We Come Alive 3

Names

Thursday afternoon, after a long and sweaty practice in the hot sun, Mateo walked inside his empty home by himself for the first time in a long while. He was use to hearing Manny and Clover walking around talking to each other or on the phone or listening to music or doing one of the other many things they do in a day. But today, the house was silent.

Mateo went straight to the living room where he sat down on the couch and let out a deep sigh. He pulled his keys and phone out of his pockets and threw them onto the coffee table. Right when he was about to reach for the remote and turn the tv on, he heard the doorbell ring along with a knock on the door.

Mateo groaned loudly as he pushed himself up off the couch. He kicked off his shoes on his way to the front door where he heard more knocking.

"Calm down! I'm coming!" Mateo yelled.

He went to the door and unlocked it before swinging it open. Instantly he saw a woman with long brown curly hair up in a ponytail, bright brown eyes, and a big white tooth smile. She was inches shorter than Mateo, wide hips, full lips, and was dressed in sandals, black shorts, and a red tank top with a green cardigan as she leaned her legs against her three suitcases.

Mateo smiled softly seeing his first love, ex-girlfriend, and daughter's mother standing in front of him. "Hey, Kiara. Took you long enough."

"I had to call a taxi." She shrugged. "Airports are busy."

Kiara slipped pass him and went inside while he carried in her bags. "Where's Manny?"

Mateo shut the door behind him as he put her bags by the front door. "She's out with Bryce. The father of her baby. The boy you let impregnate our daughter."

"Bryce Rocha?" Kiara smirked, crossing her arms as she walked around the house and admired the pictures on the walls. "He's a good kid. I know his mother, she raised up a good boy. You meet him?" She asked turning around to face him.

"Yeah, a couple times." Mateo answered, picking up Clover's cleats and tossing them down the hallway to the girl's room.

"Who's are those?" Kiara wondered, looking at the grass strained red cleats on the floor behind her since she was standing at the beginning of the hall.

"Clover. The quarterback on the football team. She's staying here for her senior year." Mateo answered. "She has no other place to go."

Kiara nodded slowly as she followed Mateo to the couch in the living room. "Where's she?"

Mateo sighed, pulling his hair out of its ponytail and letting it fall onto his shoulders. "She's out with one of the boys, Stephen. They went to grab something to eat or something. When you see her she might only talk to you and not me. I benched her."

Kiara frowned. "Why? Ain't she the big star?"

"If you wanna call her that, sure." He shrugged. "Anyway, she has a back injury. She's going to the doctor tomorrow and by the new rules from the school I have to bench her no matter what. They gave us these whole new set of rules we gotta follow. Benching the players when we suspect they have an injury is one of them."

Kiara scoffed as she leaned down and took off her sandals. "That must suck for you. It's your team and you gotta listen to people who don't even go to the games? That's bullshit. But, whatever. Good luck. So where's my room?"

"You're sitting in it." Mateo smirked, looking over at her. He bursted into laughter seeing the angry expression on her face. "We're making the guest room into a nursery for Manny, her and Clover already room together, so it's either the couch or with me."

Kiara nodded as she got up. "We made a kid together, we can sleep in the same bed together." She stepped over his legs before going to the front door to get her bags. "You're lucky I just got laid off so I could help you with this baby and with Manny. Dumb economy."

Mateo smirked as he listened to her walk around behind him. "Stay as long as you want. I don't mind."

"Course you don't." She joked. "You never did stop loving me. Even when you did date that white chick."

Mateo just chuckled and turned the tv on while she unpacked her bags.

~**~

Meanwhile across town, Manny was holding hands with Bryce as the two walked through a park together. They had just parted ways with Bryce's sister who went with them to the doctor's office for the ultrasound. While his sister knew the gender of the baby, they didn't.

"So," Bryce begun, holding Manny's hand as they walked past a lake and she watched the ducks run around the edge, "thought of any names?"

Manny looked at him for a moment before shaking her head and looking back at the ducks. Bryce lead her over to a bench so she could watch them and they could sit and talk.

"How about for a boy, Bryce Jr.?" Bryce offered, clearly joking.

Manny scoffed. "No, that's not a good one. How about for a boy, Adrian? Or Esteban? That's cute."

Bryce rolled his eyes. "Every old guy I know's names Esteban. Maybe for a middle name. How about Luca?"

"Luca?" She repeated. "Luca....Luca. Luca Esteban Rocha?"

"Luca Esteban Rocha." Bryce repeated, snickering at her repeating the name over and over again under her breath. Bryce put his hand on her baby bump and felt the baby kick his hand.

"Yeah, imagine Luca Esteban Rocha running around on the field kicking the winning goal in the World Cup. Cause he's a kicker." Bryce grinned.

Manny put her hands over her baby bump and felt their baby moving around. "I feel like she's a girl. We should name her...Esmerelda. A gem." She smiled brightly.

Bryce gave her an unsure look. "How about Ana Sofía? I always wanted to name my daughter that."

"I like Esmerelda though. And her middle name could be Aurora." Manny begged. "But we can chose when she's born. See how we feel than."

Bryce didn't say anything as he thought for a moment. "How about if it's a girl, we name her Esmerelda for sure. But if it's a boy, we have to name him Luca. It's a 50/50 chance."

Manny nodded agreeing with that deal. She held up her pinky and he wrapped his pinky around hers. "You can't break a pinky promise." Manny pointed out, letting his pinky go.

"What'd you do today? Watch a marathon of Peter Pan movies?" Bryce snickered, standing up and helping her up. "You're so stupid."

Manny elbowed him as they kept going on their walk. "Don't call me stupid."

"You're so...goofy." Bryce corrected, rubbing his side from her hitting him in the ribs. "You're so silly."

Manny smirked as she let him hold her hand and guide her through the park so she could get some fresh air. The only real times she been going out in the last couple weeks was when she went to the football practices, but for the first time she just saw the beauty of the world.