(no subject)

[brojan]

title: befores and afters
pairing: leo messi/david villa
rating: r
words: ~10150
summary: leo is used to people who leave; david is used to leaving.



“Tell me what it’s like.”

“Hm?”

“Barcelona. Tell me what it’s like there.”

Leo stretches his arms over his head, presses his knuckles into the dry grass below him. They’re laying in the grass, on a pitch in Argentina, him and Javier. Summer’s almost over, it’s almost time to go back, Leo to Spain and Javier to England, but they’re both hoping that the older man will join the younger in Barcelona soon.

Leo hums as he thinks. “It’s like,” he starts, and then pauses, unsure how to put it into words. “It’s just all this pressure weighing down on you all the time. From millions of people.” He stops again, but Javier is quiet. “And you know all the time that you have to be great because if you aren’t, someone who is is waiting on the sideline. You feel the weight of that crest on you all the time.” He closes his eyes, briefly, against the scorching sun above him. “All the time.”

He goes quiet. “Dude,” Javier says finally. “That sounds fucking awful.”

Leo laughs, and then he says, “But Javi… Javi, when they love you…” He trails off, his hands spreading through the air in front of him like he can show Javier instead of telling him. He turns toward Javier, his eyes wide, and hopes he understands.

It looks like he does, because he just laughs and says, “Okay, okay,” and they fall into silence. “It’s not like that, in Liverpool,” he says after awhile. “They love you just for wearing the crest.” He looks at Leo. “You know?” But Leo doesn’t know, won’t ever know, what it’s like to play for a club for like that. “If you don’t play well…. Well, they’ll sing for you until you do.”

“That sounds nice,” Leo offers, and Javier hums his assent.

After awhile he says, “And will they love me?”

Leo wonders when it happened, that he became someone that could reassure his captain. “Sure they will, Javi,” he says, and he believes it’s true. “I’m sure they will.”

This is the story that everyone knows: Lionel Messi was born with a growth hormone deficiency, and Barcelona paid for the treatments that made him grow. Barcelona gave him medicine and gave him a football and gave him a contract. People don't seem to consider much about the kid who had to give himself those injections, had to take his medicine with him every day and every night and stick a needle in his leg, the kid who moved halfway across the world, whose family wouldn’t, couldn’t stay, and what kind of man that would make.

People look at him and see him hiding behind long hair, ducking into his teammates’ chests, laughing away compliments, and they think he’s soft, he’s shy. If he’s honest, he likes that people think about him that way, that they don’t really know, that he has things that are out of their reach.

This is the truth: Leo Messi is a man who knows how things work. He is a man who was forced to grow up at a young age, forced to be responsible, to learn how to get what he wants, to protect his own interests. He is quiet, but not soft; kind, but not a push over. He knows how things work.

And he loves Barcelona, loves it right down to the very marrow in his bones, but it’s not like Barcelona’s never let him down. Everything you love does, eventually.

In some way that’s how they get here, what brings him to David Villa.

David Villa isn’t the first new striker Leo has had to adapt to, and Leo knows he won’t be the last. He knows David is a man of many colors; the colors of Gijon, of Zaragoza, Valencia, La Roja, and now, finally, David will wear the colors of Barcelona, Leo’s colors.

These are Leo’s only colors: blaugrana and albiceleste. Leo does not know what it’s like to learn new colors, new crowds, new cities. He doesn’t want to know. He realizes that it’s abnormal, his story, Xavi’s story, Andres’s story, to stay with one club forever, and by now he is used to it. He’s watched others leave, one by one; Ronaldinho was the worst, Deco was bad too; Eto’o, Henry, and so on, and so on.

David isn’t different, Leo knows. He doesn’t mind, but on that first day, when he first welcomes David to the club, in his head he already knows the end of the story, can imagine the day they'll say goodbye.

He’s nice, though, David is. Maybe it’s just the way he looks, his slicked black hair and his thin body, sharp and angular, his perfectly trimmed facial hair, diamonds glinting in his earlobes, but from afar he had always seemed, to Leo, moody at best, an asshole at worst.

The first day the Spanish internationals come back to training, Leo can hear the locker room from way down the hall, before he even gets close. He tries to guess who’s in charge of the music that day.

Brazilian rap, he thinks. Dani.

He walks in to a chaotic scene, a bit of a shock after the weeks of quiet preceding, when so many people were still gone. It makes him smile. He hugs his teammates, congratulates them again, asks about their vacations. He sees David sitting on a bench a few spots down from him and waves. They’ve known each other for years, not as teammates of course, but to the point where Leo would feel weird making a big deal about him being there.

“I cannot think in here,” Xavi yells over the music. “Turn this shit off, please.”

Dani, who’s shaking his hips to the beat as he pulls on his training shorts, looks genuinely offended. “Are you being serious right now? This is quality stuff!”

“You think a lot of questionable things are quality,” Xavi points out, reaching for the speakers sitting on top of a locker.

Dani jumps in front of him, making his best offended face, and says, “Hey now, it’s my turn to pick the music! Just because you guys are champions of the world, or whatever, doesn’t mean you can just come in here and interrupt the natural order of things!” He tries to keep a straight face but it’s Dani and he can’t, nor can the rest of them.

“Villa!” he yells. Dani makes his way over to their new striker, throws an arm around his shoulder. “You’re into this, right?” Villa’s eyebrows go up and his face twists into a grimace. Dani drops his arm. “New guy, don’t turn on me already.”

“Sorry,” David says. “Can’t hear you over all the fucking blood in my ears.” Dani stares in faux-offense and then walks back to his locker, muttering to himself.

“I think it should be my turn to choose the music anyway,” Gerard says, and a groan goes up from half the people in the room. “What the fuck?!” he says, looking around. “My music is the best.”

“My nieces listen to Justin Bieber enough,” Sergio calls, rising to his feet. “Don’t need it in the locker room too.”

“Hey,” Gerard says, his voice rising, “His songs are upbeat and catchy, and also, Victor liked it when I played that song. Right Victor?”

He turns toward the goalkeeper, who looks like he wants to be left out of the whole debate. When he realizes Gerard isn’t going to leave him alone, he groans, “What?”

