The same hands that had orchestrated a professional football match were now raising to answer a calculus question.
"Amani? Can you explain how you approached problem seven?"
Mr. Dekker, St. Bonifatius College's mathematics teacher, maintained a carefully neutral expression as he called on Amani. The instructor had always treated him like any other student, a policy Amani deeply appreciated, especially today.
It was Monday morning, barely thirty-six hours after Amani had been named man of the match in FC Utrecht's season opener.
The weekend's events felt almost dreamlike in the fluorescent-lit classroom, surrounded by textbooks and the familiar faces of classmates he'd known since before football had transformed his life.
"I used the chain rule for the differentiation," Amani explained, walking through his solution with methodical precision. "Then substituted the values to find the rate of change."
