Chapter 45

3 days ago.

Barracuda by Heart was playing in his ear buds as he ran as fast as his legs allowed, trying to drain out all those feelings, but he couldn't. His subconscious was doing its best to remind him falling in love was stupid. And there he was, acting the part. The scene kept playing in his mind time and time again. That guy kissed her. She allowed him.

«Who is that?» The question rumbled in his head for the thousandth time. The same question he had been asking himself the past 12 hours.

It was only six am and Dominik did his typical warm up before practice. Unable to comprehend how Samanta could turn his world upside down. He always procured keeping a distance from the women he dated. At that moment in his life, he could not afford to waste his time in relationships, emotional conflicts, let alone thinking about a girl who had a boyfriend already, or, at least, so he thought seeing how this guy smooched her outside her house.

«Alan». He remembered the name. «Darn! Who the heck is he?». He shook his head, trying to shake that feeling out of his head. He could not waste any more energy trying to understand this matter.

Ewald Metzler signaled him to stop running and come closer, but Dominik decided to take two more laps around the stadium. He never did what he was asked.

During that whole morning, he was focused on his practice.

At noon, after an abundant lunch, le Germany team headed for their next destination, the San Jose International Airport.

Staying at the beautiful city of Santa Clara was an amazing experience. The team would have 3 days to recover and leisure. When Dominik was not thinking of Samanta, he would be practicing or taking long strolls with Rodríguez, one of his closest mates, and Friedrich, with the sole intention of keeping Dominik under his radar, or so thought Dominik.

Deep down, Treadaway's real objective was to not leave him alone with the defense, he had heard the rumors about his preference for the company of men. If Friedrich kept one young Latina from getting in between him and Dominik, he was not about to allow a Costa Rican turned German do it. But his efforts for keeping Dominik away from any person with a romantic motive were in vain. During one of his many strolls down the Californian city, Dom met his former girlfriend, Dihanna. And social media collapsed shortly after, guessing whether they were back together, but this was just old friends having lunch.

*****

The game of the very much expected game arrived. Only three points were keeping them from the next round, although they were already on the elimination rounds, Ewald wanted to make sure the Germany team were leaders of group A, that would give them the opportunity to face the second place in group B, Uruguay. Otherwise, if they lost, they'd be second place of their group and face the leader of group B, Spain. Going against Uruguay, rather than Spain was more a matter of comfort, not to underestimate the South American team, but, facing Spain meant defying one of the other favorite squads to win the World Cup, besides "La Roja" had had an amazing season as well, being a strong competitor also during the European championship.

Dominik owned an innate gift for soccer. As soon as he set foot on the playing field, he forgot everything that took his calmness, his brain worked to remember the moves they had practiced, the strategies Ewald had come up with and synch with all the movements his team mates did.

Cameroon turned out to be a tough contestant, that made them suffer in four chances, with clear shots to score, but Ahren Degener, German goal keeper, played his part, becoming an impenetrable wall. “The wall from Berlin” said the commentators.

The first half had been ruled by the African squad, facing a German team focused on defense. Metzler was very clear to point out they had to wear the Africans out, they had remarkable endurance, and so they did.

Once the second half started, the Germans begun their strategic offense, weakening the opponent's defense. The first goal came in 72 minutes into the game, placing Germany as leaders of group A. Then a second and third goal came in. By the final seven minutes of the game, the Germans were rather relaxed once again.

The joy that came over Dominik was so great he even forgot what had happened in LA right before he had come to Santa Clara. He was ecstatic, he needed to share his happiness with somebody. With Samanta. So he took a moment to sneak away from the celebration going on in the German dressing room to go call Sam. He had to tell her. Tell her he was even closer to achieving his dream.

Nerves took their toll on Dominik, that was a very strange feeling, It was very rare in him. He waited a couple seconds until that voice finally answered, making him forget all the discomfort he had been going through the past four days.

“Yes, Dominik. I forgive” said Samanta When she answered. “I love the dress. How did you know I love Amaretto? 8 sounds great. Are you picking me up?” She was very excited.

