The bell had barely finished ringing before we were already running, bags thrown against the fence, shoes scraping against asphalt that looked like it had survived a small war.
The court behind the school smelled like dust, sweat, and rusted metal, chain-link fences rattling every time the ball slammed into them too hard.
Someone argued about goal size, someone else cursed about teams being unfair, and in the middle of it all the ball bounced once, twice, then stopped near my feet.
"Same rules," Imran said, tying his laces with his teeth. "No crying, no fouls unless you die."
I stepped back without announcing it, planting myself between the goals and the chaos, while everyone else pushed forward like the match was a race instead of a fight.
The kickoff was sloppy, the ball skidding sideways, and the first thirty seconds were pure noise—shouts, sneakers squealing, bodies colliding with no rhythm yet.
A kid in a red shirt tried to sprint straight through the middle, confident, head up, already imagining the nutmeg, and I slid across his path and hit him shoulder-first, ball popping loose as he staggered.
"Fuck!" he yelled, more shocked than hurt, and the ball rolled to our side.
I didn't celebrate it, didn't even look back, just pushed a short pass wide and reset my position as if nothing special had happened.
The pace picked up fast, sun baking the blacktop, legs moving heavier with every sprint, and the game stretched wide with no real shape.
Two of them pressed high, reckless, and when one tried to cut inside I waited until his foot came down wrong before stabbing in, clean and brutal, taking ball and space in one motion.
Someone laughed. Someone else swore.
"Bro, you're not human," my teammate said while jogging past me.
Another attack came, this time faster, sharper, and I had to chase, boots slapping hard as I curved my run, forcing the dribbler toward the fence where he had nowhere left to go.
He tried to flick it past me, desperate, and I stepped through him, timing perfect, sending him stumbling into the metal with a loud rattle.
The fence shook.
The game stopped for half a second.
Then it exploded again.
Sweat dripped into my eyes, my chest burned, and when the ball finally fell to me near the edge of their half, I took the shot anyway—low, rushed, not clean enough—watching it skid wide and smack into a bag.
"No worries!" someone shouted. "Reset!"
And that was fine, because while they were thinking about goals, I was already moving back, scanning, tracking, preparing for the next moment where someone would try something stupid.
By the time the sky started turning orange and our legs felt like concrete, nobody questioned where I stood anymore, or why attacks died the moment they crossed the middle.
Street football doesn't clap for tackles or praise positioning, but it remembers who made the game survivable.
On broken asphalt, with scraped skin and loud lungs, I learned that control doesn't look pretty—but it lasts.