Chapter 180

April 12, 2018 (Thursday)

Dear Ms. Diary,

We traveled to New Paris, which was a 1-14-1 team last year in an obvious rebuilding year after they had graduated seven starters from the very strong team the previous year. While New Paris seemed a better team than they were last year, so are we.

Krypton started today’s game. Despite that Coach pulled both Rhee and Char shortly before the 25-minute mark, a little earlier than planned, and replaced them with, respectively, Padme and Tonda, we still tallied six goals in the first half. Coach pulled those two after Rhee had matched Char’s two goals. Heather got her first goal of the season, cleaning up a carom from a shot by Tonda that New Paris’ center half had blocked with her foot.

The sixth goal occurred in the final minute of the half. New Paris had managed to keep the ball deep in our half of the field for over a minute when Gracey jumped a pass from their center half intended for their left wing camped out just inside the corner of the penalty box. Gracey’s second touch sent the ball up to me. I had grabbed a peek out of the corner of my right eye as Gracey’s pass came to me, seeing Tonda, Civia, and Heather approaching the centerline. I simply wheeled on the ball and sent a hard, left-footed grass-grazer upfield and somewhat left across the centerline beyond their left center back who was the up defender in a two-defender setup. The ball arrived in Tonda’s vicinity – or vice-versa – shortly before she reached the back defender, their right center back. She made a great fake on the ball, one on which the defender bit hard, and Tonda let it go by her as it was still traveling with pace.

Civia had had to slow to avoid going offside, but when she saw Tonda let the ball go, she quickly ramped back up to top speed, angled a bit to her right, and met the ball perfectly in stride halfway to the box. Their goalie had been well upfield and was still backpedaling around the penalty stripe. Civia whacked the ball hard, and it sailed over the goalie’s head and into the goal.

In the locker room, all of us facing Coach, she said, “After getting five assists last game, Beth managed only one today, and I’ll bet she thought she would not be getting that one!”

There was much chuckling and laughing, after which Coach continued, “Attagirl to Tonda for understanding that a hard fake on the ball she let go by her was all she needed to freeze their back defender and give Civia a one-on-one with their goalie. Tonda, I’ll bet you thought Civia would pull some razzle-dazzle out of her butt, leave the goalie spread out on the ground, and walk the ball into the goal.”

Tonda grinned while additional laughter filled the soundscape, then answered, “I did, however, I didn’t know how far upfield the goalie still was.”

“I’m handing out another attagirl to Civia for her recognition of something important when Tonda let the ball go through. Anyone?”

Rathi piped up immediately, “She obviously understood that since the ball would come to her from Beth rather than Tonda, she didn’t have to worry about being offside, as our whole team was still in our half of the field when Beth sent the pass forward. Tonda was on their side of the field when she let the ball go through. Had Tonda played it, Civia would have been offside if she had kept sprinting and if Tonda had just one-touched it over to Civia.”

Coach responded, “Correct on all facets.” She shook her head a couple of times, then added, “I sure do enjoy coaching smart players.” She looked around at all of us, then said, “If anyone did not see the importance of Civia’s decision, please plant that tidbit into your brain.”

After a short pause, Coach continued, “Had Rhee been in Tonda’s place, she may well have controlled the ball, deked the back defender, then launched a moon shot from midfield.” Rhee returned the wide grin that Coach sent her way, after which Coach added, “Attagirls on that play also go to Gracey for anticipating the pass she intercepted and to Beth for immediately understanding that our front-line speed could be counted on to get an easy goal so she did nothing more than simply send the ball upfield on its way. Attagirls to the trio of Char, Civia, and Rhee for the triangle pass that made Rhee’s first goal a gimme. I particularly want to point out that Civia’s assisting pass was threaded through what looked like a very narrow window from my vantage. Even more, I want to point out Char’s pass to Civia and ask her about it. Char?”

“Zala did a great job keeping their right half from clearing the ball and her pass into me was perfect. I could see that Rhee was in a hole with a clear line on the goal, but I couldn’t get the ball directly to her. I thought Civia had a better line on Rhee, so sent the ball to her and she couldn’t have sent a better one-touch pass into Rhee.”

