Cassian Gold #32 — The Jersey
The match was already over by the time Cassian found himself close enough to the sideline to see the steam still lifting from the players’ bodies in the evening air.
Golden Army had won hard. It showed in the mud on their legs, the grass ground into their socks, the shine of sweat across shoulders and necks, the loose triumphant energy that came only after a brutal game well fought. Wells stood at the center of it all, broad and powerful in his game-worn rugby kit, dark hair damp, chest still rising heavily from the last effort of the match. Even surrounded by the team, he seemed to anchor the whole scene without trying.
Cassian had come to watch out of curiosity more than anything else. He had heard about GA, of course. Hard not to. The stories, the presence, the way people talked about the team as though it were more than just sport. But hearing about something and standing at the edge of it were not the same. Up close, it felt bigger. Sharper. Charged with its own gravity.
He had not expected Wells to notice him.
As the last of the handshakes and congratulatory noise settled, Wells’s eyes caught on Cassian lingering near the barrier. There was a beat of recognition, or maybe simply decision, and then Wells stepped toward him with the easy confidence of a man who never second-guessed his own instincts.
“You stayed to the end,” Wells said.
Cassian managed a nod. “Yeah.”
Wells looked him over, then glanced down at the jersey still clinging to his own body, damp from the match. A small smile tugged at one corner of his mouth. Without ceremony, he caught the hem and pulled it up and over his head.
Cassian forgot how to breathe for a second.
Wells stood there shirtless, sweat-bright and solid from the game, holding the black-and-gold jersey in one hand. Then he stepped forward and handed it to Cassian.
“Here,” he said. “Keep it.”
Cassian took it automatically, almost too stunned to respond. The fabric was still warm.
That was the first thing he noticed.
The second was the scent, clean sweat, grass, effort, the unmistakable after-mark of a match that had demanded everything from the man who wore it. It was intimate in a way Cassian hadn’t prepared for. Not embarrassing. Not wrong. Just immediate. Real. Proof of contact, of strain, of being close to something earned.
Wells watched him with quiet amusement. “Looks better appreciated than stuffed in my locker.”
Cassian laughed softly, still holding the jersey in both hands. “You sure?”
“I wouldn’t have given it to you if I wasn’t.”
Later that night, alone, Cassian pulled it on.
It hung a little differently on him than it had on Wells, but that almost made the moment better. The jersey carried the memory of the match in its shape and scent, yet it settled onto Cassian as though waiting to be claimed a second time. He stood in front of the mirror longer than he meant to, smoothing a hand over the crest, over the worn lines in the fabric, over the number on the back.
He liked the way it looked on him.
More than that, he liked the way it made him feel—noticed, chosen, drawn closer to something he hadn’t fully understood until now. The smell of the game still lingered in the cloth, and Cassian found himself breathing it in without thinking, as if some part of him wanted to hold onto the feeling just a little longer.
A few days later, he heard there were tryouts.
That should have been the moment to hesitate. Instead, it felt like the obvious next step.
Cassian showed up wearing plain training gear, but the memory of Wells’ jersey sat on him like invisible weight. Not pressure exactly. More like direction. He ran hard, hit harder, listened closely, and refused to fade when the pace sharpened. The drills stripped everything down to essentials, speed, discipline, resilience, willingness to keep going when the body wanted to quit.
By the end of it, Cassian was filthy, breathing hard, and more certain than ever that he wanted in.
Wells approached him afterward, arms folded, expression unreadable for just long enough to make the moment land.
“You came ready,” Wells said.
Cassian swallowed, still catching his breath. “Tried to.”
Wells’ mouth curved faintly. “You did more than try.”
There was a pause. Then Wells stepped in closer, close enough that Cassian caught the same clean post-training heat he remembered from the jersey.
“You made the team,” Wells said. “Cassian Gold. Number 32.”
Cassian looked at him, almost disbelieving for a second, then grinned despite himself. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” Wells said. “You earned it.”
For a moment Cassian could only nod.
His mind flashed briefly back to that first evening: the end of the match, Wells stripping off the jersey, the warmth of it in his hands, the smell of grass and sweat still caught in the fabric, the strange certainty that something had started right there without his knowing what shape it would take.
Wells clapped a hand onto his shoulder, firm and approving. “Get used to wearing black and gold, 32.”
Cassian smiled. “I think I will.”
And this time, when he imagined the jersey on his body, it would not be borrowed.
Claim your place in gold. Join the Golden Army and step onto the field where brothers shine, belong, and rise together. Contact our recruiters: @alton-gold77, @polo-drone-125, @franco-gold94, @polo-drone-166
Featuring; @cassiangold32
