Chapter Text
“Goodness gracious, it looks like Dortmund's team chemistry today is almost abysmal!”
“Another yellow card for Borussia Dortmund. This is their third yellow card, and there's still twenty minutes left to go…”
“Jude Bellingham with the deep pass—Erling Haaland to receive the ball, and—it's intercepted by Bayern! Down the field they go!”
“Looks like it just isn't Dortmund's day today. Let's take a look at the post-game stats…”
The game is brutal, to say the least. They barely edge out a win in overtime over Bayern.
They also play like absolute dogshit, which is a given, really—Erling doesn't know what he was expecting. Playing well after a week like that? They would've needed a miracle to make it work.
The game turns into something more like American football rather than, well, football—the amount of fouls called is so outrageous, they might as well have set a new record for most fouls in a game in program history (which is not an achievement anyone wants on their resume).
Players are tackling each other every 30 seconds, and there's at least 3 yellow cards called for both teams. It's a miracle that no red cards are given out.
The verbal smackdown they receive from Coach in the locker room is almost equally as bad as the game today. Which is saying something, given their lousy excuse of a performance.
It's vaguely worrying when Coach says, “Jude, stay behind for a second. Everyone else, I'll see you tomorrow morning.”
It's also extremely vaguely embarrassing when half of the team looks at him like it's his fault. Which—well, whatever. Fair enough. He's determined to talk to Jude after this anyway, so it doesn't really matter.
They'll return to their regular dynamic soon.
He slings his bag over his shoulder and slips his feet into his slides, heading for the door—only to bump into the very subject of his thoughts.
“My bad,” Erling mutters automatically before actually looking up from the floor. They briefly make eye contact.
Jude looks so… pained.
His eyes are sunken, and there are faint eyebags under his eyes. Not to mention his entire face looks ashen.
Before Erling can say anything, he breaks away his gaze and mumbles out a quiet apology before brushing past him.
It's a complete 180 from the Jude he knows—so expressive, so emotional, so bright.
Now, he looks dulled—hollowed out, even.
Something shatters within Erling—like his whole world has been turned upside down.
This whole time, he had thought that Jude was doing fine. After all, he was the one giving Erling the cold shoulder.
But then again, he rarely ever saw the other man up close except for on the pitch during scrimmages, and they were only for a few brief moments.
And it wasn't as if Erling was entirely without fault; asking Jude about his scent blockers when the team doctor told him specifically that he wanted to keep his scent a secret?
Well, that was certainly one way to put a strain on their friendship.
Screw it, Erling looks down at his hand. Clenches it into a fist.
Waiting isn't an option anymore.
He pulls out his phone and types out a message.
Erling: We need to talk. Now.
The text is seen immediately. A speech bubble pops up.
It disappears after about thirty seconds.
It doesn't pop up again.
It takes everything within him to not scream. Or punch the wall. Maybe both. Both sound like great stress relievers at the moment.
Then—
Coach walks out of the room. He looks at Erling. “Kid, go back to the dorms and get some rest. We're having a conversation in the morning,” then he continues down the hall.
Leaving nothing but a door between Erling and Jude.
There's nobody else around—no staff, no players, no coaches… just them.
A stronger man would steel his resolve and walk away.
A stronger man would have the sense to keep the line between his professional and personal life separate.
Erling is not a stronger man.
So he puts one hand on the door, takes a deep breath, and pushes it open.
He expects to see Jude hunched over the bench on his phone, mulling over a response to his text, maybe. Or staring into space.
What he does not expect, however—is for the suffocatingly sweet scent of fuckin’ cocoa and vanilla with those unique balsamic woody undertones to assault his senses.
It feels like being wrapped in a blanket. A really thick, warm blanket. In summer.
His alpha rejoices. Erling chokes on the sheer volume of the smell.
It smells so fucking sweet. It smells like—like—
Like an omega in heat.
He lets the door slam shut behind him, making Jude flinch. “Jude?” He manages to get out, covering his nose. It barely helps—he can already feel his alpha purring louder and louder, taking over his rational subconscious completely. “What's—shit—happening?”
