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“God, I love you, you know?“ Marco says, grinning, as he takes the beer bottles from Mats’ hands and uses one to open the other.
“Would you say that if I hadn’t just brought you a drink?” Mats laughs and takes back his bottle, but doesn’t open it, only presses it against his forehead to enjoy the cool touch.
Marco makes it a point to take a nip of his beer before he answers, then he lifts his sunglasses and squints at Mats.
“Maybe. Who knows.” he says, licks his lips and adds, “Bro.”
Mats rolls his eyes and starts picking at the label of his bottle where the sweat on his hands and the condensation water on the glass mix.
It’s a hot summer day and this is just the way they are, somehow.
--
The team lines up in the tunnel with Mats who is already holding the hand of his kid in front, waiting for a signal to tell them to get out there.
He stretches his neck and rolls his shoulders, as always slightly restless before any match, when someone clicks their tongue to get his attention and Mats turns to face Marco.
“Tell me we’re going to rock it today, captain.” Marco demands with a cheeky glint in his eyes and seeing him calms Mats down in a way that only having a friend there in the prospect of a loss can.
“Using statistics or a motivational speech? Because only one of those is going to work.“
“Fuck off! Just tell me.”
“Please, Marco, there are children here,” Mats says fake-disappointedly and covers the ears of the small girl next to him although she probably has no idea what’s going on.
Marco laughs and shakes his head and Mats decides to tell him what he wants to hear.
“The stars are in the right position. We’re going to win, trust me.”
Marco seems pleased enough, pats Mats’ back and mumbles, “I love you, man”. Mats reads the phrase on Marco’s lips more than he actually hears it but he has no trouble understanding because Marco says the words often enough, like a millionaire with so much money that he has to give it to random strangers at every opportunity.
Mats watches Marco walk away and get back in line when he catches Roman behind him looking at him with a faint frown on his face, kneading his gloves.
“What?” Mats asks but then the teams are called to walk onto the field and Roman only shrugs and shakes his head as a reply.
--
Marco is not the first to run into his arms when Mats scores the goal but Marco’s the last to leave.
He leans into Mats’ hug and they smile widely as the fans howl and yell and Mats’ heart beats steadily and strongly underneath his jersey, against Marco’s chest.
“Love you, man,” Marco says and draws out of the embrace. He high-fives Mats before he jogs away, not without winking at him.
They win that day, and not only the match.
--
Marco injuries himself and he injures himself again and then he repeats it twice just for good measure.
Mats helps carrying him from the pitch the third time around and tries to ignore the way Marco’s laboured breathing scratches right next to his ear.
As they set Marco down on the bench, Mats ducks under Marco’s arm and is about to let go to return to the game, when he feels Marco holding him back by his wrist.
The medical staff swarms around Marco but he doesn’t pay attention to it, pressing his fingers into Mats’ skin.
“It’s alright, it’s going to be alright.” Mats promises and Marco returns his reassuring look through red-rimmed eyes.
“I love you -”
The sentence sounds open-ended, waiting for a conjunction or a qualifier appended to turn it into the brotherly type of confession. The thing is, they don’t need. Mats can read it all in the way Marco lets go of his wrist.
“You’re not dying, asshole.” Mats states firmly, already taking steps to cross the white line, but he can’t quite keep the worry out of his voice.
Still, Marco always, always comes back stronger.
--
Mats steps down from the improvised stage and hands the karaoke microphone to Mitchell who is waiting next in line to embarrass himself in the usual game of There’s a reason I’m a football player and not a singer.
Mats takes a shaky bow in front of the others that are sitting at the bar table, even though he knows he can’t sing to save his life and listening to him on karaoke was probably close to torture.
“At least don’t choose Helene Fischer next time,” Nuri laughs and flags down the waiter to order another round. Looking into the already tipsy faces, Mats figures that he has a couple of drinks to catch up on and lets himself drop onto the chair next to Marco.
“That was, like, so bad. Incredibly bad.” Marco says, slurring the slightest bit, his face heated up.
“Tsk, like you could do any better, Mr Justin Bieber.”
Marco laughs and leans in closer to Mats while his hand moves feathery onto Mats’ thigh under the table.
Mitchell begins to sing on stage and Mats tries to concentrate on the way he doesn’t hit a single note rather than Marco sliding his chair closer.
“I’m the karaoke king and you know it.” Marco says triumphantly, “Remember your birthday?”
“Anyone who remembers my birthday wasn’t there.”
Marco licks his lips, throws his head back, laughs about the joke louder than a real sense of humour warrants and Mats watches it all as if in HD slow-motion – until he shakes himself out of it and takes a swig of his drink to distract himself. Then another one. And another one.
As Mats empties his bottle at a steady pace, Marco continues to melt against Mats’ side and eventually lazily puts his head on Mats’ shoulder.
It’s not weird, it’s never been weird, it just feels like a comfortable, securing anchor and Mats hates to nudge Marco away when he gets up to leave.
“I’ve got to go, Reus. Get off,” Mats says gently and levers himself up while making sure Marco doesn’t fall off his chair in the process.
Marco sighs, runs his fingers through his hair and smiles at Mats.
“Hmmm, see you tomorrow. I love you.”
Mats says goodbye and wishes he could figure out why Marco keeps saying that like it’s supposed to mean something.
--
During the next training, Mats counts how often Marco says I love you and stops when he reaches fifteen times. Marco says it when Mats passes back the ball that skipped away from Marco, when Shinji and Mats help him carry the equipment for the sprint training, when Mats voices some dumb dig at another team and he tags it when he post a photo of them training on instagram.
