Fonseca gave them a rare afternoon off.
Nobody trusted it.
A man who carried a notebook as faithfully as Rui Fonseca did not suddenly become generous.
The more likely explanation was that tired players made poor decisions, and poor decisions created inaccurate evaluations.
Fonseca was exactly the sort of coach who would consider that a waste of useful information.
Diego announced that he intended to spend the afternoon at the beach.
“I need recovery,” he explained, with the gravity of someone announcing a medical procedure.
“You need a tan,” Tomás said.
“Same thing.”
Kiala disappeared without explanation, which appeared to be his preferred way of spending free time.
Nobody asked where he went.
Nobody expected an answer if they did.
Bishal decided to take the train into Lisbon.
He told himself it was sightseeing, which was technically true.
But underneath that was something simpler.
For nearly two weeks his life had existed inside a small triangle: the training ground, the accommodation, and the streets connecting the two.
The routine had begun to feel less like structure and more like confinement.
He wanted, for one afternoon at least, to be somewhere that had nothing to do with football.
The train followed the coastline for much of the journey.
The Atlantic appeared and disappeared between buildings, flashes of grey blue water beneath a pale afternoon sky.
Fishing boats rested in small harbours.
White houses climbed gentle hillsides.
Every few minutes the view shifted completely, replaced by another version of Portugal he had not seen before.
For the first time since arriving, he found himself enjoying the unfamiliar sensation of having nowhere important to be.
His first stop was practical.
The club needed a Portuguese number on file, and he had delayed buying a local SIM card for long enough.
Part of him had grown fond of the international calling card.
It turned every phone call into a small ritual.
Dial one number.
Wait.
Enter a code.
Wait again.
Hearing his mother’s voice felt earned somehow.
A local SIM card would be easier.
Which was precisely why he had avoided it.
The shopping centre in Cascais looked exactly like shopping centres everywhere else in the world.
Glass walls.
Bright lighting.
Polished floors.
Air conditioning set to a temperature nobody had specifically requested.
For a moment he could have been in Bengaluru, or Dubai, or Singapore, or any other city with enough money and enough shops.
Finding the phone store was easy.
Buying the SIM card was not.
The employee asked for identification.
Then another document.
Then something else entirely.
Bishal offered his passport.
The employee frowned.
More Portuguese followed.
Bishal frowned back.
For several minutes they communicated through a mixture of gestures, fragments of English, and mutual confusion.
Eventually a supervisor appeared, examined the exact same documents for approximately five seconds, nodded, and approved everything immediately.
Twenty minutes later, Bishal walked away with a Portuguese phone number he would almost certainly forget before dinner.
Being foreign, he was discovering, involved an endless collection of tiny administrative puzzles.
The lift doors opened on an empty car.
Bishal stepped inside gratefully.
The silence felt welcome after the confusion of the phone store.
For a few seconds, nobody needed anything from him.
The moment did not last.
Just before the doors closed, two boys slipped inside.
They looked twelve or thirteen.
School bags hung loosely from one shoulder.
Their conversation moved at the speed only children seemed capable of maintaining, words tumbling over one another in rapid Portuguese.
At first they ignored him completely.
Then one of them looked properly.
Bishal noticed the change immediately.
Curiosity first.
Then amusement.
The boy leaned toward his friend and said something quietly.
He pinched his nose between two fingers and fanned the air dramatically with his free hand.
The second boy burst out laughing.
He repeated a word.
Then repeated it again.
Bishal only understood part of it.
Caril.
Curry.
The lift doors opened and the boys ran out laughing, already moving on to whatever came next in their afternoon.
The entire incident had lasted less than ten seconds.
Bishal remained standing where he was as the doors closed again and the lift continued upward.
For a moment he simply stared at his own reflection in the polished metal panel.
A minute earlier he had simply been another person riding a lift.
Now he felt like a stereotype wearing his face.
The strange part was not the insult itself.
He had heard worse.
Professional football had provided plenty of opportunities for strangers to say unpleasant things.
Opposing fans.
Journalists.
Comment sections.
Entire stadiums, occasionally.
No, what unsettled him was how little information the joke required.
Those boys had not known who he was.
Not his name.
Not his profession.
Not his story.
They had not needed to.
All they had seen was an Indian face.
The rest had followed automatically.
The lift reached the upper floor.
Bishal stepped out and completed the SIM card purchase without really paying attention.
He signed where he was told to sign, paid what he was told to pay, and walked back through the shopping centre carrying a small paper packet that suddenly felt far less important than it had an hour earlier.
Near one of the entrances sat a small café.
Three outdoor tables.
A chalkboard menu.
No English.
Perfect.