Rhee butted in, saying, “That pass was perfect! I could see the problem Char mentioned and when she passed to Civia, I could also see the angle Char had seen. I knew Civia would see it, so I was fully prepared for that pass. At that point, smashing the ball into the left corner was ... I’d have had to put myself on the splintery bench had I missed that.”

There was much laughing.

Coach continued handing out attagirls for another five or six minutes, after which she said, “Argon starts the second half, and as we planned, Char and Rhee will go in for Tonda and Padme around the 60-minute mark. I’ll be interested to see how Char does out on the wing.”

Char got her hat-trick goal from an incredibly sweet pass from Rhee, who had the ball just outside the penalty box but with a number of their D clogging things. It looked like she was just going to hammer it and hope the ball made its way through either through luck or someone not wanting to be in the way of her rocket. Instead, as she approached the ball, she greatly moderated her intensity and just chipped it over the D to Char making a run between two of their D. With her back mostly to the goal to keep the goalie away from the ball, she chested it down to her left foot that was even then leading her body’s clockwise turn and tapped it past the surprised goalie.

All in all, despite Argon giving up a goal, they added four to our tally for a 10-1 win, with Lissa bagging her own goal after assisting the two others.

In the happy locker room, Coach was winding down her presentation when she said, “Therefore, we have tallied our first seven-scorer game of the season, and that was with Char and Rhee hogging half the goals.”

There was much chuckling.

“Interestingly, there were also seven who tallied assists. Ladies, that is impressive and, I believe, supports our decision to play everyone in every game. Congratulations, I’m so very proud of you.”

She let us enjoy the praise for a while, then changed tacks.

“Those of you not associated with the high-school team may not know this, but since it worked so well, I’m bringing that post-game system to this team. From now on, one or more of Brett, Cera, Brit, Lana, Seamus, Meka, Kim, and Maren will give out the attagirls. Liya will then give us a synopsis of the short-term future as a reminder. That is the practice schedule, where and when we have games, and any other organizational tidbits. After that, one of the aforementioned will present the game ball. Liya?”

“Despite having two games in this, the first week of play, we have only one each in the next two weeks, a home game next Wednesday against Central and a game the following Thursday at Springfield. Coach and I will be giving out reminders on both games as they approach. Practice tomorrow as usual, although it will be a short session, although exactly how short has not yet been determined.

“In a different vein, I want to remind all the girls here that we have two male team assistants. While none of you have opted to shower here today, keep in mind that, unlike the high-school locker room, most of the locker rooms we’ll encounter will not have a section of the room that is not visible to the showers. I tell you this because our two guys are quite attractive. Any effort by any of you to compromise them by being scantily clad in their presence, particularly by exposing parts of your bodies that society would find unacceptable in the presence of either or both of them will be punished by immediate and irrevocable expulsion from the team. Please, anything like that would cause irreparable harm to Coach’s reputation and, possibly, her freedom. If you want to flirt with either of the guys, do it on your own time.”

She looked around at each player, staring at each until she got a head nod or some other indication of acceptance of her words. She nodded as she completed that task.

“Cera, I understand that it’s your turn to announce the game ball’s winner.”

Cera said, “For the second straight match, the game ball goes to a sweeper, with this week’s going to Lissa Schmitt! Congratulations and thanks for a well-played half.”

We did not get home until 6:30 so we – including Civia and Maren – hustled through the shower; Brett took his shower upstairs. In the shower, I invited Civia and Maren to spend the weekend with us beginning around noon on Saturday. We joined dinner already in progress.

Dad said, “Kalina said that you got a hat trick, Char. Congrats!”

She went a little pink, but responded, “Thanks, Charlie. However, Rhee also had scored two goals by that point, and I’ve played with some girls who would have taken the shot that she didn’t really have in order to get some chance at a hat trick. Rhee passed up what opportunity she might have had in order to chip the ball perfectly to me for a gimme goal. And on Tuesday, Beth was spraying assists all over the pitch. This team is even more amazing than I thought when I had to play against it last year. I’m so-o-o-o happy here.”

We were eating on the deck and, given the warmth of the day, I was not surprised to see hints of swimwear beneath many of the women’s tops, including Alicia’s. With the addition of Cera’s parents and Kath, we were close to maxed out on seating at the three picnic tables, which is certainly why Mom said something.

