fic: awful like kisses
title: awful like kisses
pairing: stevie/xabi
rating: pg-13, maybe.
words: 2604
summary: contemplation of a relationship.
notes: for mer, as a belated birthday fic for whenever you get back home. :*** with many thanks to susan, who read over it for me. you are both awesome, darlings. :)
A football is sent sailing by your head and you look up to see him smiling at you from across the pitch, just a tiny little apologetic quirk of his lips. And even though you can still feel the slight sting of air against your cheek, you find yourself returning his smile with one of your own. It’s your first in a long while. His too. The others are watching the two of you from around the pitch. You can feel their gazes on your back as your gaze follows only Xabi. The team has not been blind to how awkward it’s been between the two of you lately. You never expected them to be.
You hadn’t meant for it to happen, you think as you see Xabi turn away from you, smile vanishing from his lips. You hadn’t wanted the relationship between you and Xabi to change into this mockery of a normal friendship. But it’s too late to change it now so you just shake your head and jog over to the football sitting innocuously on the short grass of the pitch. As you look at the football, you wish you could turn back time. It’s a foolish thought though. You don’t even know what you would do differently. You would only be reliving the moments over again.
Xabi is talking with Luis when you kick the ball directly between them. You don’t really know why you do it. It’s just a reaction born from frustration, regret, and the sight of Xabi’s smile. But you feel a little smirk forming across your lips as they both jump and look up. Luis starts yelling at you, switching from Spanish to English as he sees Rafa walk close by. Xabi gently pats him on the shoulder though and he deflates, giving you one last look before continuing with his mostly one sided conversation. You see a small frown and a strange look in Xabi’s eyes as he watches you, a look that you wish you hadn’t been seeing so much of lately.
When training is over and everyone is starting to leave to go to the locker room, you stay back. You take out your aggravation on a football and you watch with satisfaction as it hits the net at the back of the goal. You start to jog forward to grab the ball before heading off the pitch but a hand on your shoulder stops you. It’s Carra and you’re not surprised. You’ve wondered how long it would be before he’d ask you about what was wrong. And you know that you won’t tell him. Carra knows too but still he tries. It’s not in his nature to give up.
You ignore him and toss the football into the waiting basket just inside the entrance of tunnel. The locker room is filled with the sound of loud and boisterous laughter and conversations but Xabi isn’t there when you walk in. That’s perfectly fine with you. You don’t know what you would’ve said to him, if anything at all. You shower and dress in silence, nodding your goodbyes to your teammates before heading home.
Alex greets you warmly, with Lilly in her arms, when you arrive with aching muscles and a troubled countenance. Her belly shows the small bump telling of the impending birth of your second child and her smile lifts some of the burden off your shoulders. You choose to ignore the fact that she’s part of it.
You take your daughter from her arms and toss her gently a few inches into the air, a smile forming across your lips as she starts giggling excitedly. Her soft hair falls into your face and you blow a puff of air to move it, unwilling to let go of her wildly squirming body. She squeals as you tickle her sides and carry her into the living room, kicking off your shoes on the way. You hear Alex’s protests at the common occurrence as you jump over the back of the couch and lay down with your daughter on your stomach.
You love your wife and you love your daughter. You know that you’ll love the new baby just as much. But you have your doubts in your mind, no matter how much you try to quell them into silence. You find yourself thinking about Xabi. About the look in his eyes earlier in the day during training and the first time you saw it.
*
You were angry and your words reflected that anger. He just did not, could not, understand the situation from your point of view. You had a fiancée waiting at home with your daughter and a second child in her womb. He wasn’t worth losing your family over. He wasn’t worth it. And Xabi looked at you silently as your barrage of words struck him. His eyes were open wounds. Everything was still when you finally finished yelling but then you saw his hands start to shake and he walked out of the room even though it was his own. You saw yourself out of his house.
You hurt him.
*
It all began in Istanbul when he kissed you in front of the world. His lips were warm and you didn’t mind because your emotions were running high as blaring cheers and “you’ll never walk alone” echoed in your ears. Liverpool, you, won the Champions League final.
Hours later, after celebrations and a phone call home, you stumbled into your hotel room door with red confetti stuck to your champagne wet skin. There was an open and almost empty bottle in your left hand. Carra giggled madly against the door next to yours as he fumbled with both his room key and his cell phone as it began ringing to the tune of “Yellow Submarine”. You knew that it was Michael calling with congratulations. Several more of your teammates were down the hall and you heard them singing a rousing and off-key rendition of “The Fields of Anfield Road”. You hummed along as you struggled to open your door and fell in when the light finally flashed green.
