collide (you and i)
title collide (you and i)
summary ROAD TRIP FIC. set somewhere in the future.
rating pg, as always
word count 2,932
pairing fernando torres/sergio ramos
disclaimer i lie
notes THIS IS A BIRTHDAY PRESENT FOR adorerdollylux. i hope you like it, lovely! and by way of actual notes: i have never been to spain, so sorry if the progression of places doesn't make sense. each city i picked served a specific purpose to the fic and was not selected based on geographical location. ALSO as i said in the summary this is set in the future, but kind of indeterminately; i don't have a specific year in mind.
“We are not listening to flamenco for the whole trip.”
Fernando is slouched in the passenger seat, long legs spread out as much as they can be in the less-than-spacious interior of Sergio’s Audi. His sunglasses obscure about half of his face, and Sergio can’t tell whether or not the blond is joking.
“Well, we sure as fuck aren’t listening to punk the whole way, either,” Sergio shoots back, grinning broadly.
“The whole way where?” Fernando asks, sliding the sunglasses down just enough to mock glare at Sergio over them.
Sergio grins. “Hell if I know.”
--
It is hot, even with the windows cracked and the air conditioning on. Sweat sluices down Sergio’s back, his white t-shirt clinging to his skin. A few strands of hair that have been left out of his sloppy ponytail are plastered to the back of his neck. It doesn’t really matter to Sergio; he knows hot, knows the different types of hot that come with each city (the impersonal, spotlight heat of Madrid, the comforting swelter of Sevilla).
“Why are we doing this?” Fernando grumbles, shifting slightly in the seat and looking over at Sergio. His face is sweaty, too, and his hair is sticking up in tufts from all the times he’s ran his hands through it, trying to keep it off of his face and neck. Sergio resists the urge to smooth it out and instead taps his fingers against the steering wheel.
“Why not?” Sergio counters lazily.
It’s enough for Fernando, who lets his head rest against the seat and gazes up at the blue, blue sky.
--
“Salamanca?” Fernando asks, rubbing sleep out of his eyes and craning his neck to look out the window. He doesn’t remember putting the top up.
“I wanted to go to the cathedral, is that okay?” Sergio asks, fiddling with the GPS.
“S’fine,” Fernando replies, slurring slightly, muscles still relaxed from his nap. The stars are out and the sky is expansive and it feels like it’s pressing down on them, trapped in the little Audi, drawing them closer and closer together. They would collide before the end of this, Fernando thinks, and isn’t sure what he means by it. “Do you want to stay the night or go to midnight mass or what?”
“Midnight mass, if it’s good with you,” Sergio says quietly, slowing down as the streets get narrower and the turns became sharper. Fernando nods an affirmative and busies himself by staring out the window, entranced by the soft glow of the buildings.
Sergio stops the car and they both clamber out, grateful to stretch stiff limbs and breathe fresh air.
“I’m gonna walk a little, meet you back here?” Fernando asks, and this time it’s Sergio’s turn to nod.
--
The supermarket lights are a glaring contrast to the soft golden glow of the buildings outside.
“Stop poking me,” Fernando snaps, shoving Sergio halfheartedly.
“Why’re we here?” The Sevillan whines gently, poking Fernando again.
“Because I’m hungry.”
“Isn’t that what restaurants are for?” Sergio’s all for home cooking, but he doesn’t exactly have a stovetop in the trunk of his car.
“You wanted a road trip, so we’re going to do this right. Grab that,” Fernando replies, pointing at a bag of popcorn.
“Rafa will kill you,” Sergio mutters, grabbing the bag and throwing it in the cart nonetheless.
Fernando shrugs blithely and turns the cart down the next aisle. Sergio trails after him, grabbing a few bottles of water and a tin of peanuts. Fernando knows his way around the supermarket better than Sergio would’ve anticipated, and he isn’t sure what to make of the realization. Domesticity has never been a trait he associated with the striker, but then again, he supposed, years of marriage would instill that in a person.