“You liked that Justin Bieber song I played in the locker room, over the summer, right?” Gerard walks up close to him, his face imploring.

Victor just stares at him, unaffected. “I do not understand the words you are saying to me,” he says, and Gerard makes an offended noise while the rest of the group laughs at him.

A voice at Leo’s side startles him. He’s bent into his locker, digging for a pair of laces. “Is it always like this?” Leo turns his head and sees David standing close to him, facing out into the room.

Leo glances over his shoulder to look too. Gerard is holding Dani at arm’s length with one hand and trying to change the music with his other. “No,” he says, smiling at David and turning back to his locker. “This is pretty calm, comparably.” David looks at him for a moment, looks surprised, but then he laughs and Leo laughs, and that’s when Leo thinks, he’s nice. He’s surprised, maybe, that he missed it before, or that he misread the man when he’s usually good with first impressions. But it’s okay; he’s happy to have been wrong this once.

Late in August they play the Gamper game against AC Milan, and Leo realizes belatedly that it’s the first time Ronaldinho will be returning to Camp Nou since that last disappointing season. The thought makes something in Leo’s chest constrict, makes him feel like a wound is about to reopen.

He sees Ronaldinho in the tunnel before the game and immediately feels better, any negativity he felt subsiding when the taller man steps up to him and wraps his arms around Leo. Leo stretches up, smiling into his shoulder, trying not to think about the fact that Ronaldinho is wearing white and Leo is still wearing the stripes, trying to not to let that fact hurt.

“I can’t believe you’re back,” he says, and immediately feels silly for saying it, but his friend just smiles and looks around, looking giddy and happy.

“It’s been a long time,” is all he says, but Leo can see in his eyes that means more than that, that even if the circumstances he left under weren’t the best, this could make up for it.

It’s during that game that David scores his first goal in the Barcelona colors, but Leo isn’t on the pitch when he does it. Instead he watches from the sidelines as a cross from Adriano falls into Villa’s path and he just catches it, with the very tip of his boot, for an beautiful goal. It makes Leo’s breath catch a little, and for just a moment everything comes into focus, and Leo imagines the things they will create together, the things they can destroy.

After the game, Ronaldinho finds him and hands him his shirt, his white shirt, with a smile. He says “good luck,” and he says “I’ve missed you,” and he says “I’ll be watching, do well.” Leo smiles and watches him walk away again.

In the locker room he finds David, claps him on the back and congratulates him on his goal. “Just the beginning,” he says, and David’s eyes are shining but Leo’s head is somewhere else entirely.

It’s only a few days later that the club sells Ibrahimovic, and Leo can’t even bring himself to be surprised. It’s always the same.

Of course it’s even more important now that they have David, that he works out like they’re all hoping he will. This is how it begins: with goals, with beautiful one touch passes, with backheels and dribbles around defenses- Leo has done it before but he’s not sure anyone else has kept us as well, read him as quickly. They score together, racking up assists that even Xavi shakes his head at, joking that he’ll become obsolete, Leo laughing at the absurdity of such a thought.

At first, they are tentative with each other, pats on the backs, muttered congratulations. Even though they’ve known each other for years, it’s still new to be celebrating on the same team, and it takes time before it feels normal. Still, even to Leo it seems like they warm up quickly, and one day, still early in the season, it no longer feels strange to bury his head in Villa’s neck, to hear Villa whispering words of victory in his ear, his hands in Leo’s hair.

Leo invites David over to play ProEvo. David doesn’t play often, unlike Leo, and he’s not very good. He lets Leo be Barcelona and at first he chooses Valencia, but after his third loss he switches the Liverpool. “Valencia doesn’t deserve to lose that much,” he says when Leo raises an eyebrow. “And this way I can blame Pepe when I lose.”

“Would you ever go to Liverpool?” Leo asks after they place in silence for awhile.

“Nope. Don’t speak English and don’t like the Beatles,” he says, not looking away from the game. “I’ll never leave Spain.”

Leo notices he doesn’t say, “I’ll never leave Barcelona,” but he doesn’t mention it. Instead he looks at David sideways and says, “How can you not like the Beatles?”

“Don’t even get me fucking started,” David mutters, and Leo decides not to.

After they play a few more games and David continues to lose, he puts down his controller, saying, “No more. Remind me not to play against you ever again.” Leo laughs, thinks, but you will. David pauses and then says, “Well, until Spain plays Argentina again anyway,” and he smiles crookedly at Leo.

Leo rolls his eyes a little. “Don’t worry,” he says, not looking at David. “Haven’t you heard, I’m only good at Barcelona.”

He feels David’s eyes on the side of his face but he doesn’t look away from the television, where their game is still paused. “That’s bullshit,” David says finally, and Leo glances over to see David’s face turned away from him, his jaw clenched. “People are such bullshit,” he says, and he looks at Leo and his face is so sincere, Leo can’t help but laugh and laugh, and luckily David gets it and he laughs too.

David says he should get home and they stand up. It’s dark and Leo walks him outside, where the air is crisp and cool now that the sun’s down. Leo flips open his mailbox, pulls out a stack of mail, mostly ads, that he thumbs through while David stands there, looking at his phone.

“Well,” David says finally. “It was fun.”

“Yeah,” Leo says. “We’ll do it again maybe? Remuntada?” David smiles but shakes his head and it makes Leo laugh. “You’ll get better.”

“Maybe,” David says distractedly, and suddenly he’s looking at Leo with this glint in his eyes- Leo realizes David has moved closer to him and suddenly he’s pushing into him, David’s mouth nipping at his own, and he backs up into the wall of his house. David’s hand comes to settle on Leo’s stomach, over his t-shirt, and Leo leans into him.

Even though Leo hadn’t thought about this, he isn’t totally surprised that it’s happening. He’s used to people wanting certain things from him, trying to know what he’s like up close, trying to get inside his head, and feeling like they can get what they’re after, understand what eludes them, by getting close to him in specific ways. He doesn’t think it’s malicious from most people, not really, and especially not from David, but it’s just something he’s used to. And from David- from David-

He pushes back slightly against David but stops when the hand on his stomach presses him back into the wall. After a moment he starts to laugh a little, right into David’s mouth, and the older man pulls back slightly, a smile playing on his reddened lips. “What is so funny right now?” Leo is still laughing.

