I don't know what country you're reading this from, but I'm convinced every family on Earth has that aunt. I know mine did.
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Ryan closed his bedroom door, the latch clicking with a finality that shut out the day's noise. The chaotic hum of everything—his mom's voice, his friends' chatter, the teacher's droning—all of it faded into a dull buzz in his skull. He dropped his school bag with a thud by the door and fell backward onto his bed, sinking into the familiar springs.
Silence.
He lay there for a few minutes, eyes closed, basking in the quiet dark. His mind was blissfully, perfectly empty. No noise. No memories. Just static.
Then, with a sigh of pure resignation, he pushed himself up. His brief break of playing dead was over.
He walked to his desk and slumped into the chair, the old wood groaning in protest. The laptop whirred to life, its fan a tiny, frantic sound in the quiet room.
"Alright, you exploitative company," he muttered, cracking his knuckles. "Time for a background check."
"Okay, second game's out," he reasoned, patting his laptop's worn casing. "This fossil might have been around since the dinosaurs, but I'm pretty sure it can't Google the future. Right, big boy? One disaster at a time."
The memory of Makélélé robbing him played in his head like a bad highlight reel. He made a tsk sound, his expression sour. "Yeah, so this was before that fucker left for Chelsea." A quick search confirmed the transfer was 2003. "Before 2003 it is. Great."
He leaned back, not even needing to search this time. "And Zizou was there from 2001... so that leaves just two glorious seasons to choose from. Fan-fucking-tastic."
He pulled up the two kits side-by-side. His eyes locked onto the 02/03 jersey. "Yeah, that's the one. That Siemens logo...".
He stared at it for a few seconds, his lip curling slightly as the memory stung behind his eyes. "Yeah. Still ugly as fuck."
"Okay, 02/03. Let's see whose body I hijacked." He pulled up the full fixture list for that season. His eyes scanned the list of Real Madrid's opponents at the Bernabéu. "Sure as hell wasn't Barca... wasn't Valencia, I'd spot Benitez's fat ass from a mile away... not Atlético..."
His scrolling was a rapid-fire dismissal of every team whose badge was burned into his brain from years of playing FIFA. Finally, his scrolling slowed. Only two names were left that he couldn't visually place: Recreativo Huelva and Racing de Santander. One of them was his.
He opened the image results for Recreativo Huelva's crest. The vertical blue and white stripes loaded onto the screen. A slow, grim smile spread across his face.
"Yeah. Recreativo."
He navigated to the squad list for that season, his eyes scanning the names until one jumped out: Emilio. He clicked it. A team photo loaded, and he zeroed in on the player.
"That's the face that brought joy to tens of thousands of fans in the Bernabéu," he muttered. "I made you a cult hero, brother. Bet none of them are forgetting that face."
He paused, leaning back slightly.
"But that was in my match… let's see what the REAL score was back then."
His eyes, almost against his will, drifted from Emilio's face to the recorded score of the match.
Real Madrid 4 - 2 Recreativo Huelva
He stared. The number 4, then the number 2. He refreshed the page. It didn't change.
Ryan simply shook his head, a faint, humorless smile on his face. "Tsk, tsk. Real sure went easy on them, didn't they?" He snapped the laptop shut, stood up, and stretched with a groan.
"Well, 2 + 4 is still 6. At least the math is mathing, I guess."
He wandered out of his room and into the kitchen where his mother and younger sister, Leila, were setting the table.
"Yo, what's for dinner?" he asked, leaning against the doorframe.
"Pizza!" Leila announced proudly. "I helped mom make it."
Ryan sniffed the air exaggeratedly. "I don't smell anything disgusting. You sure you helped and didn't just stand there?"
A potholder flew across the kitchen, missing his head by an inch. He didn't even flinch.
"Yeah," he said, a grin spreading across his face. "You're not only a liar, but also cross-eyed. Noted."
"Ryan, be nice to your sister," his mother said without looking up from the stove.
