e :)

Emery had been more or less forced into taking vacation, (something something, costing the hospital money, something something, she hadn't paid attention to Gloria ranting, she was too busy trying to not give into the urge to strangle her after telling Miller she had no choice but to use her vacation days.) and she'd needed to find ways to kill the time. One way, she discovered, was baking. "It has taken me two days, but I think I have discovered a new way to feed my croissant addiction." Emery announces as Samira enters the kitchen. Their orange tabby, Otter, weaves around Samira's leg, meowing in displeasure at not being noticed.

Samira grins a teasing grin. "Oh good, I thought we were going to have to take stocks from the local bakery." She gives Emery a kiss before leaning down to scoop the cat into her arms. "And what is the matter, good sir?"

The meowing instantly stops, exchanged for purrs and soft headbutts. Samira grins, snuggling into him. Like a chain reaction, Emery smiles at Samira's smile. "He actually had his turn with the brain cell today." Emery snorts.

"You did?! And Mommy missed it?!" Samira peppers the cat's head with kisses. "This needs to stop happening when I work." "Don't give him too much credit. It was gone as fast as it came." Emery leans over to kiss Samira again. "How was work?"

"Long. Very long. I am very much looking forward to having the next 36 hours off with you." A meow of protest. "Both of you." Samira chuckles.

"Here, give me the boy, go get cleaned up. By the time you're done, warm and fluffy croissants will be ready for us to enjoy, along with dinner and some much needed quality time."

---

Emery's setting up the coffee table with the takeout she'd ordered when Samira descends the stairs, hair still damp at the ends. There's a semi-forgotten documentary playing on the TV, Emery not paying full attention but still getting pulled in and distracted at some parts. Otter lounges on the back of the couch, watching her intently.

"Why am I not surprised you've spent your off day watching your sharks and making croissants?" Samira hums, pulling Emery into a hug from behind.

"I am a simple woman. I love my cat, my wife, sharks, and croissants." Emery shrugs. "I couldn't have all four today, so I settled for three." There's a meow of protest at 'settled' and a soft thud as Otter trips from the back of the couch, landing on the floor. The next meow is an indignant one. Emery and Samira break out into laughter.

She counts her steps as she paces, beats of four then pivoting and restarting. One, two, three, four. Pivot. One, two, three –

“Dr Mohan.” Walsh’s voice interrupts her rhythm, stern in the way that sends a delicious chill up her spine. When Samira turns, Walsh's piercing brown eyes are fixed on her expectantly, one dark eyebrow raised in silent question. 

“I was just wondering how it went?” Samira says, more question than statement, and she knows Walsh hears it too with how her mouth twitches just slightly. 

Walsh hums unconvincingly, continuing past Samira and giving her no choice but to follow. They're halfway down the hall before she speaks again. “You could have paged me, or waited until I came back down.” The silent why sits heavy and unsaid, lingering between them.

Walsh’s face does something new when Samira doesn't respond, corners of her mouth tipping up into what may be the closest she’s come to smiling. “If you wanted to see me you could’ve just said so, Dr Mohan.” 

Her words carry a teasing edge, but there’s something slightly vulnerable behind them, something honest. 

“Well, I -” Samira says weakly, catching the amusement on Walsh’s face and fighting to find her words again. “I wanted to know.” 

Walsh simply hums again, and something in Samira snaps at the feigned nonchalance. So what if she actually had wanted to see Walsh? It was her birthday, damn it. She was 30 and had barely lived. God forbid she go after something she wanted for once, despite the roundabout way she was doing it. 

It felt like they’d been dancing around whatever this invisible thing between them was forever, exchanging smiles when they crossed paths and doing nothing more. It was frustrating to have something so within your grasp but not be able to grab onto it out of fear of rejection. 

“What?” she snaps before she can think. She stops walking, and against her better judgment, reaches out to grab the sleeve of Walsh’s UPenn quarter zip, forcing her to stop. Samira’s skin itches at feeling so exposed, like she’s been sliced straight down the middle of her ribs. 

Walsh stills under her grip, pivoting slowly to focus on Samira, head cocked as she waits. 

Samira falters, confidence slowly leaking out of her in a hiss of air as she meets Walsh's gaze and loses any thoughts that had previously resided in her brain. She drops the sleeve she’d loosely curled her fingers around, taking a step back even as Walsh's eyes search her own, looking at her with an expression that’s both unreadable and painfully open. 

“Sorry,” Samira mumbles, dropping her head and walking towards the elevator, barely making it a few feet before Walsh's voice stops her.

“Mohan, wait.”

When Samira turns, there’s something like guilt on Walsh’s face as she closes the space between them. A hand lifts as if to touch Samira, hovering midair for a few seconds before dropping back to her side.

“I’m sorry,” Walsh says quietly. “I know…” she trails off, shaking her head slightly as if to dislodge something. “I’m sorry.”

Samira nods sharply, wrapping her arms around herself. “Yeah.”

Walsh echoes the movement, taking a step back. “Right, uh, you should get back downstairs.”

Samira turns back towards the elevators, the image of Walsh's face still burned into her eyelids. There had been guilt and something that looked oddly enough like wanting, if you could even call it that. 

She’s standing at the hub with Parker and Shen at 6 am, counting down the minutes until the end of shift. They’d somehow heard — from where and who, she has no idea — that it was her birthday, and were now grilling her about her plans for the day. Unfortunately, she was off for the next two days, so she couldn’t even make up excuses about being too tired after a shift. 

“C’mon, you only turn 30 once,” Parker says, leaning a hip against the desk where Samira's charting. She looks over at Shen, gesturing pointedly in Samira’s direction. “Right?”

“Yeah,” Shen says quickly, spinning on the stool next to Samira. “Yeah, go get drunk or whatever.”

Samira shoots them both an unimpressed look, fighting a smile despite herself. “When have you guys ever known me to go out?”

“True,” Parker concedes, tilting her head as she thinks. “Well, go… I don’t know, do something fun. Celebrate yourself.”

Shen snorts a laugh, pausing his spinning for a moment to catch his breath. “Celebrate your impending old age, maybe.”

“Mm, no,” Parker says, clicking her tongue. “Remind me who’s pushing 40, again?” She reaches over to high-five Samira, both of them wearing matching smirks.

Shen frowns at them, face brightening a second later. “Emery!” he calls, waving at someone over Samira’s shoulder. 

Samira’s heart stops for a second. Of course Walsh would have to show up now, after their awkward run-in earlier. Of course Shen, of all people, would call her over as if the mere sight of her didn't send most people running. 

She can feel Walsh’s presence behind her like a gust of cold air, something like panic shooting through as footsteps approach. 

“That’s Dr Walsh to you,” Walsh snaps, her voice a tired rasp that sends an unfamiliar rush through Samira.

“Oh, fine, Dr Walsh,” Shen says, rolling his eyes teasingly. “Hey, did you know it’s Samira's birthday?”

Samira feels heat spread through her face at the attention, and she glares over at Shen. “You don’t have to -”

“Happy birthday,” Walsh says evenly, something marginally warm in her tone. But that was just Samira's mind playing tricks, right? Walsh was never warm, only ever sharp-edged and cutting. Even during whatever circles they’d been running around each other, she’d only ever received professional politeness from Walsh, with the exception of their interaction a few hours ago.

Walsh’s fingertips graze over Samira's shoulder, so fleeting and light it makes her doubt it was ever there. The contact – despite however brief it may have been – sends a jolt through Samira, catching her off guard considering the cause of it was Walsh.

Walsh, who had been apologetic earlier in the hallway when Samira had been upset at her, who was usually so brusque and snappy that people ducked out of her way, who never made physical contact but had done so now. 

“Thank you,” Samira manages to get out, still feeling the phantom touch of Walsh's gentle fingers across her shoulder. 

Walsh clears her throat. “Someone needed a consult?”

“Yeah, I did,” Parker says. “North 5.” She pushes off of where she’d been leaning against the desk, heading down the hallway. Samira watches Walsh disappear through the doors behind her, fighting a smile at how perfect her bun is even after almost an entire shift. 

“You’re not subtle, y’know.”

She snaps her head sideways to look at Shen, sipping on his melted iced coffee like he’d just commented on the weather and hadn't just shaken Samira's world with his observation. “What?”

“You and Walsh," he clarifies, taking another long sip that makes Samira shudder at the mere sight of the sugary watered-down liquid. “Just ask her out, man. Quit eyeing each other like that.”

“I - that’s not - you-” Samira splutters, flushing slightly and unable to meet Shen’s eyes. “It’s not like that.”

Shen simply hums, unconvinced. “Right. But hey, just shoot your shot or whatever. I think you’ll be surprised.” With that mysterious piece of advice delivered, he rises from the stool, strolling off to check on another patient and leaving Samira sitting there, head spinning.

Maybe turning 30 was her sign to really and truly go after the things she’d always wanted, chase the things that seemed unattainable. Maybe Shen was right and Walsh would say yes, if her slightly abnormal behaviour today had been any indication. 

She spins herself around on the stool, idly glancing around for Walsh and spotting her heading towards the elevator. Jumping to stand, she speedwalks over just as Walsh is about to press the button, standing next to her with barely any space between their shoulders. 

“Hey.”

Walsh turns her head just the slightest, eyebrows rinsing in thinly veiled surprise. “Mohan. What's up?”

Samira inhales sharply, hands curling into fists at her sides. “I was -” she hesitates for a moment before turning to fully meet Walsh's curious gaze. “Wouldyouwannagetdinnersometime?” she says quickly, the worlds coming out squished together in her haste to just get them out. 

Walsh blinks back at her, brow furrowed as she tries to make sense of the verbal vomit that Samira’s just released. “Sure,” she says finally, lips curling up slightly. “As friends, or…” the silent question hangs in the air between them, tossing the ball back in Samira's court.

“No,” Samira mumbles, nails digging into her palms. “No, not as friends.” She watches as Walsh's eyes light up with what appears to be joy, her smile turning softer and more gentle. “If that’s okay?” she adds hastily, already having visual confirmation but needing to hear it said out loud.

“Yeah,” Walsh breathes, the words barely audible but her unusually wide grin communicating enough to make Samira's fists loosen. “Completely okay.” 

She holds a hand out in invitation and wraps her fingers around the curve of Samira's wrist when it lands in her grasp, tugging a pen out of her pocket and leaning over to scribble something along Samira's forearm in neat, blocky letters. 

With a final swoop of the pen, she straightens, thumb sweeping over Samira's pulse point once before letting go. “Text me,” she says quietly, tucking the pen away and meeting Samira's eyes with steady sincerity. “We’ll coordinate schedules.”

Samira nods, watching Walsh lean forward to press the button again. Her heart pounds in her ears, the adrenaline from finally doing something that had seemed so scary coursing through her body. She feels oddly exhilarant, ready to run to the roof and scream the news from the rooftop. 

When the elevator doors slide closed and Walsh disappears from view, she glances down at her arm. Her eyes trace over a phone number simply signed Emery, followed by a loopy heart. It makes her smile unabashedly at the concept of big bad surgeon Emery Walsh signing off with something so sweet. A shiver runs down her spine at the mental image of Emery’s steady fingers delicately curving letters onto her skin, at the lingering feel of cool fingers wrapped around her wrist to hold her still. 

***

Samira practically floats home after the end of shift, collapsing into bed with her scrubs still on and rolling over onto her stomach like she’s twelve again. She pulls her phone out and carefully types the phone number in, fingers hovering over the keyboard anxiously. 

Hey, it’s Samira Mohan, she types before deleting it. Of course Emery would know who it was, they’d had that conversation not even two hours ago. Fuck, this was exactly why she didn’t do this; there were so many unspoken rules to dating and relationships that it was easier to just avoid them altogether.

But she wanted this, had been the one to ask Emery out. She knows, rationally, that the ball is in her court and she can choose to not text, can just find Emery next shift and let her down gently. But that wasn’t what she wanted – she wanted to go out to dinner with Emery, wanted to hear her really and truly laugh in a way she never did at work. So she would be brave, even if it made her feel incredibly anxious and terrified. 

Samira (7:45 AM)

hey emery, it’s samira :)

i’m off the next two days, do either of those work for you?

She forces herself to sit up and box-breathe in an attempt to slow her pounding heart, fingers clutching her phone in a death grip. A response comes through barely three minutes later, and she rushes to read it, nearly dropping her phone in the process. 