He tries to get a hold of himself, leaning his head back against the wall and closing his eyes for a moment. He opens his eyes and tells David, “Your… beard. It feels funny.” He laughs again, saying it out loud.

David’s smile grows wider at this. “Really,” he says, not asking a question. “Funny bad?”

Leo's laughter subsides. “No, no, not funny bad. Funny… David.” He knows it doesn’t make sense, but David smiles like it does. He kisses the corner of Leo’s mouth before he leaves.

Leo wonders if practice will be strange the next day, different, but it’s not. Someone’s taped pictures of Gerard from his latest modeling campaign to all the lockers and by the time Leo gets there, the team is deep into a critique.

“Jesus,” Puyol says, “They must have paid more for the airbrushing than they paid you to do it at all.”

“Hey,” Gerard says, his voice rising, “I look like a greek god, thank you very much.”

“And so modest, too,” Leo says as he enters, and Gerard shoves his shoulder when he walks by.

“This is what happens when you sign onto the same campaign as Cristiano,” Xavi says. “You’re turning into one of them.”

“One of what?!” Gerard exclaims, already looking offended.

Xavi looks toward David seriously, and they both shake their heads. He leans toward Gerard. “A galactico.”

Gerard laughs loudly. “Shut the fuck up. Never. Over my dead body.”

“It’s only a matter of time,” Puyol says, pulling on his training top. “Best to come to terms with it now.”

From further down the row of lockers, Victor calls, “When you go to Madrid, we should try to get Pepe in exchange.”

Gerard pulls a face and then says, “Wait, what the fuck is it with you and bald players? Do you have a club or something?”

“Gonna have to shave your head to find out!” Eric interrupts.

Gerard looks in the mirror inside his locker door and says, “Actually, I think I would look great bald.” Eric and Victor both laugh. “Don’t you think? Leo? Bo?” No one answers and he continues looking in the mirror, pulling his hair this way and that. “A great shape,” he says, mostly to himself.

Leo shakes his head. When he looks up from lacing his boots, he catches David’s eye, and they smile.

David shows up on his doorstep again that evening, uninvited but not unwelcome, and as soon as Leo has let him in the front door Leo finds himself pressed against a wall again, without a word, David’s warm tongue fighting past his lips, his fingers pushing and pulling on Leo’s hips. Leo doesn’t allow himself to be pushed back this time, slides a hand across the front of David’s jeans and feels him getting hard already. David jerks his hips against Leo and asks where the bedroom is.

Leo pulls the hem of David’s shirt up over his head, discarding it in the entryway and then turns away towards the bedroom, removing his own shirt. David catches up quickly, his arms circling around Leo’s waist, hands dipping below his waistband and grasping his cock without warning. Leo jerks away and all but shoves him into the bedroom, shedding clothes as he goes. Leo’s head spins, tries to slow down, but all he can think is, I want, I want, and when he feels David’s lips on his stomach and moving lower he can’t think anything at all.

When they have sex, Leo is once again surprised by how nice David actually is, how he pauses to make sure Leo is okay, how his fingers trail along Leo’s face and he breathes into Leo’s neck. Leo thinks it’s sweet, the way afterward David is the one to get up and get a washcloth from the bathroom and even cleans off Leo’s stomach for him.

While David disappears back into the bathroom, Leo pulls on some sweats and starts gathering up David’s clothes that are scattered throughout the hallway and bedroom, laying them on the bed for him. When David comes out and sees them there he says, “Oh. Oh,” like he’s surprised, and Leo doesn’t know why, but it’s getting late so he walks David to the door and says goodnight. He falls asleep on the couch watching a movie.

It becomes their little routine; a few hours after the last practice, David will show up at Leo’s door, or sometimes, though far less often, vice versa. They’ll have sex, sometimes they’ll eat or watch TV, and then Leo will walk David to the door, or Leo will tell David he needs to get home. Nothing changes at practice, and in games they are better than ever. At first Leo thinks, this is strange, but slowly it starts to feel normal and after long enough he never even thinks about it at all.

Once, when they have a day off, David shows up at Leo’s early, earlier than he’d expected. When he steps in the door, Leo slides a hand up the back of his shirt, but David knocks it away and says, “No, I brought a movie.”

“A movie?” Leo stays, standing in foyer, looking after David.

“What, you don’t like fucking movies?” David says, and that’s not what Leo meant and they both know it.

Rather than explaining, he just says, “No, I do,” and they go in the living room and Leo puts it on. It’s an American movie about a country singer, and it’s a weird choice but Leo kind of likes it anyway. They both sit on the couch, but all their clothes stay on and the only part of them that touches is their knees, sometimes, when one of them shifts.

When it’s over, David says, “The man in black. That’s pretty fucking awesome,” and he looks at Leo and smiles.

Leo says, “He kind of reminds me of you.”

David looks pleased. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Leo says. “But you’re the man in pink.” David swings his leg out and kicks Leo in the shin. “The man in DSquared, maybe,” and he’s laughing and David is trying to punch him.

“Fuck off,” David says but then he laughs too, and looks away. They don’t have sex that day at all, but they order Chinese food and it’s nice anyway. David lets him have the last wonton.

Usually on game days they are finished too late and Leo doesn’t let David come over, but one night, after a good game where they both score, when he knows adrenaline won’t let him sleep for awhile anyway, he tells David to come, lets David fuck him even further into euphoria.

David’s groaning, licking the shell of Leo’s ear, closing his teeth down over it, slamming his hips against Leo’s the way they both want on this kind of night. “Fuck-“ he gasps, “-I never thought it would be like this-“

Leo doesn’t know what he’s talking about, hopes he means the game, their playing. Leo likes to see him like this, sweat dripping off his brow, face red- almost the same as he looks on a pitch. Leo bites down on his shoulder, holding back a groan as David slides a hand between them to jerk Leo’s cock in rhythm with his own thrusts.

