Chapter 5
I’m standing at the top of the box, waiting to hear the final whistle. I look at Kelley, who tracks down a Japanese forward and clears the ball. The official blows the whistle and the crowd erupts. We did it. We won. Olympic gold medalists. I jump up, raising my arms in the air. I feel my legs moving before it registers in my mind that I’m moving towards Kelley. I lift her in my arms, hugging her.
She won that tournament for us. She learned a new position and played it like she’d been doing it her whole life. She played every minute. “We did it.” I hear her whisper in my ear. “I knew we would.” I respond. I put her down just in time to feel Pinoe jump on my back and before we know it, we’re surrounded by our teammates, celebrating our win.
Ali stayed in the room with me all day. Jill texted me, letting me know she understands why I left. Great. Now the staff knows too. As soon as I got into our room, I let out the tears I had been holding in. I flopped down on my bed, allowing Ali to rub my back, doing her best to comfort me.
“I don’t want them to pity me.” I look at her. “They won’t, Hope. If anything, they’re gonna feel like assholes.” I wipe my face of the tears. “I just don’t know how to let it go. I can’t trust them. They completely turned on me the second they thought I was in the wrong.” She sighs. “You trust me.” I nod. “Yea, but you asked me what happened. You went against the team and you had my back when no one else did.”
“I know. I’m sorry, I wish I had answers for you, but I don’t. I don’t know what I would do if I were in your position.” She looks at me, apologetically. I sigh just as my phone goes off. Kelley. I open the text and read it, out loud, to Ali. “I’m sorry it took me so long to do that. I should have told them sooner.” I roll my eyes. “I’m not responding.” I say, putting my phone back down.
I’m watching a movie with Ali when I get a text from Christie, letting me know she called a team meeting before dinner. Great. “Did she text you too?” I look at Ali, who nods. “This is gonna be fucking terrible.” I say mostly to myself. She touches my shoulder. “They’re all gonna have their tails between their legs, begging you for forgiveness.” I scoff at her. Fuck them. They don’t deserve my forgiveness. I’m here to win a world cup, that’s what I’m gonna do.
I wake up and look around, groggily searching for the sound that woke me. My phone. I pick it up, squinting at the brightness of the screen. My head is pounding. “Hello” I croak out. “You’re a fucking idiot, Hope.” I furrow my eye brows. “Car?” I sit up, putting a hand to my head. I need Advil. “I told you that you were gonna hurt her. You said you wouldn’t. You’re a fucking liar.”
“What are you talking about?” I hear her scoff. “Alex told me Kelley called her crying last night. What did you do?” I roll my eyes. “I didn’t-“ She cuts me off. “You know what? I don’t care anymore. I hope you’re happy. You broke her heart. Don’t expect me to have your back this time.” She hangs up.
My eyes fill with tears against my will. She didn’t even fucking ask me what happened. I can’t believe Kelley didn’t tell Alex that she’s the one at fault. I laugh, dryly, to myself. Figures. Camp should be fun.
Ali walks into the conference room by my side. Everyone turns towards me. I look down. Ali glares at them, their guilty faces. We find two empty seats and sit down. She puts her hand on my thigh in support. I snap my head up, making eye contact with Ash, who looks conflicted by the action. I’m dreading this. I don’t feel like hearing about how sorry they are, or listen to them blame my reputation for their assumption.
I look at Kelley, who’s sitting at the front of the room looking straight ahead. Carli walked in, looking at me, guiltily, on her way past. Christie came in last, closing the door behind her. I grab Ali’s hand, nervously. She looks over at me and nods. “It’ll be okay.” She whispers in my ear. I send her a slight nod in response.
“Alright, clearly we have a conflict here. I don’t want to make this awkward for anyone, but we have to figure this out. If we want to win this summer, we have to be able to work with each other. Right now, I don’t see us getting past the round of sixteen.” The room is silent. I can feel the tension in the air.
Christie doesn’t say anything. She looks around at the team and waits for someone to take the lead. She sighs. “Okay. I guess I’ll start. Hope, you probably hate us. I get that.” She looks at me. “I’d probably hate us too. I’m sorry that I allowed this to happen. You know that Kelley has a special place in my heart and when I thought you broke her, I stopped being a good team captain. A good captain would have done what was best for the team, would have stopped them from isolating you. I’m sorry I didn’t. And I’m sorry I assumed.” I keep my eyes at the ground. I don’t want to hear this. The room is once again filled with silence.
