Simon Lelic - A Thousand Cuts

Me and Don, we were in the team. The first team. Don was up front. He was captain. I play midfield. Terence is the coach. He calls himself the coach – no, that’s not right, what he calls himself is the manager – but he does fuck-all coaching if you ask me, and fuck-all managing come to that. What he does is he makes the first team play the second team and he makes one player from the first team sit on the bench so that he can take his place. So Terence’ll be in defence for five minutes while the defender’s off the field, and then he’ll swap with a midfielder while the midfielder takes a rest, and then he’ll swap with a striker. Mainly he swaps with the strikers. He never goes in goal. There’s never anything to do in goal cos the second team are shite. There’s no point playing em really. We usually win like eleven-nil. Our record is twenty-four-nil. This was in a sixty-minute game. Ask Terence if you don’t believe me. He’s always going on about it cos he got a double hat-trick.

Anyway, teachers against the first team. Terence loves it but when it comes to getting a team together he always starts bitching, saying it’s hardly fucking fair, what the fuck am I supposed to do with this rabble, I’ve barely got enough for eleven. Basically, the only teachers who are halfway decent are Grunt and Jesus Roth. And Bickle always refs so that’s one less for Terence to choose from, not that Bickle’d be any good, I mean he’d probably have a colonary. So apart from Grunt and Roth there’s Terence and Boardman, although Boardman’s older than Bickle, and Daniels, he teaches physics right, which just about says it all, and there’s… oh fuck , I dunno. The point is there’s hardly anyone.

So Terence is getting desperate, right? I mean, he’s already drafted in the caretaker and the guy who sorts out the DVDs. Mr Pressplay we call him. But he still needs a keeper, right, just someone to stand between the posts.

Wow. That must be why you’re a detective. You’re like frigging Columbo. Or that bird, ha, yeah, that old biddy who goes around solving murders. Only she was better looking.

Fuck knows how he managed to convince him. Maybe he didn’t convince him. Maybe he, I dunno. Made him an offer he couldn’t refuse. Whatever. I just remember we’re all on the field and it’s pissing down and it’s fucking freezing and we’re like, what the fuck are we doing out here? And Don, right, he goes, fuck this lads, I ain’t losing a testicle just so Terence has something else to do but sit at home and play with his. And he starts walking off and the rest of us, we follow. There’s a crowd along the touchline, all with umbrellas and that, and the rest of the school’s inside, all toasty and smug, watching out through the classroom windows. And everyone starts pointing and someone starts booing and Bickle, he’s doing lunges in the centre circle, he stops and he puts his hands on his hips and then he’s digging in his pocket for his whistle. He blows. He shouts, he goes, you boys, where the blazes do you think you’re going, and Don, he shouts back, he goes, the library, sir, and, just a little bit quieter, where do you fucking think? And we’re all looking at Bickle, wondering what he’s gonna do after that. But it turns out he doesn’t need to do anything cos that’s when Manchester United come running out on to the pitch.

They’re wearing the strip. All of em. Not just the shirt, I don’t mean just the shirt. They were wearing the full kit: black socks, white shorts, red top. And Terence, he’s got on green boots. Green ones. Such a cock.

We stop. I mean, us lot, we’ve got the school kit on, which is blue and white stripes, like Wigan or, I dunno, like Brighton. Cept it’s all faded and torn and it stinks of vegetables even when it’s just been washed. We’ve been going on at Terence that we need a new kit and he’s always like, you’ll get a new kit when you deserve a new kit. And here’s him poncing about in a kit so fresh off the boat from India or wherever it’s made that you can practically smell the curry.

It would of been annoying if the lot of em didn’t look so fucking ridiculous.

Check it out, goes Don and he’s pointing at Terence and Roth. It’s the Neville brothers! Which one are you, Terence?

And Terence, he checks Bickle isn’t looking and he grins at Don and slips him the bird. Then he turns around and points with his thumb at his back. He’s wearing number seven and he’s got Beckham across his shoulders. Which is funny enough, right, but then Roth turns around and he’s wearing a Beckham shirt too. And Boardman is. And Grunt is. And Mr Pressplay is. All of em are. And this is just too much.

They couldn’t agree. I found this out later. Terence wanted to be Beckham but so did Boardman. Then Roth, he decides he wants to be Beckham too. And Terence goes, I’m captain so I have to be Beckham, it’s obvious. And Boardman goes, maybe if Beckham were still playing for United but he isn’t. If you’re captain then you have to be Gary Neville. And Terence is like, fuck that, there’s no way I’m being Gary Neville. So in the end they order ten identical shirts and all of em get to pretend they’re shagging Posh.

But it gets better. Bumfluff, he can’t be David Beckham, can he? Bumfluff is playing in goal, which means he gets a costume all of his own.

We hear the cheer before we see him. By this time we’re all lined up again cos we’re obviously gonna play em now, I mean they look ridiculous already but we also wanna make em look stupid, right? So we’re ready and Terence’s lot are ready and Bickle’s ready and the only thing missing is Peter Schmeichel. And Terence is looking around, he’s like, where the fuck is he, and then we hear this clapping on the sidelines, just quiet at first, down at one end. But then some of the kids pull back and Bumfluff appears and by the time he steps on to the pitch even the teachers are applauding and hollering and whistling, you know like workmen whistle when they see a decent rack.

You know those big foam hands those dickhead Americans wear when they go and watch baseball? Imagine Bumfluff in two of them: at the end of his scrawny arms, his goalie gloves look like that. And his shorts, they’re bright yellow and so baggy you could of got two of him standing in each leg. Although you can only really see the bottoms of em cos the rest is somewhere under his shirt, which is yellow too but sort of splattered with black. It’s like he’s wearing a bumblebee outfit his mum’s made him but she’s got the measurements all wrong. And maybe he’s having trouble walking in it and that’s why he’s fifty yards behind the rest of em. Or maybe he just wanted to make an entrance. Maybe he wanted to make sure that everyone’s eyes would be on him.

I grin at Don and Don grins at me. We don’t say anything. We don’t need to. But right then: that’s when we decide.

Bickle blows and Terence kicks off. He knocks it to Roth and Roth knocks it back and Terence launches one straight at the goal. It’s a crap shot. The ball doesn’t even reach the keeper. So now we’ve got it and Scott, he plays in defence, he passes it to me and Terence is behind me but I do this little turn, like this, like imagine the ball’s here, right, I do this, and Terence is left standing there and I knock the ball out wide. Micky plays on the right, he’s well quick, he picks up the ball and he knocks it on and he’s legging it down the wing and he’s past Mr Pressplay and he whips in this cross and Don gets a head to it but he puts it inches wide. Bumfluff, he’s just standing there. He has no idea what’s going on. Terence is shouting at him, telling him to watch his back fucking post, and Bumfluff looks at the goalpost like he’s only just noticed it’s there. And while Terence and Boardman are arguing about who’s gonna take the goal kick, Don goes over to Bumfluff. He says, nice outfit, Mr Shite cough ski sir. Did you choose the colour yourself? And Bumfluff sort of looks down at what he’s wearing like, what, what’s wrong with luminous yellow, and while he’s doing that Don brushes past him and lands his studs on Bumfluff’s toes.