He sat down anyway.
When the waiter arrived and launched into a sentence full of Portuguese words Bishal did not recognise, he stared at the menu for several seconds before eventually pointing at what appeared to be a picture of coffee.
The waiter looked unconvinced.
At the next table sat a young man surrounded by the remains of what appeared to be a deeply unsuccessful study session.
An economics textbook lay open beside several pages of handwritten notes.
A highlighter rested loosely in one hand.
Judging by how long he had been staring out the window, very little economics had actually occurred.
The young man looked up.
“You want coffee, or you want a picture of coffee?”
Bishal blinked.
Then laughed for the first time since the lift.
“Honestly, I am not entirely sure.”
The stranger grinned.
“I think that is the most honest answer possible.” He said something brief to the waiter in Portuguese.
The waiter nodded and disappeared.
“I ordered for you.”
“Should I be worried?”
The young man considered the question seriously.
“Only if you dislike coffee.”
“That seems manageable.”
“Good.
Because if you dislike Portuguese coffee, life here becomes unnecessarily complicated.”
He extended a hand.
“I am João.”
“Bishal.”
“Tourist?”
“Not exactly.”
“What are you doing here then?”
“Football.
Trial at Estoril.”
João’s eyebrows lifted.
“Seriously?”
“Trying to.”
“Well,” he said, leaning back slightly, “that is significantly more interesting than economics.”
The coffee arrived a minute later in a tall glass.
João watched him take the first sip with the concentration of someone who had personally prepared it.
Bishal tasted it.
Coffee.
Milk.
No immediate signs of poisoning.
João relaxed.
“Good?”
“Good.”
“Excellent.
My reputation survives.”
The conversation drifted naturally after that.
João turned out to be twenty one and studying economics at the university in Lisbon, though he spoke about his degree with the enthusiasm of a man describing a minor administrative inconvenience.
“My parents think economics is practical.”
“And you?”
“I think my parents are practical.”
Bishal laughed.
“That is not the same thing.”
“No.
Unfortunately.”
For a while they talked about harmless topics.
Weather.
Football.
The shopping centre.
João’s older sister, who had moved to London and now complained about the rain despite voluntarily relocating to one of the rainiest cities in Europe.
According to João, this made no sense.
According to Bishal, it sounded exactly like family.
Then João asked a simple question.
“So how is Portugal treating you?”
The question was not unusual.
The answer felt more complicated than it should have.
Bishal could have said fine.
Most people did.
Fine was useful because it ended conversations.
Instead he found himself hesitating.
João noticed.
“That good, huh?”
Bishal smiled faintly.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
The change in João’s expression was immediate.
Not dramatic.
Just enough.
“Curry,” he said carefully.
“Why?”
Bishal looked down at his coffee for a moment.
Then he told him about the lift.
The story took less than a minute.
Two boys.
A gesture.
A word.
A laugh.
Nothing more.
When he finished, João sat quietly for several seconds, turning his cup slowly in its saucer.
Finally he sighed.
“I am sorry.”
The apology sounded genuine.
Not defensive.
Not embarrassed.
Just honest.
“Some people think that joke is funny.”
Bishal shrugged.
“It was not exactly original.”
“No.” João rubbed the back of his neck.
“That is kind of the problem.
They hear it once when they are kids.
Indian means curry.
Curry means smell.
Same joke forever.
Nobody stops to think about it because they have heard it a hundred times already.” He shook his head.
“It is stupid.”
The simplicity of the statement made Bishal trust it.
João was not trying to explain the behaviour away.
He was not pretending it did not happen.
He was not rushing to reassure him that Portugal was secretly perfect.
He was simply acknowledging reality.
Sometimes that mattered more than comfort.
“Most people are not like that,” João said after a moment.
Then he immediately added, “But pretending nobody is would be dishonest too.”
Bishal nodded.
That answer felt closer to the truth than anything else he had heard since arriving.
They sat quietly for a few moments.
The afternoon carried on around them.
People entered the shopping centre.
Others left.
A waiter collected empty cups from a nearby table.
Eventually João broke the silence.
“So.
You are really trialling at Estoril.”
“Trying to.”
“How is that going?”
Bishal laughed.
“Depends on the day.”
“That is usually not a good sign.”
“It is not a bad sign either.”
He found himself explaining the trial process.
The different positions.
Left back.
Midfield.
The mysterious notebook.
The assistant coach who seemed physically incapable of giving a normal compliment.
By the end of it, João looked fascinated.
“This coach sounds terrifying.”
“He kind of is.”
“And you keep showing up every day anyway.”
“That is generally how football works.”
“No wonder economics appeals to me.
Much lower risk of public humiliation.”
