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There’s a new kid in town.
There’s a new kid in town, and Coach Hernandez meets him the day of the tryouts.
Neil Josten is a quiet kid. Almost jumpy. He doesn’t talk to the other students, but he’s a good enough player, and his line-up is missing a striker, so Hernandez lets him on the team.
First thing that Hernandez notices is that the kid plays defensively. It’s a strange habit, considering he hasn’t played Exy before and is playing as a striker – he’d chalk it down as weird coincidence, except Neil’s footwork is almost too good for someone who claims he’s never held a racquet before.
Hernandez doesn’t mention anything, though.
It’s not his place – he’s the kid’s Coach. If Neil happens to be a better player than he’d initially thought, all the better.
Second thing he notices that there is something off about the kid. His parents don’t come to a single game; there’s the aforementioned jumpiness, and he doesn’t associate with the others.
He’s always the last to leave the building, too.
Then comes the day that Hernandez makes his rounds through the gym and locker rooms, and doesn’t find it empty.
Neil Josten is trying to get comfortable on one of the wooden benches, looking like he’d been there for a few hours at least and was planning to stay for at least a couple more, and Hernandez doesn’t quite know how to handle this.
It isn’t permitted for students to be in here after school. It definitely isn’t permitted to break in – Hernandez remembers locking up after practice.
He takes a look at the kid.
Neil hasn’t said anything since Hernandez found him, hasn’t tried to explain himself. He edged away a little bit – such small a movement Hernandez doubts it was deliberate, and now he’s staring at him with lips pressed in a tight line like he’s waiting for a punch.
It’s a bit disconcerting. No one’s looked at Hernandez like they were expecting them to hit them since his own high school years.
The locker room seems undisturbed otherwise. None of the lockers appear to have been broken into.
Hernandez shakes his head.
“When I come in here tomorrow, I expect this room to be empty,” he says.
Not waiting for a reply, he closes the door behind him.
It happens again and again over the course of the year. He finds Neil loitering around while the others get inside to shower, and then makes a beeline for the locker room when Hernandez tries to confront him about it. He deflects every single question about his parents, and Hernandez catches him every so often checking his jersey to make sure it hasn’t slipped upwards.
It’s on days like these that Neil seems particularly tense that he’ll find him sleeping in the locker room.
The responsible thing would be to send him home, if not report him to the headmaster.
But then Hernandez thinks of absent parents, of possible bruises on his body and reluctance to go home when he doesn’t absolutely have to.
He remembers his own adolescence, and of wishing someone would have given him an out, and thinks that perhaps the responsible thing isn’t the right thing in this case.
He leaves Neil to it.
That same night, he looks up universities that might still have open spots on their line-up.
Josten is a good player. He has the potential to be a great player, if someone were to give him a chance.
There’s a request from a Coach Wymack, Palmetto State University.
The Foxes.
Hernandez has heard of this team. Everyone who knows a thing or two about Exy has.
A team made up of kids with difficult backgrounds; a team that, like Neil, could one day be great, maybe.
Hernandez isn’t good with people, but he knows what it’s like to need someone to give him a chance. It’s why he became coach.
He jots down the address and types a letter of recommendation for Neil. It’s not the best – he’s a coach, not a linguistics professor, but he supposes it’s well enough.
He includes Neil’s file and a video made up of scenes of Neil playing over the last weeks of their season, and hopes it will be enough to convince this David Wymack to at least take a look at him.
Give him the chance he needs.
Not two weeks later, he receives an email from Palmetto, stating Coach Wymack and two members of his team are flying out to Millport to see Neil play.
Hernandez thinks of ways out and second chances, and believes this is the best choice he’s made in years.