The next morning, Sakura opens her eyes to a throbbing headache, as if her brain is being kicked around inside her skull like a soccer ball. She winces at the harsh sunlight and carefully sits up, realizing that something is wrong. Very wrong.
The satin bedsheets, the modern furniture, everything in black and white hues—so minimalistic and without a shred of sentimentality, or any human emotion, really.
Bile rises inside her gut, and it has nothing to do with the amount of alcohol she consumed yesterday. It’s because she knows this room. This bed. All too well.
It was her first time, after all.
In panic, she throws off the blanket and sees that she’s still in her yesterday’s clothes. This calms her down, if only a little.
“Oh, come on, Sakura, I know I’m not the nicest person out there, but I’m not that fucked up to take advantage of someone drunk.”
And there she is, leaning against the door frame with her arms crossed over her chest and that infuriating, cocky smirk plastered on her face.
“Kaname,” she mutters through her gritted teeth.
“There’s a towel and a set of fresh clothes in the bathroom. Take a shower and meet me for breakfast,” Kaname says, like it’s an order but then adds a somewhat apologetic ‘please‘.
Sakura shoots her a seething look. “No, thanks.”
She stands up from the bed but a wave of dizziness hits her like a truck, and she falls right back onto the sheets. “Fuck,” she mumbles, cradling her forehead with her palm.
Kaname rolls her eyes. “Right, so I’ll be waiting in the kitchen,” she says and leaves.
As much as Sakura hates it, she realizes that, in her current weak state, she has no choice but to take the woman up on her offer.
She shuffles slowly to the bathroom and takes a quick shower, which eases the tension under her skull.
Beside the sink lies a set of neatly folded clothes—a white button-up and a pair of jeans—and she realizes that these are actually hers. She must have left them at Kaname’s place and forgotten about them, which is perfect because for a moment there she feared she’d be forced to wear Kaname’s clothes.
She still can’t comprehend how it happened that she ended up at Kaname’s apartment. What was she even thinking getting drunk like that? It didn’t do anything to heal her heartache; it just added a headache on top of it.
She sighs and decides that she’ll have to do what she should have already done yesterday—call Chaewon and Yunjin, since apparently she can’t be trusted to be left alone.
Putting on the clothes, she stares at her reflection in the mirror above the sink. Her face no longer looks as pale and sick as it did when she arrived at her mother’s place but there are still faint dark patches under her eyes—a testament to her recent streak of sleepless nights.
The silver necklace hangs from her neck, its leaf pedant shining brightly. She wraps her palm around it, wondering what Kazuha would say if she saw her in such a state. She would probably worry.
A lump forms in her throat as she reminds herself of Kazuha’s soft eyes looking into hers with concern and love.
Maybe she would stay, she thinks but quickly dismisses the thought. Kazuha has made her choice, and she is better off without her anyway. No matter how much it hurts her, she has to accept it.
She hides the necklace under the button-up and leaves the bathroom.
Kaname is sitting by the dining table, scrolling through her phone and drinking coffee, when Sakura enters the kitchen. For a second, she just considers bolting out of the apartment but the smell of fresh bread rolls and toast stirs her hungry stomach and she begrudgingly takes a seat across the woman.
Kaname smiles at her from above the rim of her mug, and surprisingly, for once, it doesn’t seem smug. Regardless, Sakura still glares at her as she grabs a toast and smears it with strawberry jam.
“So, I suppose you don’t want to talk about it, but you know me, I hate eating in silence,” Kaname says, setting her mug aside. “I heard about the loan transfer. Rough break-up?”
“None of your business,” Sakura mutters around the toast in her mouth.
“Fair enough,” Kaname concedes, which is another thing that strikes Sakura as odd since normally she would expect Kaname to draw out this point and turn into some annoying banter. “Look, I know that you probably don’t care about what I have to say-“
“Correct,” Sakura interjects.
Kaname’s jaw shifts, but she musters a fake smile. “Still, I wanted to apologize for what I’ve done to your ex? Girlfriend.”