Afterwards Leo is exhausted, and his eyes drift shut while David goes to the bathroom and cleans up. He’s not sure how much later it is when he wakes up, but the lights are still on, and when he looks next to him David is there, half sitting up, half slumped over, his eyes shut, breathing evenly.

Leo studies him for a minute. He doesn’t make it a habit to look at the other man too closely, shuts his eyes when he’s too close, doesn’t see him sleep often, but Leo is tired and David’s right there, and Leo just- he wants to.

They’d taken off quickly after the game, so David’s hair is mussed and flat, and he’s not wearing his earrings or any of his jewelry. He hasn’t shaved in awhile, and the stubble on his jaw had left irritated scratches across Leo’s own face, his chest, his sides. Now, he reaches out, ghosts a finger over David’s cheek, thinks, he should look like this more, he doesn’t need it, the gel and the jewelry and the perfect facial hair, he doesn’t need it. I should tell him, I could tell him how-

David’s eyelashes flutter and it brings Leo back to his senses. He jerks his hand away, scooting as far to the side of the bed as he can. He nudges David’s thigh with his toes, and when he groans and starts to stir, Leo gets out of bed, sliding a pair of boxers on. I’m tired, he thinks, I’m way too tired. This was a bad idea- but he’s not even sure what he’s thinking about, when he thinks that-

David sits up straight and rubs his eyes. “What are you doing?” he asks, his eyes drooping but still managing to look suspicious.

“Getting some water,” Leo answers, yawning. He picks up David’s shirt that’s laying on the floor next to the bed and tosses it toward David. “You want something before you go?”

David just looks at Leo, muttering, “Before I go,” almost to himself. Leo shrugs at him.

David stands up, but he doesn’t move to get dressed. He says, “I’m really tired, Leo. You really want me to drive home right now?”

Leo just looks at him, because he shouldn’t be surprised, and Leo shouldn’t have to explain. They don’t do sleepovers, and they don’t have to talk about things like this- they shouldn’t have to, anyway. I should have known, he thinks. Nothing’s ever simple. His heart’s beating too fast. David’s still looking at him. “I don’t-“ he starts, but he cuts himself off. “Sorry. I just think it’s better this way, you know?”

David stares at him in disbelief for a few seconds. His eyes are bloodshot. “What the fuck, Leo,” is all he says, but Leo doesn’t know, can’t explain, so he just picks up David’s jeans where they’re tossed on the dresser and lays them next to David on the bed. He thinks about apologizing again, but he doesn’t think he should have to be sorry; he never pretended to be anything that he’s not. He walks out of the room, towards the kitchen.

David walks out a few minutes later, still pulling his jeans up over his hips, and Leo holds the front door open for him. The cool night breeze feels good on his flushed skin. He says goodnight but David walks out silently.

They have the next day off and Leo sleeps until almost noon. He calls David but it rolls over to voicemail, so in the end he goes to his brother’s house. His sister-in-law cooks him his favorite meal and he takes their kids out to the yard and practices dribbling with them, feet bare on the wet grass. When they’ve tired him out sufficiently he and his brother call his mom and then they all eat dinner together.

He doesn’t feel like going home to his empty house so he drives around, aimlessly, but not really because he knows he’s close to David’s. When he turns down the street, he can see lights on, thinks David must be in the kitchen. He thinks of David’s condo, the modern furniture, all black and white and slick and new smelling. He thinks it’s very David-like. He wonders if there are things in the world that people think of as Leo-like, but he can’t imagine what they would be.

Even though deep down Leo knows he probably isn’t welcome, he stops his car in front of David’s house, walks the familiar front path to his door and pushes the bell.

He can hear yelling inside before the door opens, and David looks surprised to see him. He’s holding a bag of chips in his hand and he’s wearing sweatpants and a Gijon hoodie.

“Leo,” he says, and his eyebrows are way up near his hairline. “I wasn’t… expecting you.”

“Leo?” he hears from the other room, and a moment later Xavi walks in, holding a beer bottle in one hand. “Thank god you’re here. You don’t know what I’ve been through today.”

David’s still holding the door and he looks toward Xavi. Leo can’t see his face but he can tell David’s rolling his eyes. “Shut the fuck up man, how long are you gonna complain?”

Xavi ignores the question and tells Leo, “He made me go shopping with him!” He points an accusing finger at David and Leo wonders how much they’ve had to drink today.

“For like, an hour,” David says, and he turns back toward Leo when he says it but doesn’t meet his eyes.

“It went on forever,” Xavi corrects. “You should see the things he bought. So much pink. So many sparkles.”

This time Leo can see David rolling his eyes. “Seriously, fuck off,” David moans. “You wear shiny suits.”

“Excuse me? My suits are goddamn impeccable,” Xavi says, still pointing at David. “And I’ve never worn floral in public.”

“Save that for when you’re home alone, do you?” David smirks, and Xavi moves toward him with a fist raised but he’s laughing.

Leo laughs too, uncomfortably, and they both look toward him like they forgot he was there. “I’m sure I’ll see them eventually,” he says, and they both look at him confused. “The clothes. That you bought today?” He continues, and wishes he’d just kept driving.

Xavi nods in understanding and then says, “Are you staying? We’re watching basketball.” Leo shakes his head no, starts to say he can’t, but Xavi finally seems to sense he’s interrupting something and excuses himself, telling Leo he’ll see him tomorrow.

“Sorry. I didn’t know you were busy,” Leo said when Xavi’s gone. “I didn’t see his car out front.”

“I picked him up,” David says, and he’s still not looking at Leo. “Look, Leo-“ he starts, but Leo knows what’s coming and doesn’t want to hear, doesn’t need this conversation, especially not with Xavi in the other room.

“No, look, I figured. I get it,” he says, and he’s already backing out the door.

David does look at him then, and he looks surprised. He starts to say, “I just think we can’t-“ but Leo doesn’t want to hear it, tries to cut him off, saying “No, I know, we’re cool, okay? We’re cool,” but he still hears when David finishes, “-can’t fuck around like this.” He pretends he doesn’t anyway, and turns around hastily, trying not to trip or run as he escapes back to his car. He never hears the door shut behind him.