The other man only whines, curling in on himself. The scent only gets even stronger, making Erling's head spin.
“Jude,” he chokes, coughing. He takes a step closer—then another. It's impossible to stop himself from doing it, like he's a spectator in his own body. “Are you in heat?”
Jude nods, another soft keen escaping his throat. He reaches out for Erling, grasping his shirt and pulling him in with a surprising amount of strength before inhaling deeply.
Erling kind of just stands there, hands at his sides, and… lets him.
Partially because he's just discovered the shocking revelation that his best friend has, in fact, been an omega this entire time—and partially because he doesn't know what he's going to do next if he does let himself touch him.
It's already a tug of war with his own instincts to keep his hands off Jude, and the man in question is certainly not helping.
What follows is something truly straight out of a fever dream.
“Jude,” Erling comes back to reality with the very sobering realization that he is a young, healthy alpha in close-quarters with an omega in heat. Alone. “We need to get you to recovery.”
Jude whines and shakes his head, only pulling him closer. His scent is smothering, turning stiflingly sweet. He smells as if Pandora's box manifested as a scent—all temptingly honeyed with the whispers of something more.
“Jude,” he tries again—which is a pretty feeble attempt, given that he really, really doesn't want to touch the other man. “You aren't in your right mind.”
He gets a soft keen in response.
Ah, fuck it.
He brings his hands up, hovering them above Jude's hips before he braces himself, and touches him.
(Man, he sounds like such a loser.)
As expected, the first brush of Jude's skin on his is electric. Like a shock to the very core of his being, vibrating through his soul. He hauls Jude to his feet by the waist—which ends up being easier than it should be.
“Jude—we can't do this,” he says helplessly when Jude immediately burrows into the crook of his neck, inhaling deeply. “We can't.”
Jude completely ignores him, rubbing their scent glands together like they're mates. Like they're together.
The reality is much more heartbreaking than that.
God, I hope I don't regret this. Erling squeezes his eyes shut and gently, tenderly, wraps his hands around Jude's shoulders and pushes him away. It hurts like ripping his own heart out of his chest, but he does it anyway.
Jude looks up at him, eyes wide with shock and hurt. The pheromones he emits immediately take on a hint of a foul, bitter stench, like the smell of expired vanilla and unripe cocoa. The woody, balmy scent underneath smells more like gasoline rather than wood.
“Wait— no, that's not what—” Erling looks up at the ceiling and takes a breath (it doesn't exactly help).
He needs to remember that this side of Jude is one he's never seen before. Needs to remember that he's treading in completely new territory.
His alpha huffs internally. So… what's wrong with indulging in the other man a little bit? What's wrong with letting go for once?
What would be so bad about letting loose?
Is it really such a terrible thing to give into his own desires?
In hindsight, it’s probably at this very moment that the last shreds of lucidity slip away from him—though that’s a problem for future Erling.
Right?
Just this once, Erling insists to himself, leaning in and burying his nose into Jude's neck, right over his scent glands. As soon as he does so, Jude's entire body relaxes into him, scent returning to its usual sweet notes.
Just… just once won't change anything.
For these few intimate moments, nothing else would matter. It would just be him and Jude.
He would also definitely come to regret this later—but again, a problem for future Erling.
Not present Erling, who takes a breath of genuine fucking heaven.
If the lingering traces of Jude's scent were already enough to drive his alpha (and him) crazy, this was like tasting the ambrosia of the gods for the first time.
It's hot and sticky and so damn delectable.
“Gods,” he growls, grip tightening on the other man's waist. His fingers dig in hard enough to leave bruises (he kind of likes the idea of leaving his mark on Jude for him to trace over with his fingers later, reminding him of their intimacy). “Seductive little minx. You knew what you were doing, didn't you?”
Jude gasps when he grazes his teeth over the gland. All it would take is one bite to bind them together forever.
Just one bite. And he would be mine.
Just one bite.
Erling pauses, then closes his mouth, pressing a soft kiss to the skin instead. When he looks up, Jude gives him a questioning look.
