golden blonde¹

guys, 360, 360, 360!

mid october 2022
elena would have never believed that she would be more relieved to be back in london rather than spain. after a horrible international camp, she's more than happy to be back in england.

when she hugs lia and caitlin as she arrives back at their place, it feels like home. elena hadn't realized how much she missed the two.

she greets everyone at training and it's a much more warm environment than the reception in spain. noelle and lia are joking with one another, rafa is dancing with the ball around leah. katie and beth are bothering kim endlessly. every interaction is normal and unforced, a polar opposite to what elena had experienced in the past two weeks.

in the briefing room, they're told of the busy schedule they have ahead. it actually kind of terrifies elena how many back to back to back games they have. every game for the next two weeks would be three to four days apart. they would have probably one full training session for each match.

in three weeks, they would have another international break before facing off against manchester united in the league.

jonas did make an emphasis to rotate players. he enforced this by later telling elena and katie that they would be in and out of the starting line up depending on if they needed more defense or offense.

the 18 year old didn't know what she was doing right to be competing for a starting eleven spot against katie fucking mccabe, but whatever she was doing, it was working.

with only five days until their next fixture against reading, the girls had a lot to do. first day back per usual was recovery. however, their second day was a photocall. they were taking their team photo for the season.

elena was wearing the home kit underneath her windbreaker as she walked out of the locker room with jordan. she grinned at the camera that was filming her and the girls walking through the hallway.

as she's walking out of the building, katie runs past everyone holding an odd looking object.

"guys! 360, 360, 360!"

"what does that mean?" elena wondered out loud.

katie presses a button that causes the camera to extend upwards.

"get me, jords and el's head." caitlin wraps her arm around the two shorter players. elena playfully stuck her tongue out.

as they were out on the pitch, elena was getting instructions on where to stand.

"here stina, have a go." katie said as she held the device to the scandinavian. elena laughed as stina held the camera awkwardly.

as pricey was still giving out instructions, katie held the camera in front of everyone.

"wave at my three sixty cam!"

a couple of girls waved, lia blew kisses to the camera.

elena placed a hand on viv's shoulders.

"that ponytail looks awful on you." elena grinned as viv was messing with it.

"it's not long enough to put into a bun," the striker groaned.

katie made their way over to the two of them.

"miedema! you're going to turn into an alien again!"

"nooo," viv whined as she took the camera from the irish woman. viv fiddled with the camera for a second before handing it off to jen. elena bent down as caitlin, teyah, lotte, and herself all posed for the camera.

elena watched on comically as caitlin was doing all sorts of tricks with the camera. holding it down by jordan in the front row, then bringing it back up to place in between herself and elena.