“What? What are you talking about?” Dominik took the phone off his ear, frowning. «Forgive what?» he wondered.

“Oh, please! Don't play dumb. I just received your package, it's beautiful. Really, you shouldn't have.”

“Wait a minute, Samanta.  I don’t know what the heck you are talking about. What package? I just called to say hi, ask how you are doing.”

“Bu…but, it says here: “Forgive me, give me a chance blah blah blah”. It wasn't you?”

“No” Dominik started losing his temper, guessing who could have sent that package. Anger took over Dom, remembering that guy kissing her with her consent.

“Then, who…”

“Must have been that guy kissing you outside your house the other night” he could not escape the tone of a child throwing a hissy fit.

Without another word, he hung up. He felt like the stupidest of all the men in the world.

Who was he kidding? Every time he tried to get near her, something worse happened. It was like destiny was trying to keep them apart. SIF he was trying to spread his joy with that call, he got the exact opposite.

He joined his team mates in celebration, but it only took ten minutes for him to get his fill of happy faces while he was feeling so blue, he decided to retreat to the hotel, claiming he had a terrible headache.

He lied. Also unusual in him.

Once again, feeling surprised of the negative influence Samanta had in him.

*****

The next day was very frustrating for Dominik, who had to put on a smiling face for the new Pepsi ad, which he starred in with two other team mates. He had to look his best in front of the camera, it was in his contract.

The commercial feature was shot on a beautiful beach in Santa Clara, specifically, the California Spa, and it consisted of beach soccer players defying the star footballers, who lost, not having had a refreshing drink of the famous brand.

By the end of the morning, Dominik and his mates joined the rest of the team for practice. Dom tried to concentrate as best as he could, but it was a challenge, Samanta kept popping up in his thoughts, interrupting them.

That afternoon, as he was about to take a shower after a long practice, he received a phone call. He rushed to answer it, thinking maybe it was Samanta, but his disappointment was such when he realized this was… his sister. Not that he didn't want to talk to Karol, he loved his sister. However, he was very illusioned in speaking with the woman who stole his calm. He needed to see her, talk to her…

“Little brother” his older sister's lovely voice put a smile on his face.

“Karol” greeted Dominik. “How are you?”

“Drained! I just came back in town and I thought I should let you know so we can go have lunch together, but I was kind of hesitant, I don't know If you could sneak out for a while?…”

“Oh, great! I am staying at the Hilton Santa Clara, if you want…”

“Santa Clara? I thought you were in Los Angeles. I'm in LA.”

“I was there, until recently. We had to come here for the third game.”

“What a pity! I was hoping, maybe I could get to see you for at least a couple minutes. This congress lasts 2 days and then I must go back to Germany for two weeks. I'm going to Asia and part of Africa.”

Karol Weigand, was a journalist and she was working on this article about early childhood in under developed countries. For the past year, she had been visiting different countries all around the world. She made a brief stop in the United States, to attend a UNICEF congress. She wanted to see her little brother, they hadn't met in a year.

Dominik noticed his sister's disappointment being unable to meet with him, and, in a matter of seconds, a crazy idea came to mind. This was the perfect excuse to go back to LA.

He looked at the clock on the wall, it was 4pm. If he hurried, he could catch the 5pm flight and be in La before 7. He could have dinner with Karol and before going back to Santa Clara, he could stop by the coffee shop, see Samanta and his heart could get some peace. He would be back in time for the 2pm practice. It was perfect.

“Karol? I'll see you at nine o'clock.”

“But you said…”

“I know what I said, I'll be there. I promise.”

They hung up and he rushed to put together a bag with what he needed for a day.

His specialty was sneaking out from highly guarded places, the Hilton Santa Clara wouldn't be the exception.

At 5:23 pm, flight 0520 of American Airlines took off from the International San Jose airport, heading for the LAX airport in Los Angeles. If everything went as planned, neither Ewald nor Friedrich would notice his absence.