“Not here, kjære,” he takes Jude's hand in his own and raises it to his lips, brushing them against the top of his hand. “Not here.”
Before Jude can reply, the door bursts open.
Erling whirls around, teeth bared and ready to protectwhatishis—
There's a blur of white and grey and he's moving and all of a sudden there's yelling and and someone's grabbing him and he needs to protect his omega and—
Then the pheromone medical spray blasts him right in the face like a bucket of ice water, snapping him back to his senses.
He stands there, shell-shocked, as an entire team of medical staff (all betas or wearing medical-grade blockers, thank god) flood the room. Stands there as they essentially cart Jude off right in front of his eyes and he can't do anything about it because he can't fucking move.
So he watches.
He watches them take the other man away, and lets the reality of what just happened settle deep into his bones like a branding he'll never be able to forget.
It all happens so fast—within mere minutes, he's all alone.
Nobody says a word to him the entire time.
He ends up standing there in the locker room for about four hours before he unfreezes and robotically makes his way back to the dorms. The sun's already setting by the time he steps outside, painting the sky bleeding gold and several shades of oranges and reds.
Many of the guys give him strange looks on the way when he passes by them, probably because he's quite literally drenched in omega-in-heat pheromones, but they don't question him—not after seeing the blank stare on his face.
He's grateful that they know not to bother him, at least. A small mercy amidst the chaos.
When he finally enters his room and flops back into his bed, sinking into the cushions, he immediately passes out for… however long he falls asleep for.
When he wakes, he opens his phone to see one very ominous looking message from Coach:
we'll speak in the morning.
A small part of him feels disappointed that there are no new messages from Jude, even when he knows it's impossible for the other man to message him at this time.
It sucks, not knowing how he's doing. What he's doing. Where he is.
It feels like losing a part of himself he never realized he needed so badly.
(That's a lie. He's always known that he could never be without Jude. There is no Erling without Jude. Like yin and yang, or the sun and the moon, he needs Jude on a primal level that cannot be conveyed through words alone.)
But there's one thing he does know, and it's that the team will probably separate them for an indefinite amount of time, whether under the excuse of their health and safety, or making a full recovery before pairing them together again, or even worse—disrupting team dynamics.
The latter is almost unforgivable.
He doesn't know the exact schematics of dating one's colleague in professional sports, but he can't imagine it'll be much different than the regular workplace.
Well, he probably deserves it anyway.
He pinches the bridge of his nose, sighing heavily. Fuck's sake, he almost bit Jude in a heat-drunk haze. A mating bite, even with modern technology, isn't something that can be so easily undone.
He imagines Jude, looking at him with an expression of betrayal. Imagines him pulling his shirt collar down only to reveal an ugly, unwanted set of markings at the junction between his shoulder and neck.
Imagines him asking Erling where the self-control he prided himself so much on went—asking him why he ever became friends with him in the first place.
Maybe he doesn't deserve to be around Jude after all.
The following week goes along the lines of something straight out of Erling's nightmares.
As much as he prides himself on being unbothered by what others think of him or have to say about him (it's a necessary part of being such a high-profile athlete, really) he feels like the defenses he's built up around himself are slowly crumbling.
Conversations with the guys are strained. The staff look like they're tip-toeing around a minefield while around him.
Whispers of a fight between him and Jude follow him everywhere—they say they don't know the details, but apparently, ‘he entered the locker room a few minutes after Coach left, with Jude being the only one left inside, and now Jude is in the hospital.’
The implications behind that are already bad enough, but most of all—
They're not wrong, which makes things so much worse.
He feels like he's hanging onto sanity by a thin fucking thread, and he can't do anything about it.
“Coach.” Erling greets, kicking a stray ball back onto the field.
“Erling,” he grunts, flipping through a few papers on the clipboard he's currently holding. “We have a lot to talk about, don't you think?”
In other words: you are in big, big trouble, young man.
Erling chuckles nervously, shifting his weight to his left leg. “Ha ha. Yeah. Totally.”
“What is your relationship with Jude?”
