Beatrice stands at the mouth of the tunnel leading out to the football pitch, taking in the atmosphere of the half-packed stadium, breathing in the cool evening air, letting the expectant noise from the fans on the stands wash over her. She’s distracted from her contemplation as the other team lines up next to her, led by none other than their talismanic captain.

Ava Silva.

Beatrice looks over at Ava, who catches Beatrice’s eyes before her gaze travels down to the captain’s armband around Beatrice’s left arm.

“That armband looks good on you,” Ava comments lightly.

Beatrice glances at the approaching match officials before inclining her head towards Ava. “Likewise,” she returns with a small smile.

Ava favours her with a cheesy grin before turning to the officials and striking up a conversation with them. Beatrice shakes her head good-naturedly.

Beatrice met Ava when they were just twenty-one and nineteen years old, respectively, playing for a small club in Andalusia that was, at the time, newly promoted to Spain’s first division and fighting for a spot in the Champions League. That was almost a decade ago, two Euros and two World Cups have happened since then.

Now here they are, at an invitational tournament in southern Spain, preparing for the upcoming Euros which will be held in the same country in the summer. Now Beatrice is twenty-nine, Ava is twenty-eight, both of them captaining their respective national teams. It feels almost like they’ve come full circle.

Beatrice’s journey to getting the captain’s armband for her national team is as different from Ava’s as it is possible to be.

Ava is Portugal’s star player, their once-in-many-generations hero, akin to Brazil’s Marta or Australia’s Sam Kerr. She broke into Portugal’s senior national team as a teenager, was given the captaincy in her early twenties, and led the team to many near-impossible victories over bigger footballing nations.

Beatrice, on the other hand, played for England in her youth until circumstances prevented her from doing so. In her early twenties, she was able to switch to Switzerland for her senior national team career. She was often the captain in her club teams, but it wasn’t until two years ago that she was offered the captaincy for Switzerland. She almost refused--Switzerland isn’t her birth country and she wasn’t sure whether the Swiss fans would accept her as captain--but in the end, with the help of her loved ones, she decided to take it as an honour.

The announcement for the players’ entrance rings out across the stadium, pulling Beatrice out of her reverie. She follows the match officials towards the pitch, walking in-step next to Ava until they have to separate at the touch line so their teams can line up facing the west stand.

The national anthems are sung, Portugal’s first then Switzerland’s. After, Ava leads the Portuguese team to shake Beatrice’s and her teammates’ hands, then the teams separate to take the starting eleven photos.

And then it’s time for the coin toss.

Beatrice walks towards the halfway line where the match officials are waiting for the team captains. She meets Ava there, unable to help her smile at the wide grin Ava was sporting. They shake hands and exchange pennants, then listen to the referee recite the rules of the coin toss.

The mood--between Beatrice and Ava, among them and the officials, in the stadium around them--was light. Easy. For all that this match is a preparation for one of the biggest tournaments of their lives, the current tournament they’re playing in is still an invitational one. They’re playing a friendly match.

So Ava teases the Swedish referee, pretends to confuse Sweden and Switzerland, jokingly asks for the coin toss--which fell in Beatrice’s favour--to be redone. The match officials laugh with Ava. Beatrice pretends not to be amused by her antics.

Soon enough, the match kicks off.

Portugal plays a 4-3-3 formation with Ava as the false nine, playing at the hole just behind the centre forward position. It means that Beatrice, playing just in front of the defenders in Switzerland’s 4-1-3-2 formation, is the one tasked with guarding Ava.

Ava Silva is notoriously hard to guard. She’s slick, tricky, and--as one pundit once put it--seems to dance around defenders like a superpowered being with the ability to phase through solid objects, all the while with the ball at her feet.

Beatrice, however, has a not-so-secret advantage. All those years ago, in the club where they first met, Beatrice was Ava’s constant partner when practicing one-v-one’s. Of course, Ava’s technique has improved greatly since then, but Beatrice likes to think that she has kept up.

Ava ends up scoring, in the end. It starts off of a free kick, then Ava runs towards Switzerland’s box, receiving and passing the ball in one smooth motion, runs further inward, receives the ball again, turns, fakes a shot that sends a defender tumbling, then finally shoots the ball right at the upper corner of the goal, too far for the keeper to save.

There’s only so much you can do against an unstoppable force.

