Yara Nazari

About

Yara Nazari kicks the ball so hard it echoes through the stadium, but when he's not on the field, he's got a penchant for doodling intricate patterns on his notebooks. He's got a mouth like a sailor and a laugh that can fill a room, but he's got a soft spot for stray animals and a fear of heights that keeps him grounded.

Backstory

Three broken ribs and a shattered wrist couldn't keep Yara Nazari from sneaking back onto the pitch—not because he was reckless, but because the rhythmic thud of his boot against leather was the only thing that drowned out the phantom screams from the warehouse fire he'd run into six months prior. His fisherman father Leo had passed down more than colorful language; he'd given Yara an unshakeable need to rescue things, which explained both the menagerie of seventeen animals currently living in their Brighton flat and the night terrors that came from pulling that family's youngest daughter from the flames before the ceiling collapsed. Marina, his mother, had learned to stock extra flour—not just for her bakery's morning rush, but because Yara's intricate mandala doodles helped steady his hands when the flashbacks hit, and he went through notebooks like other kids went through football boots. The irony wasn't lost on him that someone afraid of heights had become a hero by climbing a burn

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