DROPPING WALLS (MANXMAN) ~UNDER REVIEW~

Thomas has too many eyes on him.

"You know that we care, don't you?" Thomas father asked and the boy didn't reply to the man's question in any way.

His father was awake, it took him three days to be well enough to be allowed visitors and Thomas only visited him on the second day of visits. The boy didn't know how his father would treat him. The attention he was getting from his mother was not precedent. He was swimming in foreign waters and he wanted to get back to his safety zone.

"I guess, that's what parents are supposed to do, right?" The boy said after a long silence.

"We don't care because we have to... it's just, we want you to be someone, things like that don't happen without hard work... I wish my parents had done that for me..."

"You know how much grandma suffered with your father being a referee in their island. People there don't play fair and he even got to the hospital because of that, she would never put her son to play there."

Thomas said before his father could say anything. The boy had arguments with his parents about how they took all the fun out of being a child for him, but they were mostly angry when they did it, this was different, they were emotional. "You didn't need them to make you think about soccer 24/7 if you wanted to pursue the career. You guys made me lose all the beauty of the gam for a few years, i didn't have the chance to be a normal boy just playing for fun, of thinking about college, or eating whatever I wanted, no, you guys controlled my diet, you made plans for me and I just had to follow, you never showed that you cared for my well being, just my career, that's different."

His father just nodded. Thomas shook his head and closed his eyes trying to figure out what to think. He didn't come up with anything that wouldn't end up with him screaming at his parent. He opened his eyes and saw that the other man was obviously looking for something to say too. Thomas hated how much the men in his family was alike, they had the same problems with communicating. It took Thomas' grandfather most of his life to learn how to express without fear of not being understood, Thomas didn't want it to himself, he could see that that was what Sky and Lucas were so eager to help him with, open up and be more comfortable with being himself.

"I'm happy you're fine." Thomas said and his father smile. The boy smiled too.

"I'm not going anywhere for a while, imma gonna see you raise the world Cup one day. I know that." Thomas felt a warmth in his chest but didn't say anything. He was relieved that his family was well and that they would continue like that.

Buffalo's victory over France left the country on an ecstasy. Thomas saw the natives of the island celebrating everywhere, drunk people that would get drunk if the national team won or lost. It was a good thing they were drinking as a celebration.

Peter didn't stay at the hospital every day, he wanted to, but Thomas made the boy leave and go see his relatives that were leaving in the island. Thomas didn't find it right to monopolize the other boy, and he didn't want his family thinking anything more than they were good friends. The two young players went back to the main island together. Peter had stayed away for too long and the boy had to go back to his training center.

When Thomas got really alone for for the first time in a long time he didn't know what to do. He had a routine that involved his teammates, training, his newly made friends and the past few days took him off balance, made him aware of how codependent Of others he was.

The boy took a cab to the house, he checked his phone, all the texts from the people he spent most of his days with; Lucas, Sky, Sir, Tim, Isabela, Marcus, even Caca was checking on him. Apparently what happened to his family was on the news and got the people talking. Thomas had replied some of the texts, but he didn't want to talk about how he was or about the accident, he ignored the reporters who tried to pry. Peter even had to hustle one of the news guy out of the hospital.

Thomas was close to the house when he opened his chat with Vizanno, the man checked on him all the time, telling things about France and asking about the boy's family. He was the only one Thomas replied every question, he always kept Vizanno at arm's length, but the man didn't mind, always tried to cross the invisible barrier Thomas tried to keep up. The barrier that was slowly crumbling down.

All of the 29 tryouts were in the house when Thomas arrived, they all looked worried, thomas didn't like the attention on him, but he found Tim, a friend amongst the small crowd and told him that his family was fine, they just needed to recover, looking at Tim made it easy to talk to the others.

The tryouts schedule would go back to normal now that the celebration was over. Thomas had lost a few days of his personal training, he needed to focus once again, he needed to pout his back on the game, the were just three months to the tryouts final game, he needed his best to be the best!