Marco gives out his Iove declarations like autographs, it seems. Illegible and one after another until everyone his satisfied. The realisation about it itches Mats in a way he can’t explain until Marco leaves the locker room after training and says goodbye to Mats with a fist bump and an I love you.
Mats ties his shoes and when he looks up, he finds the room almost empty and only Neven staring at him.
Neven doesn’t say anything though, just stands there with his football shoes in one hand and a crease on his forehead.
“What?” Mats asks, genuinely confused, and the crease just deepens.
“Mats. Wake up. Take a hint.” Neven says insistently; disappointment, disbelief, disapproval and some other dis-words resonating in his voice.
Mats frowns at him and Neven probably realises that Mats has no idea what’s going on because he shakes his head and huffs.
“Jesus,” Neven breathes out and looks at the ceiling as if he’s actually praying for Mats to understand, “Do you want Marco to write you a fucking letter?”
“Neven, what-“
“If you want Marco to tattoo ‘I love you, Mats’ on his chest in addition to saying it all the fucking time, just ask him, okay, he’d probably do it. But don’t leave him high and dry like that without any reaction from you.”
Uncertainty begins to smother Mats and he sinks down on the bench behind him.
“What?” Mats repeats, despite the danger of sounding like a broken record. “You’re getting it wrong, he says I love you a thousand times a day, to anyone. It doesn’t mean anything.”
In reply, Neven drops his shoes and walks up to Mats, towering over him like a parent lecturing their son.
“You think Marco has ever told me he ‘loves’ me? Or anyone else in the team? And yeah, he keeps saying it but maybe he has to since you don’t seem to get it.”
Mats opens his mouth to object but then he stops and actually thinks for a second and.
Marco is always there with his fingers in his mohawk, nodding his head to some rap song on his ear phones, with rows of emojis in his texts, with neon sneakers that he doesn’t take off when he puts his feet on Mats’ couch, cursing when loses against Mats in FIFA, with the I love you on his lips and the fact that Mats never, not once, not even jokingly ever said it back.
He should have. Because fuck love if this isn’t it.
“Fix it.” Neven just says, gathers his clothes and leaves.
--
Mats calls Marco but Marco doesn’t answer the phone – which isn’t very surprising since he only ever uses SMS but this is not the sort of thing to be discussed in text messages where you can hide behind kissy face smileys and abbreviations like ilu.
(Now that Mats thinks about it, Marco uses both a lot but with people like Mario and André as well so maybe it doesn’t mean anything. Mats only now gets how inattentive he has been.)
Instead, Mats decides to use the next training to head Marco off on his way to the medical exam.
“I gotta talk to you,” he says and lets Marco believe that it’s got something to do with team business and captain’s duties, so that he follows without objections.
Mats wipes his sweaty palms on his jeans and searches for any kind of realisation in Marco’s eyes but doesn’t find it. Maybe Mats is more anxious about this situation than he needs to be, after all he’s just talking to a friend, his best friend, anything else is extra.
“Neven said that you mean it.” Mats starts and Marco just laughs.
“Well, Neven talks a lot of shit. That I mean what?”
“That you mean it when you say you love me.”
Marco visibly pales but plays it a lot cooler than Mats would have expected him to.
“And it took Neven for you to realise that? I’m a little offended to be honest,” Marco says with a hint of bitterness, avoiding Mats’ eyes and staring at his feet instead.
“I didn’t know, okay?” Mats replies, not sure why he’s defending himself, and awkwardly reaches out to touch Marco’s shoulder. He doesn’t turn away but he doesn’t lean in either, which is what he’d usually do. “I had no idea, I just knew that you said it and I liked it because it was you and I like you and – “
Maybe Mats should have prepared this speech in advance.
“I like you and I lov-“ he continues but when Marco looks up from the ground with a desperate, pleading expression on his face, the words get stuck in his throat.
„Mats, I don’t say it to hear it back, yeah? I say it to make sure you know. And, oh god, I do, I do love you. Just. Just, please, don’t lie to me.”
They stare at each other and Mats can see Marco’s eyes flicker from left to right like he’s trying to read something in Mats’ face. Mats himself is certain he can see hope shine through and when he puts his hand on Marco’s chest and feels his quick heartbeat, Marco’s eyes fall shut for a second.
“I’m not lying.” Mats says and trust that this gets his message across.
It does, because first the shadow of an unbelieving smile spreads on Marco’s face, then Marco puts his hand over Mats’ fingers on his chest.
“I love you,” Marco says and it sounds different this time around, something truly only meant for Mats.
Before Mats gets the chance to try his reply again, Marco lays his lips on Mats’ and draws him so close that their hands get squished between their chests.
That doesn’t matter though – the only thing that matters is that the kiss is like the right words to end a story and start a new one, that it tastes so sweet, that it makes Mats feel whole.
They break apart but stay as close as possible, so close that Mats has to squint to focus on Marco’s face.
Marco is blushing and Mats feels hot, too, in an exhilarating kind of way.
“Tell me again.”
When Marco hears him say it, he lets his head fall on the crook of Mats’ necks and laughs softly into his shoulder.
“I love you?” Marco mumbles, letting Mats feel the vibrations against his skin.
“I love you, too.” Mats replies and honestly, it sounds more familiar than it probably should, considering he’s never told Marco before.
Marco grins and silences Mats again but this time not because he doesn’t believe him.
This time, it’s with a kiss.