Sergio is vaguely jealous that Fernando has had the opportunity to get to know the layout of a supermarket so well, and his arm is heavy when he slings it over Fernando’s shoulder.
--
Fernando dozes fitfully while Sergio drives, through the early morning with the top down again and the cool breeze keeps Sergio awake. They arrive in Leon sometime before noon and stumble into a hotel, Fernando with bags of groceries slung around his wrists. Sergio pays for the room and they blearily stagger up the stairs and collapse on the two double beds. Sergio doesn’t even turn the blankets down before falling asleep. Fernando, for his part, flips through channels and steals glances at the sleeping Sevillan, bathed in the blue light of the television.
--
Fernando is still asleep when Sergio wakes up, and instead of waking the blond, Sergio throws on a clean shirt and slips out of the room. He wanders down a few streets, hands in his pockets, and enjoys the dying sunshine more than he thought he would, but then again, years of partying in Madrid had allowed him to adjust his sleeping schedule without too much effort. Leon is not bathed in the same golden glow that Salamanca was, but it is beautiful in an old world sort of way, Sergio muses as he ducks into a sweetshop.
The brown paper bag crinkles in his grip as he carries it back to the hotel, and he isn’t exactly sure why he’d even bought the mantecadas. He yawns as he pushes the door to the room open, and tosses the bag onto Fernando’s bed.
“Where’d you go?” Fernando asks sleepily, sitting up on his elbows.
“For you,” Sergio replies simply, pointing at the bag and moving to the bathroom to splash water on his face.
--
“What are you doing?” Sergio grumbles, shifting over slightly and pressing his face against the pillow, trying to hold on to the remnants of sleep. “We’re leaving in the morning, not now. Go back to bed.”
“You left the window open, dumbass,” Fernando growls, pulling some of the blankets away from Sergio and pushing himself up against the younger man’s back. “I’m fucking freezing over there.”
Sergio reaches for the other pillow and puts it over his head, groaning. Fernando’s knees are tucked against his thighs and slowly, his breathing evens out. Sergio can feel his chest rising and falling against his back, and to its rhythm, he too falls back asleep.
--
The drive north is dry and quiet. Fernando is texting someone, and Sergio uses his distraction to commandeer the radio, finding a pop station and barely resisting the urge to start singing along. He can’t decide whether or not he should be annoyed at Fernando, for not paying attention, or pleased that he got his way with the music.
Fernando slides the phone back into his pocket and presses his forehead against the window.
“How is she?” Sergio asks, trying to keep the testiness out of his voice.
“I think she’s going to leave me,” Fernando mumbles.
Sergio reaches over the consol and lets his hand rest, heavy and comforting, on Fernando’s thigh.
--
Sergio twirls the straw in his drink and looks out over the shoreline; he’d resisted going to the beach in San Sebastian (he wants to save that for Cadiz) but had given in when Fernando suggested the small outdoor café. He pushes sweaty strands of hair off of his face and grins at Fernando, who has his glass pressed to his cheek, desperately seeking the cool condensation.
“I’ve never been away from Madrid in the summer,” Fernando offers quietly.
Sergio blinks up at him. “Really? Never just up and gone anywhere? Even as a kid?”
Fernando shakes his head. “Back then, there was no money, no time. I was always training. And we had nowhere to go. Now, it’s the only chance I have to go back to Madrid, see my family.” He shrugs. “It’s not a big deal, I like being there.” He pauses, takes a sip of his drink. “But this is- this is nice. Being away from everything. It’s really nice.”
His smile is small and tentative, but the one Sergio replies with takes up his whole face.
--
Sergio almost flat-out refuses to go to Barcelona. He isn’t sure why, exactly- he’d told Fernando it was too out of the way, but they didn’t exactly have an agenda, so Fernando had ignored him and taken the exit. It would be, Sergio promises himself, the last time on the trip Fernando got to drive.
