Coach clapped and yelled It’s okay Olive Get it next time I ran to get the ball for the 800th time Once I stood across from Racie again Coach tried to help Now pass it back to her Olive she said Use the inside of your foot like this She showed me and I drew back my foot and whiffed the ball My face burned I saw Racie try to hide a smile But I tried again and I did it It barely got to Racie but it got there Coach gave me a thumbs-up Then she went to the next pair of kids You’re doing good for your first time Racie said I nodded but I wished that practice would
FINALLY be over My best friend Molly played soccer too in New York I hadn’t told her yet that I’d started playing Soccer would give us one more thing to talk about even though we never ran out of stuff to talk about I touched my necklace the one she’d given me and smiled Coach blew the whistle We were done Racie jogged over to me She put out her hand for a low five Hey seriously she said you did great Thanks Racie I said I’m sorry my passes were so bad She shrugged and patted my shoulder Ugh I saw Dad’s truck in the parking lot He’d told me we had to leave quick after practice We were
going to milk the goats together Then he had to fix a fence I grabbed my bag and ran across the field My bag looked like a giant purple sausage It wouldn’t even zip all the way My grandma’s hand-knitted sweater was stuffed inside it I had gotten too hot during the day so I’d shoved the sweater in my bag after putting on my soccer clothes See you Wednesday Olive Racie yelled I groaned Another practice Saturdays and
Wednesdays were practice days Fridays were game days It was going to be a long season Just before I reached the parking lot something twinkled in the grass I put down my bag and stopped to look Even though my dad was waiting I had to check it out It was a bracelet With diamonds The sun sparkled off every gem There were at least twelve of them I looked around to see if anyone saw me No one was paying attention Dad