Emery (7:48 AM)

Hi Samira

I’m supposed to work the next three nights, but would lunch work instead?

I’d like to see you sometime soon

The last text makes Samira's entire body light up with hope. It was straightforward and honest, exactly what she’d expect from Emery. And yet, it had her grinning at her phone like she wasn’t a fully grown adult who’d done the whole dating thing before, failure aside.

But maybe that was a good sign, that Emery filled her with glowing warmth and made her smile like that. She'd certainly never felt that way with anyone else; not that anyone else was Emery, but still. 

Samira (7:52 AM)

lunch sounds good! tomorrow?

and i’d really like to see you too :)

Emery (8:00 AM)

For sure, does 1pm work?

And did you have a place in mind already?

Samira (11:13 AM)

shit i’m so sorry

fell asleep

i can find something later tonight?

Emery (1:34 PM)

Hey you’re all good, fell asleep myself

Don’t stress about finding something, we can totally figure it out together tomorrow

Also

Would it be okay if I picked you up?

Samira (1:59 PM)

sure yeah if you don't mind, i’ll pull together a few options anyways

and you don’t have to!! seriously, it’s fine

Emery (3:11 PM)

No pressure, of course

But I promise I want to

Samira (3:15 PM)

okay then

thanks!

ATTACHMENT: GOOGLE MAPS

Emery (3:44 PM)

No need to thank me

I’ll see you tomorrow, get some rest Samira

Samira (5:01 PM)

have a good shift, emery!

i’m excited to see you

Emery (5:02 PM)

Me too, pretty girl

Samira tosses her phone on the couch next to her, fighting the urge to squeal and giggle. Emery Walsh, for all her feigned hardness, was actually a softie underneath. Pretty girl, she’d called Samira. Two words that were so simple but held so much weight, carefully dropped by someone who rarely cracked and showed emotion. Except when it came to Samira, apparently.

For the first time in nearly a decade, she had a date with someone who made her feel what seemed to be every possible emotion, who was responsible and steady and cared enough to want to pick her up beforehand. 

And she was excited, beyond giddy with anticipation but also sick with anxiety. What if Emery only liked the version of her she saw at work? What if it turned out that Samira really was either too much or not enough? What if it was awkward and it turned out there wasn’t actually anything between them?

Yes, she had a good feeling about this, but you couldn’t always trust your gut. That was the one thing she’d learned over the years, that people could disappoint you at any given time so there was no point in trusting them. But she wanted this to work, wanted to trust that Emery wouldn’t hurt her. And she had no reason not to, because if Emery Walsh was one thing, it was dependable. Consistent. 

***

The next day, Samira’s pacing back and forth in the living room when a knock finally sounds at the door. It’s 12:45 pm, and as expected, Emery is here exactly when she said she’d be.

She glances over at the TV, using it as a makeshift mirror to smooth her hair – a messy bun to keep her hair off her neck in the early summer heat – back one last time, double checking her outfit before moving towards the door. She's dressed in a black tank tucked into a tiered white maxi skirt, a decorative gold belt loosely wrapped around her waist. 

Emery stands on the other side, lips pressed together nervously but curving into a gentle smile when the door opens to reveal Samira. She holds a bouquet of flowers in one hand, the other tucked into the pocket of jeans that she’s paired with a white and black pinstriped shirt, sleeves rolled up to her elbows. It’s been left halfway unbuttoned, just the lacy hem of her black bra left visible, and Samira lets her eyes linger for a minute, only snapping back up when Emery clears her throat with a smirk.

“Hey, you.”

“Hi,” Samira manages, unable to once again pull her eyes away from the expanse of skin left exposed, trailing her gaze along the column of Emery's neck and over her collarbones. 

Emery just stands there and watches, taking in the way Samira's staring at her with barely concealed hunger. It’s comforting to know that what she feels isn’t one-sided, that Samira wants her just as much as she wants Samira.

She allows herself the brief pleasure of looking back, greedily taking in the curve of Samira's bare shoulders, the pendant that dangles between her breasts on a dainty chain. She’s never been jealous of inanimate objects before, but now she finds herself wanting to be Samira’s clothes, to have the privilege of clinging to her smooth skin without a single barrier. 

“Here,” she says finally, even though if it was up to her they’d have a lot longer to keep looking. She holds the bouquet out – daisies, because something told her roses were the wrong choice when it came to Samira. She deserved something beautiful and delicate, just like her. 

Samira’s face lights up with pure, unfiltered joy and surprise, mouth stretching into a wide grin. “Oh,” she breathes. “Emery, you didn’t have to.”

Emery simply shrugs in response, biting her lip to contain the happiness that threatens to spill out of her. She knew hospitals were miserable and made people appear as such, but fuck, standing here now in front of a much happier and brighter version of Samira, she absolutely believes it. 

“No big deal. I wanted to.”

Samira laughs softly at that, stepping closer and pressing her lips to Emery's cheek, a quick brush that’s there and gone within seconds. When she pulls back, she looks almost pleased, but her hands, fidgeting with the fabric of her skirt, betray her. “There’s a lot of things you want to do, huh?”

“For the right person, yeah.”

Samira just hums, unable to hide the wide grin stretching across her face. “Oh, shoot, come in,” she says, stepping back to let Emery in and heading for the kitchen. “Give me a second to put these in water.”

Emery trails behind her into the living room, pausing in the doorway to glance around. She expects it to be comfy and well-lived, but instead it’s sparse and bare. There’s nothing but the couch, a coffee table, and a TV sitting on a low cabinet. It feels dark and exhausting despite the sunlight coming through the large windows, and Emery finds herself desperately needing to get out. 

She’d known Samira had a terrible work life balance, considering the way she was always pulling doubles, but she’d underestimated just how bad it was. Her apartment looked like she’d just moved in, instead of somewhere she’d likely lived for the entirety of residency. It was a stark contrast to her own, which she’d purposely furnished to look more welcoming and lived-in than it really was.

She walks over to the kitchen instead, where Samira’s filling a large glass vase with water at the sink. 

“You look really nice, by the way.”

Samira freezes, water sloshing over the rim of the vase and onto her hands until she snaps back to life and turns the tap off. She dumps half the water out and places the flowers inside, racking her brain for the right response. It's like she’s gone offline, unable to come up with intelligible words at just the smallest compliment.

It’s been so long since someone’s said something like that to her – despite the simplicity of it – that it catches her completely off guard, frozen in place as the words bounce around inside her brain. She's so used to doubting the sincerity behind people’s words that she no longer knows how to differentiate genuine from fake; her brain doesn’t know what to do with Emery's words despite the fact that they’re meant with nothing but kindness and real awe. 

With just a couple casual words, Emery has reduced her to a blank mess, something that deeply frustrates and confuses her. She's always prided herself on keeping her cool even when flustered, but this is an entirely different thing. 

“Thank you,” she manages eventually, setting the vase on the counter and turning to face Emery. “You look nice, too.”

Emery dips her head to hide the flush spreading over her cheeks, cursing her Irish genetics. She was always so controlled and composed, but here she was, blushing like she was decades younger just because a pretty girl had said she looked nice. Clearing her throat, she jerks her head at the front door. “Ready to go?”

Samira nods, drying her hands off on a towel and following Emery. She slides her shoes on and lets Emery hold the door open for her, fighting the urge to protest against it. It’s sort of nice, letting someone do things for once, though it feels like she’s been rendered incapable. 

After years of struggling alone and pretending she’s fine even when everything’s falling apart, the idea of having someone to hold her together sounds nice. She's always yearned for it, but she knows in reality that she'd have an incredibly hard time accepting it, to not actively push it away because losing her independence feels like losing every bit of control she’s ever fought for. 

Emery’s hand lands on Samira's back as they approach the car, and she freezes for a second before melting into it. It remains there, steady and reassuring, as she climbs into the lifted car, ready to catch her if she falls.

Samira watches as Emery slides into the driver’s seat next to her, turning the engine on and then glancing over. “So, where are we going?”

“Oh!” Samira exclaims, twisting to pull her phone out of the pocket on her skirt. “Here, I’ll text you the address.”

Emery just smiles gently, fingers tapping on the wheel absently. “Hey, I was wondering something.”

“Shoot,” Samira mumbles, scrolling through something on her phone. She glances up when Emery doesn’t say anything, brow furrowing. “Yeah?”

“What made you decide to ask me out?”

“Oh,” Samira says. “Oh, Um. I guess…” she laughs under her breath, ducking her head to look down at her lap, “I guess I figured it was time?” It comes out more question than answer, and Emery raises an eyebrow curiously. “I mean, I haven’t really done much during residency. Figured it was time to actually do things.”

Emery’s mouth curls into a teasing smirk at the implication of the last sentence, and Samira gasps in realization, shaking her head furiously. “Not like that! I do want to, but I - y’know, not like -” she groans, burying her face in her hands. “Fuck.”

“You’re fine,” Emery says soothingly, a touch of laughter still lingering in her voice. She reaches out and places her hand between Samira's shoulderblades, warm and heavy. “I know what you meant.”

Samira straightens, but Emery's hand stays where it is for a moment longer before lifting off and returning to her lap. 

“Right,” Samira says brightly, still looking faintly mortified. “I’ve sent you the address.”

Emery nods, pulling it up on the car’s display screen. She starts the GPS and pulls out of the parking spot, draping an arm over the back of the passenger seat in the way that’s always made Samira's knees go weak but has only ever happened to her once before. 

“Can I ask about your plans for next year?” Emery asks. “Or are we not talking about work?”

Samira just laughs softly. “No, it’s fine. Uh, no plans, really. I’m taking a year to… find myself, is the easiest way to put it.”

“That sounds nice.”

“You don’t have to lie to me,” Samira says, looking ahead so she doesn’t have to see the look on Emery's face. She‘s usually met with pity or confusion when she tells people, as if she’s ruining the future she’s worked so hard for by not looking for a fellowship or attending position next year. “I know it’s insane and kinda stupid.”

“No,” Emery says as she stops at a red light, turning to look over at Samira. “Hey, no, look at me.” She waits until Samira's eyes meet hers to speak again. “I wouldn’t lie to you. And I really do think it’s cool. Not a lot of people are self-aware enough to do that.”

She breaks eye contact to look back at the road when the light turns green, but a hand reaches over and finds Samira's, squeezing once before returning to the wheel. It’s quick and grounding and the only response that hasn't set Samira on edge so far, especially considering that with the amount of forced smiles she’s received so far it’s surprising she hasn’t punched a wall yet. 

She lets herself relax back into the seat, shoulders dropping and spine curving from its previous ramrod straightness. There’s something about Emery’s presence that feels like a soothing balm, just the sight of her being enough to force Samira's breath out in an exhale and make her entire body loosen. It’s new and terrifying and unlike anything she's ever felt with anything else, but in a good way. In a safe and warm way that feels like she’s being cradled in the palms of Emery’s hands. 

They pull into the parking lot of the restaurant a few minutes of idle conversation about work and the latest hospital gossip, something Emery is highly amused to hear Samira recount. We don’t get much of it up in surgery, she defends herself even as Samira muffles a giggle. Too busy cutting people open. 

Emery’s sliding out of her seat and rounding the car before Samira's even gotten her seatbelt unlocked, door tugged open and hand outstretched in waiting. It’s practically second nature to her, being the oldest child and a natural helper, but she finds with Samira it’s less instinctual and more active wanting. Because yes, she’s desperate — to the point where it’s nearly pathetic, really — to feel Samira's hand in hers, to feel their fingers loosely tangle together between them. 

As they cross the parking lot, Samira sneaks a glance over at Emery, all loose brown curls and lazy grin curling at the corners of her mouth. It’s such a stark contrast to the Dr Walsh she’s used to, much softer and more laid back. 

“I like you like this.” The words slip out before she can even begin to filter them, sneaking through the gates of her Emery-drunk brain and into the air. She doesn't even realize it until Emery shoots her a startled look, eyebrow raised in questioning.

“Oh,” Samira says, chewing at her bottom lip nervously. “Too much?”

Emery looks at her for what feels like forever, pinning Samira under her scrutinizing gaze even as they continue to walk. “No,” she says finally, smiling in an almost fondly pleased way, a much softer version of her earlier smile. “No, not too much.”

“I just -” Samira says, feeling the need to justify herself even though she’s gotten the reassurance she was subconsciously looking for. “I just meant you’re… I don't know, softer like this. More human and less scary.” 

