The score climbed higher as the minutes ticked away, but the game had stopped feeling like soccer to Elly. He watched Shaine from across the field, his heart sinking every time she turned his way. Her eyes were hollowed out by her blown pupils, making her look less like his cousin and more like a stranger wearing her face as a mask.
She was scoring one goal after another, never missing a single shot. It was a statistical impossibility. Shaine was good, but she wasn't this perfect. The crowd was roaring; her teammates were high-fiving her, but Shaine barely seemed to notice them. After every point, she would press her palms to her temples, her footsteps turning heavy and uncoordinated, as if her own body were becoming too much for her to carry. Like a drunken person trying to find her way home.
A loud whistle came from the referee stating that it was already half-time. Elly walks towards his cousin who's sitting on the ground with a towel over her head.
"Hey, you okay there?" he asks while settling down beside her.
Shaine pulls down the towel on her head and gently taps it on her face, drying some of her dripping sweat. "I'm perfectly fine, just a little exhausted," she said, smiling, masking the exhaustion that she barely noticed but Elly did.
Elly stared at his hands, debating whether he should ask or not, but he chose not to ask some weird questions.
"My shots are never this good," Shaine suddenly said.
Elly softly laughs and gently punches her shoulder. "Don't be absurd; your practicing is paying off," he said.
Shaine takes off the towel from her face, revealing her eyes: her normal dark brown eyes, staring strongly at her cousin, as if speaking what was not being said.
"I've known you my entire life, Elly," Shaine murmured, her voice sounding thin and distant as she squeezed her eyes shut. "I know you can feel it. This isn't me out there. It's not how I play."
Elly remained silent, his gaze fixed on her trembling hands. His mind raced back to the previous weekend, to the oak tree and the cold, unresponsive version of her they had found in the roots. He opened his mouth to speak, to finally ask the questions that were burning in his throat, but the referee's whistle cut through the air like a blade.
Shaine's eyes snapped open. She forced herself upright, reaching her arms toward the swirling sky in a stiff, jagged stretch. "Let's just get this over with," she said, a chuckle escaping her lips. "My head is absolutely killing me."
She took two confident steps toward the center line, but on the third, her strength shattered. Her knees hit the grassy ground with a thud, and she curled inward, her fingers clawing at her temples as if trying to hold her skull together.
Elly, who saw this, instantly walked up to her side and held both her shoulders to keep her straight up.
"You don't look that good; I think you need to sit this one out," he said, looking worried.
Driven by a stubborn pride, Shaine brushed off Elly's concern and forced herself to her feet. "I'm fine, Elly," she gritted out, her voice barely a part of its usual bright self. "It's just the heat... I just need a second to catch my breath."
She didn't wait for his protest. She turned and began a slow, steady walk back toward the center of the pitch, each step a fight against the dizziness. Behind her, Elly stood frozen, the worry etched so deeply into his face. He watched her retreating back, knowing that whatever was "getting to her" had nothing to do with the sun.
Alex cut through the opponent like a knife through silk, passing the ball smoothly to Elly as he neared the box. Elly was mid-stride, ready to finish the play, when reality took a violent turn. The rival captain, the same one who had cornered Shaine, didn't even aim for the ball; he launched into a reckless slide that caught Elly's ankle with full force.
The sound of the impact was followed by Elly's painful cry as he tumbled onto the grass. The home crowd was in an uproar, a sea of angry voices rising from the bleachers. The team converged on the spot, their faces masks of worry and rage.
Shaine was the first to reach him, her own dizziness forgotten in a surge of adrenaline. Every pulse in her head felt like a hammer constantly beating at her skull, but she dropped to her knees beside him. "Elly! Elly, look at me. Talk to me!"
Whatever happened to Elly, it was only seen and known by him and the guy from the other culprit of the incident.
Elly didn't respond to his cousin's voice. His eyes were squeezed shut, his chest heaving with deep, ragged gasps that whistled in the sudden silence of the field. Shaine gently pulled his head onto her lap, using her towel to damp the cold sweat from his brow. Their coach ran off somewhere trying to find the medical team.
When she looked up, her gaze collided with the rival captain. He wasn't walking away nor walking towards them; he was standing just a few yards off, a faint, jagged smirk playing on his lips as he watched Elly silently groan in pain. With a flicker, Shaine hissed under her breath; she's not stupid or an idiot to not understand. He did something. She had always loathed violence, but staring at that smirk, she felt a dark urge to tear the satisfaction right off his face.
Elly was soon sent off the field to be examined, with one player short the team huddled up to figure out something they can do to win this game.
"How can we win now that Elly's out?" one of their teammates asked.
Shaine is quietly listening to them until she clears her throat, catching their attention.
"Let her take the spot," Shaine said, gesturing toward the girl sitting tensely on the bench. She was the final piece of their trio: the newest addition to the team. Though she lacked the pampered skills of the others, she had enough raw talent to hold the line for a single match.
"Do you have a plan, Shaine?" their coach asked.
Shaine chuckles and shakes her head. "Nothing in particular, Coach," she said before smirking at the girl.
Shaine was told to train the girl a few weeks ago when she first arrived. Shaine had taught something to the girl that only the two of them know. It was just a simple trick but enough to probably win a game.
