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Van Daniel Rodriguez Ter Avest was an American young man of immigrants parents, a Mexican father and a Dutch mother, whose sole aspiration in life was to become a footballer. He had grown up watching the legends of both his nations, with his love for Mexican football growing bigger, since it was a country he visited often, as it was just south of the border from the United States. He had only been to the Netherlands a handful of times when he was younger, and he loved his other country, it was the other half of his heart.
For one reason or another, he was never able to achieve his dream of playing football professionally. His parents were never able to afford soccer camps, and youth training, and he had been left to study at a university and work part time. He was working on his masters in physical education and sports management in the mornings, and worked the night shifts at a university near his home. On the little free time he had, he played football with some friends in an amateur football league at the park. It was the last rung of the football ladder, but it was all he had until he could earn himself the money to join the LA Galaxy try outs. His parents continued to tell him it was a dream too far out of his reach, but Van Daniel wasn't one to give up very easily.
Another thing he enjoyed during his free time was to learn football tricks to then perform them, film them, and upload them to his social media accounts. His latest one was a trick he had seen Kaka do in an old video. In it, he was dressed in a bright red Portland Thorns jersey that a viewer of his had sent as a present.
He had posted a snipet of it to his instagram account with a short caption.
vannydanny: the new vid is up on youtube, check it out pls!
Minutes after, he scrolled through his newsfeed as he often did, replying to some of the comments that people had left for him.
He was several comments down when he spotted one that caught his eye.
alexmsmith13 just liked your photo!
alexmsmith13 just commented on your photo!
alexmsmith13: that's a PORTLAND THORNS JERSEY
alexmsmith13: do u wtch the women's league??
alexmsmith13: sick trick btw, imma have to try it sometime
By looking at their username and profile picture, he couldn't tell very much. He was left as equally without information when he clicked on the person's account. Their username alexmsmith13, didn't say much to Van Daniel, neither did their display name. The only thing he gathered from the account bio was that they were a person named Alex M. Smith, and that they played footie. Their logo was the US National football team logo, and they had only uploaded three pictures so far, all of them of objects and none of themselves.
For the time being, he would assume Alex was a man. There weren't many women named Alex where he was from, and he had always known it as a boy's name.
What he did like was that Alex seemed to know about football, because he had complimented Van Daniel and said he would have to attempt the trick one day. He didn't know what it was, ultimately, but he ended up clicking the follow button on Alex's page.
It wasn't two minutes before he received something in his private messages from the mysterious commenter on instagram.
alexmsmith13: thx for the follow back :)
alexmsmith13: i had been watching ur vids for a while now. ur so talented!
vannydanny: no prob bro :)