Sakura slows down her chewing, frowning as if she just realized that the food she’s eating is past its expiration date. It’s the first time she hears Kaname sincerely apologize rather than come up with excuses, unless that’s just some twisted trick on her part.
“Don’t give me that look. I honestly regret it,” she says, sounding awfully convincing. Her gaze then veers to the side in thought. “I was just so fucking jealous. The way you looked at her. I’ve never seen that look on your face before. Just so full of…love. You’d never given me that look.” Her eyes snap back to Sakura—fiery and accusing.
“Maybe because you were always busy flirting with other women,” Sakura shots back.
Kaname scoffs, “And you never cared. Even if they were the ones flirting with me.”
“With you?” Sakura’s brows furrow.
That’s not how she remembered it. Is she being gaslit right now?
“See? You don’t even remember,” Kaname points out reproachfully. “But then, with her, you acted so possessive. You were ready to knock my teeth out when I as much as looked in her direction. That’s how I wanted you to be with me. I wanted you to show some…emotions. But you were always so distant and closed-off. You only cared when I praised you for your soccer skills.” She leans back in her chair with her arms folded over her chest like a defiant teenager about to throw a tantrum.
Yet Sakura can’t deny what she’s saying, and she realizes that maybe the fault for their disastrous relationship doesn’t lie entirely with Kaname.
“Whatever. I guess we just weren’t meant to be,” Kaname mutters and lets out a sigh as the fire behind her eyes petters out. “And it doesn’t change the fact that I still acted like an asshole. I’m sorry, Sakura. Truly, I am.”
They look at each other wordlessly, and it feels as if they’re sharing a moment of silence for what was once between them.
“Why are you telling me all of this now?” Sakura asks. “In fact, why would you even bring me here?”
Kaname sighs again. “I couldn’t leave you there, just black-out drunk. Contrary to popular belief, I’m not heartless.” She gives Sakura a pointed look. “I’d have called Chaewon, but I don’t have her number. Besides, recently I’ve been thinking about contacting you to have some sort of closure and apologize for what I’ve done. I just wasn’t sure when would be a proper moment to do that. Whether enough time has passed for you to no longer want to kill me on sight. And then I saw you at the bar.”
“Why the sudden change of heart?” Sakura mutters, taking a sip of her now lukewarm coffee.
Kaname smiles, as in, she genuinely smiles like she’s happy and again, it catches Sakura off guard. “Well, believe it or not, but I fell in love. And that can mess you up real good, as I’m sure you’re aware now. And sometimes it can even change you for the better, I guess.”
“This is her?” Sakura points to the phone, which lights up with a message. Its background is a photo showing a dark-haired girl with colorful tattoos on her arms, countless piercings in her ears and a septum ring.
Sakura would have never thought that would be Kaname’s type, but she can’t really say she knows her well, which only further proves their relationship was just one big mistake. Does Kaname even know that she likes playing video games? Or that Kimi No Na Wa is her favorite movie? She highly doubts it, considering she has no idea whether Kaname even likes watching movies herself.
“Yeah.” Kaname unlocks the phone and proudly presents the wallpaper to Sakura. The girl has a really pretty and somewhat familiar smile. “Her name is Sachiko, and you may actually remember her from school.”
“School?”
Granted, Sakura didn’t know many people at her school but someone who grew up to have such a striking look would have to stand out even back then yet no one comes to mind.
“Yeah, she told me you both attended the same class.” Kaname types something on her phone and sends it out before looking up at Sakura expectantly.
“The same class? But the only Sachiko in our class was—”
“Sachiko Suzuki. Yup, that’s her.”
“Eh?!” Sakura exclaims, bewildered. “That’s Sachiko Suzuki? But I thought she was…” her voice trails off unsurely.
“Straight?” Kaname gushes with a smirk. “I always knew your gaydar was terrible so I’m not even surprised.”
Sakura frowns. “Well, in my defense, that wasn’t how she looked in middle school.”
