Gabby Garcia's Ultimate Playbook

Author:Iva-Marie Palmer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2017-03-16T16:00:00+00:00

So I came up with a strategy: if I played the whole field, maybe I could stop Dorchester from scoring yet again. I noticed that several of my teammates were running up alongside me, but I got the sense it was more to follow me than to follow the ball.

I tried not to let them distract me and closed in on the Demon midfielder who was dribbling the ball toward their goal. When she let the ball roll a sliver out of her stick’s reach—I lunged in and pulled it away.

I turned on my heels and kept the ball close to my stick. I dribbled it in the direction of OUR goal as best I could. I was still learning how to do this—my stick caught in the grass here and there, and it was harder to keep track of a moving ball than I’d thought, especially on grass. I’d played street hockey in the cul-de-sac before, but that’s pushing a flat puck down the street. Big difference.

With the ball in my possession, I spotted Katy standing just outside the striking circle, so I yelled, “Katy, heads up!”

And I sent the ball in a perfect pass right to her. It might as well have been on a path to kiss Katy’s hockey stick right on the mouth (if hockey sticks had mouths).

But Katy MOVED! Like she was trying to stay out of the ball’s way!

I don’t think she meant to, because once she saw the ball roll past her, she scrambled toward it, but a Demon defender already had it and headed back toward their goal.

So I was running AGAIN. And, if I was being honest, I was trying to run away from the nagging question I had: had anyone on my team ever played field hockey before?

If I learned the answer was in fact no, that those 35 or so minutes of that exact game were the only ones any of my teammates had ever played, I would not have been surprised.

For a moment, I caught myself fearing the worst: WAS I A JINX HERE, TOO?

No, that wasn’t it. Because I could have been ready to score a goal from inside the striking circle and Grace Chang would have fallen in front of the ball so that I couldn’t.

Or I could have gift-wrapped the ball and presented it to Colin Reedy and he would have returned it . . . to the wrong store.

I could have flown a helicopter over the field and shone a spotlight on the ball that only our captain—our captain!—Molly Oliver could see, with big lights saying, “DON’T LET THIS GO IN THE GOAL!!” and she would somehow have made sure the ball got into the goal.

They weren’t just bad at field hockey. They might have been allergic to it.

But after every play (if you could call them plays), they were so happy.

I ran, I zigged, I zagged, I flicked the ball, I dribbled it.

Sometimes I would hit the ball to another player and get hopeful.

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