Fortunately, football is a team sport.

Beatrice is in her element as she directs her teammates, making sure the backline behind her remains organised, passing to an open teammate who can drive forward or pass to another teammate. Finally, she sees an opening; she switches play to one side, kicking the ball long, high, and accurate to a waiting winger, who crosses the ball into the box, to be headed into goal by their centre forward.

The game ends 1-1 at full time. Beatrice thinks it’s a fair reflection of both teams’ performances.

She shakes teammates’ and opponents’ hands until, eventually, she comes face to face with Ava.

“Hey, Bea,” Ava says softly.

“Hi,” Beatrice returns. She extends her hand to shake. “Good game.”

Ava rolls her eyes, swats away Beatrice’s hands, and goes for a hug. Beatrice allows herself a moment to pull Ava closer before she lets go and stands back.

“I miss you,” Ava says, always too honest. "It's been too long."

It draws the same honesty out of Beatrice. “I miss you, too.”

Before either of them can say anything else, they’re interrupted by another player, so Beatrice moves on.

There’s a team huddle. Beatrice listens to their coach as the woman gives a brief rundown of the things they did well and the things they could improve on. They disperse after, with Beatrice and the other players going to the stands to greet the fans.

Somehow, like a satellite pulled into a planet’s orbit, Beatrice finds herself standing next to Ava.

“There’s Shannon and Mary,” Ava points out their old friends in the stands. She mimes something at them.

Beatrice waves at the couple, noting that they’ve brought their two kids with them. They were teammates, back in that small Andalusian club where Beatrice met Ava. It was the two of them, Shannon and Mary, and Lilith and Camila. The latter two are currently playing a match with the Spanish national team in another city in Spain. Beatrice feels grateful that Shannon and Mary chose to watch the Switzerland vs Portugal match, even if it is only because the venue is closer to where the couple lives.

“They say that they’ll meet us at the restaurant,” Ava says. “There’s too many people here and the kids are grumpy.”

Beatrice did agree to a plan, organised by Shannon, for herself and Ava to meet up with Shannon and Mary and their kids. But she has to ask, “You got all of that from miming at them?”

“Of course,” Ava says. “I’m very good at charades.”

Beatrice gives her a look.

Ava shows her phone, grinning cheekily. “They texted me.”

“It’ll be nice to catch up,” Beatrice says, catching Ava’s eyes.

Ava holds her gaze. “Yes.”

They’re interrupted by a fan in the stands asking for a selfie and their shirt to be signed. The fan chats with them as they sign.

“Will you two be coming back to the OCS?” The fan means the old club where they met. “You two were so good for us, together in the midfield.”

Beatrice looks at Ava stiffly. Ava lets out an awkward laugh, but she turns to reply to the fan. Beatrice lets her do the talking. Beatrice can discuss tactics and gameplans to no end, but Ava has always been better at chatting with the fans.

“Well,” Ava starts, “I’m quite happy with where I am right now, and I’m sure Beatrice feels the same for herself, but,” she looks back at Beatrice, her dark eyes shining under the floodlights, “never say never.”

That sends Beatrice’s thoughts into a tailspin, and she distractedly goes through the motions as she takes selfies and signs shirts for fans.

She’s done entertaining the fans calling her name long before the ones calling out Ava’s have calmed down. Beatrice doesn’t blame the fans; Ava is a star, a supernova, a haloed being.

“I’m gonna head in,” Beatrice tells Ava. “I’ll wait for you inside and then we can go meet up with Mary and Shannon together.”

Ava gives her a coy smile. “Okay.”

Beatrice nods at her. Ava gives a little wave with her fingers. Beatrice smiles helplessly before spinning on her heel and heading for the tunnel.

She stops at the mouth of the tunnel, looks back at Ava, who seems to glow as she talks to the fans.

Beatrice doesn’t know what it is--maybe it’s the dinner with Mary and Shannon, maybe it’s the fact that they’re in southern Spain--but her mind rewinds to their time at the OCS. She remembers having just turned twenty-one and meeting Ava, immediately drawn to her thirst for life. She remembers being twenty-one, being on the receiving end of Ava’s longing gazes, too caught up in her past to recognise them for what they were. She remembers being twenty-two, regretting how blind she was, wishing she could turn back time.

But that was years ago. She cannot regret any single thing that happened then. She’s very happy with her life now.