That night, he dreams he’s walking down the hallway of his childhood home, but it’s long and dark and the floors start to crack and push up into a mountain that he climbs and climbs and never gets over. He wakes up sweating.

In the locker room things don’t change, not really. David doesn’t sit next to him and whisper jokes, he sits next to Xavi instead, and Gaby and Pinto fall into the spaces David left, just like it was before David came. He doesn’t try to call David anymore and David doesn’t call him.

At the next game they’re both off. They can’t find each other on the field, they hit the woodwork, they misplace passes, they don’t connect. Barcelona is still up, with goals from the midfield, but in the 86th minute David, in a fit of frustration, shoves an opponent and gets sent off. Leo doesn’t see it.

David’s already showered and dressed by the time the rest of them get to the locker room and he doesn’t respond when anyone speaks to him. Leo doesn’t try, doesn’t even look at him. As soon as Pep dismisses them David stalks out of the room into the bus, where he sits in the back by himself.

Leo goes home, turns on his recorded version of the game. When he reaches David’s red card he watches, rewinds, watches again. Rewinds. Over and over he watches and he’s embarrassed when his hand slips under the waistband of his pants, but then he’s stroking his cock, watching David’s angry face, the shove, the tight clench of his jaw as he stalks off the field and into the tunnel. After he comes, he’s embarrassed and ashamed and deletes the game off his DVR.

David practices apart from the team at the next training, and Leo still feels off. When they scrimmage he keeps passing to where David would be, should be, but isn’t, and then he starts beating himself up over it and gets frustrated and yells at Bojan, who plays differently than David, makes different runs. His head pounds. After practice, Pep approaches him, asks if he feels all right. Pep doesn’t say it but it’s not like Leo to be off two days in a row, to raise his voice at teammates. Leo convinces both of them he’s fine.

David comes back to the next practice. When he walks onto the pitch, Victor catcalls him and then pretends to hide behind Andres, yelling, “Don’t hit me, I didn’t mean it!”

David says, “Fuck you,” but he’s laughing. “I was defending Barca’s honor.” He looks at Leo when he says it, just for a split second; maybe he imagined it. It makes Leo feel a little better but a little worse too.

In any case it feels like something shifts, like they’re back to okay, like something has healed between them. The next game, they play and they score and it feels like normal, assisting each other, sensing each other’s runs. When Leo finishes off a hat trick midway through the second half, David is the first to reach him, grasping Leo’s face between his hands and pressing his forehead into Leo’s, a smile cracking his face, wrinkling the skin around his eyes, but by the time Leo realizes what he’s doing he’s already pulling away, already gone.

He doesn’t have much time to think about what it means because Pedro reaches him, steps between him and David’s retreating form and lifts Leo up to thrust his finger up at the cheering crowd. He looks down and sees David standing back from the group but still looking up at Leo, still a tiny smile on his face. He turns around when Leo meets his eyes. The crowd roars around him and his heart lifts, just a little.

In the locker room, everyone’s happy, celebrating. Someone hands him the game ball and they all applaud. He blushes, something swelling in his chest, that feeling that never goes away, and he feels like himself again, for a minute.

At some point, Gerard turns to him, phone on his ear, and tells him, “It’s Cesc! Wanna talk to him?”

Leo smiles but shakes his head, tells Gerard to tell Cesc hello for him. Sometimes he thinks Gerard doesn’t know what it’s like for Leo, with Cesc; Gerard is still his teammate, on the their national team, but all he and Cesc are now are rivals, and it’s all they’ve been for a long time; another person who left and eventually lost touch.

Gerard frowns at him but tells Cesc hi. He can tell from Gerard’s reaction that Cesc asked if Leo doesn’t want to talk to him, but in that way Gerard has he brushes Cesc off and passes the phone to Puyol. Leo avoids his gaze by turning to Javier, hugging him tight. He catches David’s gaze over his shoulder but squeezes his eyes shut, suddenly overwhelmed.

One morning he wakes up with this memory:

They’re in bed and it’s afternoon, sunlight creeping in through Leo’s thin curtains. David’s laying next to him, naked, on his stomach.

“We should go golfing,” he says. He’s propped up on his elbows, looking toward the window.

Leo, who’d been staring at the ceiling, turns his head, giving him a sidelong glace. “You golf?”

“No,” David says. He lays his head back on the pillow so Leo can only see one of his eyes. “Do you?”

Leo laughs. “No. So why the sudden interest?”

David shrugs, buries his whole face in the pillow momentarily. He looks- restless, Leo thinks. David turns his head toward Leo again. “It’s good to try new things.”

“Hm,” Leo says, and he reaches out with one hand to grab a strand of David’s hair, trying to crack all the gel out of it. “I like to do old things. Things I’m good at.”

David makes a disappointed face. “Boring,” he says. “Fuck, out of the two of us, you’d think you were the old one.”

“You’d be wrong about that though,” Leo says, and laughs as David bites down on his shoulder.

And that was it, that was all they’d ever talked about it, and they’d never gone golfing of course, but now Leo can’t stop thinking about it.

He calls his brother.

“Do you have a set of golf clubs?”

“Yes. Why?” His brother sounds suspicious.

He doesn’t bother answering. “Can I borrow them?”

“Um, okay,” he says. “Since when do you golf?”

Leo looks out the window in his kitchen, squinting his eyes at the brightness. “I don’t know. It’s good to try new things.”

It’s on the cover of one of the sports dailies the next day, a picture of him by himself at the driving range, mid-swing. Gerard holds it up in the locker room.

“Since when do you golf?”

“Since yesterday,” Leo mutters, trying to swipe it from Gerard’s hands.

“Why didn’t you invite me?” Gerard demands, holding the paper high in the air, and Leo huffs, knowing he’ll never be able to reach it.

“Didn’t know you were interested.”

Gerard seems to lose interest after that, and lowers his hands. Before Leo can grab the paper, David appears at Gerard’s side, peering around his shoulder to get a glimpse of the picture. He looks at it for a long time, and then up at Leo, and his expression is unreadable.

“You look like a natural,” he says finally, and his face is still blank when he walks away. Leo feels like he’s been punched.