“Oh, I know. She showed me the photos. She was her mother’s perfect little baby girl. She hated it, as you may already guess. And now, she’s a tattoo artist. You should see your face right now,” the woman chuckles into her palm.
Sakura stares at her, mouth hanging agape. “I’m a terrible person,” she mutters to herself.
Kaname snorts, quirking an eyebrow. “And why is that?”
“I always thought she had this perfect life with perfect parents and a perfect, bright future ahead of her with a perfect husband and perfect kids. While all this time, she was probably struggling with her sexuality, silently suffering, trying to meet her parents expectations,” she says, thinking back to Kazuha.
She assumed Kazuha’s life was perfect too, but now she reminds herself of what she told her about never really having friends that understood her. She could imagine kids laughing at her because of how much she loved soccer and how big of a Sakura’s fan she was. Wouldn’t she be scared of failure too? Of losing matches and never reaching Sakura’s level to play with her?
She was so scared that Kazuha would leave her but wouldn’t Kazuha be afraid of the same thing? She was always so brave, so positive, and so caring, but everyone’s got their limits…
Looking up to the ceiling, she swallows the sudden tears that clog her throat.
“Yeah, it was pretty rough for her out there,” Kaname admits somberly, interrupting Sakura’s thoughts. “Her parents aren’t the most accepting kind. She actually had to cut ties with them and leave for the States. After she came out in college, they wanted to send her to some fucked-up conversion therapy camp. But I don’t see how all of this makes you a bad person? Like, how could you know any better? You were just a kid.”
Sakura shrugs weakly. “Maybe, but still, it wasn’t fair of me to just assume all that stuff about her. I barely even knew her and that’s because I always thought we had nothing in common. Maybe if we became friends, maybe things would have been easier for her then.”
Kaname gives her a doubtful look. “Maybe, or maybe it’d have been exactly the same, so don’t beat yourself about it. You know, she actually told me she always admired you.”
“Me?” Sakura points to herself, slanting her head to the side.
This whole morning feels like a fever dream, and she’s not sure if she’s feeling dizzy because of the hangover or the endless revelations being thrown at her by Kaname.
“She said you were the only kid who didn’t care what others may think about you. Your passion and grit impressed her. She didn’t say it, but I think she had a crush on you. She was probably too deep in the closet at that time to admit it to herself.”
Sachiko had a crush on her? Even knowing now that the girl is gay, that’s still such a bizarre concept to Sakura.
“Have you told her about us?” she asks, curious.
“Yeah. She didn’t quite understand it, though, I think.”
“Yeah, neither did Kazuha.”
They share an awkward laugh. They themselves still don’t understand it, probably.
Silence falls between them.
Sakura never really thought she needed closure on what they had, but that’s how this feels like now, and she figures that maybe she was wrong after all.
Maybe it just wasn’t the right time for us to meet?
Unwittingly, her thoughts lead her back to Kazuha yet again. If they meet in a few months or years, will an unfamiliar face adorn the background of Kazuha’s phone screen? Or will they finally have their right time?
“So, maybe now you wanna talk about it?” Kaname looks at her, tapping her finger against the empty mug.
“About Kazuha? With you? No thanks. I still haven’t forgiven you, just to be clear. Also, she’s the one you should apologize to for what you did during that game, not me.”
“I know, I know. If we ever meet, I’ll do just that.” Kaname sighs. “Maybe once we’ll get to play together on the national team? Which reminds me, do you have any idea why Ikeda didn’t draft you both into the team?”
Sakura winces at the reminder. “He doesn’t draft couples,” she mutters, taking a bite out of her toast.
Kaname snorts a laugh, but Sakura doesn’t know what’s so funny, and her expression only darkens.
The laughter trails off and confusion paints Kaname’s features. “Wait, you’re serious? Who told you that?”
“My dad.”
“Is he like a homophobe or something?”
Sakura recoils at the idea. “No? Why?”
Kaname takes the thinker’s pose, rubbing her chin. “Then I don’t get why he would lie to you.”
