IMAGINE. (wsl)

𝘀𝘂𝗿𝗽𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗲 - 𝗺.𝗳𝗼𝘄𝗹𝗲𝗿

𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘳𝘦: 𝘧𝘭𝘶𝘧𝘧
----
we had done it. we were through to the quarter finals. the crowd went wild as the full time whistle was blown. everyone was on their feet, cheering and clapping as we all ran together, celebrating with each other the achievement we just accomplished. by now the whole team was back in the changing rooms, and it was a party. i was stood next to mary, we were like best friends to the team but no one knew how close we actually were.

we had met in the under 20s, when we were around 15, and started dating when we were 16. that was four years ago now, and we both turned 20 in the last couple of months. i was ecstatic when i was called up, it was my debut for the national team on a world stage. mary had already gotten the call a few days before me and she was just as happy. we had made it through all of the group stages, having just won the last one against denmark.

the next game was the quarter finals against france. we had a week until that kicked off so the team was heading back to the hotel for the night. it was almost a party on the bus back, but when we got inside everyone looked drained and headed to their own rooms. i went to mine, had a shower and waited until the hallway was clear before sneaking into mary's room. she was already waiting for me, and i ran into her arms.

"why don't we just tell them?" we were lying on the bed now, just enjoying each others' company, but my mind had wandered elsewhere. "tell who? the team?" "yea." she paused for a second. "i'm not sure. why are we keeping it secret?" "we just wanted privacy. no media." a comfortable silence fell over us again and we ended up falling asleep together on her bed.

a knocking on mary's door woke me up and i realised where i was. "mary, wake up or i'm coming in!" i could hear alanna on the other side threatening to come in. "maz wake up!" i whispered to my sleeping partner, shaking her a bit to wake her up. "what? i'm up, i'm up!" i clamp my hand over her mouth so alanna doesn't hear. "lani is at your door, she's gonna come in, i need to hide." mary sobered up immediately and directed me to the bed while she called out to lani and said she's coming.

i slipped under the hotel bed, such a cliche place for me to hide but it would have to do. "have you seen y/n?" i could here lani ask mary. "she's not responding to me knocking on her door and i can't find her anywhere else." whoops. i hoped mary would keep her composure and pretend she hadn't seen me. "i haven't seen her at all today, maybe she's out getting breakfast or something?" i breathed out a silent sigh of relief as lani thanked mary and left.

i crawled out from under her bed and shook myself off. "you should probably get back to your own room before lani figure out i sent her astray." i looked up at mary to see her smirking at me. "shut up maz, i'm going." i kisses her on the cheek, grabbed my things i had left from last night and slipped out the door.

——
a week had gone by and now we were playing in the quarters against france. i was bouncing off the walls with nerves, and the team could tell. we all lined up in the tunnel, parallel with the french players. i forced myself not to look at them, ignore them and focus on myself. we all walked out onto the field, the crowd was enormous, almost 80 thousand people.

everyone got into positions, we were all somewhat nervous but sam assured us that we could do it. we could get further than we ever had before. she was on the bench to start with so steph had the captains armband. the ref and touch judges were all on the middle with the ball, steph walking forward to stand with them, opposite french captain wendie renard. we had possession first, the touches went off the field and the ref blew her whistle. we were off.

——
it was half time and neither team had scored, it was nil all. tony was nervous, he was trying not to show it but you could tell. we all ran back on, starting the second half. the french were tough to break, they had an attack to match our own and they fought tooth and nail. i was growing tired of the back and forth between us and they got more agitated that they hadn't scored yet.

tony was getting frustrated so he subbed sam on for the first time that game. she immediately got her feet on the ball and had a shot at goal, but couldn't quite make it. we kept playing on but eventually the ref called the full time whistle. my head whipped to the clock to see that it had been the full 90 minutes. it felt like just a couple of minutes ago we were running back out here for the second half.

it went into extra time, both of the fifteen minute halves were unsuccessful for both teams. this meant the last resort was penalty shootouts. it was caitlin foord that took our first shot, scoring us 1-0. it was a high-stress moment and we keep going, back and forth, until it came down to me to score the last goal. i stood in front the ball, lining up where i would kick it. i took steps back, a deep breath then ran up and booted it into the back of the net.

the crowd in the stadium erupted in cheers and i turned to run back to my team. we had made it to the semi finals! mary was the first to reach me and picked me up, spinning me around and smashing her lips to mine. i didn't have a second thought and returned the favour. i think the whole team stopped when they saw and everyone was confused. they still crashed into us and everyone was cheering but when we broke apart, alanna pulled me over. "since when? you and mary?"

i just laughed. "surprise. it's been four years." lani's face dropped, she was shocked. "how did we not know?" i could hear the screech in her voice over the cheers of the crowd, but only shrugged at her astonished face. "you guys clearly aren't as observant as you think." i cheekily grinned and ran away from her as she yelled out and ran after me. i caught up with mary after escaping lani and she was ecstatic that we had won, and could finally be together in the open. "what did you tell her?" she referenced lani's interrogation. "i told her 'surprise'."