Leo feels it in his bones, in the crackling walls of Camp Nou, that another treble season is in their reach, can see silver in the corners of his eyes every time he’s on the pitch. He wonders if Pep knows it too, his teammates left from last time, the new guys. He tells himself that David winning the Liga and Champions for the first time doesn’t make it more important, not to him, not to the team. Still, he wonders how it feels for David, to have these things within his grasp finally, but he doesn’t have the words to ask.

In November Argentina plays a friendly against Brazil, and Leo wonders if it means something, if the universe is trying to tell him something, that he’s seeing Ronaldinho again so soon after the last time.

Ronaldinho is subbed off early but after the game he finds Leo inside, his shirt already in hand to give to Leo. “You know I’m getting yours,” he grins. “My favorite Argentine.”

His smile is wide, and when he laughs, he throws his whole head back, and it reminds Leo of when he first got called up to the first team, how Ronaldinho had taken him under his wing immediately, made him sit with his group at lunch, the way he’d said, “You’re the only Argentine allowed at this table,” and he’d laughed and laughed. His smile still looks the same, still makes Leo feel the same, warm and wanted, and it makes Leo think, maybe some things are worth it, makes him wonder if some wounds never heal and it’s okay anyway.

Ten days later Barcelona wins the Clasico 5 to 0. Leo assists David’s brace and he’s never seen David so happy, exploding with joy, racing across the field. I did that, Leo thinks, and wonders if it’s enough.

During their tactical meeting that week Leo spaces out. It’s unusual for him, because he respects Pep and because he knows the meetings are important to their success, but at this point the system is ingrained in him to the point that he doesn’t need to think about it. Receive, pass, move. It comes to him as naturally as blinking, as beating his heart. Receive, pass, move. All the rest is variations on a theme.

So he loses his focus for a moment, and it’s strange, but he thinks of Argentina, feels homesick for it in a way he hasn’t in years. He remembers afternoons playing football barefoot in the dirt, with his brothers and their friends. He was always the smallest one, the youngest, but he wasn’t afraid to challenge them, and when they saw what he could do, they let him. He remembers playing until the sun sank below the horizon and they could barely see the ball at their feet, remembers his mom showing up and dragging him and his brothers home, scolding them for staying out so late. He thinks of all her broken vases and plates that resulted from them continuing to play ball into the house, like nothing was more important. He’s still not sure anything is.

He thinks of a time, a few months ago, though it seems longer, when David turned to him, after they’d had sex. He’d still been sweaty, still breathing a little hard. “Do you still miss Argentina?” he’d asked.

“Every day,” Leo had responded, without thinking.

David had nodded like he understood. “You’re from... Rosario? Is that right?” Leo wasn’t sure what David was trying to do, but he didn’t think he liked it. He'd nodded, at the same time reaching out for David, scratching one hand down his side toward his cock.

David had laughed but tried to push his hands away. “Leo… Leo, stop. I don’t know anything about you.”

Leo remembers that David’s words had made him pause, just for a moment, his hands still on David, and he’d considered the other man’s face. David’s eyes had been searching, wide, like he did really want to know these mundane facts about Leo’s life, and for a split second Leo had thought about telling him everything, all of it, about how some mornings he wakes up and it’s almost like his lungs ache because he’s not meant to only breath in Barcelona, that sometimes he calls home and it pains him, actually physically hurts in his chest to hear his family there and be so far away.

But in the end Leo didn’t say anything, bit back the words before David even knew they were there. “Stop,” David had said, trying to push Leo’s arms away, but Leo didn’t stop, decided he didn’t want David to know things about him, and eventually David gave in to Leo’s hands and Leo’s tongue and he hadn’t asked again. And now Leo wonders.

Gerard, beside him, nudges his side, startling him out of his thoughts and Leo realizes everyone is looking at him, Pep included. Pep’s lips are pressed together tightly and his brow is furrowed. “Sorry,” Leo mumbles, looking down at his lap. “I’m sorry.”

When Pep is done instructing Leo, he sighs and looks around the room, realizes one pair of eyes are still on him. David’s chin is raised slightly and he’s facing forward, but his eyes are definitely down and to the side and on Leo. Leo thinks he doesn’t look mad, or annoyed, or anything really, nor does he react when Leo catches him staring. Neither of them look away until Pep says David’s name.

Once, Leo forgets to turn his phone to silent before bed, and it goes off in the middle of the night. In a haze of sleep his first thought is, he’s changed his mind. But it turns out it’s just his cousin, forgetting what time it is in Barcelona, and later he wonders if it was just a dream.

In the morning he gets to the training center and finds on the bench in front of his locker one of his very old training shirts, faded and bleach stained and extremely soft from being through the washer so many times. He wonders where it came from, but he doesn’t have long to think about it because he’s already late for practice.

He realizes during training that he must have left the shirt at David’s, David left the shirt on the bench for him, but he pushes the thought out of his mind and starts sprints, running until his legs burn, until sweat drips into his eyes. And long after Pep dismisses everyone else he stays, practicing his penalty kicks, his free kicks, his dribbling.

When he returns to the locker room it’s empty, like he was expecting. The shirt is still sitting there on the bench where he left it and his picks it up again, fingering the soft material, thinking about the season they wore those training tops- was it 2006 or 2007? He knows it was before Dinho left, and Deco, before Gerard came back. Before he’d started categorizing his life into befores and afters.

He’s sitting there, holding the shirt, thinking, and he hears someone walking toward the locker room from the showers. He thinks it must be a janitor but when he looks up David is there, a white towel hanging off his slim hips, not looking surprised to see Leo. He walks toward his own locker.

“You left it at my place,” David says finally, nodding toward the shirt.

“I figured,” Leo replies, looking down at it again before stuffing it in his bag and starting to pull off his cleats and socks.

“You’re here late,” Leo comments when the silent grows too heavy. David’s inspecting his hair in a mirror hung inside his locker.

“Yeah, I had to talk to Rosell after practice,” he says distractedly, picking at a stray hair, but his eyes flick to Leo’s face and he must see something flash there because he quickly adds, “About a sponsorship thing.”