“Lie?” Sakura squints her eyes at her. “What do you mean?”
“Well, Juri and Shiori have been a couple for quite some time already, and he drafted them. You didn’t know that?”
“What? Are you sure?” Sakura asks, but the dread is already slithering its way up her neck, cold and slimy. “I mean, he didn’t draft Shiori this time, right?”
“Sakura,” Kaname says her name like a teacher to a student who just made the most obvious mistake. “You’re forgetting that Shiori is literally my teammate. And he didn’t draft her because he couldn’t. She’s pausing for the cards.”
If Sakura wasn’t sitting, she would probably drop to her knees right now. “But…this doesn’t make sense,” she mutters under her breath, feeling like she’s about to throw up the toasts she just ate. “We were the best, then why…”
Break up with her, or else you’ll never make the team. Her dad’s warning rings out in her head. She doesn’t understand why he would lie about this to her. But then she reminds herself of her mother’s words—He has never been as good of a person as you made him out to be.
They’ve never watched her games during the Christmas break, only his. And on all those photos with medals and trophies, was there really a need for him to be on each and every one of them?
It was never about me, wasn’t it? It was always about him and his successes, even when they were mine. He didn’t want me—no, he wouldn’t let me win the World Cup with Kazuha, because then that wouldn’t be a success he could usurp for himself.
And all those gruelling training sessions he put her through? What did they amount to? Now that she thinks about it, she’s pretty sure they contributed to the injury she had right as she was about to be drafted to the team. His sabotage began long before Kazuha even joined their team.
One day, those newspapers will be writing about you, he told her when she was a kid. But they no longer wrote Miyawaki Sakura, the daughter of the famous Miyawaki Kentaro, and given what she now realizes about his ego, he probably couldn’t stand it.
“That’s what I’m saying. It makes zero sense to me,” Kaname tells her but Sakura barely registers her voice over the buzz of thoughts inside her head.
“I have to go.” She rises from her seat, bracing her hands against the table. “I have to talk to him.”
“To Ikeda?”
“No. To my dad.”
🌸ðŸƒ
Standing outside the door to her dad’s apartment, Sakura feels her heart pound in her chest with impatience and anger she has never felt before in her life. She knocks, then presses the doorbell, the chime piercing the stillness of the empty staircase.
She didn’t bother texting him. She knows he’s at home; due to his limp, he has been barely leaving the place. She used to call him, hoping to coax him out for a walk, believing it might lift his spirits. But he always refused. So she stopped asking.
Only now does she realize how stupid she was. He never wanted to get better, and he sure as hell didn’t give a damn about her concern for him.
The door finally fling open, revealing her father’s scowling face. “Sakura? What are you doing here?”
She doesn’t respond, instead marching past him and into the apartment.
In the living room, she stares at the trophies, medals, and framed accolades that adorn the walls. Photos of him grinning smugly at her as if in mockery. No pictures of her, her mother, or them together as family.
How could she be so naive? How could she ever believe he would change?
“Sakura–” her father’s voice halts as she turns to face him.
“Juri and Shiori. Ever heard of them?” She steps closer, her voice steady but laced with clear accusation.
Looking at him now, he suddenly appears so small to her, so frail, like those grandpas she sometimes sees at the park playing chess. Why was she ever even scared of him?
He doesn’t say anything, his jaw tense and his eyes glaring, matching her expression. And in that moment, it dawns on her—although she’s the spitting image of her mom, this piercing gaze of scorn and malice is what she inherited from him.
“You know, I always felt bad for you. In a matter of seconds, you lost everything you worked for your entire life,” she says, her voice tinged with sadness that she tries to stifle. “So I thought I understood your anger. Your resentment. Your disenchantment. Even your need to distance yourself. To just run away from all of it. But I didn’t. Not really. Because your greatest loss wasn’t losing soccer. It was losing us—me and mom, your family. And you chose that for yourself. Long before you lost soccer.”