Oh. Okay. We're just jumping right into it. “Uh… we're friends?”
“You know that's not what I mean.”
Erling presses his lips together in a thin line. He should've expected the conversation to go in this direction, but it sure doesn't make it any easier to talk about. “...We never got to the point of crossing that line until yesterday.”
Coach nods, seemingly satisfied with his answer. “Great. That makes things a lot easier.” He looks up from his clipboard, staring Erling dead in the eyes. “Let's keep it that way.”
Erling's heart drops straight to his feet. “...What?”
“You heard me. I don't want another fiasco like this happening again. Both of you are too important to the core of the team to break the current harmony we have.”
“Wait—coach, that's not fair, wha—”
“I said what I said. Now get your ass back on the field and focus.”
Erling gets his ass back on the field and tries to focus.
(Keyword: tries. It doesn't work.)
Practice feels like wading through molasses. All he can think about is their conversation, replaying over and over in his head like an endless feedback loop.
This can't be the end. There's simply no way.
Things can't just end like this.
He immediately heads for recovery as soon as training ends, practically sprinting all the way there.
“Doc!” He bursts through the doors, almost falling over himself trying to come to a stop. Cleats on polished wooden floors were a terrible mix, as one could probably tell. “Do you know where Jude is?”
“What happened to, I don't know, ‘hi, hello, how are you?’” She looks up at him, adjusting her glasses. “He's not here, if that's what you're asking about.”
“I'm asking where he is.”
“My patient's whereabouts is considered confidential information.”
“I just need to talk to him. Please.”
The doctor shakes her head. “I'm sorry, kid. I can't lose my job over this. You could try contacting a family member of his, but that's all I can really tell you.”
Ah.
Right. That part.
Jobe is definitely going to have his head, but it would be worth a shot.
It would be his only shot.
“...Thanks, doc,” Erling backtracks in the direction of the door. “Uh, mind keeping this a secret?”
“Yeah, yeah. Get out of here.”
“Great! Thanks.”
His stomach buzzes with an emotion he can’t quite put his finger on after he exits recovery to step outside once more. Nervousness? Excitement? Both?
He pulls out his phone, scrolling through his contacts until he finds Jobe's number.
His finger hovers over the call button, hesitating.
He remembers when Jude first gave him his family's contacts. It had been a gloomy day—practice was cancelled because of the lightning, and Jude was nowhere to be found.
Erling almost called the police in sheer panic before he found the other man sitting on the stairs to the roof, staring out the window.
Jude laughed at his panic-stricken state and told him next time, if he couldn't find him or there was an emergency, to call his family instead.
This counts as an emergency, right? Erling ponders for a moment before shaking his head and letting his thumb press down on the call button.
No harm in trying, at least.
It rings thrice before going through. “Hello?”
“Jobe?”
There's a beat, and a bit of muffled shuffling before the other line responds. “Who's this?”
“It's Erling. Do you—” his voice cracks. “Is Jude there with you right now?”
More muffled rustles. “No.” Then— “Yeah. What do you want?”
He sounds a little more than angry. Just a tad bit. “How is he? Is he okay?” Erling would never forgive himself if anything happened to Jude.
“Yeah, no thanks to you, you little—” there's a pause, then a few hushed whispers Erling can't make out. “Whatever. Yes. He's doing fine. Just had a phantom heat hit him because of stress, according to the medical reports.”
“Thank god,” Erling murmurs, more to himself than anyone else. “Does he remember what happened?”
“Nah. Not really. A few fuzzy bits here and there, but that's it.” He doesn't know whether to be thankful for the fact that Jude doesn't remember that he almost marked him, or disappointed that he can't remember their encounter. “I know you were there, though.”
Erling blinks. “Oh.”
“Yeah. Guess what else I know?” Jobe's voice rises in volume as he continues, the anger evident in his tone, even through the phone. “I know he hasn't been doing well lately. I know he hasn't been eating. Sleeping. It’s pretty fuckin’ obvious when you actually pay attention. You got anything to do with that?”
God, this is such a mess.