“Okay,” Leo says, pulling off his training shirt and hanging it over the bench to be washed.

He starts to walk toward the showers when David says, “Did your practice go okay?” He’s turned away from the mirror and is now looking straight at Leo.

Leo is surprised by David’s change in demeanor and makes a humming sound that he’s not sure means “good” or “acceptable” or “I’m not sure.” He shrugs. David continues to look at him.

Finally, David nods, like Leo has given him an affirmative answer. “Okay. Good. Everything’s good then?” he says, almost as an afterthought, a way to end the conversation, but Leo can’t bring himself to nod or say anything at all, and he ends up just standing there and staring and staring at David, who just looks back.

“You don’t talk to me anymore,” Leo finally says dumbly, and David’s eyebrows shoot up like it was the last thing he expected to hear.

David shakes his head, grasping for words. “I just… it’s easier for now, no?” he asks with a shrug, and Leo nods, already humiliated that he said anything. David looks like he’s deciding something and then says, “Do you want to tell me what the big fucking deal was anyway?”

Leo blinks at him, wonders what there is to explain, wonders how he could even begin. Instead he says, “I don’t have to explain anything to you,” and it sounds childish, because it is.

David just smiles like he expected that and says, “No, you don’t.” He doesn’t look angry and Leo thinks maybe he understands, a little bit.

David’s bent over his bag like the conversation is over, but Leo ventures further, offers, “You could still come over. If you want.”

David lifts his head but stays bent over and half smiles. “Leo,” is all he says, and it’s a tone Leo recognizes, one he hates- a tone that says, you don’t get it, and, you’re still so young. He hates it more because from David he believes it.

After a game where Bojan is subbed in but still struggles to score, Leo offers to stay late with him after practice and talk, or take penalty kicks, or block dribbles, or whatever Bojan wants to do. Bojan looks pained that Leo’s offering, but he accepts anyway.

He’s not sure their little session is helping, but Leo’s an awful goalkeeper and it makes Bojan laugh so at least there’s that. He hits almost all the shots he’s taking perfectly; upper right post, top shelf, left of center, until Leo’s body feels bruised from diving to the ground so many times.

After what seems like hundreds of kicks, Bojan sits down in the grass, balancing the ball on his feet. Leo collapses a few feet away and Bojan kicks the ball toward him, and they start passing back and forth like that while they rest.

“First one to drop it goes first in the ronda tomorrow,” Bojan suggests.

Leo laughs. “Fine with me. I don’t know why you hate it so much.” He gives the ball a bit of extra kick, forcing Bojan to jerk back or miss it. Bojan curses at him and he laughs.

“Well, you’ve still got the touch, kid,” Leo says after awhile, smiling at him.

“It’s just a confidence thing,” Bojan mumbles.

“But that’s fixable,” Leo says, trying to sound encouraging without being condescending. “If it was a talent thing, you’d be screwed.” Bojan quirks a half smile at him.

They kick the ball back and forth for awhile. Practice ended so long ago that they’re starting to turn the lights off in the Ciutat Esportiva, and the sun is setting, but neither of them make to get up, to go shower. Finally, Bojan says, “I’m glad you’re having a good season though,” and he looks up at Leo, almost like it’s a question.

Leo raises an eyebrow, purses his lips. “Can’t argue with those goals, can you.”

Bojan smiles and Leo is glad he can say things like that and know feelings won’t be hurt, knows that Bojan cares about him and the team before anything else. “David’s been a good addition. Better than Ibra,” he says, and he’s looking out toward the farthest goal line, like he’s just thinking out loud rather than talking to Leo. “Best striking trio I’ve ever seen,” he concludes, kicking the ball towards Leo again. Leo almost laughs at him saying that, when he’s only 20 years old, but Leo knows he’s being sincere, that he’s breathed football for all those 20 years, just like Leo, so he doesn’t laugh.

Instead he says, “Remember when Dinho and Deco left?”

Bojan looks over at him, like he’s surprised, and Leo wonders if they’ve really never talked about it, if that’s possible. “Sure I do,” he says, and he looks back at the ball he’s bouncing on the tip of his boot. “Man… that whole season was crazy.” Leo nods, pulls his knees up to his chest.

“I don’t think,” Bojan starts, and he catches the ball on the top of his foot while he pauses. “I don’t think we need to worry about that kind of situation again,” he finishes, and he looks at Leo. “Not with Pep here.”

Leo nods but he looks away, because really, how can anyone know? How would anyone have predicted it would happen then either? He certainly hadn’t. And even with Pep, plenty of people had still left. Why wouldn’t they?

“Not with our current squad,” Bojan says, and he’s looking at Leo like he can read his thoughts. “Leo. Not with us.”

Leo makes a sound in the back of his throat, a hmph that means maybe, but I’m unconvinced, and he climbs to his feet and dusts off the back of his shorts before helping Bojan up. His hands are cold in Leo’s. The words on the tip of his tongue are, But how can I know for sure? But he doesn’t ask Bojan, knows he wouldn’t have the answer anyway.

At breakfast later that week Leo sits next to Gerard. He knows he shouldn’t but he’s hoping that Gerard will talk enough for the both of them, won’t pester him about anything. He should have known better. Leo brushes him off the best he can, keeps his head down, picks at his food. Eventually he notices it’s gone quiet, which is unlike Gerard. He looks up. His friend is studying him but looks away when Leo notices, down at his food.

A few moments pass where they eat in silence, and Gerard says, without looking up, “I could punch him if you want.”

Leo thinks he’s heard incorrectly and looks up sharply. “What?”

Gerard looks up at him. “David,” he says clearly, but quietly enough that no one else hears. “I like the guy and all, but if you wanted me to. I’d punch him.”

The thought of Gerard punching David, so much smaller than him, his teammate, his friend, is so ludicrous to Leo that he just starts laughing, so hard that he snorts and starts gasping. Gerard is laughing too and when the others start to stare at them they try to calm themselves down.

“I guess that’s a no then,” Gerard says, once they’ve caught their breath.

“Yeah,” Leo says. “I mean yes, that’s a no.” He smiles at his old friend. “Thanks, though.”