The words rush out in a panicked vomit, unable to stay inside even as Emery stops on the sidewalk in front of her. 

“I know. I get what you meant.”

Emery hesitates for a moment, jaw working as she thinks. “I’m different at work,” she says eventually. “Can't really be soft, can I? But I'm glad I can be with you.” 

She drops her gaze to the sidewalk and flushes, as if the vulnerability is too much for her to bear. And it is; she’s not used to being so open with people, but she wants to with Samira. Something about those big brown eyes makes her want to divulge every secret and every ounce of her soul and place her heart in Samira's waiting and careful hands. 

“Oh,” Samira says, ever so articulately. “Oh.” She doesn’t know what to do with all this openness from Emery Walsh, someone who’s infamously closed-off except for apparently now, and it scares her. But she can tell Emery's even more scared, so she reaches out and gently cups Emery's cheek with her free hand. “Me too,” she says softly, making sure their gazes meet. “Me too, Emery.”

She lets her fingertips graze Emery's cheek for a final second before dropping her hand. “Ready to head in?”

Emery nods, looking slightly less anxious now. She squeezes their linked hands once, a silent thank you. “Yeah. You hungry?”

“Starving.” Samira tugs Emery along as she starts walking again, opening the door to the restaurant and holding it open. Emery blinks at her for a second, surprised, then finally steps inside, hovering and waiting for Samira to follow. 

They’re seated with menus and water within minutes, smiling shyly at each other across the table. It’s like they’ve run out of words now that they’re forced to do nothing but look at each other. But then Emery's boot brushes Samira's ankle, making them both startle, and they both giggle.

“Shit, sorry,” Emery says quickly, and Samira just waves her off.

“You’re fine. Do you know what you’re getting?”

“Maybe the salmon,” Emery says, trailing a finger down her menu. “You?”

Samira shrugs. “Their fettuccine is supposed to be good. Do you wanna split a side?”

“That sounds nice, anything catch your eye?”

“The potatoes, maybe? Or we could do a salad, up to you.”

Emery shakes her head. “The potatoes are fine. Now, tell me how your research is going; it’s related to racial inequalities, yes?”

Samira can only blink at Emery for a second, feeling knocked off balance. She can’t remember ever mentioning her research to Emery – they barely interacted as it was, and certainly never discussed personal interests. “It’s - yeah. Yes. How did you know?”

Emery glances down at the table, hands fidgeting with the edge of her menu. “I - you were talking to Collins about it once and I overheard and I didn’t mean to, I swear, but it sounded really interesting so I… may have looked you up?”

Emery looks almost embarrassed when she looks back up at Samira, expression hesitant. “Sorry, I know that’s -”

“No,” Samira interrupts, squinting at Emery in shock and amazement. “No, you - you care?”

“Yeah, ‘course I do.” Emery looks puzzled now, as if she can’t understand why she’s even answering the question. 

“Oh,” Samira just says. It seems to be the word of the day. “Most people get bored pretty quick, you don’t -”

“I know. I want to.”

Samira looks at Emery for one long second, brow furrowed like she was still questioning the statement, before slowly beginning to talk about the cases she’d been reading. Her eyes stay locked on Emery the entire time, as if watching for even the slightest indication that Emery was getting bored or didn’t care after all. 

But Emery listens attentively the whole time, only dropping her eyes from Samira to pick up her fork when their plates are slid onto the table. 

“Anyways,” Samira says quietly ten minutes later, glancing down at her entirely untouched meal and then across at Emery’s half-finished one. “That’s it.”

When she looks back up, Emery’s smiling at her, faint and barely there but such a stark contrast to her expression at work. There’s something like pride in her eyes, mixed with what Samira can only assume to be fondness. 

“That sounds very cool,” she says, reaching across the table and wrapping her fingers around Samira's wrist, squeezing once but not pulling away. She can feel the constant pulse under Samira's skin, steady and unchanging like Samira herself.

“Seriously. I’m excited to read it.”

“Thanks,” Samira says quietly, flipping her hand over to wrap her fingers around Emery's. “That… that means a lot.”

Emery just nods in response. “Yeah. Hey, I wanna take you somewhere after this.”

Samira frowns, thrown off by the suddenness. “What -”

“Eat,” Emery urges, face bright with excitement. She looks so much like a puppy that’s just heard the word walk that Samira can do nothing but obey and dutifully fork up a bite of pasta. 

Fifteen minutes later, both their plates are empty and Emery’s taken care of the ball, despite Samira’s protests that she should pay since she’d asked Emery out. But Emery had just shot her an unamused look and reached for it the second it arrived, ignoring Samira's attempts to take it from her.

“There you go, mi amor,” you say, slipping the last stack of beads on the braid and tying it off. “Let’s get you under the dryer.”

Alexia watches closely, with such intensity as you attach the hair dryer to the hooded bonnet dryer attachment, making sure it was fit snuggly on Sienna’s head and turning it on.

Sienna holds her hands out expectantly, making you sigh and reluctantly give her her iPad. “Just until the dryer goes off.”

You get up with a heavy sigh, quickly gathering the used supplies. As you turn you meet Alexia’s piercing gaze with a flinch. You place a hand over your chest and let out a breath. “Jeez, Ale. You scared me! When did you get home?”

You lean over and peck her lips before returning to your task of cleaning up.

“Not that long ago,” Alexia answers,hair still wet from the shower she took at the gym. “You just finished her hair? You’ve been at it since morning.”

You groan. “Yes. Her hair is getting longer and thicker, but it’s so beautiful.”

Alexia follows you throughout the house. “It doesn’t hurt your hands? Doing her hair that long, I mean.”

You snort. “It definitely does. When you do hair for so long that you learn to power through it.” You maneuver around Alexia to wash your hands.

Alexia hums, staring at your hands that seemingly relax at the piping hot water you run over them.

“Huh,” she murmurs, before kissing you on the cheek and going to join Sienna.

Alexia drowns out the noise from her teammates surrounding her. The bus is as loud as a cafeteria, like it always was. Usually, you are by her side for any trip but Clara and Aïcha guilted you into sitting with them, leaving Alexia with Vicky and Sydney by her side.

Vicky peaks over to Alexia’s screen, her head on her shoulder. “Why are you watching hair detangling videos?” She takes a second to look at Alexia’s hair then back at the screen. “You do not need that…”

Alexia rolls her eyes. “I am very aware of that, thank you Victoria.”

Vicky pouts. “Don’t full name me! Also don’t distract me!”

“It’s not my fault youth nowadays have the attention span of a fifteen second video,” Alexia mutters, eyes still watching the tutorial.

“Rude,” Vicky crosses her arms just as Sydney lets out a loud snore from next to her. “Why are you watching that?”

Alexia sighs. “I’m trying to learn how to do hair to help with Sienna’s hair days.”

“Awww,” Vicky coos and obnoxiously snuggles up to Alexia. “So cute.”

Alexia ignores the teen and continues to watch the video.

“Hey,” Vicky starts, “what if you practice on me?”

Alexia pauses the video. “What?”

“You can practice doing hair on me! Sienna and I have the same curl pattern so it’ll be similar. Also, we’re both tender-headed so it’ll be the real experience.”

Alexia mouths the word ‘tender-headed’ before snapping out of it. “I’m going to take you up on that offer. Thank you, Victoria.”

“Stop with the full name!”

“Ow! Add more water!”

“More?” Alexia picks up the spray bottle regardless, spraying more water to the section of Vicky’s hair. “It’s not to much?”

“No such thing,” Vicky responds, shoving some of Sienna’s yogurt melts into her mouth. “These things are so good.“

“Stay still,” Alexia readjusts Vicky’s head before picking up the detangling brush.

“Yowch! Don’t start at the root. Start at the ends and work your way up.”

Alexia nods at the correction, spraying more water before carefully starting at the ends. Alexia follows Vicky’s instructions and soon is done detangling one section.

Alexia sharply inhales. “Is this much hair coming out normal?”

Vicky nods, eyes that are trained on the TV in front of her flicker to the hair Alexia holds out. “Yeah it’s standard. I’ve had my hair in braids for a minute so it hasn’t been detangled in a while.”

Alexia nods, deciding to take it in stride as she parts another section out. She follows the previous steps slowing getting a hang of the process.

You sigh, rolling your shoulders back after a particularly tough weight training session. You enter the living room with the idea of going straight to bed for your scheduled nap. You eyes snap to the light of the TV, quickly following the sight in front of it. Vicky was asleep, her head resting on the inside of Alexia’s knee as the woman worked through sections carefully and gently.

“Ale?” you whisper, careful to now wake Vicky up. “What are you doing?”

“Learning to do hair,” Alexia shrugs.

“I can’t see that, baby, but why?” You round the coach to sit next to her

Alexia stays silent, her fingers moving around by instinct. “You said Sienna’s hair is getting more to deal with… I want to help you. Also, I should know how to do my daughter’s hair.”

“Ale, that is the sweetest thing you’ve said all day,” you peck her face repeatedly.

You look down at Vicky’s head. “Let me teach you how to do cornrow’s easier sister, flat twists. Also, part of Sienna’s next hair style.”

You don’t anticipate Alexia’s razor sharp focus to translate to doing your daughter’s hair, but here you are.

She mumbles your previous instructions under her breath as Sienna sings along to Gracie’s Corner. The scent of Blue Magic and jojoba oil takes you back to a place of nostalgia.

Alexia sits in a chair with Sienna at her feet. You sit on the sofa with your laptop, pretending to look at some documents your agent sent over, your eyes watching Alexia meticulously twist Sienna’s hair back and tie it off with a rubber band.

“What accessories do you want?” Alexia asks, smiling at her work.

Sienna pauses with a hum. “The pink beads please, Mami.”

Alexia nods. She inspects the bead threader for a moment before loading it with a couple of pink beads. She wraps the end of the twist around the threader, pushing the beads on the twist and tying it off with a black rubber band. You see her eyes light up at her success, silently pumping her fists in the air before prepping for another twist.

Soon enough, Sienna is under the dryer with her standard iPad time. She uses the camera on her tablet as a mirror. “Wow! Thank you, Mami! I love it!”

Alexia’s eyes water as she smiles brightly. “Anything for you, mi leoncita.”

The midfielder quietly sniffles before joining you on the couch.

You smile warmly. “Worth all the learning?”

You hate football.

You hate the sound of a ball striking a boot, that sharp crack that seems to follow you everywhere no matter how many years you spend trying to distance yourself from it. You hate the smell of freshly cut grass because it instantly transports you back to training grounds and stadium tunnels and endless afternoons spent waiting around while other people obsessed over a game you never cared about. You hate the sight of floodlights illuminating a pitch at dusk, hate the television commentators who speak about football as though it is the most important thing in the world, hate the way complete strangers seem to believe they know your family simply because they know your surname.

Most of all, you hate the way football consumed your childhood.

Your papa’s playing career had already ended when you were still young enough to think adults knew everything, but by then his managerial career was ascending so quickly that it felt as though football had just found a new way to claim him. Success turned into reputation, reputation turned into influence, and influence eventually became something larger than any individual person. It became legacy.

People spoke about him with a reverence that sometimes bordered on worship. Journalists dissected every decision he made as though it were a matter of national importance. Fans crossed streets just for the chance to shake his hand. Other managers studied his teams, copied his tactics, and spent entire press conferences discussing his ideas. Everywhere you went, there were reminders that your father was not simply a man anymore.

He was a symbol.

Maybe, at twenty-eight, you should appreciate that more than you do.

Maybe you should be grateful for the opportunities his career created for your family, for the doors that opened before you ever had to knock, for the experiences that most people only dream about. Maybe you should feel proud every time somebody recognizes your surname and their eyes widen in admiration.

You try. You really do. But it is difficult to feel grateful for a legacy that demanded so much from the people who loved him.

It is difficult to celebrate football when football stole countless evenings that should have belonged to your family. Difficult to romanticize success when it meant birthdays spent waiting for him to return from away matches, school performances where an empty seat sat beside your mother, and holidays interrupted by phone calls that inevitably dragged his attention back to training sessions, injuries, transfers, and tactics.

Football never stopped asking for more.

And because football never stopped asking, neither did life.

One day you were running barefoot across the warm sand of Barcelona’s beaches, speaking Catalan with your friends, convinced that the Mediterranean sun would shine forever. The next, your entire life had been packed into boxes because your father had accepted a new challenge in Munich.

You still remember how cold it felt.

