalty box. Will and Tyler, my other center back, collect the ball. Both teams keep the pressure on and play all out, but can't finish with a goal. We're still up one-nothing with five minutes left. The play's been aggressive on both sides and the refs have pretty much let it go. Now, Fort Ben is getting desperate and the play is brutal. Tyler's been battling with the Fort Ben striker in the backfield and between him and Will, they've been able to mostly shut him down. The striker is obviously frustrated and angry, which makes him dangerous.

In the last play of the game, their striker gets the ball and starts dribbling down the field. I try to judge if he's going to pass
it off or try to score himself. I'm crouched and ready in the goal, coiled for action. Tyler runs on to him, trying to push him wide or get the ball. They're getting close to the penalty box when the striker comes down hard on Tyler's instep with his cleats and gives him a vicious elbow to the ribs.

Tyler drops like a rock, head over heels, and he takes the striker down with him. The ref blows the whistle and calls the foul, but it's on Tyler!
No way!
Will and the other Monroe players are yelling at the ref that the foul was on the striker, but the ref's already positioning the ball for a free kick. At least it's not a penalty kick—point blank at the goal. Two more steps and they would have been in the box.

“Wall! Four!” I yell, directing four guys on the wall to block their free kick. Will and Tyler and the two midfielders form the wall between me and the ball. I judge the angle of the striker. “Right, right! Okay. Stop!” I'm not getting any feeling about where the ball is going, but I still feel the energy coursing through me.
Deep breath. Focus. Move to the center of the goal, get the angle right. Think—where's it going?
The striker's been playing it to the lower right corner all night, so I'm anticipating that shot. The ref blows the whistle.

The striker lines up to take the shot, runs onto the ball and past it! A second player runs onto the ball to take the kick and just before he connects it flashes in my head—
upper 90, left corner!
I'd been thinking lower right corner, so I'm slightly out of position and off balance. Can I make it?
Don't think! Move!
He's leftfooted, and he shoots, sending the ball with pace towards the center of the goal. Then it starts curving, bending to my left. I'm off the ground, flying, reaching—the tips of my fingers connect with the ball and I crash to the ground. It goes wide of the goal, but not far enough. I'm on my hands and knees scrambling to
get to the ball—
where are my defenders?
—but the striker is on to it before I can collect it and he sends it past me into the goal, lower right corner.
Damn
.

The game ends in a tie. We're 14-0-1 for the season, not 15-0-0. No perfect season. None of the great saves I made matter when the one I miss means we didn't win the game. Of course, it wasn't my fault that the call went the wrong way and there was a free kick. And everyone knows that it's a team effort, but I'm the one who got scored on. Will and Tyler should have been there to clear the ball, but in the end I over-thought it. And let them score.

We walk back to the bus deflated. The Fort Ben team is pumped, happy about avoiding a loss, but we were ahead almost the whole game and I let it slip away. I still have to act confident and cocky, so I don't look weak, but I feel like shit.

“Hey, dude, don't sweat it,” Paul says, walking beside me. “It was a brutal game and you saved like twenty shots. You can't save them all. Will and Tyler needed to shut that guy down. And that had to be a home town ref.”

“Whatever,” I say. I'm pissed at myself and I don't feel like being let off the hook. Somehow I need to figure out how to get out of my own way and not over-think the play. Let it just come to me. I'm not sure how to do it.

“Anyway, save it for the tournament. We could face them again if we make it to the finals, and we
will
shut them down.”

The coaches pass out box lunches and drinks when everyone is back on the bus. Sub sandwich, chips and an apple. It's always the same thing, but I'm starving, so I wolf it down and take four ibuprofen from the bottle in my bag. My ribs and various other places on my body are starting to hurt.

Oblivion is what I need. I shove my soccer bag against the window as a pillow and go right to sleep as the bus pulls out of the parking lot.

I dream that I'm in the goal saving shots. Will and some other faceless players are taking shots on goal. They're coming at me fast and furious, but I'm deflecting them easily. It's dark outside, and there are millions of stars in the sky overhead. The field is illuminated from a glowing fog that floats around it, on the edge of my vision. Now the shots are even faster and they've become like comets, blazing down on me in fiery balls from the sky. I catch them and they explode in my hands, but my gloves protect me from the flames. Then the comets are raining down all around me in a hailstorm of bright, burning lights that cover the field. The dream morphs and I'm walking with Renee through the woods at the lagoons. It's still night time and we're holding hands. I feel a strength and comfort from her touch. Up ahead we see an orange glow through the trees. It gets brighter as we approach. We step past the edge of the trees into the clearing and before us is the star gazing rock rising up into the sky, glowing red and orange and gold in the night; hot and molten. It throbs with energy that bathes us in waves of power and light.

My phone buzzes in the bag under my head, waking me up. It's Renee texting me that she'll meet me at the concert tonight. I text back ‘okay' that I will see her there. She's going with friends from her AP Studio Art class to the PantheRock concert on the practice field behind the football stadium. All the garage bands from school try out to get a chance to play in the concert. Some of them are totally awesome and some of them suck. It's a big deal to the bands that get in, and we get to listen to some pretty tight music. I check the time on my phone. I've been asleep for almost two hours. My fingers tentatively probe my ribs. Definitely
sore, but I don't think they're broken. I'll be purple and green by morning though.

I could go to the concert with Paul and some of the other guys, but I might just go by myself so I have a car to take Renee home. Strange that she texted me right when I was dreaming about her. I want to tell her about the dream, but in person, not in a text. Maybe I'll tell her tonight about the other dreams, too. I haven't told anyone about them. Talking about them would have been like acknowledging them somehow. Giving them importance. At least in this one I didn't wake up screaming, and no one seemed in any danger. Those other dreams had started to freak me out a little … really more than just a little. What with the remote viewing and the astral projection, who knows what I was actually seeing in those dreams or if it was in any way real. This one was more cool than anything else. I'd felt like the energy from the comets and the star gazing rock was somehow part of me and that it was good energy. It gave me a feeling of power, and I'd had this wonderful positive sense of everything being right. So why now, awake and sitting on the bus, do I still feel uneasy?

I
END UP
going to PantheRock with Paul, Tyler and Will. Tyler has a Jeep Cherokee with a wicked sound system, and I can hear the bass coming in through the open windows of my bedroom when they pull up to the house.

My phone dings with a text from Paul. W
E R HERE.
W
ILL BROGHT A FLASK
.
Great
. Now he's gonna be drinking on school grounds. I don't feel like dealing with this. Except for soccer, he's been totally blowing me off, so why should I be his babysitter?

G
REAT… B RIGHT DN.
I was actually surprised that Will wanted to go with us at all. It's probably because his ‘cool' friends started without him and he needed a ride.