“You just didn’t want to come here ‘cause you lost the last Clasico,” Fernando quips, elbowing Sergio lightly in the ribs. They are in line to get into a club, and Sergio has his arms crossed, unused to having to wait in line.
It’s not true, anyway, so Sergio just shoves Fernando back, laughing it off. He doesn’t hate the blaugrana, he just wants to beat them. He likes this city, with its unique flavor, so different from Sevilla or Madrid.
Once they get inside, watching Fernando twist his hips to the dance beats, Sergio decides coming to Barcelona wasn’t such a bad idea, after all.
--
Sergio misses the exit for Valencia and decides not to turn around. He is eager to get to Andalucía, ready for open skies and the beaches near Cadiz. He skips the exit for the city, as well, instead driving into a smaller town, where there is only a motel and a diner and endless miles of beach. The stars are beginning to twinkle down on the pair as they park the car and head out onto the empty beach.
“What are you going to do?” Sergio asks, letting his shoulders gently knock Fernando’s.
“About what?” Fernando’s eyebrows scrunch down and he kicks up some sand.
“Olalla.”
“Oh,” Fernando breathes out. “Well. She’ll probably move back to Spain, won’t she? I mean, she only came to Liverpool for me but obviously that isn’t working,” he lets out a derisive laugh, and Sergio’s chest feels tight.
“I asked about you, not her,” Sergio reminds him petulantly, plunking himself down near the tide line and sticking his feet out. The waves tickle as they wash over his legs. “What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know,” Fernando says quietly, sitting down next to Sergio and letting his head rest on the Sevillan’s shoulder. “I don’t know. Do I have to know? Does it matter? She’s leaving and she’ll probably take Nora and then what do I have left? A year or two left playing, and then what? I’ve got nothing but football in Liverpool, of course I don’t know.”
“Shush,” Sergio murmurs into Fernando’s hair, turning to wrap strong arms protectively around the older man. “It’ll be okay. You’ll be okay.”
They stay like that for a while, and when they get up to go into the motel, Sergio weaves their fingers together and holds on tight, a lifeline.
--
“Hola--“
Fernando is cut off as Sergio’s mother envelops him in a hug, her arms every inch as strong as her son’s. Fernando lets her pull him close and breathes in her scent- talcum powder, something spicy -she must’ve been cooking-, some kind of floral shampoo, and something that reminded him vaguely of Sergio. He hugs back, not awkwardly, until she finally pulls back and holds him at arm’s length.
“It is so good to finally have you in our home!” Paqui tells him, leading him into the house. Sergio trails behind them, talking rapidly with his sister. “Sergio never brings people here, you know. He always takes his friends to fancy resorts and what-have-you, but never home.” She shakes her finger sternly at Sergio, who breaks away from Mirian to scoop her up in a hug and kiss her cheek. She laughs and pushes him away. “We’re eating out back, come on before the food gets cold!”
Fernando shares a grin with Sergio and they follow his mother and sister out onto the patio.
--
“Why don’t you bring people here?”
Sergio bites his lip. It is a little strange, to be lying in his boyhood room, in his twin bed, with Fernando sprawled out on the floor next to him.
“I guess because this is my home,” he says slowly. “This is the place that is the most sacred to me, you know?”
“More than the Bernabeu?” Fernando asks, half joking.
“Mmhmm,” Sergio replies, staring up at the ceiling. “It’s my private life, it’s my family, it’s the house I grew up in. I don’t want to share that with everyone. I don’t want to bring people here so that the press will take up residence in the driveway. I want to keep it just for me.” He laughs a little. “I sound like a selfish kid, but it’s true.”
Fernando gets up and pads over to the bed, sitting down on the edge of the mattress. Sergio shifts his hips to make room.
“Makes sense,” Fernando murmurs. “It’s perfect here. Your parents, your sister, this house. It’s perfect for you.”