The language sounded harsh and unfamiliar, all sharp consonants and impossible grammar, and no matter how hard you studied, you never felt as though you truly belonged there. The city was beautiful, people always insisted that when you complained, but beauty means very little when you are eleven and homesick. What you remember is the grey sky, the endless winter, and the feeling that everyone around you understood a world that remained stubbornly closed to you.

Before you could fully settle, football moved your family again.

Manchester was somehow worse.

The rain seemed endless. The sky existed in varying shades of grey. Entire weeks passed without seeing proper sunlight, and you became convinced that British food was an elaborate punishment disguised as a national cuisine. Every conversation somehow circled back to football. Every newspaper featured football. Every radio station discussed football.

You could never escape it. Not even in your own home.

And yet, despite everything, despite your resentment and frustration and the years spent insisting that you wanted absolutely nothing to do with the sport that had dictated so much of your life, you never stopped loving your father.

Because your papa never brought football through the front door with him.

The moment he stepped inside, he became simply Papa. 

The father who woke you up early on weekends for bike rides along the coast whenever the family was back in Spain. The father who spent hours researching restaurants because he wanted to surprise you with somewhere new. The father who never missed an opportunity to take you to the cinema, even if it meant staying out far later than he probably should have before training the next morning.

When you graduated from law school, he celebrated with more enthusiasm than he had ever shown after winning a trophy. When you secured your first prestigious internship, he called every member of the family before you even had the chance to tell them yourself. When you received the offer for your dream position back in Catalonia, he looked prouder than any photograph you had ever seen of him lifting silverware.

Football trophies decorated museums and boardrooms. Your achievements decorated conversations. And there was never any doubt which mattered more to him.

You were the apple of his eye and everyone knew it.

Your brothers teased him about it relentlessly, your mother rolled her eyes whenever he tried to deny it, and even he occasionally admitted it with a sheepish smile when he thought nobody important was listening.

You were his little girl - always.

So when you finally came home, part of you wondered if something in him had quietly settled too.

After nearly two decades of living abroad, after years spent building a life around airports and moving trucks and temporary addresses, you returned to Barcelona for good. You found an apartment overlooking streets you actually recognized. You reconnected with old friends. You started the career you had worked so hard to build.

For the first time in years, home felt like home again.

And not long after you settled back in Catalonia, he announced he would be leaving Manchester. Maybe it was coincidence or maybe he was simply ready to rest and enjoy everything he had spent decades building instead of always chasing the next challenge. But regardless, the football world reacted with the kind of dramatic disbelief usually reserved for royal abdications.

Television channels dedicated entire evenings to discussing his decision. Former players gave emotional interviews. Journalists wrote lengthy retrospectives examining every trophy, every tactical innovation, every rivalry, and every triumph. Fans treated it like the end of an era.

Your father just seemed relieved.

While the rest of the world searched for hidden meanings and secret plans, he spent his days taking long walks with your mother, drinking coffee on terraces overlooking the sea, and rediscovering hobbies that football had stolen from him years ago. For the first time in your life, he looked like a man who wasn’t carrying the weight of an entire club on his shoulders.

He was sometimes a little too relaxed though, in your opinion.

You arrive at your parents’ new house on a warm afternoon, letting yourself in through the front door without bothering to knock. The house sits along the coast, tucked away from the attention that had followed your family for most of your life, and it already feels more like home than any of the temporary houses you had occupied in Munich or Manchester. Sunlight pours through enormous windows overlooking the water, filling every room with a warm golden glow. The distant sound of waves drifts through the open terrace doors and mixes with the faint commentary coming from a television somewhere deeper inside the house.

Following the noise into the living room, you find your parents exactly where you expected them to be.

Curled together on the sofa, practically intertwined, your mother’s legs stretched across your father’s lap while his arm rests comfortably around her shoulders. Some football match plays quietly in the background. The local women’s side, you think after sparing the screen barely a second of attention before immediately losing interest.

The sight would probably make most people smile. It mostly makes you roll your eyes.

Thirty years of marriage and somehow they are still disgustingly in love.

The moment they notice you, their faces brighten in perfect unison. They exchange identical smiles before rising from the couch together, both already reaching for you before you’ve even crossed the room. Your father gets there first, wrapping his arms around you with enough enthusiasm to make it clear that retirement has done absolutely nothing to reduce his affection. You lean into the embrace for a brief moment before your mother steals you away for one of her own.

They have become unbearable since you moved home.

Years of complaining that you lived too far away have apparently convinced them that physical affection must now compensate for every lunch, celebratory dinner, and ordinary afternoon they missed while you were building your career elsewhere.

You allow it because, despite your complaints, you’ve missed them too.

The three of you settle into the living room and fall easily into conversation. Your mother disappears briefly to bring coffee and pastries while your father asks about work, genuinely interested in the answer despite understanding almost nothing about corporate law. He listens anyway, nodding thoughtfully while you complain about difficult clients and impossible deadlines, asking questions with the same focus he once reserved for post-match tactical analysis.

The conversation drifts naturally between subjects until you notice a look pass between your parents.

The tiny exchange lasts less than a second, but after twenty-eight years of being their daughter, you recognize it as something immediately.

Your father suddenly becomes very interested in his coffee while your mother struggles to hide an amused smile behind her hands.

You narrow your eyes. “What?”

Your mother’s smile widens. Your father sighs. And suddenly you know with complete certainty that whatever is about to happen is going to inconvenience you.

“Carinyo…” your father begins, setting his drink down on the table with a level of caution that makes you suspicious. “I have a favor to ask you.”

You narrow your eyes at him.

Across the sofa, your mother seems very interested in stirring her coffee despite the fact that she hasn’t added anything to it.

That alone tells you everything you need to know.

“What kind of favor?”

Your father shifts slightly in his seat.

“Your mother has that baby shower tomorrow. You know, for your cousin.”

A very distant cousin, but yes, you know exactly which baby shower he means. Your mother has been talking about it for weeks despite the fact that neither of you could confidently identify the woman in a lineup.

You wait patiently for him to continue.

“Well,” he says, drawing the word out slightly, “Barça is hosting a gala tomorrow night for the foundation. They’ve asked me to speak because apparently they think seeing your old man back in blaugrana colours will encourage people to donate more money.”

He rolls his eyes as though the idea is completely ridiculous, which is particularly rich coming from a man who could probably convince half of Catalonia to buy bottled tap water if he attached his name to it.

You continue staring at him. The favor still hasn’t arrived. Your father notices your blank look and suddenly looks far less confident.

The sheepish expression that crosses his face is answer enough.

“Oh no.”

His shoulders sag, “Listen-”

“No!”

“I haven’t even asked yet.”

“You don’t need to.”

A laugh escapes your mother before she quickly hides it behind her coffee cup. Your father points at her accusingly before turning back toward you.

“I was wondering…” He hesitates for a moment, clearly aware that this conversation is not heading in his favor. “Well, since your mother can’t come…”

You already know where this is going. You know it before he even finishes the sentence. You know it so certainly that your eyes close in defeat.

“Maybe you could come with me?”

There it is. The disaster. A football gala.

An entire evening surrounded by former players, club executives, sponsors, journalists, donors, and every other category of person you have spent your entire adult life trying to avoid.

“Be my date?"

“Papa,” you groan, dropping your head back against the couch cushions and staring up at the ceiling as though divine intervention might still save you.

“It won’t be that bad.”

It will undoubtedly be that bad.

Your father, unfortunately, mistakes your silence for uncertainty and quickly launches into his defense.

“You can pretend it’s some lawyer event! There’ll be loads of lawyers from the club there.”

Wonderful, your favorite.

An entire room filled with wealthy old men who would spend the first few minutes of every conversation staring at your chest and the remainder trying to impress you with stories about their glory days. At least until they realized who your father was, at which point they would inevitably begin treating you like some extension of him rather than an accomplished lawyer in your own right.

The more you think about it, the worse it becomes.

Unfortunately, Papa is looking at you with the same hopeful expression he has worn your entire life whenever he wants something from you, and that expression has always been your weakness.

He rarely asks for anything at all so when he does you’re basically a goner.

The sigh that leaves your mouth is long and dramatic enough to make your mother smile.

“Okay. Fine… I’ll go.”

The relief that floods your father’s face is so genuine that it almost makes the sacrifice feel worthwhile. Almost.

You hold up a finger before he can thank you.

“But I expect to buy a beautiful new dress on your dime.”

His grin arrives instantly. He doesn’t seem remotely surprised or concerned about the expense.

“Done.”

You narrow your eyes suspiciously. That agreement had come far too quickly.

Your father only looks more pleased with himself, leaning back into the sofa with the satisfied expression of a man who had anticipated every step of the negotiation before it even began.

And perhaps he had.

After all, his daughter might be a lawyer and a professional negotiator, but he had spent twenty-eight years studying her habits, weaknesses, and bargaining tactics.

In many ways, he was the only person in the world who negotiated with you better than you negotiated with everyone else.

------

The following evening, a sleek black town car waits outside your apartment building, its polished exterior reflecting the golden glow of the streetlights as the driver stands patiently beside it. The entire scene feels unnecessarily dramatic, which is exactly what you would expect from an event connected to football. Somewhere along the way, the sport had apparently decided that everything needed to feel larger than life.

The chauffeur moves toward the rear door the moment you emerge from the building, but he barely has time to reach for the handle before the opposite door swings open.

Your father steps out. You can’t help smiling.

For all the wealth and status and prestige that surround him, he has never quite mastered the art of letting other people do things for him.

His face brightens when he sees you and for a moment, he just stares.

The expression is familiar. It’s the same expression he wore at your university graduation. The same expression he wore when you passed the bar exam. The same expression he wore whenever you accomplished something that made him proud.

Only tonight you’re fairly certain he’s just admiring his beautiful daughter.

The black gown hugs your frame perfectly before flowing elegantly toward the floor, simple enough to be sophisticated and expensive enough to make your father wince slightly when the credit card bill eventually arrives.

“You look stunning, darling.”

A warmth spreads through your chest despite yourself.

“Gràcies, Papa.”

You step closer, reaching up automatically to straighten his bow tie. It has shifted slightly to the left, something no one else in the world would probably notice. Your father remains perfectly still while you adjust it, smiling softly the entire time.

“There,” you murmur. “Now you look presentable.”

He laughs. “Thank you for coming.”

The words are simple, but there is a sincerity behind them that softens whatever complaints you had prepared.

“I really am happy you’ll be by my side tonight.”

"Me too." You squeeze his arm affectionately. “And when you inevitably get kidnapped by hundreds of middle-aged fanboys who want to tell you where they were when Barça won some trophy fifteen years ago, you can find me at the open bar.”

His laughter echoes across the quiet street. The look he gives you says he knows you’re absolutely right.

Unfortunately, you are.

The moment the two of you arrive at the gala and step into the ballroom arm in arm, it feels as though half the room suddenly remembers your father exists.

People begin approaching from every direction almost immediately.

Former players, executives, sponsors, club officials. Men who have apparently spent the last decade waiting for an opportunity to tell your father the exact same stories he has heard three dozen times before.

Hands are shaken. Introductions are made.

Your father proudly introduces you at every opportunity, his arm occasionally settling around your shoulders as though he cannot resist reminding people that you are his golden child. For a few brief moments the conversations remain balanced, the guests politely asking about your work and your life before inevitably gravitating back toward football.

They always gravitate back toward football. Every single time.

You stand there smiling politely while listening to conversations about matches, transfers, tactical systems, club politics, and moments from seasons that happened so long ago they should probably be considered historical events.

The muscles in your face practically ache from resisting the urge to roll your eyes.

Eventually your father catches your expression.

His mouth twitches and a small apologetic grimace flashes across his features as another group begins steering him toward a gathering of board members and club leadership waiting across the room.

You simply gesture toward the bar. He nods in understanding.

You have performed this dance together your entire life. He gets absorbed into football. You escape. Everyone wins.

The bar occupies one corner of the ballroom beneath a cascade of crystal chandeliers, and you settle onto one of the empty stools before ordering a glass of wine. The bartender delivers it moments later and you take a long sip, grateful for both the drink and the temporary solitude.

From your seat, you can observe the entire room.

The gala is fully alive now. Clusters of elegantly dressed guests fill every corner of the space. Women in designer gowns drift between conversations while men in tailored tuxedos cradle glasses of expensive liquor. Laughter rises above the soft music playing in the background. Waiters weave effortlessly through the crowd carrying silver trays piled high with champagne flutes.

