"Hi." I whispered.

"Pai." Neymar said. He must have heard us, I was sure. I cursed myself for thinking we were alone although it was the worst luck to bump into his dad. I didn't even know he was in Granja Comary today.

Of course his father said something I didn't understand and didn't bother to acknowledge I was there.

"Liv, I'll catch you later." Neymar told me.

"Um, okay. Bye." I said and once again his father didn't say anything. I walked away feeling embarrassed most of all. As I walked towards my room I saw David walking outside, still talking on the phone. I didn't want to bother him until he was done with his call so I decided to do something I hadn't done in a while. I went to my room, took my mp3 player and went to the garden kiosk that sat atop the small hill overlooking the pond. I put my earphones on to listen to some music as I laid down on the bench, closing my eyes.

I thought about how crazy the last three days had been. Thinking back to the game against Croatia and me running like a crazy person all the way from the bleachers to the locker rooms, it felt like it was someone else and not me that did all those things. Like watching something unfold in front of your eyes and not being able to stop it. But in this case, I didn't want to stop it.

That's not to say I wasn't afraid. I was terrified.

I didn't know exactly how much time had passed, the only way I could count it was by the 20 repeats of my favorite song playing, when my phone rang.

It was a text from my brother. They had all arrived to Belo Horizonte by train to see the game between Greece and Colombia. Demis was half Greek and he wanted to see his team play. They had devised a good plan to see lots of the games that were close to Sao Paulo, visiting some of the cities along the way. Our next match which would be held in Fortaleza was too far for them to come but I was hoping I'd get to see them again one way or the other. If we advanced to the round of 16 I'd definitely get to see them.

I texted back, wishing Greece good luck before I closed my eyes again. After a while I heard heavy footsteps through my earphones. I opened my eyes as David came and sat next to me.

"No don't get up." He said when I started to stand. I took my earphones off.

"What happened?" I asked him.

He let out a big sign. "My mother talked to her."

"Now?"

"No. After we broke up, the second time. She asked Sarah to try to leave me alone! Can you believe this?" David said.

"Why didn't Sarah tell you?"

"Because we had already said we'd give each other space, or she had said as you remember and she didn't think it would do me good to know that."

"That's kind of her." I remarked. David shot me a somewhat angry look. "And Theo? Is she with him now?"

"No. At least she said no. I don't know Liv. She said accepting the proposal was a mistake. She panicked, she thought she and I were over, she had seen these pictures of you and me and she thought I'd moved on. She thought I had given up on us. When in reality she did."

"That's what she meant when she told me it would be bad if you knew. It was about the proposal."

He nodded. "But the thing is, do I believe her? Or was she having fun with Theo and that's why she said yes?"

"But then she wouldn't come back to you, would she? She wouldn't come find you in Rio that day."

"I don't know. Honestly I'm too tired with all this. Why are you girls so complicated?" He whined.

"You wouldn't like us if we weren't." I joked.

"Where is your other half? I was surprised to see you sitting here."

"With his dad, believe it or not. He kind of caught us?"

"Making out?" David asked making a face.

"Not exactly." I said before telling him what had happened.

"And Neymar is trying to fix it?"

"Yeap. And to think we were making progress with his dad." I said rolling my eyes.

"You were?"

"Yeah, just the other day he said a word to me without making a face."

"That's just tremendous progress."

"It was, wasn't it? C'mon let's go watch a movie or something. We have practice again in two hours."

I didn't see Neymar at all until practice; I only got a text saying I'd see him then. Indeed as David and I walked towards the fields I saw him sitting on the bench. His father was there too.

"Oh boy." David said when he saw the look on my face.

"Shut up." I poked him with my elbow as we walked up to Thiago.

"Hey guys." Thiago said.

"Hello to you too Brutus." David sneered.

Thiago gave him a perplexed look.

"I haven't seen you all day." I told him.

"I just got back. Why did you call me Brutus? And in what world are you Caesar?"

"You're Brutus because you told her about Bruna!"

"You told him I told you?" Thiago turned to me.

"Brutus and Bruna, how lovely." David commented.

"We talked about it. Neymar too." I told Thiago.

"You told him we went to see her?"

"YOU WENT TO SEE HER?" David asked making the people around us turn to look at us. "Just how deep does this conspiracy go?"

"Well I'm glad to see you're so much better." Thiago told him.

"Yeah the sneer is back." I commented.

"Seriously, you went to see Bruna?" David asked again.

I nodded. "Yesterday."

David made an incoherent sound.

"Let me tell you, we kind of made up with each other." I told him.

"No way." David said as Hulk who had Marcelo on his back started running around and bumping into people.

 "Pfff children." David commented.

"Yeah you're such an old guy at 27." I mocked him.

"I'm mature." David said and stuck his tongue out.

Thiago and I looked at each other, rolling our eyes before we joined the others. I approached coach Coto when I spotted him

"Where is Neymar?" Coach Coto asked me.

"He was just here."I turned to look to where I last saw him.

"How come you don't know since you two are attached at the hip?" David whispered in my ear, mockingly. I pushed him away and he walked towards the others, laughing.

"I'm here." Neymar said approaching us.

"Alright." The coach said as he grabbed a bag of equipment. "Let's go." He told me. "Oscar will be joining us today."

Indeed Oscar ran up and joined us the rest of the way. "Hey there." I told him.

We started practicing with coach Coto explaining the basics to Oscar. It was like going back to the start and from a coaching point of view it was a little boring to have to go all over it again. But I thought it was a good idea to not limit this practice to Neymar anymore.

"Guys go get the mannequins." The coach told me and Neymar as he explained something to Oscar.

This gave me a chance to finally talk to him. His dad was still there observing the practice but not watching us at the moment.

"How did it go? You never came by afterwards." I told Neymar.

"Yeah I went for some light conditioning in the gym." Neymar told me.

"Is everything alright?" I asked as we started rolling the mannequins.

"Yeah, totally." He told me. I realized he didn't want to talk about this so I didn't push him further. For now.

After we were done with practice I went to my room for a shower and got dressed. "Hey stranger." I told Marina when she came in. She was followed by David. "What's going on?"

"We're going out after dinner. You're coming." Marina said and disappeared in the bathroom.

"We are? I am?"

"We thought it was a good idea. We won't stay out too late but we need to celebrate our win and let loose a little." David said. "So?"

"Did you tell Neymar?"

"Not yet. I'll go tell him."

"Alright I'm going if he wants to go. He looked pretty tired before." I said.

David made a face before leaving.

I started looking through my things and I realized I had forgotten a shirt in Neymar's room so I decided to go get it. I reached it as David knocked on the door but hid behind the wall, fearing that Neymar Senior might be there.

Neymar answered the door after two knocks. "You alone?" David asked him.

He nodded. "C'mon in quickly. I don't want Olivia to know I'm here."