"I don't know what you had in mind, but let's go with it," their coach agreed, making the whole team cheer.
The whistle was blown, and it was back in the field. Shaine looked at the girl, who looked back at her too. They nodded to each other, like talking telepathically and understanding words unspoken before running towards the middle of the field.
The whistle shrieked, and the rival team surged forward, their lead attacker confident as he began to dribble. He hadn't even cleared the center circle before a blur of a jersey intercepted him: the newcomer had picked his pocket with a clean steal. She didn't rush; she kept the ball close, waiting for Shaine to overlap on the wing. Together, they tore through the midfield, their passes so sharp and forceful they seemed to defy the wind.
"What are you doing? They're just girls!" the rival captain roared, his face contorting with frustration as his defense crumbled. He lunged forward, desperate to shut the newcomer down, but with a flick of her ankle, she sent a lightning-fast pass to Shaine before he could even plant his feet.
Shaine's blood boiled. She didn't need to throw a punch to break him; she knew that for a boy like this, nothing was more humiliating than being outclassed by the very person he had mocked, and a girl at that.
She fired a sharp pass back to the newcomer, who paced her run to create space. Shaine surged forward, like a predator closing in on its prey, until she was staring down the rival captain. She planted her foot, pivoting to her side, ready.
"Shaine!" the girl cried, launching a high, arching pass toward the box.
As the ball descended, Shaine spun in a full, graceful circle, gathering momentum like a storm. She felt an unfamiliar surge of heat wrap her legs, and her vision tunneled as her pupils dilated into twin voids, completely covering the dark brown shade of her eyes. She met the ball mid-air with a strike that broke the sound barrier. It wasn't just a shot; it was a bolt of pure, unreal white-hot force. It hissed past the captain's ear, so close he could feel the gust of air, before tearing a hole through the back of the net.
She could have hit his face. She chose not to. It wasn't her style.
A long silence echoed through the field before a final ear-piercing whistle echoed, filling the silence of the stunned field.
"Goal!"
That technique was hard for her to learn; she even twisted her ankle once trying to turn at the exact time, and luckily today luck was on her side.
The crowd cheers louder than before, yelling the team's name. Shaine isn't paying attention to the crowd or even to her tea; it was like all she could hear was each beat of her heart, thumping in her chest like it wanted to skip out.
She just glares daggers at the boy; his eyes are full of shock, and his lips are slightly trembling. Shaine walks up to him, stopping merely 3 feet away.
"Nothing goes as planned if cheating is involved," she said, smiling sweetly towards him. He's taken aback by the sudden sweetness of her tone and feels a little flutter hover on his chest; realizing what he felt, he quickly shakes the feeling away.
Shaine turns her back to the boy; she chuckles while slowly turning her head slightly. Her appearance looks dangerous; she's smiling at the boy, but her eyes spark a dangerous glimmer. The brown color of her eyes completely vanished, replaced with a pure black void; staring enough would make you feel like you're being sucked in.
"Don't do that again to anyone on my team because if you do, I won't hesitate to kick that ball into your pathetic face." Her voice was bitter, but her smile was sweet, like the taste of dark chocolate. The boy is once again taken aback; she was like a two-faced girl, one with goodness and sweetness while the other had darkness.
Her eyes began to slowly come back to their original color and state. She slowly walks away from the boy, her hearing slowly improves, and now the noise from her surroundings booms in her ears. Her head began to ache again, giving her vision a full blur, but she shook the feeling and focused on the game: it was far from over; one score doesn't end it all.
The game soon continued with Shaine and the girl being in the spotlight; the other team slowly caught on to the little tricks they played.
The final whistle blew, and just like that, the whirlwind was over. Shaine's team had secured the win by two points, but as the crowd erupted into a roar, the victory felt empty. The scoreboard meant nothing to her, not with the thought of Elly, still grounded and broken. To her, the win was just a piece of metal; her cousin was the only thing that mattered.
"Coach, how's Elly?" she asks with a soft blue towel around her neck and a bottle of cold water in her hand.
Her coach smiles sincerely. "He's brought to the nurses' office for now for further examination. You did great out there, Shaine; I'm glad you didn't take it out on that boy." Shaine knows, to herself, that their coach saw what had happened to Elly; she didn't ask why he didn't report it; instead, she replied with a small smile.
She looked back to the field; seeing the other team walking towards them, she stood her ground and looked calmly.
"Nice game," the boy from earlier said with his eyes averted. He walks up to her and stops about 2 steps away.
"I'm… I'm sorry," he said in a low voice. His apology sounded sincere, forced but sincere. Which made Shaine smile.
"No problem," she managed to whisper, but the lie was instantly crushed. The agony she'd shoved aside during the game came rushing back with the force of a tidal wave, hitting her all at once.
She gripped the sides of her head, her fingers digging into her scalp as if she could physically hold the pain back. When she forced her eyes open, the world had turned into a sea of jagged, pulsing blurs. Her knees trembled, leaving her swaying on the field. Muffled voices drifted toward her, sounding like they were coming from the bottom of a deep well: distorted, echoing, and entirely meaningless. The dizziness finally stripped away the last of her strength. Unable to fight the darkness any longer, she let go, her body hitting the grass with a heavy, final thud.