He walked over to her, his tone shifting to mock-seriousness. "Mom, I think the evil eye got me. Seriously. Can you, you know... do that thing with the seven circles and the salt? Just... encase me in a spiritual force field real quick."
( Note : This thing is legit my mom used to do it i don't know if it work )
His mother turned, giving him a look that was equal parts amusement and exasperation. "What nonsense are you talking now? The only evil eye here is the one you're giving your sister."
"Yeah, but I got a really weird nightmare yesterday," Ryan replied, completely deadpan. "As a mother, it's your job to chase them away."
His mother barely looked up from the pizza she was slicing. "Yeah? What kind of nightmare? I can ask your aunt, you know she can decipher dreams really well."
Ryan looked up at the ceiling, his eyes going distant. "Hmmm, let me think... I was trapped in this... huge, noisy cage. And there was this group wearing ugly white uniforms. They moved in a cycle, just passing this... thing around me. Then another group, in green, they kept shouting at me, throwing stuff, demanding I catch it." He finished with a theatrical shudder. "Yeah. It was scary."
He expected an eye-roll. Instead, his mother's face went pale. She put the knife down with a clatter. "Leila," she said, her voice tight with sudden urgency. "Watch the pizza. Don't let it burn. I need to call your aunt. Right now."
Before either of them could react, she was wiping her hands on her apron and hurrying out of the kitchen, already pulling her phone from her pocket.
Ryan and Leila stared at the empty doorway. The only sound was the faint sizzle of the pizza in the oven.
Leila turned to him, her eyes wide. "They're going to talk for hours. What if the dinner gets burned?"
Ryan looked from his panicked sister to the oven, a slow, opportunistic grin spreading across his face.
"Didn't you say you helped?" he said, striding toward the oven. "Come on then, little sis. Show me. Seeing is believing."
A little while later, the family was at the dinner table—or most of it was. Ryan's father took a bite of the pizza, a satisfying crunch echoing in the room. "Mmm, this is perfectly crispy! Just how I like it."
Leila immediately sat up straighter, a proud smile on her face. "I helped!"
From across the table, Ryan rolled his eyes so hard he was surprised they didn't fall out. "The only thing she helped with is eating. She ate half of it in the kitchen."
"He's lying!" Leila protested, turning to her father with wide, innocent eyes. "I only ate one slice!"
Ryan gave a dry, knowing smirk. "You mean you left one. Not the other way around."
Their father waved a dismissive hand, already serving another slice onto Leila's plate. "I work hard so my baby can eat. Don't worry, here, have some more."
Ryan stared in disbelief at the blatant favoritism. "Urgh, I'm gonna look for Mom," he grumbled, pushing his chair back. He couldn't resist adding, shooting a look at his sister, "Yeah, yeah. With her eating habits, you'll be the baby very soon."
He left the dining room, the sound of his father assuring Leila, "You're not fat, don't listen to him!" fading behind him. He found his mother in the living room, just hanging up the phone.
"Mom, come on. Your pizza is getting cold."
"Yeah, okay," she said, following him back toward the dining room. She lowered her voice. "Your aunt said those are very bad dreams. A very bad omen."
Ryan nodded, his face a mask of serious understanding. "Yeah," he said, completely deadpan. "It sure felt bad."
"But don't worry," she whispered as they reached the table. "She gave me a few suggestions."
Ryan just nodded again, sliding back into his chair. "Yeah," he said, picking up his slice. "Let's finish dinner first."
Later that night, Ryan was in his room when his mother came in, looking solemn. Without a word, she slid a large kitchen knife under his pillow.
"Don't remove it," she instructed firmly. "Your aunt said so. You know how she is... blessed in these areas." She gave his shoulder a reassuring pat. "There. Now you can sleep in peace."
As she left the room, Ryan stared at the lump in his pillow.
"Well," he muttered to himself. "From punching to a knife. This is sure escalating."
He lay down, carefully avoiding the impromptu weapon beneath his head. As he closed his eyes, a final, weary thought crossed his mind before sleep took him.
"Well, dear aunt... it's in your hands now."