Bishal pointed toward the open textbook.
“You seem to be humiliating yourself just fine.”
João looked offended.
“That book and I have reached an understanding.”
“What understanding?”
“I ignore it.
It ignores me.”
“Sounds healthy.”
“It is not.”
The conversation drifted again.
This time toward India.
João asked questions the way genuinely curious people asked questions.
Not performing curiosity.
Not trying to collect interesting facts.
Just interested.
He asked about Bengaluru.
About football.
About whether cricket really was as important as everyone claimed.
About Bishal’s family.
About whether his parents had supported his football career.
That question made Bishal smile.
“My mother supported it.”
“And your father?”
“My father supported the idea of me having a backup plan.
Very strongly.”
João laughed.
“My parents would like him.
They would probably exchange notes.”
The afternoon slipped away without either noticing.
By the time they checked the clock, nearly an hour had passed.
João looked surprised.
“I was supposed to study.”
“You absolutely were.”
“That is unfortunate.” The economics textbook remained firmly closed.
A victim of circumstances.
Eventually Bishal stood.
“I should probably head into Lisbon.”
“Tourist activities?”
“Something like that.”
João nodded.
Then he grabbed a napkin and scribbled something on it.
A phone number.
“In case you need help translating anything.
Or if you need someone to complain about Portugal to.”
“That too.”
“Especially that.”
Bishal folded the napkin carefully and slipped it into his pocket.
The gesture surprised him slightly.
It was just a phone number.
Yet it felt oddly significant.
A week earlier Portugal had been nothing but training grounds and uncertainty.
Now it included a person.
Sometimes belonging started smaller than expected.
Outside, the afternoon sunlight had softened slightly.
Lisbon waited another train ride away.
For the first time since leaving the shopping centre, Bishal realised he was not thinking about the lift anymore.
Not because it no longer mattered.
Because something else had happened afterward.
And for now, that was enough.
Lisbon turned out to be exactly the sort of city that rewarded wandering.
Bishal emerged from the metro at Praça do Comércio and immediately stopped walking.
The square stretched out before him in pale yellow and white, framed by elegant buildings on three sides and the river on the fourth.
Sunlight bounced off the stone beneath his feet.
Ferries crossed the Tagus slowly in the distance.
Somewhere nearby, a musician was playing guitar badly enough to be noticeable and well enough to keep people listening.
For a few moments he simply stood there.
No training session.
No notebook.
No evaluation.
Nobody timing his runs or analysing his positioning.
Just a city existing around him.
It felt strangely liberating.
A crowd had gathered near the centre of the square around a street performer painted entirely bronze.
The man stood perfectly still on a small platform, frozen like a statue.
Children circled him suspiciously.
Tourists took photographs.
Then a little girl dropped a coin into his hat.
The statue came to life instantly.
The crowd jumped.
The girl squealed.
Everyone laughed, including Bishal.
It was the first completely uncomplicated laugh he had had since arriving in Portugal.
He bought a pastry from a nearby cart despite having no idea what it was called.
Whatever it was, it tasted excellent.
For nearly half an hour he wandered without direction, watching people more than buildings.
Families.
Students.
Office workers.
An elderly couple holding hands as they walked along the riverfront.
Nobody paid him any attention.
Nobody stared.
Nobody laughed.
Nobody pinched their nose.
For the length of that afternoon, he was simply another face in a city full of faces.
The invisibility felt surprisingly comforting.
A guitarist had taken over a corner near the waterfront.
The melody was unfamiliar but beautiful.
Bishal paused to listen.
That was when he felt a slight bump against his hip.
Nothing unusual.
The square was crowded.
People brushed past each other constantly.
He barely registered it.
A few minutes later he stopped at a kiosk to buy a bottle of water.
His hand went automatically to his pocket.
And found nothing.
For a second his brain refused to process it.
He checked again.
Same result.
Then the other pocket.
Then his backpack.
The wallet was gone.
He stood perfectly still.
Around him, Lisbon carried on exactly as before.
Tourists continued taking photographs.
Children continued chasing pigeons.
The guitarist continued playing.
Nobody knew anything had happened.
Nobody cared.
Bishal took a slow breath.
Panic solved nothing.
Football had taught him that years ago.
When a match started slipping away, panic only accelerated the collapse.
First, inventory.
Passport, safe, locked in the accommodation.
Most of his cash, also safe, hidden in a separate pocket sewn into his bag.
His father had insisted on that precaution before he left India.
At the time, Bishal had considered it excessive.
Now it seemed annoyingly intelligent.
What he had actually lost was not catastrophic.
Forty euros.
A temporary club identification card.
And a photograph.
The photograph stopped him.
