Read Online Shutout by Brendan Halpin - Free Book Online Page B

that they’d scored five goals, but if you need five goals to win, you’re in trouble because most teams won’t let you have that many.
    Unless you’ve got Lena on the wing with fresh legs in the second half. Then maybe every team will give up five goals or more.
    One thing did make me glad I wasn’t on varsity, though. We knew this from practice, but Geezer was a screamer. She spent the whole game screaming at her players for every mistake they made, and we never once saw her crack a smile or compliment anything anyone did right.
    When the game ended, we could hear Geezer berating the team from way up in the bleachers.
    â€œWhat do you think she does when they lose?” Shakina asked.
    We all shook our heads like we didn’t want to know.
    As we were gathering up our stuff to go, Beasley said, “Amanda, can I talk to you for a second?”
    Uh-oh. She’d waited for a whole other game to end before doing it, but now she was going to drop the bomb on me for my horrible performance. “Yeah?”
    â€œWell, two things. One is that you played a really good game. Don’t let one mistake make you think otherwise.”
    â€œBut—”
    â€œExpert talking here, okay? I did not see one player on any team today who had a perfect game.” Really? Because it sure looked to me like Lena did.
    â€œOkay.”
    â€œThe other thing is that I did some research on Sever’s disease.”
    â€œYeah?”
    â€œYeah, and you should consider taking Rosalind up on that yoga thing. I really think it will help you.”
    â€œOkay. I guess I’ll try it.”
    â€œGreat. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
    â€œYes you will.”
    I tried not to sulk too much at home, but it was hard. Lena called, and two weird things happened. The first one was that she did not mention Conrad once. She usually managed to make some fake-casual question about him within the first thirty seconds of our call, but she didn’t mention him at all this time. The other thing was that instead of our usual marathon conversation, we were only on the phone for a few minutes—okay, twenty, but still—when she got another calland said she had to go and she’d call me back. Who was more important than me? Well, I never found out because she never called me back.
    Dad looked like he wanted to say something to me a couple of times, but Mom gave him this look that shut him up, and I was glad. She knew that there was nothing anybody could say that wouldn’t make me feel horrible, so nobody said anything.
    Well, I guess I should say there was nothing either of my parents could say to make me feel better because at dinner, Dominic said, “That was awesome the way you stopped that penalty kick! Nobody ever gets those!” And that did make me feel better—even if I’d muffed an easy shot, I’d gobbled up a nearly impossible one.
    I did homework. Lena still didn’t call back. I thought about calling her and asking since when did she not call me back, but I decided she was going to have to come to me. I was sick of thinking about stuff that made me sad, so I got online and looked up the schedule for Charlesborough Yoga Studio.
    Mom came and snooped over my shoulder like she always does when I’m online, I guess to check that I’m not chatting with some creepy pedophile or something.
    â€œWhatcha doing?” she asked, all fake casual.
    â€œOh. Well, we get half-price classes at this yoga studio, and Ms. Beasley told me she thought it would be a good idea for me to do it, so I figured I would take one class to see what it was like.”
    Mom stared at me for a minute and then said, “Who are you, and what have you done with my daughter?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œI have been trying to get you to go to yoga with me ever since you got your diagnosis. And you always made fun of me with all kinds of stuff about tight clothes and how you weren’t