“I’m glad I got to share it with you.”
Fernando leans down and brushes the ghost of a kiss over Sergio’s cheekbone. “I’m glad you did, too.”
Sergio reaches his hand up to cup the back of Fernando’s head and lets his finger tangle in the soft curls there. He hauls himself onto his elbows and their noses knock gently.
“When your mom hugged me earlier, I just felt like everything was maybe going to be okay,” Fernando whispered. The words are forced but genuine, intimate in their softness. Sergio slides his arms around Fernando’s torso, pulling the striker flush against him.
“Everything is going to be okay,” he promises.
When their lips finally meet, it is a slow fumble of a kiss, open mouthed and lingering. For once, Fernando is not searching for anything in it, not thinking about anything at all except for the slide of Sergio’s lips against his own, and he thinks that maybe everything will be okay, after all.
--
Sergio’s parents feed them and wave them off in the morning, and they get back into the Audi and Sergio is driving slowly, trying in vain to prolong the trip. Fernando’s hand rests atop his on the gear shift and he is happy, happier than he has been in years.
“I think maybe I’ll stay in Madrid for a while,” Fernando says, about halfway between Sevilla and the capital. Sergio nods but remains silent. “After the summer, I mean,” he clarifies.
Sergio blinks a few times and thinks seriously about pulling over. “Looking for a transfer?” Sergio knows the answer, but he asks anyway.
“No,” Fernando responds. “No, no transfer.” He sighs and looks out the window at the countryside flying by far more quickly than he would’ve preferred. “I’m getting old, my knee’s hurting again. I don’t have anything in Liverpool except for football and I’m not even starting every match anymore. I don’t know, I just feel like maybe it’s time. I’d rather go out now then just kind of, I dunno, fade away.”
--
After so many days of just them in the car and nothing but open stretches of highway in front of them, returning to the traffic of Madrid is jarring. Sergio wonders how it is he ever came to love this city, as he weaves in between lanes. It is so different from his Sevilla, from the comfort and familiarity of his beloved dusty streets filled with flamenco guitar.
He looks over at Fernando and thinks maybe he came to love Madrid because of circumstance, because he had to. Maybe he came to love the city because it came to love him.
--
“Do you want me to drop you off?”
Fernando shifts uncomfortably in the passenger seat, his long legs stiff. “Could we just- go to yours, maybe? It’s just a lot to drop on my parents at once, y’know? The divorce and- retirement, and everything. Be nice to have time to plan out what I’m gonna say, yeah?”
“Is there actually going to be a divorce, then?” Sergio hates himself for asking.
“She said she faxed the forms to my lawyer this morning,” Fernando replies, and it feels good to admit that it is actually happening.
Sergio turns the blinker off and keeps driving.
--
The apartment is bigger than Sergio remembered; he’d always thought it felt homey, comfortable, but as he flicks the lights on and throws his keys on the counter, it feels big and sterile, not his.
Fernando trails in after him and Sergio moves around, turning on lights and making sure his plants haven’t died. He realizes after a moment that Fernando has never been to this apartment before; the last time they caught up in Madrid had been years ago, before Sergio moved.
“The guest room’s through there,” Sergio said, pointing down the hall. Fernando moves toward him with purpose, taking his hand and kissing him slowly. “Or that works too,” Sergio laughs, stroking Fernando’s cheekbone, smoothing out the laugh lines that framed the striker’s eyes with his thumb.
He leads Fernando to his own room, and the double bed is a much more comfortable fit than his twin bed in Sevilla, as Fernando pushes him over and he rolls around a little bit, getting acquainted with his space again.
“So what are you going to do?” Sergio asks Fernando, once he’s finished making a mess of the sheets.
“I don’t know,” Fernando shrugs. “Announce my retirement. Relax a little.”
“How long will you be in Madrid?”
Fernando smiles and moves to lie down next to Sergio.
