Klopp's order to "be a teenager" was a liberation. It was the lifting of a weight Mateo hadn't even realized he was carrying: the weight of being a professional, a prodigy, a phenomenon.
For one weekend, he was allowed to be just… Mateo. And with Lukas as his enthusiastic guide, he dove headfirst into the bewildering world of normal adolescence, a world that began, as all modern journeys must, with a trip to the shops.
Their first stop, inevitably, was the shopping street. But this time, the atmosphere was completely different.
The anxiety that had crippled Mateo before the fear of being seen, of being judged, of being a fraud in clothes that didn't fit his identity was replaced by a hesitant curiosity. Klopp's words had given him a new lens through which to see himself.
