The world narrowed to a single, searing point of pain in his hip. The roar of the Rusea's crowd was a distant, mocking wave. Lying on the rain-soaked turf, Armani saw the celebration through a haze of agony and shame. He saw his teammates, shoulders slumped, walking back to the center circle for the restart. He saw Kofi, chest heaving, staring at him with a look of concern that quickly hardened into frustrated confusion.
The Cornwall physio, a harried man with a magic sponge and a bag of ice, jogged onto the field. He knelt beside Armani, his fingers probing the injured hip. Armani winced, a sharp gasp escaping his lips.
"Bad?" the physio asked, his voice clipped.
Armani could only nod, tears of pain and humiliation mixing with the rain on his face.
"Can you put weight on it?"
He tried to push himself up, but his leg buckled, the pain screaming in protest. He shook his head.
The physio looked toward the sideline and made a substitution signal. "We need a stretcher!"
The walk of shame was a ride of shame. Carried off the pitch on a stretcher, the object of pity from the Cornwall fans and jeers from the Rusea's supporters, was a new low. He kept his eyes shut tight, unable to face anyone. He had stolen from his mother, betrayed his team's trust, and failed his scout, all in one catastrophic afternoon.
He was deposited on the bench in the dugout, a blanket thrown over his shoulders, a bag of ice pressed to his hip. He didn't watch the rest of the game. He couldn't. He just sat there, hunched over, listening to the sounds of the match—the shouts, the referee's whistle, the occasional roar from the crowd. Every sound felt like an accusation.
Cornwall lost 2-0. The second goal was a formality after Armani's departure shattered their already fragile structure. The final whistle was a mercy killing.
The locker room was a tomb. The usual post-match sounds—cleats being kicked off, the hiss of showers, banter—were absent. There was only the heavy silence of defeat and the grim, rhythmic sound of Marcus slamming his fist into his locker door over and over again.
Coach Reynolds stood before them, his suit soaked through with rain. He didn't yell. His silence was infinitely worse.
"That," he said, his voice quiet and hoarse, "was a disgrace. Not because we lost. But because we didn't fight. We didn't play as a team. We played for ourselves." His gaze swept the room, landing finally, and lingering, on Armani, who was still in his kit, the ice pack melting on his hip.
"When one of us falls, we pick him up. When one of us is struggling, we carry him. We did none of that today. We fractured. And we were picked apart by a team that remembers what it means to be a unit." He took a deep breath. "Get cleaned up. The bus leaves in twenty minutes."
No one looked at Armani. Not even Kofi. The distance he had created had become a chasm. He was an island of failure in a sea of collective disappointment.
The bus ride back to Montego Bay was three hours of pure torture. The usual post-game chatter was replaced by a stiff, angry silence. Armani sat alone, his head leaning against the cool glass of the window, watching the Jamaican countryside blur past. Every bump in the road sent a fresh jolt of pain through his hip, a physical reminder of his moral and athletic failure.
His phone, tucked in his bag, felt like a live grenade. He knew there would be a message from Croft. He dreaded it. What could the scout possibly say? What platitude could possibly fix this?
When they finally arrived back at Cornwall, the team dispersed quickly into the night without a word. Armani hobbled off the bus, using his bag as a crutch. Kofi was waiting for him.
For a long moment, they just stood there in the dimly lit parking lot, the silence between them heavier than any words.
"Kofi, I—" Armani began, his voice cracking.
"Save it," Kofi cut him off, his voice flat, devoid of its usual warmth. "Just… save it, Armani. Mi don't know wha'appen to yuh. Yuh head not right. Yuh playing for… for something else. Not for us." He shook his head, a look of profound disappointment on his face. "Dem new boots? Really? Dat was the priority?"
He turned and walked away, leaving Armani standing alone in the dark.
The walk home was the longest of his life. Each step was a struggle, each pang in his hip a punishment. He rehearsed a hundred lies to tell his mother about the injury, but none of them mattered. The real injury was one he could never explain.
He pushed open the door to his house. The lights were on. His mother was sitting at the kitchen table, but she wasn't waiting up with a proud smile. Her face was pale, her eyes red-rimmed. Spread out on the table in front of her wasn't the electricity bill.
It was their household budget ledger—a small, worn notebook where she meticulously tracked every dollar earned and spent. Next to it was her open purse.
The world stopped. The pain in his hip vanished, replaced by a cold, sinking dread that reached into his soul.
She didn't look up at him. Her voice was quiet, trembling with a hurt that was far worse than anger. "The money for the light bill. The money for the groceries for this week. It's gone, Armani."
He stood frozen in the doorway, unable to speak, unable to move.
Finally, she looked up. Her eyes, usually so full of love and pride, were shattered. "Mr. Henry… he came by. He said a package came for you. Expensive football boots." She said the words like they were a foreign, poisonous thing. "He was so happy for you. He thought I'd bought them for you."
A single tear traced a path down her cheek. "I would never… I could never afford such a thing. Where did you get the money, Armani?"
The silence in the room was absolute. The hum of the refrigerator was deafening. He could hear the ragged sound of his own breath. There was no lie left to tell. No excuse that could possibly bridge the canyon of betrayal that now separated them.
He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. The weight of it all—the stolen money, the failed game, the injury, the disappointment in Kofi's eyes, the shattered look on his mother's face—crashed down on him all at once.
The dream wasn't just deferred. It was corrupted. And in his desperate pursuit of it, he had broken the most important things in his life.
The fantasy had finally, and utterly, collapsed. And the reality that was left in its ruins was unbearable.