CHAPTER 37: EAVESDROPPED

"GOALLLL!!!"

This time the bench went crazy.

The coaching staff hugged each other. The teammates on the bench ran to the touchline where the goal scorer had gone to celebrate.

Lukas had a wide grin on his face as he ran to his number 9.

"It’s all you man! It’s all you," the striker screamed as they embraced.

"Keep feeding me like this, and I might just be called to the first team soon," he added.

"Well, I gotta do that too — I want a call-up just as bad," Lukas responded, some players laughing at his response as the referee signalled for them to get back into position.

The game was virtually over.

The Stuttgarter Kickers’ coach stared at the scoreboard in disbelief.

STUTTGARTER KICKERS 2 - 3 EINTRACHT FRANKFURT II

They had been on the cusp of winning this game.

But a single substitute — the youngest kid on the field — had turned the game on its head.

"Today just wasn’t our day," he thought with a bitter smile as the referee blew the whistle to end the game and the coaches of both teams exchanged greetings with each other.

* * *

The next day.

In an apartment in Darmstadt area.

The sitting room was bright and tidy, with a couple of charcoal sofas, a small oak coffee table, and shelves lined with books and travel souvenirs.

The white walls accentuated the sunlight which poured in through sheer curtains, and a faint scent of coffee lingered in the air, adding warmth to the minimalist charm.

Laying on one of the sofas, was João, Lukas’s best friend.

He had been scrolling through TikTok all morning. The SV98 U19 team, to which he had been recently promoted to, had no practice scheduled for the day.

He scrolled mindlessly through dance videos, story times, "GRWM" trends, and some football highlights.

Then he found a video with about 50k likes.

It showed Lukas, with the Eintracht Frankfurt II jersey, getting subbed into a match while his team was two goals down.

The trivela pass to create the first goal.

The volley for the second goal.

And the quick free kick from his own penalty area, that created the third.

He watched the video with an expression that said, "This is absurd."

Why didn’t I know about this?

The first feeling he had was annoyance. He wasn’t annoyed due to jealousy, far from that. He was angry because Lukas hadn’t informed him about his debut.

He opened the comment section.

"Who is this kid? What game was this?"

He replied under the comment.

"His name is Lukas Brandt. He is 15. He plays for the reserve team. His social media handle is @Lukas.Brandt36."

He favorited the video, exited the app, and called Lukas.

The call rang, unanswered.

He called again.

This time after the third ring, it connected.

"He..llo... João.. what’s up?" Lukas’s voice came through the phone, he sounded completely exhausted.

"You’re just waking up? It’s like 11AM," João replied sensing he had woken his friend up.

"Yeah.. I’ve felt so tired since yesterday’s match."

"What match are you talking about? You didn’t mention you had a match yesterday."

"I’m sorry, man. I wasn’t sure I was gonna play. You remember the last two times I told you, and I didn’t even get a single minute. I was not sure it wouldn’t be the same."

"Alright then.. Still, congratulations. I just saw your highlight on TikTok. That first assist was sick."

"Thank you, it’ll be your turn soon."

"Hahaha.. I really hope so."

"Are you at home? No training today?"

"Nah. I’m just at home, chilling."

"Is she at home too?"

"You can’t be serious man. Yes, she is. Why? Should I give her the phone? Is there a time you’re not thinking about my sister?"

"Of course. Maybe when I’m on the pitch?"

"Are you asking me? You’re not even sure!"

"Still.. she’s home, right?"

"Yeah. She’s in her room, I think. Why? Wanna talk to her? You have her number right? Send her a text."

"You think? Maybe I will do that. I have your blessing?"

"You have my prayers. I pray you survive — you’re one of God’s strongest soldiers after all."

"What do you mean? Joanna isn’t troublesome."

"Yeah, you’re completely blinded. Let’s talk again if you start dating."

"No, ’when’ we start dating."

"Yeah, yeah. Good luck. Anyway, when is your next match?"

"We have a home game on Friday, August 2nd. Also I think you can find the information about the matches online, maybe I might forget to inform you due to training or something."

"Okay. That’s good. I’ll try and attend."

"Yeah? If it doesn’t affect your training, you’re always welcome."

"Alright, I have to go watch some match recordings. Since you’ve already started dropping man-of-the-match performances in the Regionalliga, I can’t fall so far behind."

"Yeah. Hurry up. I need someone that can stop me."

"Haha.. Funny guy. Bye."

"Alright. Later."

The call ended.

"Was that Lukas on the phone?" Joanna, her voice calm and composed, asked as she walked into the room with her phone in her hands in landscape mode presumably watching a movie.

"How long have you been there?" João asked, a bit freaked out.

"I just walked out of my room and heard the goodbyes."

João looked at her suspiciously, but didn’t press the issue.

"Yeah. It was Lukas. He played his debut match yesterday."

"Oh yeah. Against Stuttgarter Kickers. He scored a goal and assisted twice."

"Wait, how do you know? I just found out."

"What do you mean? A Google search would tell you all of that.

I knew he played for the Eintracht reserve team. I checked yesterday and saw that they had a match so I followed the live score."

"Just coincidentally?" João asked, his brow raised as he looked at his sister who was pouring herself a glass of water at the dining table.

"Just because you’re a bad friend who doesn’t check his friend’s team, and we are twins, doesn’t mean I am like that too."

"Hmmm.. okay then."

Joanna gulped down her water as she sneaked glances at her brother, whose attention had returned to his phone.

"He didn’t find out, right? I think I played that off really cool," her mind was all over the place.

"He said he was talking to Lukas. Does that mean Lukas thinks about me?"

She had eavesdropped on João’s entire conversation with Lukas.

She had initially been on her way to show him the highlights of the match that had been posted on the Eintracht Frankfurt YouTube channel when she over heard João lecturing Lukas over not informing him of his debut.

She couldn’t explain how she felt about it.

Lukas had always come to their house since they were kids as he had been best friends with João since they moved to Germany from Portugal.

Naturally, she became friends with him too. But she never thought about him in a romantic way.

"How come I haven’t noticed anything weird all this time?" She thought.

It had never been the case that Lukas was gawking at her. If he had a crush on her, she concluded that it would either have been a recent development, or he was an expert at hiding his feelings.

A/N: Unfortunately I can’t remove the Chapters locked in privilege tier. But it’s just 1 coin to open, and I have deactivated it for next month.

I won’t be adding a privilege tier until I have a few Chapters stock-piled.

So far, I have none. So please open the privilege Chapters to read the latest Chapter. It costs 1 coin only. Thank you all.

This is the GT Chapter. I can’t believe we got to 30 GTs. I’m so grateful to everyone who contributed to this Chapter: ChayceMT, Oliver27, Skullyhall, KendrickStan98, moped1244, Patrick_Djan, Piggy.

I’m so grateful to you all.

The official Chapter for today, July 17, 2025, will be released soon.

Stay safe.

-Writ.