We Come Alive 4

Bastard

Thursday evening, Mateo sat down in his chair behind his desk as he sat along with the rest of the  coaches and trainers for their debriefing of the practice they just had.

"So, any cons? Bad things from today?" Mateo wondered, looking around at his co-workers. Victor and Danny were sitting in front of him in the two chairs on the other side of his desk while Sam and Ricky were sitting on the couch against the wall.

The four men shook their heads and mumbled their no's. Mateo nodded as he looked down at the notes Ricky took during practice.

"Great things?" Mateo asked aloud, reading over the notes.

"Yeah." Sam spoke up. "Lane's doing fantastic this week. He's really doing well when it comes to him coming in and picking up the slack. Leading the boys, working well with them, even fixing the plays to make it work for them. He's giving me new plays that are just fantastic."

Mateo nodded his head then looked at Danny when he spoke up. "Diego's getting better and better as time goes on." He informed. "I might work with him to do some tackles against a crash pad next week, see where he is with direct contact. But he's speeding through the drills, keeping up there with the rest of the defense. Even starting to lead the pack."

Mateo dropped the notes down on his desk and leaned his elbows on the desk top. "Yeah, that's great. Just tell me when you wanna do it and I'll have him go in the space behind the field and work with you there."

Danny just nodded his head as he scratched his beard. Mateo laced his fingers together as he glanced down at the notes from the week then back to the men in front of him.

"Alright. Tomorrow is game day. So tomorrow night, Sam make sure Lane knows those plays because he's starting." Mateo confirmed. "Clover is benched until further notice, so Jose and Colby will do the coin toss alone. Away game at Central High, so meet back after practice at 4:30."

"Wait..." Victor trailed off, frowning. "What did you say about Clover?"

Mateo cleared his throat as he dropped his hands down on the table. "I'm benching Clover until further notice. She wouldn't know the difference. She hasn't shown up to practice since Tuesday and when she did come, she couldn't keep her head in the game and sat the bench most of the time. She left halfway through. She hasn't been to school either, so she's gone."

"She's Clover. You can't kick her off the team." Sam pointed out. "She's the starting quarterback. Kick her off the team and the offense falls apart."

"I'm not." Mateo sighed, laying his hands flat on the desk as he looked at the four concerned men. "She's going through a lot. I gotta try and have her back as much as a I can, but my job is to coach this football team. Her head is somewhere else. Understandable, but I have to do what I have to do as the coach. It's not fair that she disappeared for three, four days and comes back getting to play starting quarterback. That's not how it works. That's not fair to Lane who's picked up all of her slack so we have a chance to win tomorrow, and it's not fair to the rest of the team when she bails out for a whole week leaving them high and dry. I understand what she's going through and it's extremely tragic, but my job is to coach this football team. So as the head coach of the football team, she's benched until she shows she can balance football and her home life."

The room fell silent for a moment. The four men internalized what Mateo said until Ricky finally spoke up for the first time since the meeting begun.

"That it?"

"That's it." Mateo nodded.

The four men got up and went their separate ways to their offices. Ricky walked into his office where he saw Manny working on her laptop at his desk. Ricky just flopped down in the chair on the other side and burped as he pulled out his phone out his pocket.