His parents, taken at a cousin’s wedding years earlier.
His father standing stiffly in a suit he clearly hated.
His mother smiling at the camera while resting a hand lightly on his shoulder.
The picture existed in multiple albums back home.
Probably several drawers.
Maybe even an old computer somewhere.
Yet the thought of losing that specific copy bothered him far more than the money.
The nearest police station was only a few streets away.
The officers looked unsurprised.
Deeply unsurprised.
As though tourists losing wallets was merely another administrative process, somewhere between traffic tickets and lunch breaks.
One officer listened patiently while Bishal explained.
The other filled out paperwork with practiced efficiency.
Eventually the older officer looked up.
“You will probably not get it back.” His English was excellent and devastatingly direct.
“I guessed.”
The officer nodded.
“Tourist area.
Very busy.
They take.
They disappear.” Not cruel.
Not dismissive.
Just honest.
He completed the report anyway.
Signed forms he could not read.
Accepted copies he would almost certainly never use.
When everything was finished, the officer handed over the paperwork.
“For insurance.”
“I do not have insurance for forty euros.”
The officer considered this.
“Then for paperwork.”
Bishal laughed despite himself.
The officer almost smiled.
Almost.
Outside, the square looked different.
Not worse.
Just different.
Like a football stadium after watching your team lose there.
The place had not changed.
Your relationship with it had.
He sat beside the river for a while.
The water moved slowly beneath the afternoon sun.
His thoughts kept returning to the photograph.
Not the money.
Not even the inconvenience.
Just the photograph.
Strange what the mind chose to value.
That evening he called Sohini before calling home.
The decision surprised him slightly.
The moment she answered, she said, “You sound off.” Not hello.
Not how are you.
Straight to the point.
Apparently she and his mother shared certain instincts.
“My wallet got stolen.”
A pause.
Not alarm.
Assessment.
The kind of pause a scientist probably used before deciding whether an experiment had failed.
“How much?”
“Forty euros.”
“And?”
“A photograph of my parents.”
The silence lasted a little longer this time.
“That is the part that bothered you.”
“Yeah.”
“Can you get another copy?”
“My mother definitely has one.”
“Then it is not lost.”
Bishal leaned back against the wall.
“It feels lost.”
“Those are not the same thing.”
The answer sounded exactly like Sohini.
Not dismissing the feeling.
Just refusing to let it become larger than reality.
He found himself smiling despite the day.
“That is annoyingly reasonable.”
“I have spent years developing this skill.”
He told her about the square.
The street performer.
The pastry.
The lift incident from earlier.
The coffee with João.
The wallet.
The police station.
Everything.
She listened without interrupting.
When he finally finished, there was a long silence.
Then, “I hate that this happened.” Simple.
Direct.
No attempt to minimise it.
No attempt to solve it.
Just acknowledgement.
A surprisingly rare skill.
After a moment she continued.
“But none of it changes why you are there.”
Bishal looked out the window.
The parking lot lights had already come on.
“Maybe.”
“No.” Her voice remained calm.
“You did not go to Portugal because you expected a pleasant experience.”
“That sounds terrible.”
“It is terrible.”
He laughed.
“Thank you.”
“You went because you could not live with not knowing.”
The words settled somewhere deep.
Because they were true.
Painfully true.
Every difficult day in Portugal still hurt less than the regret he had carried through his first life.
“Being foreign means you are always slightly off balance,” he said quietly.
“Of course.
And you pay for familiarity in small amounts.
A misunderstanding here.
An embarrassing mistake there.
A bad day.
A wrong assumption.
A stolen wallet.
Some countries charge more than others.”
For a while neither spoke.
The silence felt comfortable.
Eventually she added, “You survived all of it.”
“The wallet theft?”
“The week.”
That made him pause.
Because she was right.
The lift had not broken him.
The loneliness had not broken him.
The football had not broken him.
The uncertainty had not broken him.
The week had simply happened.
And he was still here.
Still moving forward.
Still learning.
Still trying.
When the call finally ended, Bishal remained sitting on the edge of the bed for a long time.
Outside, the parking lot lights reflected faintly through the curtains.
Inside, the room felt quieter than usual.
But not lonely.
Not tonight.
He thought about the day.
The boys in the lift.
João buying him coffee.
The missing wallet.
The photograph.
The police officer.
The guitarist.
The river.
All of it belonged to the same city.
The same afternoon.
The same experience.
Good and bad tangled together so tightly that separating them felt impossible.
Maybe that was what being somewhere new actually meant.
Not choosing between disappointment and kindness.
Learning how to carry both at once.
Football had brought him to Portugal.
But days like this were teaching him how to stay.