“Irene, die!” Signora Martelli’s voice repeated. “Die” is what the word would have sounded like to American ears. And since I had been thinking in English right then, I didn’t recognize the Italian word, dai. She was telling me to “Come on,” or “Hurry up!”
“I’m almost ready.” I stuffed my shorts and T-shirt into the equipment bag, snapped it shut, and opened the door.
“I told Marco Fornaio, the mister, that you were here,” Signora Martelli said. “Give me your backpack. I’ll put it in the room with the others.” Her smile was encouraging, but it still made me nervous.
“Thanks,” I said.
“It’s nothing. Dai.”
I ran down to the field of powdery brown dirt. The mister was leading the players in a slow trot around the chalked boundary. The line was straight and the spaces between the players were all the same. They were even jogging in time. Right. Left. Right. Left. I fell in behind the last boy.
He wore black shorts and a long-sleeved gray shirt instead of the white and blue uniform. The goalie, I guessed. He must have heard my footsteps because he glanced over his shoulder.
“Madonna!” he exclaimed in surprise. Then, without stopping his forward motion, he spun around to get a good look at me. In the process, he nicked the heel of the player in front of him.
“Hey, watch out, Luigi,” the second player called. Then he saw me and made the same spinning move as his teammate. The news of my arrival kept drifting up the line, destroying its organization and rhythm.
Only the mister did not turn to look at me. “No talking!” he snapped. “Follow me.” He switched from a jog to a sideways gallop.
Another team slowly circled the other half of the field. I kept my eyes fixed on the six-thousand-foot-high mountain peaks rising sharply behind them, but my peripheral vision told me that they were staring at me too. I hadn’t had so much attention paid to me since…well, never.
Boys did not make a habit of falling at my feet—not unless I tripped them during a pickup game after school. My hair is either dark blonde or light brown, depending on whom you ask. My curves are small. My long, thin face boasts a complexion that has its good days and bad days. My smile shows slow and painful improvement with every visit to the orthodontist.
The mister blew his whistle and changed from the sideways gallop to an exaggerated skipping motion. His arms swung in large arcs. He drove his knees high into the air.
“Maybe the mister skips for the girl,” the goalie joked.
Snorts and suppressed laughter followed that remark.
“Nothing to laugh at!” the mister snapped.
And so we skipped. This sight took the attention away from me. The other team grinned, pointed, and chuckled until their mister made them start skipping too.
The muscles in my calves and thighs began to tighten. I carefully controlled my breathing so no one would catch me sucking air during the warm-ups. I was relieved when the coach stopped and arranged us in three lines for the stretches.
We started with our necks and worked our way down to the Achilles tendons. The slight tugs on my triceps, quads, and hamstrings all felt familiar and reassuring.
When we finished, the mister emptied a mesh bag full of black and white soccer balls onto the ground. All the other players surged forward to get one. I hung back until the end.
“Irene?” the mister asked as I stepped up. A deep dent appeared between his black eyebrows.
“Sí.”
“Watch well the others. Do that which they do. Pay attention. Dai!”
I took the ball the mister handed me and joined the team in what my coach in the U.S. called the dribbling drill. Each of my teammates dribbled the ball at his own speed, choosing his own direction. They moved faster than a jog but slower than a run. There was one exception.
A boy with curly black hair, surprisingly blue eyes, and a determined chin was dribbling at top speed. He dashed at players head-on and then cut left or right. I heard boys call out his name in protest: “Matteo!” He was as graceful and gorgeous as Bernini’s statue of David, but he could move like a racehorse.
My new teammates, with the exception of Matteo, continued to check me out, undoubtedly wondering whether the girl knew how to handle the ball. And so I found myself focusing on the ball and the way it made the dirt puff up behind it.
“Don’t look at the ball! Don’t look at the ball!” the mister roared. I flinched. Undoubtedly, the mister’s bad first impression of me had only gotten worse. Then he blew the whistle. Everyone stopped for a ball-handling drill. We each bounced our ball off of our thighs, ankles, and feet, keeping it in the air for as long as possible. I counted my touches: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight…
Another whistle blast and we were off again. My thighs felt as though someone had strapped sandbags to them. It was tough to get my breath. After five minutes of this, even Matteo had slowed to a steady jog. But again, the familiarity reassured me. My American coaches had stressed conditioning at the earliest practices.
Finally, the mister told us to form two lines near the center circle and sent Luigi to the goal. Matteo stood at the front of the line with his right foot resting on the ball, waiting for the signal.
“Dai, Matteo!”
Matteo kicked the ball to the mister and bounded forward a few steps. He bounced on his toes until the mister returned the ball. Matteo dashed to intercept it. With a one-touch pass, he sent it directly back to the mister, who tapped it toward the goal.
Matteo sprinted toward the ball again. The tilt of his body, his angle of approach, the way he held his head—each promised that he would kick it to the right. Instead he buried the ball in the far left corner of the goal.
“Bravo, Matteo!” the mister said.
Matteo retrieved his ball and dribbled it to the end of a line—my line. Even though I was taller than he was, he still managed to stare down his nose at me. Every inch of his body seemed to ask: “How dare you set foot on the same soccer field as ME?” But all he settled for was a contemptuous “How do you call yourself?”
“Irene,” I told him.
“From where do you come?”
“The United States. Near St. Louis.”
His eyes widened. “You’re an Americana? Really?”
“Sí.”
His upper lip curled. “Girls really play soccer over there?”
I clenched my jaw. Matteo probably did not know or would not care that the American women’s national team was one of the top three in the world, so I merely said, “I do.”
His lip curled in silent disapproval, but before he could say anything, the mister called: “Stop talking! Stay attentive!”
Soccer was obviously serious here, not a social event. Matteo took a step back.
I faced forward and studied the goalkeeper, Luigi, as he caught, kicked, or batted away almost every shot. His moves had a grace of their own, a living, full-color illustration in a book on how to defend the goal.
My turn came. I had done this thousands of times before, and I could do it now. Why was I more nervous today than I had been at any game back home—even the tournaments?
I kicked my ball toward the mister. He returned it to me. Instead of a fancy one-touch pass, I controlled the ball and booted it back to him. After a few more passes, he sent the ball spinning toward the goal with a “Dai, Irene.”
The ball rolled across the chalk line and into the penalty area faster than any other pass during the entire drill. Was this a gift for the girl? I wondered. But that didn’t matter. I charged forward.
Instead of coming out to challenge me, Luigi stayed in the goal. Something about his stance reminded me of Matteo. He obviously didn’t expect much from me.
I decided to change his mind.