The storm and the shield- "the bat and the net" sequel

Excerpt from Rimbaud’s diary:

------ day of the ------ year
Clear weather, midday, strong eastern winds,
I’m wearing a thick overcoat, some earmuffs, fur mittens, and extra layers as I’m writing this.
I talked with the coach at a cafe earlier. I was told about the new guy that will arrive tomorrow in our team.
I was so shocked, I had to ask three more times.
The coach seemed to think of the new boy as an incredible resource. Because he was told that he had been doing on pro level many sports before now, he had probably better skills and force than all the other boys in our team.
And I had to turn him into a useful and perfect teammate, because he had never played volleyball.
His education and supervision was left to me. Me, a teacher?! I couldn’t do something like that! I was a player not a goddamn parent!
Can someone like me guide and teach a person? I don’t know. But what if I could?

------ day of the ------ year
Sunny, midday
I really don’t know how, but I found a way to make ends meet. He enrolled in my sport team.
At first I thought, while trying to talk to him in the changing room, that I would have ahead the worst months of my life, trying to teach to a fricking wall. But then, as soon as we went on the court, I changed idea. I started thinking about his potential. Indeed, his height and strength could be useful for volley. Plus, the coach told me he did agonistic sport since little, so he would for sure be athletic.
But the biggest shock was when I started actually to teach him. He didn’t speak to me, he just observed me and incredibly copied every movement I made, as if he had been doing volley since little.
I smiled proud when I realised that maybe I had finally found the way to get a promotion without having to actually work.
Well, I had been “educating” him for 6 months now, so he knows now anything about volley. He still had sometimes sudden outbursts, mostly in the first two months and I didn’t know anything about the origin of those. I had a feeling that something was wrong with him, because I had already seen those kind of… breakdowns, unluckily, in some people I knew. Ah, god knows what had happened to him before he had joined this team!

------ day of the ------ year
Cloudy, midnight,
Well, maybe people do change after all. It’s been a year since Paul joined the team… and well, he’s become literally a sport idol in our team. He learned really quickly the rules and made his way so quickly that there is even the hypothesis that he’ll sit in a few months in the national team’s benches, even thought he’s 20 and has played for just a year.
We hanged out often too, and he started to talk to me a little. He’s still quiet and introvert and all, but the atmosphere is for sure less tense. I gave him often tips or trained with him outside in the park. Sometimes, I see him smile while we toss each other the ball, but he doesn’t want to admit it. He still feels strongly linked to whatever he was before I took him out of there, but I’m trying my best to help him, even though it’s not easy, because he never really told me anything about that. If go on like this, who knows, maybe I’ll even love this sport. But I don’t know if that’s because of itself or because I had finally found a friend here. only time will explain.

------ day of the ------ year
Hi.
It’s 4am, I can barely see the paper and pen I’m holding while I’m writing in this diary. I’m in the kitchen of my apartment and only god knows how I managed to not bump on anything as I usually do in this cramped place.
Tonight I’m not alone. Paul’s right now in my bed.
But I won’t write ANYTHING about what you’re thinking I’ll write ok? Because this secret is just between him and I. It was 9 pm, I guess, when he arrived at my door. It was really normal at first, but after a hour of… uhm… “problems” (so just us trying to form a conversation without me stuttering or him becoming suddenly quiet), he had started for the first time to open up to me. He didn’t say a few things, he said A LOT about him. It was… shocking. Yeah. I still am a little. He’s now sleeping, but I didn’t manage to close my eyes, even though I was with him.
He told me about the ex-base of “guivre”, about what he had to go through, about a certain “Faunus” and anything… oh god, and there I was until yesterday believing I was helping! I was such an idiot, believing I could. There is… there is so much sadness, anger and despair inside of him. Even when I pulled him close after he finished talking, I felt like I couldn’t really reach him, reach his heart.
Aaah, I really don’t know. I just know I won’t forget a single word.
There, inside Verlaine’s—
(From there, the page was torn, making it impossible to read)