“How long will you let me stay?”
summary ROAD TRIP FIC. set somewhere in the future.
rating pg, as always
word count 2,932
pairing fernando torres/sergio ramos
disclaimer i lie
notes THIS IS A BIRTHDAY PRESENT FOR adorerdollylux. i hope you like it, lovely! and by way of actual notes: i have never been to spain, so sorry if the progression of places doesn't make sense. each city i picked served a specific purpose to the fic and was not selected based on geographical location. ALSO as i said in the summary this is set in the future, but kind of indeterminately; i don't have a specific year in mind.
“We are not listening to flamenco for the whole trip.”
Fernando is slouched in the passenger seat, long legs spread out as much as they can be in the less-than-spacious interior of Sergio’s Audi. His sunglasses obscure about half of his face, and Sergio can’t tell whether or not the blond is joking.
“Well, we sure as fuck aren’t listening to punk the whole way, either,” Sergio shoots back, grinning broadly.
“The whole way where?” Fernando asks, sliding the sunglasses down just enough to mock glare at Sergio over them.
Sergio grins. “Hell if I know.”
--
It is hot, even with the windows cracked and the air conditioning on. Sweat sluices down Sergio’s back, his white t-shirt clinging to his skin. A few strands of hair that have been left out of his sloppy ponytail are plastered to the back of his neck. It doesn’t really matter to Sergio; he knows hot, knows the different types of hot that come with each city (the impersonal, spotlight heat of Madrid, the comforting swelter of Sevilla).
“Why are we doing this?” Fernando grumbles, shifting slightly in the seat and looking over at Sergio. His face is sweaty, too, and his hair is sticking up in tufts from all the times he’s ran his hands through it, trying to keep it off of his face and neck. Sergio resists the urge to smooth it out and instead taps his fingers against the steering wheel.
“Why not?” Sergio counters lazily.
It’s enough for Fernando, who lets his head rest against the seat and gazes up at the blue, blue sky.
--
“Salamanca?” Fernando asks, rubbing sleep out of his eyes and craning his neck to look out the window. He doesn’t remember putting the top up.
“I wanted to go to the cathedral, is that okay?” Sergio asks, fiddling with the GPS.
“S’fine,” Fernando replies, slurring slightly, muscles still relaxed from his nap. The stars are out and the sky is expansive and it feels like it’s pressing down on them, trapped in the little Audi, drawing them closer and closer together. They would collide before the end of this, Fernando thinks, and isn’t sure what he means by it. “Do you want to stay the night or go to midnight mass or what?”
“Midnight mass, if it’s good with you,” Sergio says quietly, slowing down as the streets get narrower and the turns became sharper. Fernando nods an affirmative and busies himself by staring out the window, entranced by the soft glow of the buildings.
Sergio stops the car and they both clamber out, grateful to stretch stiff limbs and breathe fresh air.
“I’m gonna walk a little, meet you back here?” Fernando asks, and this time it’s Sergio’s turn to nod.
--
The supermarket lights are a glaring contrast to the soft golden glow of the buildings outside.
“Stop poking me,” Fernando snaps, shoving Sergio halfheartedly.
“Why’re we here?” The Sevillan whines gently, poking Fernando again.
“Because I’m hungry.”
“Isn’t that what restaurants are for?” Sergio’s all for home cooking, but he doesn’t exactly have a stovetop in the trunk of his car.
“You wanted a road trip, so we’re going to do this right. Grab that,” Fernando replies, pointing at a bag of popcorn.
“Rafa will kill you,” Sergio mutters, grabbing the bag and throwing it in the cart nonetheless.
Fernando shrugs blithely and turns the cart down the next aisle. Sergio trails after him, grabbing a few bottles of water and a tin of peanuts. Fernando knows his way around the supermarket better than Sergio would’ve anticipated, and he isn’t sure what to make of the realization. Domesticity has never been a trait he associated with the striker, but then again, he supposed, years of marriage would instill that in a person.
