Chapter 4: Volume 1, - 4: The Backup Plan
The chalk squeaked sharply against the blackboard, producing a dry, grating sound that seemed to vibrate through the enamel of Rayan’s teeth.
"If the quadratic expression (x^2 - 6x + 8 = 0) represents the points where a ball’s trajectory intersects the ground, we must calculate the roots to find those intercepts," Senhor Almeida explained, his wooden pointer tapping the board with rhythmic, military precision. "Rayan. Come to the board and solve for (x) using the quadratic formula."
Rayan blinked, his mind yanked violently from a deep tactical trance. He had been staring at the square grid of his mathematics notebook, but he had not written a single number. Instead, the page was covered with a meticulous diagram of pitch three at Alcochete. Dozens of tiny blue arrows traced Duarte Faria’s movements into the half-spaces, crossed out by frantic, heavy lines where Rayan had attempted to map possible interception routes.
"Rayan? We are waiting," the teacher said, his eyebrows drawing together.
A low wave of laughter moved through the classroom. Rayan rose slowly, his legs stiff, and buried his hands inside his uniform pockets to conceal the sudden tremor running through them. He walked down the narrow aisle between the desks with the attention of thirty classmates following every step.
He accepted the piece of white chalk from Senhor Almeida. The board looked like a meaningless blur of symbols.
[x = \frac{-b \pm \sqrt{b^2 - 4ac}}{2a}]
He stared at the equation. His mind refused to process it. The numbers would not arrange themselves into anything useful. The only figures that seemed to matter were Duarte’s 1,120 academy minutes and eight goals, alongside Rayan’s own miserable 3.5 composure rating.
He lifted the chalk and held it against the board. He wrote a tentative (6), then stopped, his wrist locking in place.
"You have not calculated the discriminant, Rayan," Senhor Almeida said quietly, releasing a sigh weighted with months of disappointment. He took the chalk from Rayan’s fingers. "Return to your seat. Tomás, please complete the problem."
As Rayan walked back, his face burning, he caught the whispered conversation between two boys in the second row.
"I heard he didn’t even make the squad for yesterday’s tactical match," one muttered, not quite quietly enough.
"Yeah, my cousin plays for the under-fifteens," the other whispered. "He said Sporting are already looking at new wingers for the next intake. He’s finished."
Rayan dropped into his plastic chair and lowered his head between his shoulders. He tightened his grip around his pen until the casing creaked. They knew nothing. They did not see the extra running, the bruises beneath his socks or the blood staining his shin guards. They were simply waiting for him to fail so they could feel better about never risking anything themselves.
"Rayan," Senhor Almeida said, cutting through the murmurs as he turned toward the rest of the class. "A green-and-white shirt does not grant an exemption from the Portuguese education system. Sporting may be an important opportunity, but it does not remove your academic responsibilities. Without passing marks, you will not be permitted to sit your final assessments, regardless of the badge on your training kit."
---
The smell of overcooked cabbage and floor polish hung heavily inside the cafeteria during lunch. Rayan sat at the end of a long bench, dragging his fork through a plate of cold rice.
"Look, the mathematics exam is next Thursday," Idris said, placing a neatly organised binder beside Rayan’s tray. Every page was colour-coded, with formulas highlighted in clean yellow strips. "If we start tonight, we can do two hours after school and another two on Tuesday. I can break the quadratic sections into simple steps. It isn’t that difficult once you stop treating it like a foreign language."
"I can’t tonight, Idris," Rayan muttered, keeping his eyes on the table. "I have to take the five-o’clock bus to Alcochete."
"Official training is on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, Rayan," Inês said, leaning across the table with her arms folded. Her sharp eyes studied his face, stripping away his excuses before he could properly construct them. "We all know the schedule. What are you actually doing tonight?"
"Extra work," Rayan replied defensively, his voice rising slightly. "I’m going to the public pitches near Olivais. I need more ball work. I have to practise with my weak foot."
"And what exactly is the plan for this extra work?" Inês challenged, the teasing edge disappearing from her voice. "Are you completing specific technical drills? Did the academy staff give you an individual programme, or are you going to drag a bag of footballs onto an empty pitch and kick them against a rusty fence until it gets dark?"
Rayan opened his mouth to argue, but nothing came out.
"She’s right, Rayan," Idris said gently, resting one hand on the binder. "You’re exhausted. You look as though you haven’t slept properly in a week, your marks are collapsing, and you’re pouring all your energy into work that has no structure. You need a backup plan."
"I don’t want a backup plan!" Rayan snapped, slamming his fork onto the tray with a sharp clatter that made Idris flinch. "A backup plan means you’re already preparing to fail. Rafa doesn’t have a backup plan. Duarte doesn’t have one. They just play! Why is everyone in my life preparing for the day I get released?"
He stood abruptly, grabbed his backpack and pulled it over one shoulder.
"Rayan, wait," Idris called.
Rayan was already walking away, his shoes striking the linoleum heavily while his chest tightened beneath a suffocating mixture of anger and fear. They did not understand. If he admitted they were right. If he took his attention away from football for even one afternoon to study equations. The gap between him and Duarte would become permanent. He could not afford to stop running.