Erling pinches the bridge of his nose. “I don't know, Jobe. I don't know why he keeps avoiding me—it's as much of a mystery to me as it is to you. As a matter of fact, I wanted to call you and ask if you knew anything about it.”
He doesn't mean to get annoyed, but a man can only take so much before he begins to either bend or break.
Erling doesn't know which one he'll end up doing.
He hears Jobe let out a sigh on the other line. “Sorry. I'm just worried, y'know? Jude won't say anything about what happened in the past week.”
Something squeezes around Erling's heart painfully. “Can I see him?”
“...Fine. But just know, if this ever happens again, next time I catch you—”
“Thank you, Jobe. Truly,” Erling can't help but smile, “thank you.”
There’s a pause. “Just get over here before I change my mind. I'll send the address.” Before he hangs up, he can faintly hear Jobe grumble about how he can't believe his parents still like Erling.
Honestly, Erling doesn't know either.
But if they’re willing to give him another chance, then best believe that he's going to take it.
The first thing Erling sees when he gets there is Jobe sitting hunched over on one of the benches outside of the hospital room, hood over his head.
Jobe looks up at him when he walks up to the other man. “Hey. Is it okay if I…?”
He nods, expression glum. “Go ahead.”
Judging by his face, Jude doesn't seem to be doing as well as he initially hoped.
Clenching his fist, Erling steels his resolve, and steps past him to push open the door.
What he sees isn't as bad as he braced himself for (thank god), but it still makes his entire body go rigid.
Jude is sitting up in the hospital bed, hooked up to an IV drip. He looks up towards the entrance, going wide as saucers. “Erling?”
Erling can't help but take a step forward—almost like that day in the locker room, which feels like forever ago.
It feels like it's been forever since he's last seen Jude. “Jude. Are you okay?” He can't help but ask, approaching the other.
Jude tenses up a little when he reaches the foot of the bed, which makes him frown. He begins backtracking quickly. “Do you want me to leave?”
“No!” Jude blurts out, arm shooting out to grab his wrist. “I mean—no. Sorry. I just,” he sighs, dragging a palm down his face. “I don't know why I'm so skittish. Sorry.”
“Don't be.” Erling laces their fingers together, relishing in the familiar warmth. “It was my fault in the first place.”
Jude shakes his head. “How could it be your fault when you don't even know what you did wrong?”
Erling opens his mouth to respond, but nothing comes out. His mind draws a blank. “Uh… well, when I went into the locker room…”
Truth be told, he's been so swept up in the recent light of things, he never really got to actually know what he did wrong to start all this in the first place. It's not like he went into the locker room with prior knowledge that Jude was in heat, or for a matter of fact, an omega at all.
Though… “I almost bit you,” he admits anyway, because that's just the type of guy he is. “And I couldn't control myself. I should have just walked away when I was still thinking clearly—”
“Erling. Sit down.”
Erling sits down.
“I didn't go into heat because of you,” Jude makes a face. “Well, not really. It was just an overabundance of stress and other factors that you couldn't have known about at the time.”
“Like not eating or sleeping properly?”
Jude looks at him, surprised. “...How did you know?”
“Jobe told me. That was because of me, wasn't it?” Erling looks down at their hands, still interlinked. He thumbs over Jude's wrist, where his pulse point lies. Presses into the skin gently, feeling his heartbeat. “I knew you were avoiding me, but still, I should have tried harder to talk to you. Should've recognized the signs earlier.”
Jude met his eyes briefly before looking away. “No. You aren't responsible for me, and you aren't omnipotent. I knew what I was doing, and I bore the side-effects.”
Erling runs a hand through his hair. “I know, but still—it doesn't change the fact that I did something to make you avoid me to the point of… well,” he gestures to the room around them. “This.”
“Do you know why I avoided you in the first place?”
“...No. Why?”
Jude laughs softly. “To be honest, it was because you took off your scent-blockers.”
Erling blinks. “Oh.” Then— “Wait, what?”
“I wanted to quite literally jump your bones. That's why I started wearing medical-grade blockers—they were the only thing that kept me from being able to smell you, but then… well, I'm not sure what happened, but they stopped working recently.”