The amount of wealth concentrated inside the ballroom is honestly staggering.

You suspect there are enough questionable offshore accounts in attendance tonight to single-handedly support several Mediterranean economies. The thought makes you smirk into your wine.

Unfortunately, your solitude doesn’t last long. It never does.

You notice the older man approaching several seconds before he reaches you.

Expensive watch, expensive suit, and the particular confidence of someone who has spent decades assuming that women will be delighted by his attention.

You suppress a sigh. What exactly about sitting alone at the end of a bar while staring into a glass of wine suggests that you are hoping to be interrupted?

You brace yourself for whatever painfully rehearsed line he is about to deliver.

Thankfully, he never gets the chance.

Another figure appears seemingly out of nowhere, slipping smoothly into the space between the two of you before the man can even open his mouth. The movement is so natural and effortless that it takes you a moment to realize what has happened.

The woman leans casually against the bar beside you, one arm resting lightly on the polished countertop as she lifts a hand to catch the bartender’s attention.

“Sparkling water, please.” Her voice is warm and confident.

Then she glances toward you. “And another…”

The sentence trails off as she gestures politely for you to finish the order yourself.

“White wine,” you tell the bartender. “Please.”

Only then do you risk looking past her shoulder.

The older man has stopped several feet away, apparently receiving the message loud and clear. After a brief moment of hesitation, he turns and heads toward another bar on the opposite side of the ballroom.

Your shoulders relax immediately.

The stranger notices, a faint smile touches her lips.

Moments later, the bartender returns with both drinks. She thanks him before carefully taking your wine glass and handing it to you.

For the first time, you properly look at the woman who has just rescued you. And for the first time all evening, something about the gala becomes interesting.

“Thanks,” you say as your fingers wrap around the stem of the glass.

The woman offers a small shrug, as though stepping in to save complete strangers from uncomfortable conversations is something she does every day.

“No problem. I saw him making a beeline toward you and you didn’t seem particularly interested.”

You let out a quiet laugh at that.

“Yeah,” you admit. “Definitely not.”

Her smile widens slightly, seemingly pleased that her assessment had been accurate. For a moment neither of you says anything, the comfortable silence settling naturally between you as the noise of the gala swells around the bar. Conversations overlap across the ballroom, punctuated by bursts of laughter and the occasional clink of crystal, while somewhere near the stage a photographer calls for attention from a cluster of former players posing together.

The woman lifts her sparkling water in a small gesture of farewell and begins to turn away.

For reasons you can’t entirely explain, you find yourself stopping her.

“I didn’t catch your name.”

She pauses and glances back over her shoulder.

“Alexia.”

Just Alexia. No surname or explanation or attempt whatsoever to clarify who she is.

You find yourself studying her more openly now that you have an excuse to do so. 

She is undeniably beautiful, though not in the polished, manufactured way so many people at events like this seem determined to be. Her beauty feels effortless. 

Her dark hair falls loosely over one shoulder, framing striking hazel eyes that seem to miss absolutely nothing, while the understated elegance of her dress somehow draws more attention than the far more extravagant gowns scattered throughout the ballroom.

There is a quiet confidence about her, the sort that cannot be purchased or practiced in front of a mirror. She carries herself like someone completely comfortable being noticed, yet entirely uninterested in demanding attention.

Perhaps she notices your prolonged inspection or perhaps you’re just less subtle than you think. Because when your eyes meet hers again, there is unmistakable amusement dancing there.

“Alexia no last name?” you ask lightly, attempting to recover some dignity by shifting the attention back onto her.

The knowing smile that follows is immediate. The sort of smile that suggests she understands exactly what game you’re trying to play.

She merely nods.

You can’t stop your own smile from appearing.

“Fair enough.”

Extending your hand, you introduce yourself exactly the same way she had, offering only your first name and nothing else. If she wanted to play mysterious, you were more than capable of meeting her on equal footing.

The look in her eyes brightens instantly. The challenge has been accepted.

When she takes your hand, you’re struck by how confident the gesture feels. Her grip is firm without being aggressive, practiced without feeling rehearsed, and accompanied by steady eye contact that somehow manages to feel both professional and deeply personal at the same time. It reminds you vaguely of networking seminars during law school, where entire lectures had been dedicated to first impressions and the psychology of handshakes.

Yet nothing else about her suggests lawyer.

She carries herself differently, more comfortably and naturally. She is far too sun-kissed to spend every day trapped inside offices, conference rooms, and court buildings. And there is none of the carefully managed tension that seems to plague everyone in your profession. 

Instead, she appears completely at ease within herself, as though she has long since stopped worrying about how others perceive her.

Your curiosity grows.

“So what brings you to the gala?” you ask, hoping to fill in at least some of the increasingly obvious gaps in her story.

Alexia takes a slow sip of her water before answering.

“I’m affiliated with the club.”

The response is so vague that it borders on parody. The smile she gives you is suspiciously innocent.

You stare at her. She stares right back, completely serious. Your head tilts slightly and her smile widens. 

Before you can press for clarification, she smoothly redirects the conversation back toward you.

“And you?”

The challenge is obvious.

You laugh softly despite yourself. “My father is affiliated with the club.”

For the first time, genuine amusement flashes across her face. The corners of her eyes crinkle slightly. Touché.

The conversation continues from there with surprising ease.

What begins as polite small talk somehow stretches into something far more engaging, neither of you appearing particularly interested in discussing the things that should logically dominate a conversation between two strangers at a gala. Instead of careers or accomplishments or the carefully curated biographies that people usually exchange at events like this, the discussion drifts effortlessly toward entirely different subjects, as though both of you have silently agreed that those details can wait.

You compare childhood neighborhoods and debate which corners of Catalonia are still worth visiting before tourists inevitably discover them. You argue over the best cafés in Barcelona, exchange stories about terrible landlords and nightmare neighbors, laugh about absurd encounters with overly entitled strangers, and commiserate over the strange experience of returning to a city that once felt like home only to discover that it has somehow changed while remaining exactly the same.

One topic melts into the next so naturally that you eventually lose track of how the conversation keeps evolving. There are no awkward pauses, no desperate searches for something new to discuss, no moments where either of you scans the room for an escape route. Every answer seems to create three new questions, every story sparks another memory, and before long the noise of the gala has faded into little more than background static.

At some point you find yourself telling her about growing up in Barcelona before moving away, about how strange it felt watching your childhood disappear through the rear window of a moving car while every adult around you insisted that the next city would be an exciting adventure. You tell her about Germany and the endless struggle of learning a language that always seemed to have twice as many rules as necessary, about England and its relentless grey skies that somehow managed to make even summer feel overcast, and about the peculiar loneliness that comes from constantly arriving somewhere new only to know that eventually you’ll be expected to leave again.

Most people hear stories like that and immediately begin searching for opportunities to tell stories of their own. They wait just long enough for you to finish speaking before redirecting the conversation back toward themselves, eager to compare experiences or share an anecdote that proves they understand exactly how you feel.

Alexia doesn’t. Instead, she listens. Actually listens.

Her attention never seems to wander despite the chaos unfolding around you. She doesn’t glance over your shoulder searching for someone more important. She doesn’t check her phone. She doesn’t interrupt with stories designed to redirect the spotlight back onto herself. She just watches you with genuine interest, occasionally asking a question that reveals she has been paying far closer attention than most people ever do. 

It is unexpectedly disarming.

You have always been a gifted storyteller. Long before law school taught you how to construct arguments and command a room, you possessed an instinctive understanding of narrative, timing, and audience. You know how to hold someone’s attention. You know how to make people laugh at exactly the right moment. You know how to guide a conversation wherever you want it to go and leave people feeling as though they arrived there naturally.

Yet with Alexia, you find yourself becoming unusually aware of that instinct.

You’re not even consciously trying to impress her, if anything, the realization sneaks up on you slowly. Somewhere between discussing childhood memories and trading stories about cities that never quite felt like home, you discover that you care whether she finds your stories interesting. You care whether she laughs. You care whether that attentive look remains in her eyes.

Every time her expression softens with interest, you find yourself elaborating slightly more than necessary. Every time she laughs, warmth spreads through your chest with surprising ease. Every thoughtful question encourages another story, another memory, another piece of yourself that you wouldn’t normally volunteer to someone you’ve known for less than an hour. 

Gradually the rest of the gala begins to fade into the background.

The donors and executives become little more than moving shapes beyond the bar. Conversations that had once seemed annoyingly loud blur into an indistinct hum. Bursts of laughter rise and fall somewhere across the ballroom without ever fully registering. Even Papa, who had been the entire reason for your attendance tonight, slips from your thoughts entirely as the world narrows down to the space occupied by two bar stools and a woman with hazel eyes.

For nearly an hour, the woman who introduced herself only as Alexia somehow becomes the most interesting person in a room filled with football legends, celebrities, politicians, and people wealthy enough to purchase entire islands if the mood ever struck them.

And judging by the way she continues looking at you, as though every story is worth hearing and every answer only creates a dozen new questions, you begin to suspect she is finding you equally difficult to walk away from.

The announcement comes far too soon.

A man’s voice echoes through the ballroom speakers, warm and polished in the way that only people who spend their lives hosting charity galas seem capable of sounding, thanking everyone for their generosity before informing the room that dinner would be served shortly and asking guests to begin finding their assigned tables.

Around you, conversations begin dissolving. Clusters of people separate with reluctant smiles and promises to continue discussions later, while waiters appear as if summoned from nowhere and begin directing guests toward the dining area.

Beside you, Alexia huffs softly in irritation. The sound pulls a smile from you because it mirrors your own disappointment almost perfectly.

You hadn’t realized how much time had passed until now. Somewhere between discussing childhood friends and comparing favorite vacation destinations, an hour had disappeared without either of you seeming to notice.

Apparently neither of you had wanted the conversation to end.

Alexia rises from her stool with obvious reluctance, smoothing a hand along her dress as she glances toward the dining area where guests are already beginning to find their seats. For a moment she just stands there, as though considering whether there might be some socially acceptable way to ignore the announcement altogether and remain exactly where she is.

Then her eyes find yours again and without a word, she extends her hand. 

The gesture is simple and effortless. Yet something about it makes your stomach do an embarrassing little flip.

You are perfectly capable of standing on your own. In fact, you have spent most of your life being fiercely independent, stubbornly refusing help even when you probably should have accepted it. Yet the offered hand feels less like assistance and more like an invitation, and you find yourself taking it before you’ve fully thought through why.

Her fingers close around yours warmly.

The contact is brief, lasting only long enough for her to help you from the stool despite the fact that neither of you actually needed the assistance, yet you become acutely aware of it anyway. The softness of her hand. The quiet confidence in the gesture. The way her thumb brushes lightly against your knuckles as she releases you.

By the time your feet are firmly beneath you, the moment has already passed. Still, the sensation lingers.

You hesitate for a second, caught between caution and curiosity, between the instinct to protect yourself and the increasingly powerful desire to see where this might lead. Normally you would overthink it and spend ten minutes analyzing every possible outcome before saying anything at all.

Instead, before your better judgment can intervene, you decide that being brave for once might actually be worth it.

“Come find me after the auction?”

The question leaves your mouth before you have the opportunity to reconsider it.

For the briefest moment, uncertainty flickers through you. Maybe she was simply being polite. Maybe she had enjoyed the conversation in the pleasant, fleeting way people often enjoy conversations at events like this, with no expectation of ever continuing them. Maybe you had mistaken friendliness for interest, curiosity for chemistry. Maybe the easy rhythm that had developed between the two of you existed only in your imagination.

The doubts barely have time to form before Alexia’s face brightens. The reaction is so immediate and so genuine that it erases every one of them at once.

“Yes,” she says, the answer arriving almost before you’ve finished speaking, as though there was never any possibility of a different response. “I’d like that.”

Something warm unfurls inside your chest.

It is an embarrassingly satisfying reaction, made worse by the fact that you cannot seem to stop the smile spreading across your face. For someone who prides herself on being composed, on remaining rational and measured and entirely unaffected by attractive strangers, you are suddenly doing a remarkably poor job.

Alexia notices. The amused softness that settles into her expression suggests she is having far too much fun watching you try and fail to appear unaffected.

Still smiling, you give her hand one final squeeze before finally letting go.

For a few lingering seconds, the two of you remain exactly where you are, standing beside the bar as though neither is particularly eager to be the first one to leave.

