"It's yours, Luigi.." Philip said to me, as he raised his voice in a manner that almost made me nervous. I jumped to smash in the ball, immediately my feet were off the ground, I was pushed out of the way. The coach immediately called off the match.."why did you do that?"  I heard the coach say in a low and calm voice..as I was still down. When I looked up, I saw it was Johnny who pushed me out of the way. I was expecting the coach to yell at him but he just didn't, I could only hear him ask Johnny, " What did you do that for..". I would have gone home so I would report Jonny to principal after the weekend, but the rage I had in me just couldn't wait to follow that protocol. All I could think of was payback. Philip helped me up from the ground. The coach didn't even bother to check on me. Immediately I got up, I took the ball from where it was, and I thought to myself, "since he stopped me from getting the ball inside the net, how about I make his left eye my new target..". The coach was still talking to Johnny as I placed the ball about 5 meters away from where they were standing, and boom! I struck the ball with my foot, I've always been a left footer, that was why I used my left foot..it was definitely stronger than the right foot. I also thought it would cause a lot more damage to his eye if I used the left. On striking the ball, it was like I had a remote that was connected to it or something, cause I have never had such an accurate shot in my entire life.. even up till today. I guess it was because it was driven by anger and bitterness. "Jeez! Who just struck Johnny with the ball.." The coach screamed, as I covered my ears. Johnny was still on the ground, crying and rolling on the floor as he held his left eye tightly. Everyone on the field pointed towards me " He did it!" they chorused. "You!" The coach said, as he was so furious, he walked slowly towards me, I felt like I was standing in the way of a running elephant. I used "elephant" metaphorically, but in the true sense of it, he was not so different from an angry elephant to me, I mean he was extremely chubby and compared to me as a kid, what else would you call him? I wonder why I didn't notice all those things at first until I saw his ass-kissing side.., and I also wondered why he was made our coach, he didn't have an atom of fitness in him. I realized all his flaws at the second he kicked me out from the team. I could tell that everyone on that field wanted me to leave as I had never been useful to them in the past and was definitely not going to be of use to them in the future.

                 The coach didn't even shout at Johnny when he pushed me away for doing nothing to him, and there he was chasing me out of the squad for taking revenge...is that even fair? Maybe it was because Johnny was a better play than I was or because Johnny's parents were rich, well.. not that rich, they were more like a middle class family and the coach could really use their financial support. Johnny was still in severe pain, I was already out of the team, the coach had already taken I and Johnny to the clinic outside the school...I was not injured, but still the coach brought me to the clinic with Johnny so he could call both our parents to meet up with him at the clinic and pick us up.

                  The coach called for my patents, Johnny's too, our parents both arrived at almost the same time at the clinic, my patents would have arrived earlier than Johnny's parents if only they had a car, because our house was closer to the clinic.

"Sebastiano! What did you do this time?", my mother said to me -raising her voice (angrily) at me, as she pulled my ear and dragged me towards herself. " leave him alone, aspetta fino a quando non lo confermi" He said to my mom and told her to wait until she has confirmed what happened before taking actions.

"Johnny! Johnny! Johnny, where is my son," Johnny's mom screamed passed our eyes as she couldn't wait to see her son, while she was already running into the clinic. Johnny's dad stood outside the clinic just like I and my parents, but was standing a few steps away from us. Johnny's father, Mr. Francis, he was a very influential man in the neighborhood. He was a lawyer and all he needed to do was to pull a little string and my father would pay for the so called "Crime" I committed.

   "You are Italian, right? I don't care if you can understand English or not, But you better pray nothing happens to my son, if he should lose his sight from what your brat of a son did to him..., I promise you I will make your entire family sleeps in jail for the rest of your life. At least I would do you a favor. You can consider it as a vacation from that," rat hole" you call a house.

My father stood and listen to the pile of rubbish Johnny's father vomited on him.

My eyes fell down to my feet as I felt so guilty for dragging my poor parents into that kind of situation with people of such status... I mean, my parents had nothing to back me up even when they believed I couldn't just do something like that to another kid unless I had the course to.

"I might live with my family in a *Rat hole* like you just called it... (he said, as he made some gestures while he mentioned -Rat hole- in order to show that he was only quoting what Mr. Francis said)

But at least I still haven't lost my respect...

sciocco spudorato, non puoi rispettare gli altri e vuoi che ti rispettino (He added in Italian: shameless fool, you can't respect others and you want them to respect you)..my dad responded to him.

               I regretted what I did to Johnny, not because he didn't deserve what happened, but because I had to drag my parents into it.

Johnny's dad: "You're are the shameless one, You allowed your son to get involved in such a situation when you know pretty well that you just have don't have...

Dad:" If this is how you raised your son as a father, I would prefer mine to be an orphan.

Luckily for me, I wasn't expelled from school, I was only kicked out of the junior soccer team.

"your son is to be blamed for everything, how can he just go after another kid without having a course to, he is so violent, that must be the reason other players in the team hate him so much," that was what the coach told my father.

"father, believe me he started it, he attacked me first," (I said to counter what the coach was saying in Italian). my father is half American and half Italian. my mom was a full Italian woman. but she still understands and speak English.

 ".                           ," ("I know, son,") my father replied in Italian. 

".                                                                  ,"

(This fool has been bought with money)

 He added as he ignored what the coach was saying and went to sit on the bench in front of the clinic. The coach still stood confused where he was talking to my dad, because he had no idea of what we were talking about.

(I rather be poor and remain in possession of my brains than be rich and senseless)

. my dad said to my mom as he spat on the floor in anger.

       We waited at the clinic until Johnny's eye was attended to and he was already coming out with his mother.

"I hope you know that you are going to handle the bills?" Johnny's mom said to mom as she walked towards the car with her husband and Johnny.  They drove off without paying a dime and left us to pay for the treatment.. even though they had more than enough money to pay for the treatment. Luckily for us, dad had some money with him, which he then used for the payment. After that, we went back, my parents were mad at me, they never said a word to me while we were on our way home. We got home and found out that there was nothing to put on the table for dinner, and my father had used all the money he made for that day for Johnny's bills. It was no big deal to us, including i as a kid, that was not the first time we had to go to bed hungry and it was not the last.

   my parents were angry at me only for a few hours after they scolded me and made me promise never to get involved in that kind of situation ever again. I went to school after that day just to learn, but I knew I was done with football as long as that school was concerned. I met johnny in class, looking at him with his left eye all covered in bandage, I thought he was all done for it, until he told me he got me kicked out of the off the team. Now I really wonder why a kid like Johnny would be that selfish and greedy just for the sake of football. And another thing is I can't seem to wrap my head around is why he was after me, I understood that he wanted to eliminate every competition or anything that seemed like it. If he wanted the spotlight so badly, why didn't he go for Philip? After all, Philip was the one with the amazing record that no one could beat.

           There must be something that drives his rage towards me.., maybe it's all because of my status in the society, maybe it was because my family was poor and he didn't want to play on the same field with someone that doesn't belong to his class.