It’s the soccer try outs of 2025 and I’m going to make my mark in history today. I have my boots that are patched together from other worse off boots. My training kit was once white but now an even brown. And my hair which is mated and coarse has been completely shaved off. I look like a monk on welfare but within me there’s a lion, a roaring beast who wants to conquer.

  I’ve heard stories about the coach. Some say he lost his penis to a bullet back in 06 and that’s why he walks like a crab. Others say he used to be a married man but his wife eloped with their house help who was a woman. Which just seconds the rumor that he’d lost his penis because why else would a woman leave you for another woman? Others say he was the best footballer of his generation before he got shot in the dick, but to me, he is my ticket out of poverty for today the try outs begin, and there will be scouts on the lookout for promising talent.

  I made my way to the soccer stadium before the first cock crowed and found myself having to maneuver my way through throngs of promising footballers who resembled me in one way or another but none of them had the lion within them and I could see this because their eyes could tell, they did not look hungry for more, more than all life had to give.

  The coach was nowhere to be seen but I figured he was busy with coach business and we all resorted to waiting. As time etched by more promising young soccer players continued to stream in but the coach was nowhere to be seen. We waited for the better part of three hours until a rudy young man with a mustache resembling public hair offered the solution of going to the coach’s place to rouse him. All of us decided to go to the coach’s place because we believed the act of rousing him might earn us his good favor and that would guarantee us the change we so needed in our lives.

  So off we went, roughly one thousand young men, all crowding the road as we trailed in a steady stream to the coach’s aboard. We found his gate locked but it was a wooden gate so we just tore it off its hinges. Looking back, I think this was the first mistake we made. We knocked on his door, knocked so much he didn’t answer until one of us came up with the idea to break into his house. And this was the second mistake we made. So all of us, eager and filled with dreams of grand aspiration, brought down the coach’s door.

  That’s when he started shooting. The coach apparently had a gun and believed that we were out to get him in some way. He fired three shots above our heads and everybody went down. Then he jumped through the window and made a run for it, gun in his hand, he would look back and fire shots above our heads (He wasn’t a good shot) then he’d keep running.

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  We had no option but to chase him, and this was the third mistake we made. All of us, numbering to a thousand. Ran after the coach while screaming that we’d only come for him so he’d lead us to the glory we so desperately desired. We gave chase, only pausing to lower ourselves when the bullets flew over our heads. Those closest to him in the chase tried to explain to him why we’d come to his place but the man wouldn’t hear of it. He only wore pink underpants with heart shapes all over it and a vest that was once white but now was indigo and he kept on saying. “What the fuck! What the fuck!”

  Soon others joined our chase for the coach. Local men wielding iron bars and wooden planks and one even had an iron nail in his grasp. The number of people who chased the coach soon doubled and it seemed the whole town was after him. He was caught trying to bridge a canal. Those who’d joined the chase had no idea why we chased him and therefore presumed he was a criminal of some kind because of the gun.

  Things took a drastic turn, instead of the coach taking us to glory, he was lynched by the mob. They beat him with stones first, slathered him nice and bloody before putting a tire around him and setting him alight. We watched as he lay there senseless, unable even to thrash due to weakness as the flames engulfed him.

  Those of us who wanted the coach to lead us to glory could only watch in horror, too afraid to intervene, too dumbfounded to do anything rather than stare.

  We trembled as we strode our way back to the football stadium leaving the coach’s mangled corpse behind. None of us said a word. We hoped we’d get there and explain to the scouts what had happened so maybe they’d carry out the try outs without the recently deceased coach. But on arrival at the stadium we found the coach waiting there, mad as a bull, practically fuming at the nose. He asked us where we’d been and he berated us on matters of tardiness. All we could do was just stare at him, mouths gaping with confusion.

  It’s only later that we were able to piece things together. The coach had an identical brother who served in the army. When we went to the coach’s place said brother had visited the previous night and our arrival sent him into a panic that resulted in a mad chase and an untimely death.

  None of us said a word to the coach. He carried out the try outs, wondering why everyone’s game was off. Later the police interrupted the try outs to talk to him and then things got quite aggrieved.

  The coach cried and cursed us. Called us bastards with whores for mothers for killing his brother. It’s safe to say the try outs brought more suffering than glory. None of us were picked by the scouts and the coach resigned and swore he’d kill all of us. It was then that I decided it’s better to be a writer

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