Free Finding Sky by Joss Stirling

from plague? Stop it, Sky: this wasn’t helping.
    ‘Um … well—well done, Nelson, great goal. Let’s have more of those, please.’
    ‘That’s it? Your tactics? More goals, please? ’ Sheena inspected her nails. ‘Sheesh, look, I broke one. Do you think they’d let me retire injured?’
    ‘I don’t play football—I mean soccer—back home. I didn’t want to be captain. Sorry.’ I gave a pathetic shrug.
    ‘This is so humiliating,’ grumbled Neil, who until then had always been quite nice to me. ‘Mr Joe promised you’d be great.’
    I was beginning to feel a lot like crying. ‘Then he was wrong, wasn’t he? Expecting me to be good at football is like expecting all Welsh people to be able to sing.’ My team looked blank. OK, so they hadn’t heard of Wales. ‘Just stop letting so many of them past you with the ball and then I wouldn’t have to save so many.’
    ‘Save!’ Sheena shrieked with derision. ‘You’ve not saved a single one. And if you do, I’ll eat my sneakers.’
    The whistle blew for the second half. I trekked up field to my goal, only to be stopped by Zed. ‘What now?’ I snapped. ‘Gonna rub it in some more that I’m rubbish? No need, my team’s done that already.’
    He looked over my head. ‘No, Sky, I was going to tell you that you’re down that end this half.’
    Sheesh, I was going to cry. I scrubbed my wrist over my eyes and pivoted on the spot to set off for the other end of the pitch. I had to run the gauntlet of mocking faces.
    I blinked. Zed’s team were all surrounded by the raspberry pink glow of amusement. Mine had a charcoal grey aura shot through with red. Was I really seeing this—or imagining it? Stop it!
    Sometimes I’m such a nutcase.
    The massacre—sorry, game—continued until it was embarrassing for everyone, even the spectators. I’d not managed to save a thing. Then Sheena brought Zed down in the box and I was facing a penalty. The jeers and laughter from the stands grew louder as all realized that a classic high school moment was in the making: Zed, the best player in the year, was facing the talent-challenged foreigner.
    ‘Go on, Sky, you can do it!’ yelled Tina from the bleachers.
    No, I couldn’t, but there spoke a true friend.
    I stood in the centre of my wretched goal and faced Zed. To my astonishment, he wasn’t gloating; if anything, he looked a bit sorry for me—that’s how pathetic I was. He placed the ball carefully on the spot and glanced up at me.
    Dive to your left.
    His voice in my head again. I was certifiable. I rubbed my eyes, trying to clear my brain.
    Zed held my gaze. Dive to your left.
    What the hell: I was now so far gone I was hallucinating. I had no hope of stopping the ball, so I could at least make a flamboyant, if hopelessly unnecessary, dive. Maybe I’d knock myself out on the post—let’s think on the bright side.
    Zed ran up, kicked, and I spreadeagled myself sideways to the left.
    Ooof! The ball struck me square in the stomach. I curled round it in agony.
    An enormous cheer went up—even from Zed’s team mates.
    ‘I can’t believe it—she saved it!’ yelped Tina, doing a celebratory dance with Zoe.
    A hand appeared in front of my eyes.
    ‘Are you OK?’
    Zed.
    ‘I saved it.’
    ‘Yeah, we saw.’ He cracked a smile and pulled me up.
    ‘Did you help me?’
    ‘Now why would I do that?’ He turned his back, reverting to the rude Zed of our first acquaintance. Great.
    Thank you very much, O mighty one.
    Spurred on by irritation, I’d acted on instinct and sent the thought the same way I’d heard his voice. It was as if I’d taken a plank of wood to his head. Zed spun round, reeling, to stare at me—I couldn’t tell if he was horrified or amazed. I froze, momentarily stunned, as if I’d just brushed against a live electric fence. I clamped down on the shriek of emotion shooting through me. He hadn’t heard my sarcasm, had he? That was just … just impossible.
    Mr Joe jogged between us, blowing