Sergio is vaguely jealous that Fernando has had the opportunity to get to know the layout of a supermarket so well, and his arm is heavy when he slings it over Fernando’s shoulder.
--
Fernando dozes fitfully while Sergio drives, through the early morning with the top down again and the cool breeze keeps Sergio awake. They arrive in Leon sometime before noon and stumble into a hotel, Fernando with bags of groceries slung around his wrists. Sergio pays for the room and they blearily stagger up the stairs and collapse on the two double beds. Sergio doesn’t even turn the blankets down before falling asleep. Fernando, for his part, flips through channels and steals glances at the sleeping Sevillan, bathed in the blue light of the television.
--
Fernando is still asleep when Sergio wakes up, and instead of waking the blond, Sergio throws on a clean shirt and slips out of the room. He wanders down a few streets, hands in his pockets, and enjoys the dying sunshine more than he thought he would, but then again, years of partying in Madrid had allowed him to adjust his sleeping schedule without too much effort. Leon is not bathed in the same golden glow that Salamanca was, but it is beautiful in an old world sort of way, Sergio muses as he ducks into a sweetshop.
The brown paper bag crinkles in his grip as he carries it back to the hotel, and he isn’t exactly sure why he’d even bought the mantecadas. He yawns as he pushes the door to the room open, and tosses the bag onto Fernando’s bed.
“Where’d you go?” Fernando asks sleepily, sitting up on his elbows.
“For you,” Sergio replies simply, pointing at the bag and moving to the bathroom to splash water on his face.
--
“What are you doing?” Sergio grumbles, shifting over slightly and pressing his face against the pillow, trying to hold on to the remnants of sleep. “We’re leaving in the morning, not now. Go back to bed.”
“You left the window open, dumbass,” Fernando growls, pulling some of the blankets away from Sergio and pushing himself up against the younger man’s back. “I’m fucking freezing over there.”
Sergio reaches for the other pillow and puts it over his head, groaning. Fernando’s knees are tucked against his thighs and slowly, his breathing evens out. Sergio can feel his chest rising and falling against his back, and to its rhythm, he too falls back asleep.
--
The drive north is dry and quiet. Fernando is texting someone, and Sergio uses his distraction to commandeer the radio, finding a pop station and barely resisting the urge to start singing along. He can’t decide whether or not he should be annoyed at Fernando, for not paying attention, or pleased that he got his way with the music.
Fernando slides the phone back into his pocket and presses his forehead against the window.
“How is she?” Sergio asks, trying to keep the testiness out of his voice.
“I think she’s going to leave me,” Fernando mumbles.
Sergio reaches over the consol and lets his hand rest, heavy and comforting, on Fernando’s thigh.
--
Sergio twirls the straw in his drink and looks out over the shoreline; he’d resisted going to the beach in San Sebastian (he wants to save that for Cadiz) but had given in when Fernando suggested the small outdoor café. He pushes sweaty strands of hair off of his face and grins at Fernando, who has his glass pressed to his cheek, desperately seeking the cool condensation.
“I’ve never been away from Madrid in the summer,” Fernando offers quietly.
Sergio blinks up at him. “Really? Never just up and gone anywhere? Even as a kid?”
Fernando shakes his head. “Back then, there was no money, no time. I was always training. And we had nowhere to go. Now, it’s the only chance I have to go back to Madrid, see my family.” He shrugs. “It’s not a big deal, I like being there.” He pauses, takes a sip of his drink. “But this is- this is nice. Being away from everything. It’s really nice.”
His smile is small and tentative, but the one Sergio replies with takes up his whole face.
--
Sergio almost flat-out refuses to go to Barcelona. He isn’t sure why, exactly- he’d told Fernando it was too out of the way, but they didn’t exactly have an agenda, so Fernando had ignored him and taken the exit. It would be, Sergio promises himself, the last time on the trip Fernando got to drive.
