Verbal: what it actually felt like.

I'd pictured the call a hundred times. In every version I was calm. In the real one my hands were shaking and I said "yes, coach" about four times in a row like that was a complete sentence.

Then I hung up and the house went quiet for about two seconds — and then it absolutely did not. Mum cried. Dad did the thing where he nods and pretends he isn't. Cooper put me in a headlock. Somewhere in there someone started a haka in the lounge and the neighbours definitely heard it.

Here's what they don't tell you: the verbal isn't the finish line. It's the day the work gets more serious, not less. But for one night in Pāpātoetoe, we just let it be loud.