“What? Why?”
Jude wrinkles his nose. “Not sure. The doctors are still investigating it. Could be a faulty manufacturer; the team has decided to void their partnership with the company.” A pause. “It could also be that I spent too much time around you and, y'know,” he shrugs, “my omega had enough of waiting around.”
Erling isn't too sure whether to be concerned about the fact that Jude has been using faulty suppressants for almost an entire year, or to celebrate the fact that Jude basically just confessed.
Wait.
Jude just confessed to him.
Jude… confessed. To him.
“You—” Erling points to himself. “You…” he doesn't dare finish his sentence.
“Yes, you idiot,” Jude rolls his eyes fondly. “I'm surprised you didn't catch on already. I thought I was being very obvious.”
“I think I'm going to faint, dude,” Erling mutters, unable to stop a stupidly wide grin spreading across his face.
“Mate, how in the world are you about to pass out before the actual patient?”
“In my defense, I think this is more of a compliment than anything else.”
“...Fair enough.”
Erling clears his throat, still grinning. “So, uh… when will you be discharged?”
Jude waves a hand. “Probably in a week or so. There's a good chance I'm going through some type of phantom heat in waves, only because I haven't actually had one in so long. They say it's best I stay here to ride it out so they can monitor me.”
Erling nods. “Okay. Well, I,” he clears his throat. “I wanted to ask if you wanted to, you know…”
Jude tilts his head innocently. “What?”
“IfIcouldaccompanyyouforyournextheat.” A pause. “Not this one. The next one. You know what I mean.”
Jude regards him with an unreadable look on his face before bursting into laughter. “Of course. God, you can be so funny sometimes.”
Erling raises an eyebrow. “Are you implying I'm not very funny on the regular?”
“Well…”
“You do know that it also means you have a terrible sense of humor, right?”
“Unorthodox sense of humor, you mean.”
“...You're never letting that one go, are you?”
“Nope.”
“Jude, you've spoken to your family about this, right?”
“Yeah. Did you get the food?”
“It's all in the fridge and pre-packaged. Water is also stocked. But, uh,” Erling scratches the back of his neck. “What did your parents say about us?”
Jude rolls his eyes and bumps him with his shoulder. “What do you think they said? Use protection, blah blah blah. The usual very sudden, very embarrassing sex-ed class.”
Erling bumps him back before pulling him back in by the waist, planting a firm kiss on his lips. They linger for a moment, lips barely brushing, before pulling away. “They mean well.”
“I know, but it doesn't make it any less mortifying when your entire family now knows you're having sex with your best friend, now does it?”
“Best friend? Have I been demoted, kjaere?”
“Sorry. Boyfriend. My sincerest apologies, Your Highness.”
“Guess I haven't been fulfilling my boyfriend duties properly.” He looks at Jude. “S'pose that needs addressing.”
The other man looks right back at him, a glimmer in his eye.“I think it does. I've been so lonely.”
Erling grins. “Coach is going to be so mad.”
“Is that really the first thing on your mind?” Jude pouts, bottom lip jutting out enticingly. “Will you really leave your omega by his lonesome for his first ever proper heat?”
Erling settles both of his hands on Jude's hips, just like he did on that fateful day when he walked into the locker room. “Not in a million years. It would be a sin to leave you hanging like that, now wouldn't it, hjertet mitt?”
Jude wraps his arms around his neck, beaming at him with a smile so bright that it could light up the entire night sky. "I love you, you know that?"
Erling's face hurts from how wide his smile is. "I love you more."
"Nah. I think I do more."
"Would you rather sit here and argue over it, or would you rather I simply show you to prove it to you?"
Jude chuckles, giving him a soft peck. “Ta meg til sengs, alpha,” he whispers, nipping at Erling's earlobe teasingly. “Don't keep me waiting.”
And who would Erling be to not oblige?
When all is said and done, Coach is furious, as expected.
What follows is a whole lot of begging, coaxing, and arguments that this will benefit the team dynamic (in their opinion, it really does!).
He comes around eventually.