Lionesses- Harry Hampton

We don't want anyone to be skewered

When they arrived back at their house, Hannah noticed she had an email from Harry's school.

"Due to an increased number of Covid cases it has been decided that students and staff shall remain at home for a period of two weeks. There will be online learning which students must attend. Stay safe and we will see you in two weeks," Hannah read aloud.

"I hate doing learning from home," Harry groaned, plopping himself down on the sofa. An idea suddenly came to him.

"Please can I come on England camp with you? Only if that's okay with you though," Harry asked, his face lighting up at the thought.

"Well, I'm happy with you coming. Does that sound good to you, Grandad?" Hannah asked.

"Don't have a problem with it," he answered.

"I'll ask Sarina then," Hannah told Harry.

***

The next morning Hannah came into Harry's room and told him that Sarina was more than happy to have him come.

They set off the following morning and it didn't take long to get down to St George's Park. Because they were driving, Harry missed his first few live lessons but they both decided that missing two lessons wouldn't hurt.

"Hello everybody. Welcome back to St George's Park," Sarina said which caused a few cheers from some of the girls.

"We have some good games coming up. It's very important that we do well and qualify for the World Cup. I have training schedules for you all and the rooms are the same as usual," Sarina explained.

"Oh, and we have Harry here so can we just all make sure he's doing okay around camp. He says he won't use any choice words this time," Sarina added. The girls all laughed at the language comment and Harry went bright red at the thought.

***

It was dinner time and Harry was sitting with Hannah, Ellen and Jill.

"No school for you then?" Ellen asked.

"Shut cause of Covid," Harry explained.

"Lucky you, getting to spend all this time with us," Jill said, pulling him in for a side hug. Harry smiled. He loved spending time with the Lionesses. To him they were literally the coolest people in the world.

After dinner they all went to the chill out space and it didn't take long for a darts tournament to get started.

"You want to play Fran?" Keira asked. They needed another player, so the numbers worked out.

"No. I'll just watch thanks," Fran replied.

"Probably best. We don't want anyone to be skewered," Jess teased her. They managed to convince Mary to play and with the numbers right they started.

Jess and Lauren played first. It was an even game but, in the end, Lauren ended up winning.

Mary and Alex played next, and it took forever for the game to finish as they were both pretty bad.

"You know we want to finish playing today right," Harry joked when Alex once again only managed to land one dart on the board.

"Alright cheeky," Alex said, laughing along nevertheless.

Eventually Mary pulled through with a win.

Then Harry played Millie and he won by a good amount.

"You're bad, you," Rach teased Millie as she sat down on the floor.

"Alright Miss Darts Expert, go beat Keira," Millie told her.

Keira managed to beat Rachel by even more of a gap than Harry had beaten Millie.

"You're bad, you," Millie said, quoting Rachel as she knew it would annoy her.

The second round of matches went under way and Harry was pleasantly surprised that he beat Lauren.

Keira was less surprised that she beat Mary and then it was time for the final.

Jill, being her usual self, set up as if she was the presenter.

"And our first finalist is Harry 'Hot Hands' Hampton," Jill said, putting on the best presenter voice she could. They all fell about laughing at Harry's nickname and Jill had to wait for them all to calm down before she introduced Keira.

"Our second finalist is Keira 'Waltzy' Walsh," Jill announced.

"What does the waltz have to do with playing darts?" Harry asked.

"Got any other name ideas?" Jill asked him.

"Fair point," Harry agreed after a moment of thinking about it.

They all settled down and the game went under way. It was pretty even, and Harry was surprised. Keira had a lot of practice, and he certainly didn't.

As the game was at the ending stages, Harry lost concentration a little bit and Keira managed to just pull away.

She ended up winning with Harry not too far behind.

"You're actually really good," Keira said as she shook hands with him.

"No need to sound so surprised," Harry told her. He was fine with losing and was happy to joke around with her.

"I didn't mean it like that," Keira said, a bit embarrassed at her choice of words.

"I'm joking I don't mind," he reassured her.

***

A/N: Through to the quarters! I'll be honest I'm not holding out much hope of beating France but you never know.