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Fear of Fish

Later on that day, the USWNT found out they'd been drawn against Brazil. The South Americans had been unlucky to finish second behind the Matildas on 7 points, the same amount  as the U.S managed to accumulate. The team was admittedly nervous. Still spearheaded by the ever resilient Marta, the likes of Andressa and Debinha had now stepped up as well and were threats to the USWNT.
Andonovski had given them the next day off so Emily, Karima, Rose, Sam,Lindsey and Mal all went exploring in Tokyo. Well by "exploring" they got lost a couple of times, Rose saw a Shiba Inu and went crazy and Lindsey's attempt on Google Translate saw her insult a couple of locals by accident.
The group decided to go to a nearby restaurant. Looking at the menu, they only recognised Sushi and Ramen. Then Sam had an idea "Why don't we all just get a massive portion of Sushi?"
While the others agreed, Karima was starting to worry. While she had never tried Sushi, she hated fish. Another bad memory was about to be brought up.

Tears were streaming down Karima's face as she turned her head away from the plate of cod Yazmin was trying to feed to her. "For god's sake." Her older sister pleaded. "Why can't you co-operate for once?" .
It had been over two hours and the seven year old Mendoza just didn't want to eat fish. It clearly got to much for her mum was well . "Listen here." Mum grabbed the plate from her oldest daughters hand. She then proceeded to grab Karima by the throat. "If you don't eat this, you're out the house ok?" Karima personally wanted to leave the house. Of course she wasn't going to tell her mum that . Having not received a reply, Karima's mum slapped the child so hard, it left a red hand print. Karima looked to her then 19-year old sister for help. Yazmin returned her with a look of deep disapproval. With tears still stinging in her eyes, Karima proceeded to eat. She couldn't be bothered to receive more hits.

"Hello? Earth to Karima?" Emily waived a hand in her face. Karima snapped back to reality to see her fellow players look at her with concern. She quickly put on a look of reassurance and told them "Yeah I'll just take what you're having." Sam smiled. "Great." Sticking her hand up, the table waited for the waitress to come over. Karima sighed much to Emily's concern. "Is something wrong?" She asked. Karima tried to put on a smile once more. "I-I don't want to seem fussy but er... I don't really like fish that much." To her surprise the others weren't bothered. Lindsey picked up the menu again. "We can try and order something else." She offered. Karima shook her head. "It's ok...I wanna eat the same as you guys." Rose and Mal put their heads together. "Aww." They cooed much to everyone else's laughter.

Karima was embarrassed. After just a couple of bites, she was done. Like full . The Sushi wasn't that bad. Sure it was raw fish but Karima coated it a lot with sauce which helped and the side of vegetables were quite nice as well. However she couldn't eat anymore. The rest of the table had noticed her putting the chopsticks down. "Did you not like it?" Lindsey frowned. Karima shrugged. "It actually wasn't that bad ." Avoiding eye contact she just said . "I'm just...full."
Emily dropped her chopsticks while Sam and Lindsey widened their eyes. Rose choked on a piece of Sushi while Mal came to her rescue by patting her back. Karima judged that by those reactions, they were quite surprised. Emily was very annoyed. "You've literally not ate anything!" She exploded. Karima was dreading her next response.
"Like breakfast this morning, you ate what? A piece of toast? Didn't even get a drink did you? Then we go here because you know, you'd actually eat something?" Karima tried to cut in. "Look I'm sorry that you guys wasted money on me." This response annoyed Emily even more. "That's not it though! It's the fact that you never eat. Properly that is." Karima looked round the table.
Rose and Sam both had a look of sympathy of their face. As for Lindsey and Mal...they both seemed pretty mad as well. Then Rose's phone came to the rescue. "Everyone has to meet back at the hotel in 5 minutes." She read. As they got up, Karima considered issuing an apology but felt that judging by the stoney looks on her teammates faces, that may worsen things.

This is the truth . Karima has struggled with anorexia. She has been since she was 16. There was no way however she was going to confess this. At least not voluntarily. Ever. Why? Well no matter what they say, people will view her as weak. Something Karima has tried to hard to fight the label off for as long as she could remember. And another thing? Karima didn't want to embarrass her mum.