No one says a word. No one makes a sound. “Seriously?” I hear Ali say. I look at her. She stands. “You really have nothing to say for yourselves? You acted like you were in high school, ganging up on her. Carli, you were her best friend and you didn’t even have the decency to ask her what actually happened? To see if she was okay? You should all be ashamed.” She’s almost yelling at them. I look up at her, then back down at the ground. This is a fucking blast. I shake my head.
Ali looks around at everyone and scoffs before sitting back down, grabbing my hand. “I’m sorry.” I hear. Carli. She stands slowly, looking at me. I look up at her, hesitantly. I shake my head at her. “I don’t know what to say to you. Nothing I say will make up for what happened, what we did. Yes, we’re all assholes. We jumped to conclusions and yes, I should have had your back. I’m fucking sorry, Hope, I’m so sorry.” She looks at me desperately. I clench my jaw, looking at the ground.
I’m done with this. I shouldn’t have to be here. I didn’t do anything wrong. Why am I still suffering? I look up, scanning the room. I stand up, slowly. “Honestly, this is a pointless meeting.” I shake my head before continuing. “I can’t trust any of you. We’re supposed to be professional soccer players. I was prepared to come into camp and act professionally, to not treat Kelley any differently. Even though she did what she did, I wasn’t gonna treat her differently.” I look at Kelley, who is still facing forward. She hasn’t looked at anyone since she’s arrived. I look at Carli. “You. You fucking hurt me. You hurt me so badly.” I look her in the eyes. She immediately breaks eye contact, looking down.
“You all did. You all treated me like I didn’t matter. How do you expect me to just brush this off? To play behind you and trust that, if it comes down to it, you’ll have my back? I can’t.” I pause, scanning the room. “I don’t know what else to say. I don’t think this is an issue that’s going to get resolved any time soon. I’m here to win a world cup. That’s what you’re all here to do, too. You’re my teammates, not my friends. It’s that simple.” I wait a few seconds to see if anyone else has something to say, but when all I hear is silence, I start to leave.
“Hope” I stop and turn around. Pinoe. I look at her, skeptically, unsure of whether she’s gonna try and make a joke of this or not. “I have your back now. You don’t have to believe me, but you should know.” I give her a slight nod, before walking out. Well that was just as miserable as I expected it to be.
I get back to my room and check my phone. About 45 minutes after I left the meeting, Ali finally comes in. I glance up at her. “What took so long?” She flops down on my bed, looking up at me. “You missed a lot.” I raise my eye brows. “Yea?” She nods.
“Well no one said anything for a few minutes after you left. It was super awkward. Then ARod kind of went off.” I furrow my eye brows. “ARod?” She nods. “Yea. She basically said that there was no fixing it and that they were all fuck ups and to just give you space. Then that got Lauren going. She had a lot to say to Kelley. She called her a coward a couple of times and told her she doesn’t deserve someone like you.” I tilt my head.
“Did Kelley respond?” I’m curious. “No. She just nodded at what Lauren was saying. Then she walked out. After that everyone kind of left awkwardly. No one knew what to say.” I shake my head. “This is crazy. Training tomorrow is gonna be hell.” Ali nods.
“Ash pulled me aside after the meeting.” I raise my eye brows. “She said she understands why I had your back so hard. She said she was sorry for how she acted. I don’t know. I believe her, I guess. But I don’t know if I want to be with her. She asked me to go to dinner with her on Friday.” I scoff. “Did you say yes?” She nods. “I did. I want to know what she has to say about everything. We’ll see what happens.”
I give her a small smile. “Hopefully it goes well. You really do deserve the best.” I say, quietly. She smiles. “You are sweet.” She says, poking my thigh. I look down, playing with hem of my shirt. “It’s true. Ash needs to get her shit together before you get tired of waiting.” She nods. “I mean I’m not really helping the situation, but she’s certainly not either.” I nod in understanding.
“You do realize you have to talk to Kelley at some point, right? Like about what happened?” I snap my head up to look at her. “Why would I do that? I know all I need to know.” Why would she even suggest me talking to her?
“Hope, you need closure. It’s clear that you’re still hurt and confused by everything that happened and you aren’t ever gonna be able to move on completely until you talk to her, especially because you see her every day.” I roll my eyes. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I know you don’t. I know. But you have to. No one wants to have difficult conversations, but I promise you. I promise it will help in the long run.” I nod. “It probably would. I’m not doing it though.” Ali looks at me disappointedly. “I can’t make you. But I will say that it’s for the best. If you don’t talk, you’ll always wonder why. You’ll wonder what happened. You’ll ask yourself ‘what if’.” I sigh.
“We’ll see.” It’s the best she’s gonna get from me and she knows it. So she drops it.