“You just didn’t want to come here ‘cause you lost the last Clasico,” Fernando quips, elbowing Sergio lightly in the ribs. They are in line to get into a club, and Sergio has his arms crossed, unused to having to wait in line.
It’s not true, anyway, so Sergio just shoves Fernando back, laughing it off. He doesn’t hate the blaugrana, he just wants to beat them. He likes this city, with its unique flavor, so different from Sevilla or Madrid.
Once they get inside, watching Fernando twist his hips to the dance beats, Sergio decides coming to Barcelona wasn’t such a bad idea, after all.
--
Sergio misses the exit for Valencia and decides not to turn around. He is eager to get to Andalucía, ready for open skies and the beaches near Cadiz. He skips the exit for the city, as well, instead driving into a smaller town, where there is only a motel and a diner and endless miles of beach. The stars are beginning to twinkle down on the pair as they park the car and head out onto the empty beach.
“What are you going to do?” Sergio asks, letting his shoulders gently knock Fernando’s.
“About what?” Fernando’s eyebrows scrunch down and he kicks up some sand.
“Olalla.”
“Oh,” Fernando breathes out. “Well. She’ll probably move back to Spain, won’t she? I mean, she only came to Liverpool for me but obviously that isn’t working,” he lets out a derisive laugh, and Sergio’s chest feels tight.
“I asked about you, not her,” Sergio reminds him petulantly, plunking himself down near the tide line and sticking his feet out. The waves tickle as they wash over his legs. “What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know,” Fernando says quietly, sitting down next to Sergio and letting his head rest on the Sevillan’s shoulder. “I don’t know. Do I have to know? Does it matter? She’s leaving and she’ll probably take Nora and then what do I have left? A year or two left playing, and then what? I’ve got nothing but football in Liverpool, of course I don’t know.”
“Shush,” Sergio murmurs into Fernando’s hair, turning to wrap strong arms protectively around the older man. “It’ll be okay. You’ll be okay.”
They stay like that for a while, and when they get up to go into the motel, Sergio weaves their fingers together and holds on tight, a lifeline.
--
“Hola--“
Fernando is cut off as Sergio’s mother envelops him in a hug, her arms every inch as strong as her son’s. Fernando lets her pull him close and breathes in her scent- talcum powder, something spicy -she must’ve been cooking-, some kind of floral shampoo, and something that reminded him vaguely of Sergio. He hugs back, not awkwardly, until she finally pulls back and holds him at arm’s length.
“It is so good to finally have you in our home!” Paqui tells him, leading him into the house. Sergio trails behind them, talking rapidly with his sister. “Sergio never brings people here, you know. He always takes his friends to fancy resorts and what-have-you, but never home.” She shakes her finger sternly at Sergio, who breaks away from Mirian to scoop her up in a hug and kiss her cheek. She laughs and pushes him away. “We’re eating out back, come on before the food gets cold!”
Fernando shares a grin with Sergio and they follow his mother and sister out onto the patio.
--
“Why don’t you bring people here?”
Sergio bites his lip. It is a little strange, to be lying in his boyhood room, in his twin bed, with Fernando sprawled out on the floor next to him.
“I guess because this is my home,” he says slowly. “This is the place that is the most sacred to me, you know?”
“More than the Bernabeu?” Fernando asks, half joking.
“Mmhmm,” Sergio replies, staring up at the ceiling. “It’s my private life, it’s my family, it’s the house I grew up in. I don’t want to share that with everyone. I don’t want to bring people here so that the press will take up residence in the driveway. I want to keep it just for me.” He laughs a little. “I sound like a selfish kid, but it’s true.”
Fernando gets up and pads over to the bed, sitting down on the edge of the mattress. Sergio shifts his hips to make room.
“Makes sense,” Fernando murmurs. “It’s perfect here. Your parents, your sister, this house. It’s perfect for you.”
