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“Some English player,” Kovár says. “Photos leaked. He’s seeing a guy.”
“Hm.” Polášek looks at the screen and back at his plate.
The table keeps moving. Šíma hasn’t paused. Kovár is prodding his brisket with a fork, face concentrated. But the ticker runs and I feel it land the way I feel a shift in a striker’s body before the run develops. The word privacy. The wordrelationship in its quotation marks. The word leaked, doing work nobody asked it to do.
The people at this table would be decent about it. Tomáš would say something measured. Kovár would shrug. Šíma would find the joke that made it bearable. These are good men. But the ticker is not about this table. The ticker is about stadiums and tabloids and comment sections and dressing rooms in cities I have never played in. The version of football that has opinions about the word inside the quotation marks.
I take a drink. The beer is cold. The room is warm.
Tomáš taps my arm. “You’re quiet.”
“Thinking about tomorrow.”
“The call?”
“The call.”
“Good.” He squeezes my shoulder. “You’re making the right move, Dami.”
“I know.”
“Will you really?” Šíma asks. “Will you actually call? Because you have said you would call tomorrow every day since we’ve been here.”
I don’t reply. I know what I want. I know what the ticker says about men who want it where anyone can see. The captaincy is louder at this table. The wanting is louder when the table goes home.
“The brisket is acceptable,” Kovár announces. “The pink has proven itself. I retract nothing, because I never admitted doubt, but the brisket is acceptable.”
“Growth,” Novotný says. “Mark the date.”
“It’s not growth. It’s evidence-based assessment.”
“Kovár has been in Italy too long,” Šíma says. “He’s turned everything into a philosophy.”
“I’ve turned everything into standards. You should try it.”
On the walk back, Tomáš talks about the film session tomorrow. Kovár decides the brisket place is acceptable but not as good as Rome. Šíma says Rome does not have brisket and Kovár says that is precisely what makes Rome superior.
“Good night,” Tomáš says in the lobby.
“Good night.”
“Call Peter.”
“I’ll call Peter.”
Chapter 13: Tobík
The coffee is the same coffee. Same dark roast, same counter, same morning. I drink it standing and check my phone. Three texts from Damián in the last two days. Short ones. Training ran late. Talk later? and Early recovery tomorrow and, under the photo of Bagel I sent yesterday, Looks good.
He’s busy. It’s the World Cup. Group stage matches every few days, recovery sessions, film review. That’s real. But the voice has changed. Three days ago I’d have gotten the laughing reaction, the sentence that ran longer than it needed to because he wanted to keep talking. Now the replies come back trimmed. Same words. Different hand.
I put the phone down and walk.
The Beltline is warm at seven thirty. The green so dark it looks painted, the city pressing into summer with full commitment. Claire is ahead, losing the leash negotiation the way she always loses the leash negotiation. Bagel has spotted me. The heavy golden body straining forward with the focus of a creature who has never once in his life considered restraint.
He reaches me and sits on my left foot. Full weight. Committed. Vibrating.
“He was looking for you on Thursday,” Claire says. “He sat at your bench for twenty minutes. I had to carry him past it.”
