"This should be good."
Mateo stood in front of the mirror, tugging at the wrinkled front of his suit, smoothing the fabric down where it had creased.
He had just gotten up from his 'session' on the bed. 'Session'. That was what he was calling his five minutes of madness earlier. The lying-there-giggling-at-the-ceiling had gone on longer than he would ever admit to a single living soul, and "session" was the word he had landed on to give the whole thing a little dignity.
He picked up the brush off the drawer and ran it through his hair, tilting his head, checking himself from one side and then the other.
"It's finally growing out."
He said it to the mirror, half-pleased, turning his head to look at the top of it. The low cut he had worn all season was filling out, getting longer, the blond starting to have some actual body to it.
He leaned in and checked the edges. The lineup that had been sharp a couple of weeks ago had gone soft around the temples.
"It's losing its shaping." He frowned at it. "I should probably get to the barber's for a trim."
He brushed it out a little more, patted it down, turned his head one final time, and gave himself a nod.
"Done."
He stepped back and looked at the whole picture.
The suit. His one suit. His mother had always made sure he had one, exactly one, ready at all times, because in her words a man never knew when he would need one and she was not going to have her son turning up to something important looking like a street child. He had gotten this one the year before. He had grown since then. He had grown a lot since then, and looking at himself now, the jacket pulling a little across the shoulders, the sleeves sitting a touch high on his wrists, he could see it.
Seems I've grown again.
He turned side-on. The button was straining across his middle, not because of any weight, but because his chest and shoulders had filled out over a season of professional training and the suit had been cut for a slightly smaller boy.
He stood there for a second, considering.
"What if."
He undid the button.
The relief was immediate, the jacket falling open, the fabric no longer fighting him. He adjusted the lapels, opened the collar a little, pushed the sleeves back the smallest amount, and rearranged the whole thing into something looser, something that read less like a boy in a too-tight formal suit and more like a deliberate semi-formal choice. Jacket open. Collar relaxed. Easy.
He looked at it.
"Better."
He glanced at the clock on the wall.
11:17.
"Shit."
He bent down fast and pulled on his loafers, the ones he had bought around the same time as the suit. Thank goodness these still fit, more or less, a little snug at the toe but wearable. He worked his heels in and straightened up.
"Okay. Time to go."
He fastened his watch. He sprayed a little perfume, one pump at the collarbone, one at the wrist.
"Okay."
He turned to leave.
He stopped.
"Wait."
He turned back. He crossed to the shelf by the drawer, and he looked up at the top of it, where the La Liga trophy was standing.
He smiled.
He reached up and touched it, brushing a little dust off the top of the cup with his fingers, a small giggle escaping him before he could stop it.
He had not put this one with the others.
His youth trophies were all together somewhere, in the place where they had arranged them. Not this one. This one he had set apart, on its own, up high, where he could see it. Because it was different. It was a major trophy. It was a thing that more than half of all professional footballers in the world would go their entire careers and never once touch. That thing people liked to say, about how every trophy is the same, about how you should treat them all equally. That did not fly with him. Not with this one. This one was special and it deserved to be treated like it was special.
He had been thinking about getting a proper trophy cabinet. He thought of removing his youth ones and placing this one's there but decided against it. A shelf, a case, something he could put somewhere in the house. Maybe in this room. He was not sure yet. He had the idea, though, half-formed, floating around. But until then, he just kept it near him. He liked looking at it. And before he left the room, he liked to feel it, to put his hand on it. It was something he liked, so he did it, and he did not believe he needed any reason beyond that.
He rubbed his thumb across the base of it and smiled.
"Okay. Now it's time to go."
He set it gently back down.
"What's—"
His eyes caught on something.
A white envelope, tucked at the edge of the shelf, half behind where the trophy had been standing.
He picked it up. He turned it over in his hand, and realisation moved across his face, and he muttered, low.
"This is—"
BANG. BANG.
The knock hit his door hard, and his cousin's voice came through it at full volume.
"MATEO. Let's GO. Must you always be late?"
He startled, the envelope still in his hand. He set it back down on the shelf.
"I'm coming. I'm coming. I'm done."
