Law of Pascal

thirty-first day of May two thousand and four

half past seven in the morning

Radzikowskiego Street, Cracow

Poland

‘Whole bloody moon as’n EU citizen, feelin’ good, innit?’

Said Robert, who was, unfortunately, my uncle. Fortunately, he had some money to spare on his stubborn nephew.

‘Please, don’t even try your slang now’

I said and tried to focus on Pascal’s Law, once I passed physics, I’ll have a fun vacation. Or not, I thought, looking at my uncle.

‘Alright, do your school thing, pass the physics shit and pack to see the concert in Chorzów, hit the lights, yeah!’

Or not. Or not… Well, parents don’t care, so at least kids go into Heavy Metal because of uncles, no matter how embarrassing they would be. Or even because of this? ‘rrrhhhhh… whatevaah’ I said to myself.

‘Please, just don’t play Aerosmith when we’ll go to Chorzów, I’m not interested in plastic chicks’, I had to add. ‘Doesn’t he look like an old prostitute.’

‘Naughty bhoy, alright, there won’t be Tyler’s singing, but hey, I just thought about grilled kiełbasa for lunch, you know, the one from this blue-yellow furniture shop’

Alright, go pass the physics shit, go pass the physics shit, ‘dreaming, thinking/ ready for my happy day/ and some easy livin’’. I don’t know why they play that song every morning at ten past seven, one of the radio guys probably has issues. ‘Ready for my happy day’. A heepy alarm anyway.

first day of June two thousand and four

thirteen minutes to two at night

Katowicka Street, Silesian Stadium, Chorzów

Poland

‘Careful what you wish’ I hummed.

‘Show’s over, school’s out, bhoy’ said uncle Robert

‘Wait, why out?’

‘They said all’s ok so we can go straight to Katowice for a plane, school’s out, you bhoy will be sleeping this night in bloody Crawley, happy Kid’s Day or whatever it is today’

Careful what you wish.

‘Shit I was going to kick some ball today’ I said

‘Hope not mine, I’m a nice person’ he said and made that moronic face.

‘But anyway’ I said ‘No football, no Law of Pascal, so maybe not so bad, I’m a bit tired of bringing the ball over and over’

‘The fuck? I thought you’re done with physics?’

‘You should learn some Polish slang too’

’Yeah…? So, you once said you liked all these Portuguese dudes Nuno Gomes, Figo, Xavier... I thought maybe you like Scholes too?”

‘Kinda’

‘So what you say for a little trip to Portugal? Maybe England be the champs finally. Don’t eyeroll. Got tickets. Anyway, you know one song from the most British of British albums is about Steven Tyler?’ he said and push the play button and for next 7 minutes I wondered is Tyler’s second name Charlotte’

twenty-fourth day of June two thousand and four

fifteen minutes to midnight

Eusébio da Silva Ferreira Avenue, Benfica Stadium, Lisbon

Portugal

Watcha want, watcha really really want. If Beckham was good at physics. If Costa was good at physics. If you apply pressure to one part of a confined gas, that pressure is transmitted equally in all directions within the gas. But, it’s all in your mind, they say. If Beckham had gone to a Polish school and knew Polish slang, he would have scored that penalty.

‘Hey, wanna know what the Law of Pascal is?’ I asked

‘Sure, bhoy’ said Robert

So I screamed as loud as I only could:

‘Law of Pascal, you fuck off the ball, you bring it, rascal!!!’