Sandy stood after tapping her glass with her fork and announced, “We’ve commissioned a company to manufacture a big, square ... picnic table that will be three-and-a-half-sided and inside which we’ll be able to put at least the big grill. We hope that such will enable more ... cross-table conversation without having to look at the backs of people. We also hope it will seat 35 reasonably comfortably. We may not need that much space, but this Thursday get-together has already required us to add a third picnic table here, and we greatly enjoy having the need to add seating space, because Thursdays are greatly fulfilling for us. We ... the old fogies of the Williams clan ... admit to having been not-quite recluses here, and we thank our daughters for encouraging us to expand our social efforts to their families and their ... friends’ families.”

After the quick dinner cleanup, we adjourned to the hot tub without the heater running. Carol had turned it off this morning and the water was nicely comfortable, warmer than a pool, cooler than a bath. Emma wore a bikini that was not particularly skimpy, just slightly more conservative than those that most of us girls wore. Kalina wore the same conservative two-piece as previously, but Jeff wore a shorter-legged trunk than he had worn on previous Thursdays, almost as short-legged as Dad’s. Steph and Alicia were rocking two-piece suits that were just a bit skimpier than Emma’s, while Matt and Richard wore longer-legged trunks than Jeff’s. Kath wore a small two-piece, but, like Heather, she did not need a lot of material to cover her breasts. Civia and Maren wore the same suits as previously because those were the suits that they kept at the J.

As has become typical, Kalina started off the interesting part of the evening’s discussion.

“While I suspect that all the parents here already understand this, I lead with this to provide a basis for the discussion I hope it will generate. Jeff and I have watched whom we considered our wonderful daughter develop mentally and personally when she became associated with what used to be the Gang of Five or Go5: Beth, Rhee, Gracey, Liya, and Heather. While we don’t know the other girls that live permanently or sporadically in the J house as well as we know Civia, we – along with Emma – have noted the same personal and mental growth in Maren in the short time that Civia and she have become nearly attached to each other at the hip. In our minds, that is Jeff’s, Emma’s, and mine, the close association with the Go5 and the other girls here – including Brett, whom I understand is fine with being included in the term ‘the girls’ when discussing the J-house residents, as are the four that could be considered women – seems to be producing much more adult-like ... personalities and thought processes than is typical of young teenagers. Civia has always been responsible and helpful at home, but she has become more so, and Emma reports the same of Maren. It is obvious to us from our relatively extensive interactions with the Go5 that they have ... infected our two daughters with their ... beliefs and ... worldview if you will. We may be late to this understanding, but – and I’d like to hear the thoughts of the Go5’s parents as well as those of the Go5 – are they making their own family out of whole cloth?”

I was surprised when Nira responded first, “I’ve had the least amount of time in proximity to the Go5 of any of the other parents. However, it is still plain to me that that is exactly what they’re doing. Liya and I had a very rough relationship for quite a while before, during, and after the breakup of my marriage with her father. While I think she was moderating her antipathy to me before meeting them, falling in with Beth, Rhee, and Gracey brought greatly accelerated cessation of the anger she held that was engendered by the strife between her parents. Of the others, I’ve had much more interaction with Gracey than with Beth, Rhee, and Heather and I watched her change, and lose much of her uncertainty about her life in just a few years. Without the changes brought about in Liya by her friendship with the other girls, I could never have considered going on sabbatical and leaving her here while I got to immerse myself fully into my field for six months. I don’t know what’s in the water here, but I highly recommend it for anyone with an older pre-teen or young teenaged girl.”

Emma was quick to pounce on the opportunity and added, “Maren, while having much less interaction with the Go5 than Civia has had, has also benefited from the relationship, as Kalina noted. However, for my daughter, much of any change was possibly due mostly second-hand via Civia. Maren, while not the difficult teenager of woeful tales, was negatively affected by my two failed marriages, particularly the second. Because of the rapid and obvious changes in her outlook and maturity, I feel no need whatsoever to look for a third marriage. Our relationship has become stronger, more open, and some or even much of that change I place at the feet of the girls with whom she’s associating now.”

I quickly looked around at the others of the Go5 looking to gauge their reactions to the praise being heaped on us and could see mixed emotions of pride and embarrassment, which were what I was feeling. Before I could respond to any of the mothers’ words, Celeste did.