Page 66 of Offside

“Still here.” His arm tightens. “Nobody leaves.”

“Nobody leaves. It’s in the terms.”

The party downstairs plays something Moravian. Tomorrow there are boarding passes and one taxi and a squad to scatter. The day after that, there’s a whole life neither of us has ever lived, waiting to see if we’re serious.

We’re serious. It’s on the record.

I sleep like the dead, in daylight terms, with the whole file open on the nightstand of the world, and for the first time in five years there is nothing anywhere left to file.

?

Chapter 20: Tomáš

Scatter morning sounds like wheels on marble.

The lobby at eight is a freight yard. Twenty-three men’s worth of bags, kit cases, medal boxes. One framed FEEDBACK form, which Novotný is transporting by hand.

“Kapitáne.” He presents it like a diplomatic credential. “I’m requesting an exemption. The appendix doesn’t fly cargo.”

“The appendix is a piece of paper in a frame, Novotný.”

“The appendix is a founding document. You signed it.”

“I graded it.”

“You graded it EXCEEDS. That’s a signature with extra steps.” He tucks it under his arm. “Reunion goulash in October. My mother’s recipe. Attendance is mandatory.”

“Nobody agreed to the goulash.”

“The goulash,” he says, backing through the revolving door, “is a concept. Concepts don’t need agreement.”

I run the manifest out of habit. Fifteen flights, one taxi. Everyone accounted for, everyone fed, everyone hugged or scheduled for hugging. The machine’s last morning, and it runson time. I built it. I’m still the captain until the last wheel leaves the curb.

“Captain.” Horak, backpack on both shoulders like a schoolboy. “I wanted to say. This summer. What you did for me.”

“You kept nine crosses in a semifinal. You did that.”

“You told me to let the gloves work.”

“And you let them. That’s the whole division of labor.” I put my hand on the back of his neck, because that’s where my hands go. He grins like it’s another medal. “Eat real food this autumn. I’ll be checking the chat.”

“There’s still a chat?”

“There’s always a chat,” Polášek says, rolling past with two cases. “The chat has never once been closed.”

“The chat is a concept,” Šíma says, from across the lobby, not looking up from his phone. “Concepts don’t close.”

“See,” Polášek tells Horak, “he understands. Ten years and I finally have a witness.” He stops in front of me and puts out his hand. “Kapitáne. My wife has a list. It has categories. I’m needed at home.”

“Go. Kiss the twins.”

“The twins have requested the horn for Christmas.”

“The horn is not available. The horn has a career.”

Horak goes, taller than June. Polášek goes, to his list with categories. One at a time, the summer walks out through revolving doors. I stand in the middle of it with my clipboard heart doing what it does. Counting.

Through the glass, on the training-ground steps across the service road, Damián sits with Kovár. Two coffees. One of them is on the step by Kovár’s foot. I can’t hear a word and I don’t need to. Damián is doing his quiet thing, the one he’s always done. Kovár is staring at the middle distance. Whatever’s moving over there is theirs. I let it be theirs.