He crossed the room and pulled the door open.
Aina was standing there, fully dressed, arms crossed, glaring at him.
She opened her mouth.
"Finally."
She scoffed. She looked him up and down.
"How do you even take this long to get ready? You use more time than two girls put together. Two."
"I'm sorry, I was just—"
"Yeah, yeah." She waved a hand, cutting him off. "Always with the excuses."
She was dressed for the night, and dressed well. A deep emerald dress, cut clean and simple, elegant without trying too hard, the kind of semi-luxurious thing that looked understated and had almost certainly not been. Small earrings. Her blonde hair pinned up off her neck. She looked like someone who had somewhere to be and knew it.
"Pedri is already outside with the car," she said.
Mateo nodded and stepped out, pulling his door shut behind him, and started down the hall after her.
Then he stopped.
Olivia was standing near the front of the apartment, waiting.
She was in black. A black dress, but not a plain one, a row of small buttons running down the front of it, fitted and clean and falling right. Her makeup was done, soft and dark around the eyes, nothing overstated. A fine chain sat at her throat. Her fingers were stacked with rings, thin gold and silver bands catching the light every time her hand moved. Her hair was loose over one shoulder.
Mateo stopped walking.
He looked at her.
"Wow."
It came out of him before he had decided to say anything at all.
Olivia's hand went to the edge of her sleeve and fidgeted with it, a small nervous movement, but her chin stayed up and the smile stayed on her mouth. She liked the way he was looking at her. She liked it a lot. And even though she already knew the answer, could read it plainly on his entire face, some old thing wired deep into her made her ask it anyway.
"How do I look?"
Mateo did not answer.
He just kept looking at her.
The silence stretched a beat too long, and it flipped her confidence over into something more nervous, and she started talking to fill it.
"I didn't. I didn't plan that I'd be going somewhere like this when I came, so." An awkward little laugh. "I didn't exactly bring my nicest stuff from the States. I wasn't really expecting to be, you know, going out to fancy dinners with, um. So this is kind of just what I—"
Mateo started walking toward her.
Off to the side, Aina watched the two of them, her eyes going from one to the other, her face folding slowly into confusion. She looked at Mateo staring. She looked at Olivia fidgeting and babbling. She looked back at Mateo.
What in the Indian drama is this.
"We really should—" she started.
"Yeah, yeah." Mateo waved a hand back at her without looking, shutting her down.
Aina's mouth stayed open for a second. She shut it.
Mateo reached Olivia. He stopped in front of her. He looked at her one more time, slow, taking the whole thing in, and the spark went between them, the small private current that had been running for nine months, and he smiled.
"Wow," he said again.
Then he tilted his head.
"Sorry. What was the question again?"
He smiled at that.
So did she.
He reached out and took both her hands into his own, and he squeezed them, a little too hard, the awkward squeeze of a boy who was not quite sure what to do with his own hands when he was this happy. He held on anyway. He looked at her.
"You look so beautiful."
Olivia's smile softened.
"Thank you. You look dashing yourself."
Mateo's eyebrows went up.
"Dashing?"
"Yes." She let go of one of his hands and used it to smooth down the front of his suit, pressing out a wrinkle he had missed, adjusting the lapel where it had folded. "Dashing."
They stood there smiling at each other, her hand flat on his chest, his other hand still holding hers, the two of them in the hallway acting like there was nobody else in the entire world.
"I'm gonna barf."
Aina was watching from a few feet away with the flat expression of a woman witnessing something deeply upsetting.
Her phone buzzed. She looked down at it. A text from Pedri.
Out front already.
She pocketed the phone and moved, reaching in and physically peeling Olivia off Mateo by the arm.
"Okay. Okay. Let's go. No time for all of this."
Mateo and Olivia were both laughing, looking back at each other over Aina's shoulder as she dragged Olivia toward the door. Mateo shook his head, still grinning, and followed them out, pulling the apartment door shut behind him.
Outside, the night air was warm.
Aina and Olivia walked ahead, hand in hand now, and Mateo trailed a few steps behind them. Aina glanced sideways at Olivia.
"You two, up here? Really? Are we in a K-drama?"