Your eyes were immediately drawn to him.
He was only a silhouette, seated on the window sill, illuminated by streetlamps and the moon. You wondered when he’d returned to the hotel. Your attempt to search through your memory for the moment stopped, however, when he turned away from the window and looked at you. He smiled. And suddenly you remembered the press of his lips against yours. The split second feeling of warm and wet. The champagne bottle was left on the dresser as you stumbled across to him and you winced as your head hit the window. Xabi reached over to help you sit down beside him on the sill and you pressed your flush cheek against the cool glass. “We won,” he said and pressed his forehead against yours. His eyes were liquid and bright. His cheek was smooth beneath your fingertips.
The two of you sat there without speaking for what seemed to be hours on end. Sometimes, when you blinked, you felt his eyelashes catching on yours. At one point his right hand wrapped around your left wrist and you could feel your pulse pounding. You wondered if he could too.
You don’t know when you feel asleep but you woke the next morning as sunlight pierced through your eyelids. There was a crick in your neck, your back was aching, and your head felt like somebody battered it with a hammer. However, his breath was warm and humid against your neck and his cheek was above your heart. You felt his eyelashes fluttering through the thin cotton of your shirt. He sighed but didn’t wake when you picked him up in your arms to set him on his bed, the one next to the window. His bed was still made and you didn’t want to jostle him so you placed him on top of the sheets. You watched as he immediately curled into himself, rolling into the fetal position. You grabbed the blanket off your bed and covered him with it before heading to the bathroom, pulling a piece of red confetti off your cheek.
Your skin was sticky from champagne. It was a struggle to tug off your clothes as you prepared your shower, steaming hot and soothing. You groaned softly as you stepped under the steady spray, the knot between your shoulder blades melting away. The simple sound of water drops quelled your headache to a manageable level. You didn’t want to leave the calm of the shower.
His eyes followed you as you exited the bathroom with a towel around your waist and another across your shoulders. He lounged across the bed like a cat, all sinuous muscle beneath smooth skin. Your eyes locked and you were the first to look away, unsure how to handle his gaze. You walked over to your suitcase and searched through it for some clean underwear; you hadn’t bothered to unpack completely when you first arrived.
You heard the creak of mattress springs and assumed that Xabi was headed towards the bathroom to shower. You felt the gentle press of his fingertips trailing across your shoulder blades instead. You stiffened in shock as you stood up and turned around to face him. Then his fingertips moved up along the cords of your neck and across your cheekbones. They felt like fluttering butterfly wings hovering above the delicate skin beneath your eyes.
He stepped closer and all you could see were his eyes, luminous amber, staring deep into your own. Your name was a breath of air released against your lips and then he kissed you.
*
Time slows as the ball leaves your foot. You don’t even have to look to know that it hits the back of the net. Suddenly everything is but streaks of motion and you are running with your arms outstretched as if you are attempting to fly. The roar of the Kop is deafening and you hear the echoes in your mind. And then you are surrounded by bodies and hands hold you close. Xabi is there. As the others begin to dissipate, you tug him closer. You press a kiss into the curve of his neck, where his muscles are taut with tension. It’s a spot familiar to the brand of your lips. His eyes are wide as you let go and the two of you head off to your separate positions on the pitch.
You remember telling him the two of you could only be “just friends”.
*
Your body is shaking as you knock the door in front of you. His door. Rain is pouring down on you as you wrap your arms around your waist to bring forth some semblance of warmth and you don’t know what you’re doing here. You don’t know what made you want to see him outside of the pitch once again. As a few seconds pass without a sound from inside the house, you contemplate turning around and going home. Alex has taken Lilly with her to go visit family though. And you think about how lonely it feels there when you are by yourself.
Xabi opens the door before you get a chance to leave. He stares at you, a sorry sight with water dripping from the end of your cold nose, for a moment before gesturing for you to enter. “Is there something you needed to talk to me about?” he asks as he steps away to go fetch a towel as you wipe your feet on his welcome mat.
You shrug in answer as he comes back into view. You came here on impulse, not knowing what to say but knowing that something needed to be said. You take the towel he hands you and bury your face in the soft cotton. You tell him that you’re sorry. And when he asks you what for, you find that you don’t really know. Everything, anything, nothing. He doesn’t give you a chance to try to think of a reply.
“Did you ever think, even once, of what it meant to me? What I was willing to risk for you?” His questions, spoken with a calm and even voice without a hint of inflection, strike you like a slap across the face and a lightning bolt from the sky.
