protocol | antoine griezmann ✓

Chapter Four.

  «I want to live where soul meets body.»  

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Red suits me, red suits me. I look flawless in red. Oh my God I look like Clifford, the big red dog.

Alexandra's day didn't start the way she expected. Her alarm clock failed and she fell asleep, if it wasn't for Antonio she would have probably miss her first day at work –or be there five hours later, there was no in between–, somehow they ran out of hot water in the apartment and she had to shower not with cold water but frozen, that shit could've go out in ice cubs according to her, Alexandra missed breakfast because her little amount of time to get to work, her taxi driver misunderstood her and stopped in front of Real Madrid's stadium exactly when she had only ten minutes to get to el Vicente Calderón and she almost embarrassed herself in front of the whole security team when her shoe got stuck in a sewer grate –gladly Alexandra managed to free her shoe before the gang of men noticed.

Thanks God everything started to change when she got into the stadium; she could get coffee and what looked like a bagel in the dining room, she changed to her official uniform, a red polo shirt with Atletico de Madrid's badge on her left boob, Alexandra took a picture for her worker card and it looked amazing, Manuel Cortéz instructed her about her duties –which basically concluded on serving whoever was in need– and so on. By far, taking away the fact that she indeed looked like Clifford with the shirt, everything was in function.

That until the real action began.

Two hours before the game even started the stadium already felt like a mess –in a good way. Alexandra loved going to baseball games, but never thought the atmosphere behind those enjoyable activities was so tense, especially in football games. She quite understood it, according to Antonio, Atlético de Madrid's stay in the Champions League was in the table today; big game, big deal. When there was an hour left, the bleachers started to fill and a part of the staff cooled down; from now on the deal would not be on their hands.

"Alexandra, can you go to back entrance, receive PSV and help Luis to guide them?" Somebody spoke from her wireless headset. Luis was one of the delegates and pretty much one of the few people who got to talk with the players.

"On my way" The other person murmured a thank you and the line went blank. This looked like that summer when her best friend worked at Bloomingdale's. She had to organize, receive and basically being attentive for whatever happened. Alexandra left the papers she had on her hands to another person near her and headed towards the back entrance.

As soon as she stood beside Luis Montenegro, a huge red bus with PSV's badge printed on it parked in front of the entrance. Mr. Montenegro and she were waiting for the football players right at the end of the steps. One by one started to get out of the bus, someone gave them their respective bags and they entered the stadium. Alexandra followed Mr. Montenegro from behind as the players followed them to the visitors' locker room.

"Alexandra Atlético is here, go back to the back entrance and stay there in case they need something" There are no breaks in this job.

She literally ran to the back entrance, a few people gave her a rare look but it was the least of her issues. When Alexandra got there, some players were already walking towards the locker room, she settled beside a man in a tuxedo exactly where the guys could see her in case of any need.

Some of them said hi and others were too busy with their phones or listening music to interact with the line of people around them. Her eyes caught a sight of two familiar faces from yesterday, if she did a perfect research those two were Saúl Ñíguez and Koke; both seemed to be having an entertainment chat in Spanish until Saúl looked up and saw Alexandra, he literally elbowed Koke and she noticed that –not so– discreet detail. Koke caught her face and smiled while Saúl pursed his mouth in a cheeky smirk, she wanted to twirl her eyes but it didn't look so correct.