Eventually reality reasserts itself. Dinner, tables, responsibilities. The endless procession of speeches and fundraising and networking that accompanies every event of this kind. The evening begins pulling you in opposite directions, demanding your attention whether you are ready to give it or not.

Reluctantly, the two of you separate.

You take several steps toward the dining area before glancing back over your shoulder.

Alexia is already looking. The discovery sends an entirely unreasonable amount of satisfaction rushing through you. 

For a brief moment your eyes meet across the growing crowd, both of you caught in the act, and neither bothering to pretend otherwise. Then she laughs softly and shakes her head before turning toward her own table.

You continue walking with a smile that refuses to leave your face.

The ballroom has transformed while you were distracted. The lights have been dimmed slightly, softening the vast room into something warmer and more intimate, while the enormous chandeliers overhead cast everything in a golden glow that reflects off crystal glasses and polished silverware. Elaborate floral arrangements sit at the center of every table, their carefully arranged blooms competing for attention with the designer gowns, tailored tuxedos, and enough expensive jewelry to fund a small nation. Around you, VIPs, politicians, former players, sponsors, and donors settle into their seats, conversations gradually quieting as the evening shifts from cocktails and mingling into the more formal portion of the program.

Your own table appears to contain precisely the sort of people you had spent the first half of the evening trying to avoid.

The executives are already deep into discussions about sponsorship agreements and broadcasting rights. A politician whose face you vaguely recognize from television is attempting to charm everyone within earshot. Two former directors are comparing stories from decades ago as though they personally built the club brick by brick.

You slide into the empty seat beside your father, offering the polite smile expected of you before settling comfortably into your chair.

As soon as you settle in, your father leans slightly in your direction.

“Having a nice time?”

The question itself is perfectly innocent, his expression, unfortunately, is not.

You know that look. The faint curve threatening at the corner of his mouth. The glimmer of amusement dancing behind his eyes. The unmistakable expression of a man who has noticed something and is enjoying the fact that you haven’t caught up yet.

Your own eyes narrow instantly.

“Yes,” you answer honestly, because there is little point pretending otherwise. “It’s actually been better than I expected.”

The smile grows enough to send alarm bells ringing somewhere deep inside your head.

“I thought you always said no footballers.”

You blink. “What?”

The single word leaves your mouth before you can stop it.

For a moment your father appears as though he might elaborate. His smile widens further, clearly delighted by your confusion, and you can practically see the response forming behind his eyes.

Unfortunately, before he can say another word, the foundation president steps onto the stage.

The ballroom gradually falls silent - conversations fade and heads turn. Attention shifts toward the podium as the evening’s official program begins. Your father is forced to abandon whatever explanation he had been preparing and straighten in his chair, his focus returning to the stage.

The moment passes, at least for him. For you, however, the damage has already been done.

You barely hear a single word of the speech. The president could be announcing the discovery of extraterrestrial life and you aren’t entirely sure you would notice, your brain is too busy replaying that sentence.

For as long as you can remember, those two words had been one of the few constants in your life.

No footballers.

The rule had first emerged when you were a teenager, born out of years spent watching football dictate nearly every aspect of your family’s existence. You remembered crying to your mother after another school performance where your father’s seat remained empty despite his best intentions. You remembered holidays interrupted by transfer negotiations and urgent phone calls. You remembered constantly packing boxes and saying goodbye to friends because football had decided your family belonged in a different country. You remembered loving your father fiercely while simultaneously resenting the profession that always seemed to claim the largest share of him, no matter how desperately he tried to shield you from that reality.

Football had given him everything. Football had taken a great deal too. And somewhere amidst all those years of airports, moving vans, and missed moments, a rule had quietly taken shape.

No footballers.

The rule had only strengthened with age. 

When friends attempted to set you up with players, the answer had been no. When athletes approached you in bars and restaurants, the answer had been no. When people insisted you were being unfair, that you might be surprised if you actually gave one a chance, the answer had remained exactly what it had always been: no.

The specifics had never mattered - tall or short, blonde or brunette, funny or serious. None of it had ever been relevant.

The only requirement had always been painfully simple.

No footballers.

Which was precisely why your father’s comment now felt so suspicious. Because it hadn’t been random. Your father never said things randomly.

Not after decades spent navigating dressing rooms filled with enormous personalities, boardrooms filled with competing agendas, and press conferences where every word was analyzed from a dozen different angles. He observed everything. He noticed everything. Entire careers had been built on underestimating how much information he absorbed simply by paying attention.

If he had said it, there was a reason.

Slowly, your eyes drift across the ballroom. Toward the tables positioned near the stage. Toward the section where Alexia had disappeared after leaving the bar.

The realization begins forming before you consciously reach it.

Too tan to be a lawyer. Too young to be an executive. Far too comfortable in this environment to just be some donor or guest.

You had spent the better part of an hour trying to place her without ever quite succeeding. At various points you had convinced yourself she might be a doctor, something about her attentiveness and the way she listened fitting neatly into that image. Other times you had wondered if she was an entrepreneur, a foundation director, or perhaps someone involved with one of the club’s charitable projects. Her calm confidence, thoughtful questions, and complete lack of pretension had pointed your imagination in a hundred different directions.

Just not the correct one.

Because of course the answer had been staring you directly in the face the entire time. This was a Barça gala. A Barça foundation event. A room filled almost exclusively with people connected to football in one way or another.

Your stomach drops. The feeling is immediate and absolute.

Oh. Oh, shit.

Across the room, Alexia laughs at something someone says beside her, her head tilting back slightly as the warm light catches the features you had spent the last hour trying not to admire too openly.

And suddenly everything clicks into place.

The woman who had rescued you at the bar. The woman who had somehow made this entire evening enjoyable. The woman you had been looking forward to seeing again after dinner. Had to be a footballer.

The realization makes you close your eyes briefly and resist the urge to bang your forehead against the table.

Because after twenty-eight years of maintaining exactly one dating rule, after a lifetime spent insisting that footballers were categorically off limits, the first person to genuinely capture your attention in over a year had turned out to be the one thing you had always sworn you would never touch.

And the truly infuriating part was that the knowledge changed absolutely nothing about how excited you still were to see her again after the auction.

The eruption of applause around the ballroom drags your attention back to the present before you can disappear completely into your own thoughts.

You blink and straighten slightly in your chair as your father rises beside you, earning another standing ovation simply for existing. 

The reaction is almost comical at this point. Years have passed since he last stood on the touchline at Camp Nou, decades since he wore the club’s colors professionally, yet the affection people feel toward him remains almost untouched by time. Executives applaud enthusiastically. Former players beam at him from neighboring tables. Wealthy donors who probably couldn’t explain a single tactical system clap like devoted disciples greeting a prophet.

Your father, meanwhile, looks mildly embarrassed by all of it.

The sight makes you smile despite yourself as he buttons his jacket and begins making his way toward the stage. For all the attention football has forced upon him throughout his life, he has never quite become comfortable being the center of it. The trophies and documentaries and statues and endless praise have somehow failed to cure him of the instinctive discomfort that always appears whenever people celebrate him too loudly.

As he climbs the steps toward the podium, your attention begins drifting around the room again. Toward the hundreds of guests seated beneath glittering chandeliers. Toward a woman whose charming smile has managed to completely derail your evening.

Your father reaches the microphone and immediately attempts to begin speaking over the applause.

“Thank you. Thank you.”

Eventually the room settles enough for him to continue.

“I’m so honored to be invited to speak tonight and to be welcomed back with such open arms. This truly is the club of my life, and I know I strayed away for a little while.”

Laughter ripples throughout the ballroom at the understatement. Even your father smiles.

“But Barça always has been and always will be my home. No matter where football took me, no matter what challenges came next, this club and the people connected to it remained part of who I am. I owe so much to everyone in this room, and I owe even more to the supporters who believed in me long before I deserved it.”

The applause returns briefly before fading once more.

You have heard variations of this speech your entire life. Different clubs, different trophies, different cities. Yet the sincerity always remains the same.

Your father was never particularly good at pretending to care about things he didn’t actually care about, which is probably why people trusted him so much. When he spoke about football, about family, about loyalty, there was never any doubt that he meant every word.

His gaze sweeps across the ballroom before eventually landing on your table.

Instantly, a familiar feeling of dread settles into your stomach. You’ve known that look since childhood. The look that always appears right before he embarrasses you in public.

“And I cannot thank you enough for everything you’ve done for me and for my family. My beautiful wife unfortunately couldn’t be here tonight because of a prior commitment.”

A chorus of sympathetic murmurs rises from the crowd.

“But thankfully my wonderful daughter agreed to accompany me.”

There it is. You close your eyes briefly. The smile in his voice is practically audible now.

“You all know I’d be completely lost without her.”

The spotlight finds you immediately and the entire ballroom seems to turn as one. Hundreds of faces. Hundreds of eyes. Hundreds of people looking directly at you.

Years of practice save you and the panic never reaches your expression.

Instead, you straighten your shoulders, lift your chin slightly, and produce the polished smile that has been perfected through decades of public appearances, family photographs, charity events, and championship celebrations.

The crowd reacts exactly as expected. Applause breaks out throughout the room. Several people whistle. A few call your name.

The beloved daughter of their beloved manager.

You smile graciously while internally considering whether it is possible to legally disown a parent at twenty-eight.

Eventually the spotlight drifts away.

The sudden darkness leaves dancing spots across your vision and you blink repeatedly, waiting for your eyes to adjust while your father continues speaking somewhere above you. The words barely register. Something about community. Something about the foundation. Something about giving back.

Your attention is elsewhere.

As the dark spots finally begin fading, your gaze drifts instinctively across the room and immediately collides with Alexia’s. For a moment neither of you looks away.

The expression on her face is almost enough to make you laugh. 

It's shock - pure, unmistakable shock.

The easy confidence that had defined every second of your conversation disappears completely as her gaze flickers from you to the man standing at the podium and then back again, her brows drawing together as she tries to process what she’s seeing. You can practically watch the pieces falling into place in real time. 

The woman she’d spent the last hour talking to wasn’t simply attending with someone connected to the club. She was attending with the greatest manager to ever live. Who just so happened to be her father.

The realization unfolds across her features one detail at a time. First recognition, then disbelief, then understanding.

Suddenly every vague answer you’d given her begins snapping into focus. Every time you’d referred to your father as merely “affiliated with the club.” Every carefully sidestepped question. Every missing detail and intentionally incomplete explanation that had seemed amusing at the time.

You can almost hear the conversation replaying in her head as she reconstructs it with this new information.

And then, rather uncomfortably, you realize you’re doing exactly the same thing.

Because if she hadn’t recognized you, it means she hadn’t known who your father was when you were sitting together at the bar. Which means she hadn’t approached you because of him or stayed because of him or spent nearly an hour laughing at your stories because of him.

The realization sends unexpected butterflies through your gut.

Unfortunately, it also forces another realization to the surface. One that is significantly less comforting.

Because now that Alexia knows exactly who your father is, there is no longer any plausible explanation for how comfortably she had navigated this room, how effortlessly she had moved through a gala filled with football royalty, or why your father had immediately known who she was without needing an introduction.

Slowly, painfully, the final pieces click into place.

The confidence. The athletic build hidden beneath the elegant dress. The non-answers to your probing questions. The fact that she had introduced herself as simply Alexia and somehow expected that to be enough.

At the time, you had assumed it was part of the game the two of you were playing. A harmless attempt at mystery. A way of teasing each other while carefully avoiding the details that usually dominate conversations between strangers.

Now you realize it was something else entirely. Because even in a room like this, she didn’t need a surname. Everyone already knew it.

Your stomach drops.

The woman who had spent the last hour completely captivating you isn’t some reserve player or academy coach or random club employee.

She is important.

The kind of important that transcends introductions. The kind of important that allows a person to identify themselves with a single name and expect recognition. The kind of footballer whose face appears on billboards, whose jersey hangs in children’s bedrooms, whose name is spoken with familiarity by people who have never met her.

And judging by the slow, increasingly amused smile beginning to spread across her face from across the ballroom, she has reached exactly the same conclusion about you.

The two of you had spent an entire hour carefully concealing your identities from one another while unknowingly discussing everything except the one thing that connected you both.

Now, across a crowded ballroom filled with some of the most influential people in European football, you watch recognition fully settle into her beautiful hazel eyes.

And the worst part is that, instead of making her any less interesting, it somehow makes her even more so.