Her dad’s lips twist into a smirk. “You think you–”
“Shut up!” She yells, her voice echoing through the room, and she swears she saw her dad flinch ever so slightly. “I won’t let you mess with my head again. Today I realized you don’t want me to succeed. Maybe there was a time when you did, but that was when you saw me as a mere extension of your own ego. Now you just want me to suffer like you, so you’re not alone in your misery.”
“Don’t make me laugh,” her dad seethes. “You don’t know anything about suffering or loss. You don’t know how it feels to be forgotten, to be replaced by some 19-year-old nobody.”
Sakura’s eyes go wide, hearing those words.
“That’s why you hate Kazuha so much? Because she reminds you of the guy who replaced you on the team?” She scoffs in disbelief, shaking her head. “You pathetic, weak man.”
Her dad raises his palm, ready to strike, but Sakura doesn’t even blink. In the end, it’s only her heart that takes the hit as her dad’s hand falls limply at his side.
“I can’t believe I trusted you,” she mutters, feeling the sting of tears. “I should have just let you leave when you wanted.”
She looks at his blurry image, hoping that, against all odds, the man whom she thought was her hero, her best friend, is still there. That he really exists. That he’ll hug her and tell her how sorry he is for making her feel this way. But there’s none of that. His eyes remain cold and unmoving, and she wipes her tears, feeling stupid again.
As she moves to leave, her gaze catches an old newspaper clipping on the wall. It shows her dad after a game, flashing a charming smile at the cameras, while Coach Ikeda lingers in the background.
The only teammate with whom he still keeps in touch, who even shares with him drafts before they end up in the newspapers. She remembers that one time she saw him at the park—was he meeting his old friend then?
“What did you tell him?” she asks, her voice shaking with barely contained rage. “Have you, what? Blackmailed him into not drafting me? Please tell me. How far exactly would you go to stop me, to stop us, from playing together and winning, huh?”
Her dad lifts his chin defiantly but remains silent.
She scoffs, “Fine. I will ask him myself then.”
“Sakura!” The man calls out to her as she’s about to leave. She stops and turns around to face him one last time. “You’ll never win the World Cup. You don’t have what it takes.”
“Maybe,” she says calmly. “Even so, I refuse to become like you. Victory is important, but not more than the people who love you. And as for you, I don’t want to hear from you ever again. Don’t call me. Don’t even come to my games. It’s not like you ever came to cheer for me anyway.” With that, she walks away, slamming the door behind her.
She runs out of the building and across the street, ignoring the honking cars that almost run her over. Someone curses at her after she stumbles into them, but she doesn’t even spare them a glance and just keeps walking ahead. It’s only when her lungs start to burn that she slows down, collapsing onto a park bench.
The fresh white snow shimmers around her in the midday sun. The park is quiet, save for the occasional cawing of birds perched on the bare branches above her. Nearby, people stroll leisurely, bundled up in thick coats and scarves, their breath visible in the cold, crisp air. Further away, children build a snowman, and a large, fluffy dog chases after a snowball.
The world hasn’t ended. She lets out a short laugh at the thought.
Each breath she takes feels a little lighter, each exhale a little less burdened. She closes her eyes for a moment, letting the cold air fill her lungs, grounding her in the present as fresh tears start rolling down her cheeks, but this time, they are tears of relief.
Finally, she’s free.
🌸ðŸƒ
Coach Ikeda still lives in the same apartment he did when he played with her father. She remembers her dad sometimes dropping him off after training. Of course, he’s taken aback by her impromptu appearance at his doorstep but readily agrees to talk to her.
As he leads her further inside, he casually mentions that his wife and kids are at the park and that they just got back from their Christmas break yesterday.
Now, seated on a floor cushion across from him in the modest living room, Sakura anxiously awaits his answer to the question that has been haunting her for weeks on end—why didn’t you draft me?
“Was it perhaps because of something my dad told you?” she asks, her hands clasped tightly in her lap.