The fluorescent lights inside the Santa Maria medical clinic hummed with a flat, sterile energy. Behind the reception desk, Sofia Duarte adjusted her glasses while her fingers moved across the keyboard, checking in a patient for an ultrasound appointment. Her feet ached inside her orthopaedic shoes. She had started at six that morning, and because another administrator had called in sick, she would not leave for another two hours.
Her phone buzzed against the desk, vibrating sharply beside a stack of patient files.
She glanced down, and her stomach tightened when she saw the notification from her banking application. It was an automated alert regarding the account used for Leonor’s private mathematics tutoring.
Account Status Update: Expected transfer from K. El Mansouri — PENDING
Payment overdue by four days.
Sofia closed her eyes for a moment and breathed in the faint mixture of antiseptic and old paper. She opened her messages and scrolled to Karim’s name.
Sofia: Karim, Leonor’s tutoring payment was due on Tuesday. The administrator called me again today. Did you make the transfer?
Karim: Sofia, my champion! Do not worry for a single second. The distributor in Amadora is finalising the inventory-release codes. The moment the funds clear on Friday morning, I will transfer double the amount. Tell Leonor her father is buying her the best books in Lisbon! 🌟🚀
Sofia did not reply. She locked the screen and placed the phone face down. ’The distributor in Amadora.’ It was always Friday, and there was always another distributor. She looked at her cracked cuticles and then at the small calendar pinned to the partition. Rayan’s transport pass for the Alcochete shuttle needed to be renewed the following week. The rent on the Olivais apartment would increase by ten percent in February.
She picked up her pen, flexed her stiff fingers and returned to the patient-registration screen. No distributor was coming to rescue them. There was only the additional shift on Saturday and the hope that her ageing silver Renault Clio would not require a new alternator before spring.
---
When Sofia pushed open the apartment door at eight that evening, the flat was cold. Leonor was inside her bedroom with the door closed, the muffled sound of a history video playing through her laptop speakers.
The television provided the only light in the living room. Rayan lay across the sofa with his legs propped on one armrest and a heavy ice pack secured against his left ankle. A high-definition compilation analysing Cristiano Ronaldo’s dribbling movements played repeatedly on the screen, the commentary lowered to a dull murmur.
An open box containing the remains of a frozen pizza sat on the coffee table, surrounded by three empty cans of soda. Rayan’s schoolbag remained untouched beside the front door, its buckles still fastened.
Sofia placed her keys down with a loud, deliberate click. She crossed the room and pressed the power button beneath the television, plunging the room into sudden darkness.
Rayan sat upright, causing the ice pack to slide onto the rug. "Hey! I was analysing his body rotation during lateral cuts. Why did you turn it off?"
"Because your geography portfolio is still completely blank, Rayan," Sofia replied, her voice settling into the quiet, dangerously level tone that signalled complete exhaustion. She did not remove her heavy winter coat. She simply stood over the sofa with her arms crossed. "Your mathematics teacher emailed me during my afternoon break as well. He said you could not complete a basic equation at the board today. You have completely stopped participating in class."
"It was one question, Mum," Rayan groaned, leaning back and pulling a cushion over his face. "Everyone gets a question wrong sometimes. I had a massive training session this afternoon. Tavares made me run five extra laps because he was testing my endurance. My legs are dead."
Sofia walked to the entrance, picked up his heavy backpack and dropped it onto the coffee table with a thud that rattled the empty cans. "Open it. Now."
"Mum, please. I’m tired," Rayan shouted, throwing the cushion aside. "You don’t understand how difficult it is out there! The technical review is next week. If I don’t focus entirely on my football, nothing else matters! Why can’t you support me for once instead of coming home and immediately searching for something I did wrong?"
"Support you?"
Sofia did not raise her voice, but it gained a sharp, trembling intensity that made Rayan freeze. She stepped closer to the table, her dark eyes steady beneath the kitchen light. "Who do you think pays for the transport that takes you to Alcochete every week, Rayan? Who works extra shifts at the clinic so your father’s promises do not leave this household without rent or food? I bought the high-grip boots because your coach said you were losing balance on wet grass. I buy the fish, the eggs and the vegetables your nutrition plan requires. I sat in freezing rain for two hours last Saturday to watch you play for eight minutes."
"Then why do you expect me to fail?" Rayan screamed, his voice breaking as he stood. He kept most of his weight on his right leg while his sore left ankle throbbed beneath the compression wrap. "Every time I mention the academy, you give me that look! You look at me as though I’m a child playing in the dirt. You want me to give up so I can sit behind a desk like everyone else!"
"I do not want you to fail, Rayan!" Sofia finally shouted, her eyes shining with sudden, raw emotion. "I am the only person in your life who cares enough to tell you what the world may look like when the ball stops rolling. If Sporting releases you in June, the academy coaches will not complete school for you. Duarte Faria’s father will not pay your bills. You will still be a fifteen-year-old boy without a secondary-school qualification, and the football world will move on to the next group of players before the new season begins."