------

love, as far as you’re concerned, is mostly an administrative error.

that’s what you tell mapi one afternoon after training when she’s halfway through describing a tiktok she saw about soulmates.

“that’s the saddest thing you’ve ever said.”

you shrug. “i’ve said sadder.”

“no, i don’t think you have.”

“i once told jonatan that pineapple belongs on pizza.”

“that’s not sad. that’s criminal.”

you grin and lean back in your chair.

around you, the cafeteria buzzes with conversation. players drift in and out, grabbing food, arguing over music, complaining about training. normal things.

comfortable things. things that make sense.

love doesn’t. at least not to you.

you’ve never understood why people willingly make themselves vulnerable like that.

why they hand another person the ability to ruin their week, their month, their entire life.

it sounds exhausting.

you’ve had relationships before, technically. a few. none of them lasted.

mostly because eventually the other person wanted something more and you couldn’t understand why.

why wasn’t having fun enough?

why did everything have to become serious?

why did everyone act like love was some unavoidable force of nature instead of a choice people kept making over and over again?

you never got it. still don’t.

which is why the entire team has decided you’re emotionally defective.

“one day,” aitana says as she drops into the chair beside you, “someone is going to make you eat all these words.”

“unlikely.”

“you said that last time.”

“because it’s still true.”

across the table, mapi points at you dramatically.

“see? this is what i’m talking about.”

“you’re always talking about me.”

“because you’re fascinating.”

“i’m not.”

“you treat relationships like tax forms.”

“thank you.”

“that wasn’t a compliment.”

you open your mouth to respond when another voice cuts through the conversation.

“what’s happening now?”

you glance up.

and immediately regret it.

because alexia putellas is standing there.

which means everyone suddenly looks more interested.

more awake. more annoying.

alexia balances a coffee in one hand and studies the table suspiciously.

mapi lights up. “perfect. tell her she’s insane.”

alexia slides into the empty seat opposite you.

“that depends. what’s she done?”

“apparently love is fake.”

you groan. “that isn’t what i said.”

“it’s basically what you said.”

alexia raises an eyebrow.

then looks directly at you.

“love is fake?”

“love is dramatic.”

“same thing?”

“close enough.”

a laugh escapes her.

you hate that laugh.

not because it’s annoying.

because it isn’t.

because it’s warm.

because it always makes you want to hear it again.

which is a problem.

not a serious problem.

just a small one.

the kind you ignore.

alexia shakes her head.

“you’re impossible.”

“i hear that a lot.”

“for good reason.”

“yet here you are.”

“unfortunately.”

you grin.

she rolls her eyes.

and somehow everybody else at the table suddenly looks smug.

which immediately makes you suspicious.

“why are you all looking at us like that?”

“like what?” aitana asks.

“like you’re plotting something.”

“maybe we’re plotting something.”

“don’t.”

“too late.”

you point at alexia.

“control your children.”

“they don’t listen to me.”

“that’s true,” mapi says.

alexia sighs.

you laugh.

the conversation moves on.

eventually training gets discussed.

then travel schedules.

then a movie someone wants everyone to watch.

normal.

easy.

exactly the way you like things.

because reality makes sense.

people don’t.

especially not feelings.

feelings complicate everything.

you’ve spent years making sure your life stays uncomplicated.

and for the most part, it’s worked.

until three days later.

when the communications team asks you to come in after training.

you assume it’s routine.

a social media thing.

a sponsorship obligation.

something boring.

instead, when you walk into the meeting room, alexia is already there.

sitting at the table.

looking just as confused as you feel.

“that’s reassuring,” you say.

she glances up. “what is?”

“you look like you’d rather be anywhere else.”

“i was thinking the same thing about you.”

“good.”

you drop into the chair beside her.

“any idea what’s happening?”

“none.”

“great.”

“great.”

the door opens. and immediately you know this meeting isn’t routine.

because there are too many people. communications. marketing. sponsorship representatives.

everybody looks tense.

which is never a good sign.

you exchange a look with alexia.

she looks equally concerned.

one of the staff members clears her throat.

“thank you both for coming.”

already terrible.

nobody starts good meetings like that.

the presentation begins.

and somehow it only gets worse.

there’s a recent sponsorship campaign.

public engagement numbers. social media trends. fan demographics. media attention.

you stop listening after five minutes.

mostly because none of this seems relevant to you.

until it suddenly is.

“we’ve noticed,” someone says carefully, “that fan engagement surrounding interactions between the two of you is significantly higher than average.”

you blink.

alexia blinks.

silence.

then:

“what?”

the staff member clicks to another slide.

your face appears on the screen.

alexia’s face appears beside it.

you immediately hate where this is going.

“there’s been a growing amount of speculation online.”

“about what?” alexia asks.

nobody answers immediately. which is answer enough.

you lean back in your chair. “absolutely not.”

the room somehow becomes even more uncomfortable.

“we’re not suggesting anything inappropriate- ”

“you absolutely are.”

“hear us out.”

“i don’t want to.”

alexia covers her mouth.

trying- and failing- not to laugh.

you point at her. “don’t encourage them.”

“i’m trying not to.”

“try harder.”

she looks away. still smiling.

traitor.

another person jumps in. “we believe there’s an opportunity here.”

those words are never followed by anything good. ever. you’ve learned that.

“an opportunity.”

“yes.”

“for what.”

nobody wants to say it. which makes it worse.

finally:

“a temporary public relationship.”

you stare.

alexia stares.

the room waits. then you laugh.

a full laugh.

because that’s ridiculous. completely ridiculous. nobody joins in.

your smile slowly disappears.

“oh, you’re serious.”

they are. unfortunately. very serious.

the explanation continues.

something about public perception. something about sponsorship visibility. something about positive media attention.

you tune most of it out. why? because the proposal itself is insane.

fake dating?

seriously?

you’re surrounded by professional athletes at a legendary club and somehow this is the best idea anyone produced to get ratings?

incredible.

eventually the room falls quiet. everyone waiting for a response.

alexia looks at you.

you look at alexia.

then back at the staff.

“this is stupid.”

“it would only be temporary.”

“still stupid.”

“there are benefits.”

“for who?”

“everyone.”

“that sounds fake.”

alexia snorts.

the staff member sighs. “we understand it’s unconventional.”

“that’s one word for it.”

“we’re simply asking you to consider it.”

you should say no. immediately. a normal person would. a smart person definitely would.

except the more they explain it, the more you realise something.

it’s actually… practical.

you don’t have to be in love. you don’t even have to change much. people already think whatever they want. all you’d really be doing is giving them a story. a controlled one.

temporary. simple.

you hate that it makes sense. because as much as it doesnt, it does.

alexia is still listening carefully. thinking.

which means she’s considering it too. which means the thought of the two of you dating doesnt completely repulse her.

finally someone asks the question. “would either of you be open to it?”

the room waits.

alexia looks thoughtful.

you don’t.

because you’ve already made your decision.

“okay.”

the word leaves your mouth before anybody expects it. including you. the entire room freezes.

alexia turns toward you.

“okay?”

you shrug. “why not?”

“that’s your response?”

“seems easy enough.”

alexia looks genuinely surprised. which offends you slightly.

“what?”

“i thought you’d say no.”

“why?”

she laughs, actually laughs. “have you met yourself?”

fair. still.

you lean back in your chair.

“it’s temporary.”

“yes.”

“it’s practical.”

“yes.”

“nobody actually has to catch feelings.”

the marketing team looks relieved. alexia just keeps staring at you. like she’s trying to solve a puzzle. eventually she shakes her head, a small smile appearing. “okay.”

now it’s your turn to be surprised.

“okay?”

“why not?”

you narrow your eyes.

“don’t copy me.”

“i’m not.”

“you literally are.”

“maybe.”

the meeting ends shortly afterwards.

details can wait. contracts can wait. everything can wait.

except apparently the fact that you’ve just agreed to fake date alexia putellas.

which feels absurd. your career is established, and neither of you have any desire to become anymore famous than you already are. but still.

you and her walk out together. the hallway is quiet.

for a few seconds neither of you says anything.

then:

“well.”

“well.”

she laughs again.

there it is. that stupid laugh.

“this is going to be interesting.”

“that’s one word for it.”

“having second thoughts?”

“no.” you answer too quickly.

her smile widens. “confident.”

“always.”

“liar.”

“rude.”

you reach the end of the corridor.

both slowing automatically.

neither seeming particularly eager to leave yet.

which is strange.

alexia glances at you.

“so we’re really doing this.”

“looks that way.”

“you know everyone is going to be unbearable.”

“mapi is going to make my life hell.”

“she’s going to make both our lives hell.”

“good point.”

another silence. comfortable somehow. easy.

then alexia extends her hand. “partners?”

you stare at it. then at her. “that sounds suspiciously romantic.”

“i meant professionally.”

“sure.”

“you’re impossible.”

“that’s what everyone says.”

she rolls her eyes.

still smiling.

and keeps her hand extended.

waiting. eventually you take it. just a handshake. nothing complicated. nothing important. the kind people do every day. except neither of you lets go immediately.

just a second longer than necessary. maybe two. long enough to notice. long enough for something strange to flicker through your chest.

gone before you can identify it.

alexia seems to notice too. because her expression shifts briefly. something unreadable. then she’s stepping back. the moment disappearing.

“see you tomorrow.”

“yeah.”

she starts walking away.

you watch her go. then immediately regret watching her go. because that’s weird. 

and you’re not weird. you’re practical. logical. grounded.

you have a tight grip on reality. and reality says this is just an arrangement. temporary. simple.

nothing more.

you tell yourself that all the way home.

for some reason, it doesn’t sound quite as convincing as it used to.

——

the first problem is that nobody tells you how couples are supposed to act.

which becomes painfully obvious approximately twelve minutes into your first sponsorship photoshoot.

“closer.” the photographer barely looks up from his camera.

you and alexia exchange a glance. you’re already standing shoulder to shoulder.

“we are close.”

“closer.”

“any closer and i’ll be inside her skin.”

“perfect.”

“that was a joke.”

“closer.”

alexia bites back a laugh. traitor.

you sigh dramatically and shuffle a few inches toward her.

immediately the photographer shakes his head.

“still too stiff.”

“i’m literally standing here.”

“look like you want to be standing there.”

you stare. alexia stares. the photographer waits.

finally alexia leans toward you slightly.

“just pretend.”

you look at her.

“that’s what we’re doing.”

“pretend harder, amor.”

you hate that she’s funny.

you hate it even more because she’s trying not to smile.

the photographer brightens immediately.

“yes. exactly that.”

“what?”

“whatever you just did.”

you look away from alexia.

the camera flashes.

again.

again.

again.

for the next hour you’re forced into increasingly ridiculous situations.

sitting together. walking together. laughing together. looking at each other.

the last one is somehow the worst.

“eyes on each other.”

you and alexia obey.

the camera clicks.

except now you’re just staring at her.

which feels strange. not bad.

just strange.

because people don’t usually look at each other this long. not without a reason.

alexia’s eyes narrow slightly. “what?”

“nothing.”

“you’re staring.”

“you’re staring too.”

“because i’m supposed to.”

“same.”

another camera flash. the photographer looks delighted. you look away first. which annoys you. because you’re not entirely sure why.

—

the second problem appears a week later. interviews. you hate interviews. alexia tolerates them.

which means she gets to watch you suffer.

“you’re enjoying this.”

the interviewer is busy setting up equipment.

alexia doesn’t even try denying it. “a little.”

“rude.”

“you make funny faces.”

“those are my normal faces.”

“that’s concerning.”

you open your mouth to respond when the interviewer suddenly sits down. smiling. far too enthusiastically. “thank you both for being here.”

immediately suspicious. the interview starts normally. football, training, the season.

all safe. all boring.

then- 

“and how is the relationship going?”

there it is. you knew it was coming. alexia knew it was coming.

still.

hearing it out loud feels weird. you glance at her. she glances at you.

for half a second neither answers.

then alexia speaks- smoothly, effortlessly.

“it’s good.”

liar. professional liar. the interviewer beams.

“what’s your favourite thing about her?”

you nearly choke. alexia nearly laughs. the interviewer waits. apparently serious. unbelievable.

alexia turns toward you. and now she’s definitely trying not to smile. “this should be interesting.”

“don’t.”

“i haven’t said anything.”

“yet.”

the interviewer gestures encouragingly. alexia thinks for a second. then shrugs.