Ikeda sighs, running his hand across his wrinkled forehead. “He told me you weren’t interested in playing for the national team. That you didn’t consider yourself ready. I questioned him about it, but he said not to even bother drafting you because you’d refuse. So I didn’t.”
Sakura’s heart sinks, her nails digging painfully into the insides of her palms. So it really was as she suspected—her own father sabotaged her.
But as much as it angers her, there’s also something comforting about it. Despite what he told her today, he really must have been afraid that she and Kazuha could actually do it—could win the World Cup together while he would remain forever forgotten.
“He lied to you,” she says. “Playing for the national team has always been my biggest dream.”
“I don’t know what to say,” Ikeda says, his voice laden with regret. Then, after a moment of pondering silence, he adds, “He’s the reason I got the job, you know? They first asked him to be the coach, but he refused it and proposed me instead. I was thankful for that, though I always felt like he’d be a better coach than me. I often sought his advice regarding the squads. So although it seemed odd what he was saying about you, I had no reason to suspect that he was lying.”
“He didn’t want me to succeed,” Sakura says quietly, more to herself than to Ikeda. “He wanted to keep me down, to make sure I never achieved what he lost. Especially not with Kazuha by my side.”
A moment of silence passes, interrupted only by the soft ticking of a clock. The weight of everything that has just been revealed hanging between them.
“I still remember that match like it happened yesterday,” Ikeda murmurs, his eyes staring off into the distance. “I believe it still haunts all of us who played in it. I remember you screaming for him from the stands, trying to escape your mother’s grasp. I thought that maybe that’s why you didn’t want to play.”
Sakura shakes her head, refusing to linger on those dreadful memories again. “If anything, I wanted to play even more after that,” she says. “To make him proud, to show him that we could both overcome it.”
Ikeda’s face softens with understanding. “I wish I had known. I should have spoken to you directly instead of relying on his words.”
“It’s not your fault,” Sakura assures him. “He manipulated both of us.”
Ikeda crosses his arms over his chest with a heavy sigh. “That he did, and now I understand why Nakamura-san was so upset with me,” he mutters. “But you know what, Sakura? There are still plenty of matches ahead of us.” He looks at her, giving her an encouraging smile, one that she always wished her dad would give her.
“Thank you, Coach,” she says, smiling back at him. “I’ll keep working hard to earn that spot on the team.”
🌸ðŸƒ
Stepping outside Coach Ikeda’s house, Sakura watches the sun begin its slow descent towards the horizon, casting long shadows across the snow-covered pavement. It’s been a long and eventful day, but it’s still not over yet.
She reaches into the pocket of her coat and takes out her phone. Now that she knows everything, there’s only one thing left for her to do.
“It’s never too late to tell someone you love them ,” she whispers to herself as she stares at Kazuha’s contact on her phone.
She hits the call button and listens to the monotonous beeps.
“Please pick up. Please pick up,” she repeats under her breath, hastening her steps despite having no clear destination in mind.
“Sakura? “
When she finally hears Kazuha’s soft, confused voice, her heart leaps to her throat and she stops in the middle of the pavement, almost stumbling over her own feet.
“Haacchan…” A muffled sob escapes her lips.
“Sakura? What happened? Are you okay? Please talk to me.“
She chuckles, sniffling. “I’m fine. Sorry, I just really missed your voice.”
There’s a momentary pause that stretches into eternity for Sakura but then Kazuha says, “I really missed yours, too.“
Sakura exhales and wipes her cheek. “Is it okay if we meet? There’s something important I need to tell you.”
“Sakura…” Kazuha’s voice slowly fades, and Sakura can hear noises in the background but can’t pinpoint their origin. “I’m flying to the States today.“
Sakura swallows, and her knees suddenly feel weak. “W-when?”
“In three hours.“
“From Tokyo?” Sakura asks but her eyes have already begun frantically scanning her surroundings.
“Yeah.“
“See you at the airport then,” Sakura says and hangs up.
It’s now or never, she thinks as she hails an approaching taxi.
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