“I’m glad I got to share it with you.”
Fernando leans down and brushes the ghost of a kiss over Sergio’s cheekbone. “I’m glad you did, too.”
Sergio reaches his hand up to cup the back of Fernando’s head and lets his finger tangle in the soft curls there. He hauls himself onto his elbows and their noses knock gently.
“When your mom hugged me earlier, I just felt like everything was maybe going to be okay,” Fernando whispered. The words are forced but genuine, intimate in their softness. Sergio slides his arms around Fernando’s torso, pulling the striker flush against him.
“Everything is going to be okay,” he promises.
When their lips finally meet, it is a slow fumble of a kiss, open mouthed and lingering. For once, Fernando is not searching for anything in it, not thinking about anything at all except for the slide of Sergio’s lips against his own, and he thinks that maybe everything will be okay, after all.
--
Sergio’s parents feed them and wave them off in the morning, and they get back into the Audi and Sergio is driving slowly, trying in vain to prolong the trip. Fernando’s hand rests atop his on the gear shift and he is happy, happier than he has been in years.
“I think maybe I’ll stay in Madrid for a while,” Fernando says, about halfway between Sevilla and the capital. Sergio nods but remains silent. “After the summer, I mean,” he clarifies.
Sergio blinks a few times and thinks seriously about pulling over. “Looking for a transfer?” Sergio knows the answer, but he asks anyway.
“No,” Fernando responds. “No, no transfer.” He sighs and looks out the window at the countryside flying by far more quickly than he would’ve preferred. “I’m getting old, my knee’s hurting again. I don’t have anything in Liverpool except for football and I’m not even starting every match anymore. I don’t know, I just feel like maybe it’s time. I’d rather go out now then just kind of, I dunno, fade away.”
--
After so many days of just them in the car and nothing but open stretches of highway in front of them, returning to the traffic of Madrid is jarring. Sergio wonders how it is he ever came to love this city, as he weaves in between lanes. It is so different from his Sevilla, from the comfort and familiarity of his beloved dusty streets filled with flamenco guitar.
He looks over at Fernando and thinks maybe he came to love Madrid because of circumstance, because he had to. Maybe he came to love the city because it came to love him.
--
“Do you want me to drop you off?”
Fernando shifts uncomfortably in the passenger seat, his long legs stiff. “Could we just- go to yours, maybe? It’s just a lot to drop on my parents at once, y’know? The divorce and- retirement, and everything. Be nice to have time to plan out what I’m gonna say, yeah?”
“Is there actually going to be a divorce, then?” Sergio hates himself for asking.
“She said she faxed the forms to my lawyer this morning,” Fernando replies, and it feels good to admit that it is actually happening.
Sergio turns the blinker off and keeps driving.
--
The apartment is bigger than Sergio remembered; he’d always thought it felt homey, comfortable, but as he flicks the lights on and throws his keys on the counter, it feels big and sterile, not his.
Fernando trails in after him and Sergio moves around, turning on lights and making sure his plants haven’t died. He realizes after a moment that Fernando has never been to this apartment before; the last time they caught up in Madrid had been years ago, before Sergio moved.
“The guest room’s through there,” Sergio said, pointing down the hall. Fernando moves toward him with purpose, taking his hand and kissing him slowly. “Or that works too,” Sergio laughs, stroking Fernando’s cheekbone, smoothing out the laugh lines that framed the striker’s eyes with his thumb.
He leads Fernando to his own room, and the double bed is a much more comfortable fit than his twin bed in Sevilla, as Fernando pushes him over and he rolls around a little bit, getting acquainted with his space again.
“So what are you going to do?” Sergio asks Fernando, once he’s finished making a mess of the sheets.
“I don’t know,” Fernando shrugs. “Announce my retirement. Relax a little.”
“How long will you be in Madrid?”
Fernando smiles and moves to lie down next to Sergio.
“How long will you let me stay?”