She Taught Me

The first time I saw Cici, she was standing at the edge of the soccer field wearing bright yellow rain boots.

Rain boots. To soccer practice.

I'm Jordan, and I'm eight years old, and I've been playing soccer since I was practically a baby. Well, since I was five, but that feels like practically a baby. I know how to dribble with both feet. I can do a throw-in without losing my balance. Coach Hernandez says I have "excellent field awareness," which means I always know where the ball is going before it gets there.

So when Coach Hernandez said, "Everyone, this is Cici. She's six, and she'll be joining our team because the younger team is full," I wasn't exactly thrilled.

Cici had two poofy pigtails, a missing front tooth, and those ridiculous yellow rain boots. She waved at everyone with both hands, like she was trying to land an airplane.

"Hi! I've never played soccer before! Is it like tag?"

I looked at my friend Marcus. Marcus looked at me. We both looked at the sky.

This was going to be a long season.

At the first drill, Cici kicked the ball and it went sideways. Not sideways toward another player — sideways toward the parking lot. She chased it, laughing, her rain boots going squish-squash-squish-squash on the grass.

"Cici," Coach Hernandez said gently, "you might want to try wearing cleats next time."

"But these are my lucky boots!" Cici said. "I found a frog in them once."

I tried not to groan.

During the scrimmage, I passed the ball to Marcus, who passed it back to me, and I dribbled around two players and scored. Cici was standing near the goal, spinning in a circle, watching a ladybug on her finger.

"Cici, you're on defense!" I called.

"Oh!" She looked up. "What's defense?"

The next week, Cici showed up in actual soccer shoes. They were too big — probably her older cousin's — and she shuffled around like a penguin. But she tried. She really tried.

She kicked the ball and fell down. She got up.

She kicked the ball the wrong way. She turned around and chased it.

She tried to head the ball and missed completely, and it bonked her shoulder. She just laughed and said, "Almost!"

Here's the thing about Cici that drove me absolutely crazy: nothing bothered her. When she messed up, she didn't get upset. She didn't stomp her foot or blame someone else. She just tried again. With that goofy gap-toothed smile.

It was annoying.

Because I got upset when I messed up. I stomped my foot when my shots went wide. And I'd been playing for three whole years.

A few weeks later, something happened.

We had a game against the Westbrook Wolves, and they were good. Their players were fast and tall, and they passed the ball so smoothly it looked like they were reading each other's minds.

By halftime, we were losing four to nothing.

I sat on the bench with my head in my hands. "We can't beat them," I muttered. "They're too good."

Marcus nodded, looking miserable. A couple of the other kids were pulling at the grass, not talking.

Then I heard a small voice.

"So what if they're good?"

I looked up. It was Cici. She was sitting cross-legged on the ground, retying her too-big shoes for the hundredth time.

"We're losing by four," I said. "Did you even notice?"

"Yeah," she said. "So we need five goals. That's like..." She counted on her fingers. "Five!"

"That's not how it—" I started.

"When I started, I couldn't even kick the ball forward," Cici said. "Remember? It went to the parking lot."

"I remember."

"Now I can kick it forward AND a little bit to the left!" She beamed like this was the greatest achievement in the history of the world.

I stared at her. "Cici, that's not really—"

"So I got better by trying," she continued, completely ignoring me. "So let's just try. What's the worst thing? We lose? We already lost at halftime in our brains. Might as well have fun."

She said it so simply. Like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

And something about the way she said it made the knot in my stomach loosen, just a little.

Marcus looked at me. I looked at Marcus. He shrugged.

"She's kind of got a point," he said.

The second half started, and something was different. Not because we were suddenly amazing — we weren't. But we were playing. Really playing. Not with our heads down, not with heavy feet, but actually trying like it still mattered.

I got the ball and dribbled up the field. A Wolves defender came at me, and instead of panicking, I faked left and cut right. The ball sailed into the net.

Four to one.

Our team erupted. Cici jumped up and down so hard one of her big shoes flew off. She didn't even stop to put it back on.

Marcus scored the next one off a corner kick. Four to two.

Then something nobody expected happened.

Cici got the ball.

She was near midfield, and for a second, everything seemed to freeze. Cici looked down at the ball. The ball sat there, waiting. A Wolves player charged toward her.

And Cici — little, goofy, rain-boot-wearing Cici — did the most incredible thing. She didn't panic. She didn't freeze. She just kicked the ball, simply and cleanly, right between the defender's legs. It rolled forward to Marcus, who was wide open.

Marcus took the shot. Goal. Four to three.

The crowd on our side went wild. Cici pumped her fist. "Did you SEE that?! It went through his LEGS!"

I was laughing. Actually laughing, in the middle of a game we were still losing.

We didn't win. The final score was four to three. But when that last whistle blew, our whole team was cheering like we'd won the World Cup. Because we'd played our best soccer in that second half. Because we hadn't quit. Because it had been fun.

After the game, I walked over to Cici. She had found a dandelion and was blowing the seeds off it.

"Hey, Cici."

"Hey, Jordan! Did you see my nutmeg? That's what it's called, right? When it goes through the legs? I watched a video about it!"

"Yeah," I said. "That was a great nutmeg."

I sat down next to her in the grass. The sun was going down, making everything gold and soft.

"Can I tell you something?" I said.

"Yeah!"

"I was kind of annoyed when you joined the team."

Cici nodded thoughtfully. "Was it the boots?"

I laughed. "It was a little bit the boots."

"That's okay," she said. "They were a weird choice."

I picked at the grass for a second. "I've been playing soccer for a long time, and I thought I knew everything about it. But today, at halftime..." I paused. "I think you might be better at the most important part than I am."

Cici tilted her head. "What's the most important part?"

I thought about it. About her laughing when she fell down. About her chasing the ball the wrong way and turning around without a single tear. About her saying might as well have fun like it was nothing.

"Not giving up," I said. "And remembering it's supposed to be fun."

Cici smiled her big gap-toothed smile and held up the dandelion stem. "Want to find another one? If you blow all the seeds off in one breath, you get a wish."

"That's not a real rule."

"It is if we say it is."

So we went looking for dandelions, our shadows stretching long across the soccer field, and I thought about how the person who taught me the most about soccer that season was a six-year-old girl in shoes that were two sizes too big.