You hadn’t. He watches you with guarded eyes as you focus on him and you don’t know what to say. Your mouth opens and closes several times, teeth clacking together in a painfully loud sound. He looks to you as if he’s poised upon a precipice; his body tight with tension and leaning forward in an unintentionally looming manner. Your teeth click shut again. He sighs and deflates like a balloon as it soars through the air. “Leave, Steven,” he says, no emotion in his voice. He turns and begins to walk away before the last syllable of your name passes through his lips.
You don’t know what to say, what to do, but you know you can’t leave like this. You say his name, clear like a ringing bell, for once not mumbling, and you see him pause mid-step before continuing forward. And this time, in Liverpool on a rainy afternoon, it is you who slams your lips together. There is none of the adrenaline and magic of Istanbul. None of the lazy and languid kisses of the hotel room. This is a kiss born from desperation; mouths open and tongues twisting. Sharing oxygen. Life.
When you finally pull away to take in a deep gasp of fresh air, you see that his lips are like the deepest scarlet cherries and his eyes are dark chocolate. You begin to press butterfly kisses against his neck, the long expanse of soft skin that attracts your gaze no matter how much you try to resist. He shudders beneath your lips and under your callused hands. But then you feel his hands gripping your upper arms, nails digging into your skin through the fabric of your wet shirt, and he strains away from you.
“You can’t do this.” The quiet calm of his voice, the tension returning to your body, stops the movement of your fingertips against his cheeks and the scattering of kisses on his neck. “Steven,” the sound of your name, not Stevie, gives you pause. You feel him pull away from you. “My life isn’t a game, a joke, for you to enjoy,” he whispers. “You are the one who said that we must be just friends. Not me.”
He stands there in front of you with his hands clasped tightly in front of him, a defensive stance. “We can’t do this anymore. I can’t do this anymore.” His words hurt but no more than how yours hurt him before. “I think you should leave.”
When you reach home, you wonder if it’ll ever be possible for the two of you to return to how you used to be.
*
He had always smiled at you. Not just little quirks to his lips but full-blown smiles after each wonderful pass and every brilliant goal. His eyes had twinkled like little stars and parentheses would form on his cheeks, framing his mouth that you had not yet thought of kissing. The two of you had seemed to be able to read each other’s mind when on the pitch. And your friendship had come as an after effect of playing the beautiful game together. Your relationship had been as close to perfect as possible.
You were just friends.
pairing: stevie/xabi
rating: pg-13, maybe.
words: 2604
summary: contemplation of a relationship.
notes: for mer, as a belated birthday fic for whenever you get back home. :*** with many thanks to susan, who read over it for me. you are both awesome, darlings. :)
A football is sent sailing by your head and you look up to see him smiling at you from across the pitch, just a tiny little apologetic quirk of his lips. And even though you can still feel the slight sting of air against your cheek, you find yourself returning his smile with one of your own. It’s your first in a long while. His too. The others are watching the two of you from around the pitch. You can feel their gazes on your back as your gaze follows only Xabi. The team has not been blind to how awkward it’s been between the two of you lately. You never expected them to be.
You hadn’t meant for it to happen, you think as you see Xabi turn away from you, smile vanishing from his lips. You hadn’t wanted the relationship between you and Xabi to change into this mockery of a normal friendship. But it’s too late to change it now so you just shake your head and jog over to the football sitting innocuously on the short grass of the pitch. As you look at the football, you wish you could turn back time. It’s a foolish thought though. You don’t even know what you would do differently. You would only be reliving the moments over again.
Xabi is talking with Luis when you kick the ball directly between them. You don’t really know why you do it. It’s just a reaction born from frustration, regret, and the sight of Xabi’s smile. But you feel a little smirk forming across your lips as they both jump and look up. Luis starts yelling at you, switching from Spanish to English as he sees Rafa walk close by. Xabi gently pats him on the shoulder though and he deflates, giving you one last look before continuing with his mostly one sided conversation. You see a small frown and a strange look in Xabi’s eyes as he watches you, a look that you wish you hadn’t been seeing so much of lately.
When training is over and everyone is starting to leave to go to the locker room, you stay back. You take out your aggravation on a football and you watch with satisfaction as it hits the net at the back of the goal. You start to jog forward to grab the ball before heading off the pitch but a hand on your shoulder stops you. It’s Carra and you’re not surprised. You’ve wondered how long it would be before he’d ask you about what was wrong. And you know that you won’t tell him. Carra knows too but still he tries. It’s not in his nature to give up.