“she’s honest.”

you blink.

that wasn’t what you expected.

“honest?”

“painfully.”

“that’s not a compliment.”

“i think it is.”

“you would.”

the interviewer looks thrilled.

like he’s witnessing something adorable. which is unfortunate. because the next question comes immediately. “and what about you?”

you point at yourself. “me?”

“yes.”

“why?”

alexia starts laughing. the interviewer looks confused. you groan. “fine.”

you glance sideways at her. expecting something sarcastic to come easily.

instead your mind goes completely blank. which is ridiculous. you know alexia. you’ve been knowing alexia.

everybody knows alexia. she’s one of the most recognizable athletes on the planet. why are you struggling?

“well?” the interviewer prompts.

you sigh. “she cares.”

alexia looks at you.

the room suddenly feels warmer.

“cares?” the interviewer asks.

“about everything.” you shrug, trying to sound casual.

“football. people. random things nobody else notices.”

silence. alexia is still looking at you. you immediately regret saying it. because it sounds genuine. which is dangerous. the interviewer practically glows.

“that’s sweet.” 

you hate that word. “sweet is a strong description.”

“i thought it was nice.” alexia’s voice is quiet.

you glance at her. she’s smiling. a small one. different somehow. your stomach does something strange. you ignore it.

—

the third problem arrives through the team. specifically mapi. because of course it does.

“you held hands.”

you don’t even look up from your locker. “okay.”

“for seven minutes- your own personal seven minutes in heaven.”

“mentira.” you mutter under your breath.

“five.”

“still not true.”

“four and a half.”

“why are you timing us?”

“because i’m a scientist.”

“you’re many things.”

“thank you.”

you stare. she grins. insufferable. across the room, patri sighs.

“please stop encouraging her.”

“never.”

mapi immediately points toward the doorway.

“look.”

you don’t.

because that’s a trap.

“look.”

“no.”

“look.”

you finally give in.

and immediately regret it.

because alexia just walked in.

and mapi’s smile becomes dangerous. “there she is.”

“you’re weird.”

“you’re in love.”

“i’m literally not.”

alexia arrives beside the lockers, raising an eyebrow. “what happened?”

“nothing.” mapi responds with a grin.

“they’re bullying me.”

“we’re helping you.”

“by lying?”

“by opening your eyes.”

you close your locker. hard. “goodbye.”

mapi laughs. alexia looks confused. you keep walking.

—

the problem is that spending time being falsely romantically involved with alexia is supposed to feel like work.

that’s the entire point. it’s an arrangement. a role. a performance. instead it starts becoming normal. easy.

you don’t notice it happening at first. that’s probably why it’s dangerous. it starts with small things.

alexia learning your coffee order.

alexia saving you a seat before meetings.

alexia texting when flights get delayed.

nothing important. nothing unusual. except eventually you start doing it too. without thinking.

one afternoon you’re walking back from training when your phone buzzes.

alexia: where are you?

you stare at the message. confused.

you: walking.

alexia: obviously.

you: thank you.

alexia: come to physio.

you: why?

alexia: because i’m bored and i want company.

you laugh. actually laugh. alone. in public.

which is embarrassing.

you: that’s not my problem.

three dots appear immediately.

alexia: wow. heartless.

you: correct.

another pause.

then:

alexia: bring snacks.

you shake your head.

still smiling.

which is when you realize you’re already changing direction toward the cafeteria.

before you’ve even consciously decided to.

—

a few days later the team travels for an away match. nothing special, just routine.

except your flight gets delayed.

then delayed again.

then delayed again.

everybody’s annoyed, you included.

the airport lounge is crowded- half the team is asleep and the other half is complaining.

you sit alone scrolling through your phone. enjoying the peace. until someone drops into the seat beside you.

alexia. obviously. “you look miserable.”

“i am miserable.”

“dramatic.”

“we’ve been here for four hours.”

“three.”

“same thing.”

alexia laughs. then opens a packet of crisps, offering them to you automatically.

you take one automatically.

neither of you notices. because somehow this has become normal. she starts talking about something.

you only catch half of it.

mostly because you’re distracted. not by what she’s saying. by how comfortable this feels. when did that happen? when did being around alexia stop requiring effort? when did it become the easiest thing in the world?

the thought lingers longer than it should.

—

your first official public appearance happens two days later. a sponsor event- crowded, bright lights, too many cameras.

exactly your favourite environment. 

which is to say not at all.

“you’ll survive.”

alexia adjusts her jacket, calm as ever.

“unlikely.”

“you’re very brave.”

“thank you.”

“that wasn’t a compliment.”

“everyone keeps saying that.”

she smiles. you hate that smile too. there are too many things about alexia that have become familiar. you don’t like thinking about that. so you don’t. instead you focus on the event- the interviews, the photos, the endless conversations.

eventually someone calls you over for pictures.

you and alexia move automatically, standing side by side.

the photographer lifts her camera. “perfect.”

before you can react, alexia’s arm slides around your waist.

easy, natural, practiced.

you don’t think- you simply lean slightly toward her. the same way you’ve started doing during interviews. during flights. during team dinners.

the camera flashes.

again. again.again.

“great.”

you barely hear her.

because suddenly you’re aware of two things.

one: alexia’s hand is resting against your side.

two: neither of you consciously chose this position. it just happened.

the realization hits harder than it should. the photos end. people move on. the moment passes.

except the thought doesn’t.

because as you’re walking away, you catch a glimpse of one of the photos on a nearby monitor.

you and alexia. smiling. comfortable. happy. like a real couple. and for one brief, dangerous second- you wish it was. the thought vanishes immediately. buried before it can grow. before it can mean anything.

still, the damage is already done. because now you know the thought existed at all.

and that’s far more worrying.

—

at some point, alexia becomes a habit. you don’t notice it happening. that’s the problem. if you’d noticed, maybe you could’ve stopped it. instead it sneaks up on you slowly.

a seat left open beside you in meetings, a text after training, a shared look during team talks.

small things. harmless things. until suddenly they’re not.

“where’s alexia?” the question leaves your mouth before you can stop it.

silence. immediate silence. you look up. half the team is staring at you. mapi looks particularly delighted. which is never a good sign.

“what?” you ask in confusion.

“nothing,” mapi says.

lying- badly.

you narrow your eyes. “don’t.”

“don’t what?”

“whatever you’re about to do.”

“i wasn’t going to do anything.”

“that’s how i know you’re lying.”

aitana snorts into her water bottle. patri actually turns away to hide a smile. traitors, all of them.

you groan. “seriously. where is she?”

mapi clasps her hands dramatically. “look at that.”

“look at what?”

“she misses her girlfriend.”

“i don’t.”

“you literally just asked where she was.”

“because she usually sits there.” you point at the empty chair, immediately regretting it.

because now everyone’s smiling. great, fantastic, wonderful.

“you’ve become predictable,” patri says.

“that’s offensive.”

“it’s true.”

“i’ve never been predictable.”

“you look for her every day.”

you open your mouth. close it. open it again.

nothing comes out. why? because unfortunately she’s right. and that’s annoying. mostly because you hadn’t realized anyone else had noticed.

—

the thing is, alexia really is everywhere. not physically.

just- somehow.

you keep finding her in your routines. she’s there when you arrive at training. there after training. there during meetings. there during recovery sessions. there in your messages. there in your thoughts.

which feels unfair. one afternoon you’re halfway through physio when your phone buzzes.

alexia.

alexia: they put pineapple on my sandwich.

you stare at the message.

then laugh. immediately. without thinking.

the physio looks up. “good news?”

“no.”

you type back.

you: deserved.

alexia: wow. 

alexia: you wound me amor.

alexia: more and more everyday.

you: that’s the goal. 🤷‍♀️

three dots appear.

alexia: breaking up with you.

you roll your eyes.

you: thank god.

another response arrives almost instantly.

alexia: mean.

for some reason, your smile lingers.

which is unfortunate.

because now your physio is looking at you strangely.

“what?”

“nothing.”

“you’re smiling.”

“people smile.”

“not like that.”

you immediately stop. the physio laughs.

you hate everyone.

—

the first genuinely bad training session happens on a thursday. nothing catastrophic, nobody gets injured, nobody screams.

you just can’t do anything right.

every pass is slightly off. every touch feels wrong. every decision comes a second too late.

one of those days. the kind athletes hate. the kind that sits under your skin.

training ends. everyone starts heading inside. you stay. because you don’t feel like talking. don’t feel like pretending you’re fine. the sun is beginning to disappear. the pitch is quieter now.

empty.

you drop onto the grass. staring out toward nothing. trying not to think. it doesn’t work.

obviously.

a few minutes pass.

then: “there you are.”

you don’t need to look up. you’d know that voice anywhere. which is somehow another problem.

alexia walks across the pitch. holding two water bottles.

she offers one. you take it automatically. “thanks.”

“bad day?”

you shrug.

which answers the question.

alexia sits beside you.

close enough that your shoulders nearly touch.

not quite.

just enough.

for a while neither of you says anything.

the silence isn’t awkward.

which is irritating.

because most silences are.

this one isn’t.

eventually alexia takes a drink.

“you’re overthinking.”

you scoff.

“that’s your diagnosis?”

“yes.”

“very scientific.”

“i’m serious.”

you glance at her.

she is.

annoyingly.

“everything looked difficult because you were trying to make it perfect.”

“i wasn’t.”

alexia raises an eyebrow.

you sigh.

“maybe a little.”

“exactly.”

you hate when she’s right. mostly because she’s right often.

“it’s one training session.”

you stare ahead. “i know.”

“then stop acting like the world ended.”

“i’m not.”

“you absolutely are.”

you laugh despite yourself.

alexia smiles- small, soft, but it’s a smile nonetheless.

the kind she doesn’t show reporters. or sponsors. or cameras.

just people she trusts. the thought lands somewhere uncomfortable. you ignore it.

badly.

“you stayed.”

the words leave before you think about them. alexia looks confused. “of course i did.”

of course. she says it like it’s obvious. like there was never another option. something tightens unexpectedly in your chest.

“you didn’t have to.”

“i wanted to.”

simple.

matter-of-fact.

completely genuine.

and suddenly you’re aware of the fact nobody is watching. there are no cameras. no interviews. no obligations.

no reason for her to be here. except she wants to be. the realisation settles heavily.

because that’s different. that’s very different.

you look away first.

the conversation drifts somewhere easier after that.

football, travel, mapi being annoying (justice for mapi)

normal things. safe things.

eventually the stadium lights flicker on overhead. alexia stands. “come on.”

you stay seated. “what?”

“you’re buying dinner.”

“why?”

“because i spent thirty minutes fixing your mood.”

“that’s not how that works.”

“it’s exactly how it works.”

you groan.she grins.

and somehow you’re already getting to your feet.

—

later that night you’re sprawled across your couch.

exhausted.

half watching television. half asleep.

your phone buzzes beside you.

a message from your brother. a photo.

apparently his dog managed to get stuck inside a laundry basket.

you immediately laugh. the dog looks furious. humiliated. personally offended by existence.

you open your messages. without thinking.

your thumb automatically moves toward alexia’s contact.

look at this. that’s what you’re about to type.

the words are practically there already.

look at this.

you stop. completely. the room suddenly feels very quiet. your screen glows in the darkness.

alexia’s conversation sits open. waiting.

you stare. then stare some more.

because what exactly are you doing?

it’s a stupid photo- a random photo.

nothing important. nothing urgent.

yet your first instinct was to send it to her. not mapi. not aitana. not your family.

her.

why?

the question lingers. uncomfortable.

you don’t have an answer. or maybe you do.

maybe that’s the problem.

slowly, you lock your phone. setting it face-down on the coffee table. the apartment feels strangely empty.

you don’t like that thought either. for a few moments you sit there. staring at nothing.

trying to convince yourself this means nothing.

people text their friends. people share things. people get close.

normal.

completely normal.

except something about this doesn’t feel normal.

because alexia isn’t becoming someone you spend time with. she’s becoming the person you want to spend time with. the first person you look for. the first person you think about telling things to. the first person you notice is missing.

and maybe that should worry you more than it does.

your phone buzzes again. you glance down. a new message.

from alexia.

did your mood survive?

a pause.

then another message.

or should i send emergency snacks?

despite everything, you smile.

immediately. helplessly. you hate that. you really do.

because pretending wasn’t supposed to feel this easy. and you’re starting to suspect that’s exactly why it’s dangerous.

⸻