"Jealousy doesn't look good on you," Mateo said from behind her.
Aina scoffed without turning around.
"Please."
"You guys are here."
They all looked up.
Pedri was waiting by his car. He had gone more formal than any of them, a proper dark suit, well cut, sitting on him like it had been made for him, and there was something in the colour of it, in the details, that matched.
Aina let go of Olivia's hand.
She walked toward him, and there was a shift in the way she moved, more sure of herself, her chin up, and she came to his side and looked him over.
"You look good." She tilted her head. "Whoever picked that has taste."
Pedri laughed.
"You look beautiful."
"I know." She smoothed her own dress, pleased with herself. "Thanks."
Pedri laughed again.
Mateo reached the front of the car, Olivia at his side, and he looked at the two of them, and then he looked properly, his eyes going from Aina's dress to Pedri's suit and back.
"Wait. Are you both—"
Olivia, beside him, finished it for him.
"Matching?"
Aina turned. She smiled. She moved a half-step closer to Pedri, and she said, sweetly:
"Isn't it cute?"
Mateo grinned.
"For a man you just started dating." He let it hang. "Pretty territorial, are we?"
Aina rolled her eyes.
To the side, Pedri laughed, and then, easily, he said:
"Well, it was my idea, actually."
Mateo's head turned.
He looked at Pedri with genuine shock.
"Dude. Really?"
"He also got me the dress," Aina said.
"Awww." Olivia lit up, both hands going to her chest. "That's so cute. I knew it was a new one."
She went over to Aina and the two of them fell into it, gushing, and Mateo just stood there staring at Pedri, and he said it again, flatly, the same three words.
"Dude. Really?"
Pedri shrugged, smiling.
And Mateo, standing there in his outgrown suit that he had unbuttoned to make work, watching Pedri in a tailored two-piece he had coordinated with his girlfriend's brand-new dress that he had also personally selected, came to a quiet and slightly alarming realisation.
As long as he was standing next to this man, he was going to have to start putting extra effort into his relationships.
The kid had scored the goal that won the league and picked out his girlfriend's outfit in the same week. Mateo, meanwhile, well he was gonna leave that one. He was going to have to lock in. Lord knew he needed to keep up, standing next to this finished man.
They spent a few minutes taking pictures out front, all four of them, in pairs and then all together, Olivia's arm out holding the phone, Aina fixing everyone's angles, before they finally piled into the car.
The seating fell into place without anyone deciding it. Pedri in the driver's seat. Aina in the passenger seat beside him. Mateo and Olivia in the back. Exactly the way it had been the night at Oriol's farm, and the arrangement said everything there was to say about who this group had quietly become.
In the back seat, Olivia leaned over toward Mateo's phone.
"Let me see the pics."
They put their heads together over the screen, scrolling.
"Send me those," Aina said, twisting round from the front.
Up front, Pedri checked his mirrors, adjusted one of them, and then reached over and helped Aina with her seatbelt, guiding the strap across and clicking it in. She smiled at him.
"Thanks."
He just smiled back and said nothing.
In the back, Mateo tilted the phone toward Olivia.
"This one looks good. I like your smile there."
Olivia looked at it. Her own smile came up, small and pleased, at both the photo and the boy holding it.
Pedri put his hands on the wheel.
"Okay. Let's go."
Author's Note
Sorry for the "short" chapter... even though it's still around 3,000 words. 😅
There's just one more slice-of-life chapter left—the celebration/party and everything that comes with it. After that, we'll be heading straight back into the matches and all.
The next chapter will be out tomorrow, and it's going to be a long one. I want to cover a good portion of the slice-of-life moments before we jump back into the football, so expect a much bigger chapter.
As always, thank you all for reading and for your support. I really appreciate every one of you!
A/N
If you want to read chapters ahead with uploads and to support me subscribe to my Patreon below There is also a picture of how mateo looks like posted and later there would be votes and all on the site some you wont need to pay to vote but you can if you want to support me thanks
patreon.com/David_Adetola
Thank You your support is greatly appreciated thank you all
I've also created a Discord channel to make communication easier, where I'll post updates
https://discord.gg/ebrzh3Kyr (New discord link)