You ignore him and toss the football into the waiting basket just inside the entrance of tunnel. The locker room is filled with the sound of loud and boisterous laughter and conversations but Xabi isn’t there when you walk in. That’s perfectly fine with you. You don’t know what you would’ve said to him, if anything at all. You shower and dress in silence, nodding your goodbyes to your teammates before heading home.
Alex greets you warmly, with Lilly in her arms, when you arrive with aching muscles and a troubled countenance. Her belly shows the small bump telling of the impending birth of your second child and her smile lifts some of the burden off your shoulders. You choose to ignore the fact that she’s part of it.
You take your daughter from her arms and toss her gently a few inches into the air, a smile forming across your lips as she starts giggling excitedly. Her soft hair falls into your face and you blow a puff of air to move it, unwilling to let go of her wildly squirming body. She squeals as you tickle her sides and carry her into the living room, kicking off your shoes on the way. You hear Alex’s protests at the common occurrence as you jump over the back of the couch and lay down with your daughter on your stomach.
You love your wife and you love your daughter. You know that you’ll love the new baby just as much. But you have your doubts in your mind, no matter how much you try to quell them into silence. You find yourself thinking about Xabi. About the look in his eyes earlier in the day during training and the first time you saw it.
*
You were angry and your words reflected that anger. He just did not, could not, understand the situation from your point of view. You had a fiancée waiting at home with your daughter and a second child in her womb. He wasn’t worth losing your family over. He wasn’t worth it. And Xabi looked at you silently as your barrage of words struck him. His eyes were open wounds. Everything was still when you finally finished yelling but then you saw his hands start to shake and he walked out of the room even though it was his own. You saw yourself out of his house.
You hurt him.
*
It all began in Istanbul when he kissed you in front of the world. His lips were warm and you didn’t mind because your emotions were running high as blaring cheers and “you’ll never walk alone” echoed in your ears. Liverpool, you, won the Champions League final.
Hours later, after celebrations and a phone call home, you stumbled into your hotel room door with red confetti stuck to your champagne wet skin. There was an open and almost empty bottle in your left hand. Carra giggled madly against the door next to yours as he fumbled with both his room key and his cell phone as it began ringing to the tune of “Yellow Submarine”. You knew that it was Michael calling with congratulations. Several more of your teammates were down the hall and you heard them singing a rousing and off-key rendition of “The Fields of Anfield Road”. You hummed along as you struggled to open your door and fell in when the light finally flashed green.
Your eyes were immediately drawn to him.
He was only a silhouette, seated on the window sill, illuminated by streetlamps and the moon. You wondered when he’d returned to the hotel. Your attempt to search through your memory for the moment stopped, however, when he turned away from the window and looked at you. He smiled. And suddenly you remembered the press of his lips against yours. The split second feeling of warm and wet. The champagne bottle was left on the dresser as you stumbled across to him and you winced as your head hit the window. Xabi reached over to help you sit down beside him on the sill and you pressed your flush cheek against the cool glass. “We won,” he said and pressed his forehead against yours. His eyes were liquid and bright. His cheek was smooth beneath your fingertips.
The two of you sat there without speaking for what seemed to be hours on end. Sometimes, when you blinked, you felt his eyelashes catching on yours. At one point his right hand wrapped around your left wrist and you could feel your pulse pounding. You wondered if he could too.
You don’t know when you feel asleep but you woke the next morning as sunlight pierced through your eyelids. There was a crick in your neck, your back was aching, and your head felt like somebody battered it with a hammer. However, his breath was warm and humid against your neck and his cheek was above your heart. You felt his eyelashes fluttering through the thin cotton of your shirt. He sighed but didn’t wake when you picked him up in your arms to set him on his bed, the one next to the window. His bed was still made and you didn’t want to jostle him so you placed him on top of the sheets. You watched as he immediately curled into himself, rolling into the fetal position. You grabbed the blanket off your bed and covered him with it before heading to the bathroom, pulling a piece of red confetti off your cheek.
Your skin was sticky from champagne. It was a struggle to tug off your clothes as you prepared your shower, steaming hot and soothing. You groaned softly as you stepped under the steady spray, the knot between your shoulder blades melting away. The simple sound of water drops quelled your headache to a manageable level. You didn’t want to leave the calm of the shower.
His eyes followed you as you exited the bathroom with a towel around your waist and another across your shoulders. He lounged across the bed like a cat, all sinuous muscle beneath smooth skin. Your eyes locked and you were the first to look away, unsure how to handle his gaze. You walked over to your suitcase and searched through it for some clean underwear; you hadn’t bothered to unpack completely when you first arrived.