The bedroom door opened slowly. Leonor stood in the hallway, her small frame wrapped in an oversized hoodie. She looked between her mother’s exhausted, flushed face and her brother’s defensive stance.
"She’s right, Rayan," Leonor said quietly, without her usual sarcasm. "Mum spent three hours yesterday trying to figure out how to pay for my tutoring because Dad missed the transfer again. She isn’t trying to ruin your life. She’s just the person who has to fix everything when it goes wrong."
Rayan looked from his sister to his mother. He felt cornered behind a suffocating wall of facts that no technical drill could help him overcome. Their realism felt like a coordinated betrayal. A systematic dismantling of the dream he had built to escape the slow, grinding financial strain surrounding their family.
"You just don’t understand," he whispered, his throat tightening. He grabbed his phone from the sofa, turned away and stormed into his bedroom, slamming the door hard enough to make the small mirror rattle against the wall.
The dark bedroom felt like a fortress. Rayan sat on the edge of his bed with shaking hands and dialled a familiar number. He needed a lifeline. He needed someone who did not measure life through clipboards, deadlines and bank balances.
The phone rang three times before Karim’s cheerful voice filled the speaker.
"Rayan! My champion! I was just thinking about you. Did you see the goals from the Lyon match tonight? Their winger, pure poetry!"
"Dad," Rayan said, his voice small and unsteady in the darkness. "Mum and I had a massive fight. She keeps saying I’m going to be released. She says my school marks are going to ruin my life, and she switched off the tactical videos. She thinks I’m wasting my time."
There was a brief pause. A sports broadcast went silent in the background as Karim muted the television. When he spoke again, the usual theatrical enthusiasm had softened into an intense fatherly warmth that felt like fire inside a freezing room.
"Listen to me, Rayan," Karim said firmly. "Your mother is a good woman. She loves you more than almost anyone ever will. But she has spent years carrying bills, deadlines and responsibilities alone. She looks at risks because nobody else has protected her from them. When she looks at your dream, she does not see what I see. She sees another thing that might hurt you, and another disaster she may have to help you survive."
"She said football will forget me," Rayan whispered as a tear slipped down his cheek.
"Football cannot bury a diamond forever," Karim insisted, his voice gaining the magnetic certainty Rayan had been searching for. "Next week, I am finalising the Amadora contract. The money is coming. I will personally pay for your transport for the rest of the year, and your mother will not have to mention it again. Do not let fear destroy what is inside you. Go to sleep, think about Cristiano, and show that coach on Tuesday who Rayan El Mansouri really is."
Rayan released a long, trembling breath as the knot inside his chest dissolved into profound relief. ’He understands,’’ Rayan thought, wiping his face with the back of his hand. ’Dad knows what it means to fight for something bigger.’
Across town, however, unpaid utility bills still lay across Karim’s kitchen counter, and the electronics distributor had stopped answering his calls three days earlier. Karim had not solved a single practical problem. He had simply wrapped his latest failure in the golden fabric of an inspirational speech, leaving his son to carry a dream built on foundations neither of them knew how to repair.
At one in the morning, the apartment was completely silent.
Driven by the lingering guilt of his mother’s exhausted expression, Rayan sat at his desk beneath the small yellow circle cast by his lamp. His mathematics textbook lay open in front of him beside an unfinished problem requiring several stages of factorisation.
He picked up his pen. Step one: identify the common factor.
His eyelids felt impossibly heavy, and his muscles remained sluggish from the extra running and the cold ice pack pressed against his ankle. The lines of text began swimming across the page, blurring into the green-and-white stripes of a Sporting shirt. Numbers transformed into technical assessments. 4.5 for first touch, 3.5 for composure.
He rested his chin against his palm and attempted to follow the sequence of variables. ’If (x) represents a place in the starting eleven...’
His head dropped forward. The pen slipped from his fingers and rolled across the page, leaving a long, crooked streak of black ink through the unfinished calculation. His cheek settled against the rough paper of the textbook as his breathing slowed into the deep rhythm of complete physical exhaustion.
A harsh beam of winter sunlight pierced the gap between the curtains and struck Rayan directly across the eyes.
He jolted upright, his heart immediately accelerating into a frantic rhythm. He stared at the bright room before looking toward the digital clock on his bedside table.
08:12.
First period began at 08:30. The journey from Olivais took at least twenty-two minutes on a good morning.
"No, no, no," Rayan muttered, shoving his feet into his unlaced school shoes.
His left ankle responded with a sharp twinge. He had fallen asleep without removing the compression wrap properly, leaving the joint stiff and cold, and there was no time for the fifteen-minute mobility routine prescribed by the academy physiotherapist. His uniform was crumpled from being left on the floor, the homework page was ruined by the ink stain, and the high-protein breakfast Sofia had prepared remained untouched inside the refrigerator.
He grabbed his bag and sprinted from the room, his sore ankle protesting with every step as he rushed blindly into another day that had already escaped his control.