The Game

I didn't fall in love as much as I tripped over my sneakers and then dove into it wholeheartedly, discovering the beauty. I loved the scent of the ball, the sweat creeping down my back, my dirty kneepads like shields, like medieval armor. The kneepads work with the net. The net is stretched out like a fence, protecting. Protecting me and my team, or protecting the other team, it doesn't matter. The net is a challenge; it guards the no-man's-land.
And then I feel it: the exhilaration of the ball coming down before me, the adrenaline pumping my fist into my opposite hand, crouching, rising, making contact, watching the ball continuing on when my arms have stopped. Its stripe pattern swirls dizzily as it gains height and as it drops, hopefully on the other side, hopefully where the net will obscure it from my gaze.
That's when it's beautiful. When the ball drops behind the challenge and the net's strings distort the stripes and the ball is wreathed, hidden, covered in mosaics, tiny off-white slivers of leather looking like they were broken apart and smashed and then glued back together. The ball keeps falling, and the mosaics shift, dancing and swirling.
When it hits the ground, I imagine what should happen. It should break, the shards should fall apart and explode everywhere, showering us all in glittering, glorious, leather mosaics. Except my team; except the people guarded by the net as it sways gently in the breeze of our hard breathing.