You heard the creak of mattress springs and assumed that Xabi was headed towards the bathroom to shower. You felt the gentle press of his fingertips trailing across your shoulder blades instead. You stiffened in shock as you stood up and turned around to face him. Then his fingertips moved up along the cords of your neck and across your cheekbones. They felt like fluttering butterfly wings hovering above the delicate skin beneath your eyes.
He stepped closer and all you could see were his eyes, luminous amber, staring deep into your own. Your name was a breath of air released against your lips and then he kissed you.
*
Time slows as the ball leaves your foot. You don’t even have to look to know that it hits the back of the net. Suddenly everything is but streaks of motion and you are running with your arms outstretched as if you are attempting to fly. The roar of the Kop is deafening and you hear the echoes in your mind. And then you are surrounded by bodies and hands hold you close. Xabi is there. As the others begin to dissipate, you tug him closer. You press a kiss into the curve of his neck, where his muscles are taut with tension. It’s a spot familiar to the brand of your lips. His eyes are wide as you let go and the two of you head off to your separate positions on the pitch.
You remember telling him the two of you could only be “just friends”.
*
Your body is shaking as you knock the door in front of you. His door. Rain is pouring down on you as you wrap your arms around your waist to bring forth some semblance of warmth and you don’t know what you’re doing here. You don’t know what made you want to see him outside of the pitch once again. As a few seconds pass without a sound from inside the house, you contemplate turning around and going home. Alex has taken Lilly with her to go visit family though. And you think about how lonely it feels there when you are by yourself.
Xabi opens the door before you get a chance to leave. He stares at you, a sorry sight with water dripping from the end of your cold nose, for a moment before gesturing for you to enter. “Is there something you needed to talk to me about?” he asks as he steps away to go fetch a towel as you wipe your feet on his welcome mat.
You shrug in answer as he comes back into view. You came here on impulse, not knowing what to say but knowing that something needed to be said. You take the towel he hands you and bury your face in the soft cotton. You tell him that you’re sorry. And when he asks you what for, you find that you don’t really know. Everything, anything, nothing. He doesn’t give you a chance to try to think of a reply.
“Did you ever think, even once, of what it meant to me? What I was willing to risk for you?” His questions, spoken with a calm and even voice without a hint of inflection, strike you like a slap across the face and a lightning bolt from the sky.
You hadn’t. He watches you with guarded eyes as you focus on him and you don’t know what to say. Your mouth opens and closes several times, teeth clacking together in a painfully loud sound. He looks to you as if he’s poised upon a precipice; his body tight with tension and leaning forward in an unintentionally looming manner. Your teeth click shut again. He sighs and deflates like a balloon as it soars through the air. “Leave, Steven,” he says, no emotion in his voice. He turns and begins to walk away before the last syllable of your name passes through his lips.
You don’t know what to say, what to do, but you know you can’t leave like this. You say his name, clear like a ringing bell, for once not mumbling, and you see him pause mid-step before continuing forward. And this time, in Liverpool on a rainy afternoon, it is you who slams your lips together. There is none of the adrenaline and magic of Istanbul. None of the lazy and languid kisses of the hotel room. This is a kiss born from desperation; mouths open and tongues twisting. Sharing oxygen. Life.
When you finally pull away to take in a deep gasp of fresh air, you see that his lips are like the deepest scarlet cherries and his eyes are dark chocolate. You begin to press butterfly kisses against his neck, the long expanse of soft skin that attracts your gaze no matter how much you try to resist. He shudders beneath your lips and under your callused hands. But then you feel his hands gripping your upper arms, nails digging into your skin through the fabric of your wet shirt, and he strains away from you.
“You can’t do this.” The quiet calm of his voice, the tension returning to your body, stops the movement of your fingertips against his cheeks and the scattering of kisses on his neck. “Steven,” the sound of your name, not Stevie, gives you pause. You feel him pull away from you. “My life isn’t a game, a joke, for you to enjoy,” he whispers. “You are the one who said that we must be just friends. Not me.”
He stands there in front of you with his hands clasped tightly in front of him, a defensive stance. “We can’t do this anymore. I can’t do this anymore.” His words hurt but no more than how yours hurt him before. “I think you should leave.”
When you reach home, you wonder if it’ll ever be possible for the two of you to return to how you used to be.
*
He had always smiled at you. Not just little quirks to his lips but full-blown smiles after each wonderful pass and every brilliant goal. His eyes had twinkled like little stars and parentheses would form on his cheeks, framing his mouth that you had not yet thought of kissing. The two of you had seemed to be able to read each other’s mind when on the pitch. And your friendship had come as an after effect of playing the beautiful game together. Your relationship had been as close to perfect as possible.
You were just friends.