Gerard shrugs. “Offer’s on the table,” he says, and steals Leo’s apple. Leo doesn’t mind.

After a few minutes where they eat in silence, he looks up at Gerard, who’s scrolling through his phone. “I think I fucked up,” he says, keeping his voice low, but Gerard looks up so Leo knows he heard.

Gerard sets his phone down and raises his eyebrows, looks like he’s thinking. “Well,” he says finally. “So you fix it then.”

Leo stares at him incredulously. “Oh. Great. Thanks for the fantastic advice, buddy.”

Gerard laughs softly, and then he just tilts his head at Leo and says, “You know what I’m saying. You know what you have to do,” and he smiles, and it’s so kind that it makes Leo a little flustered, like it always does when he realizes how much people care about him, when he feels like maybe they shouldn’t. “You’re Lionel Messi,” Gerard finishes, laughing, teasing. “You can do anything.”

Leo rolls his eyes. Gerard shoots a hand out, quickly, probably to pinch Leo’s cheek but Leo is faster and he slaps it away. “Don’t touch me,” he says. “We’re not speaking anymore.”

“One of these days you’ll say that and I really won’t speak to you anymore,” Gerard informs him.

Leo just laughs. “You wouldn’t,” he says. “You couldn’t.”

It’s not that any one thing changes Leo’s mind, really. It’s just that they have a game, just like any other week. And Leo passes to David and David scores. David passes to Leo and Leo scores. Leo passes to Xavi who passes to David who passes to Pedro who scores, and Camp Nou sings around them and it should be great- it is great, it is, his heart lifts when he sees the faces around him, when he hears them chant his name, it’s just that maybe it lifts a little less than it used to, a little less than it could.

It’s just that David comes up to him in the locker room, laughs about a missed pass, a slip, a crazy tackle. He looks so calm, so happy, so different than Leo feels, and Leo wants to ask him, why are you even speaking to me, wants to tell him he should hate Leo, wants to ask how he doesn’t. But he can’t get the words out, and instead he just gapes at David, who doesn’t seem to notice, who just smiles, genuinely, and says good night and walks away and Leo just stares after him and regrets.

So Leo does the only thing he can think to do, which is to go home, and pack a bag- he doesn’t know what to put in it- pajamas? A toothbrush? Maybe a bag is too much, but he feels like the bag is symbolic of something, so in the end he throws in a pair of old Barcelona track pants and his phone charger. He doesn’t look at the clock, doesn’t care what time it is, he just gets in his car and drives.

When he parks outside of David’s he wishes he’d thought it through a little more but he figures it’s too late to turn back now so he rings the doorbell and waits.

David tries not to look shocked when he opens the door and sees Leo standing there, but Leo sees it flash across his face anyway. He watches David’s eyes go from Leo’s face to the bag in his hand and feels the dread settle in the pit of his stomach. He hasn’t thought about what to say, doesn’t know how to explain, so after groping for words for a moment, he just says, “I was wondering if I could spend the night,” and hopes David gets it, hopes he doesn’t ask for more.

David continues to stare at him for another moment and Leo shifts his bag from hand to hand, thinking about what a bad decision this was all around. But then he looks up and David smiles and Leo exhales in relief.

“Relax, Leo,” David says, and steps aside to let him. “Don’t be so fucking negative all the time. It’s not that serious.” Leo doesn’t know what he means by that, but he walks in past David and drops his bag on the floor while David shuts the door behind him. Leo turns toward him, not sure what to do now, but before he can say anything David is on him, tongue sliding into his mouth while one hand slips under his shirt and the other around the base of his neck, devouring him like a starving man finally fed.

Leo laughs to himself, thinks, maybe it is that serious, and maybe he can show David why.

It’s late but they have sex anyway, quick but hot, and when they settle into bed with drooping eyes it feels easy to Leo, easier than he’d expected. Before they sleep David tells him, “At some point you’ll have to explain what happened before.” His hand is in Leo’s hair and he tugs gently, a smile pulling at his lips, making the corners of his eyes crease. Leo thumbs at them, smoothing them out.

After a moment of silence, Leo says simply, “Someday you’ll leave,” and he hopes David understands what he means, because he’s too tired to explain it further, and it doesn’t matter anyway because he doesn’t care anymore; doesn’t care if this is the only season they ever play together, if David moves back to Asturias, or Valencia, or Liverpool or Italy, because right now he is here, in Leo’s colors, Leo’s Barcelona.

David seems to get it, because he just hums and says, “Maybe.” Leo nods, closes his eyes. “And if I do?” David asks.

Leo is already drifting off, but he mutters, “Relax, David. It’s not so fucking serious.” He falls asleep with David’s laughter ringing in his ears.

When he wakes in the morning, David isn’t there. He wanders down to the kitchen and finds David there, standing in front of the window cutting up fruit, morning light spilling over him and blinding Leo for a moment.

“What are you doing?” Leo asks, through a yawn.

David gives him a look and says, “I’m cutting fruit, what the hell does it look like?” But his voice is low and scratchy and it makes Leo laugh.

Leo moves to stand next to him and David silently hands him a thick slice of peach. It’s ripe, and juicy, and when Leo bites down into it juice drips down his fingers to his wrists and he thinks that he hasn’t tasted anything better in weeks, months.

“Good?” David asks, watching him. Leo hums his approval. David takes a finger and runs it down Leo’s hand, scooping up some of the juice and sucking it off his own finger before he takes the bite left in Leo’s hand and pops it into his mouth.

“Mm,” David grunts. “Perfect.”

“Nothing’s perfect,” Leo says automatically, knows he doing it again and looks toward David guiltily, but David just looks contemplative.

“What about a manita at the home stadium on a cold Monday in November?” he asks finally, handing Leo another slice of peach.

Leo looks out the window over the city, where he can almost see Camp Nou in the distance. A smile spreads over his face. “Okay. You got me. Some things are close to perfect.”

“That’s all I’m saying,” David says, turning back to his fruit slicing, and Leo looks at him in the morning light, his dark features, and his good heart, and he doesn’t know how the story ends but he doesn’t mind waiting to find out.