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Darwin Nunez considered himself lucky to play for Liverpool. Not for the reasons everyone else thought, but because he was friends with many of his teammates.
Among those friends was Alexis Mac Allister, who'd just arrived from Brighton. Mac Allister quickly settled in with his teammates, both on the pitch and off it. He was shy at first, but he soon opened up to the others, with Nunez being one of his most trusted accolades.
They were like twin brothers. But not in the way that they were the same; the two couldn't have been more different. Mac Allister was so quiet sometimes that he virtually disappeared, while Nunez was always heard before he was seen. Mac Allister was the kind of person who liked to observe and take in the world around him, while Nunez was a talker who could never stay still. Despite their differences, the two were inseparable, and they always had each other's backs.
But today, Nunez wished he had never befriended Mac Allister in the first place. The reason? A damn snail.
Mac Allister had quickly become known among his teammates for his snail obsession. He kept a terrarium in his room with three giant African land snails, which he'd named after his Argentina teammates.
Kun was a gentle snail, and he was the slowest of them all. He'd munch on carrot and radish tops, and nothing else. Lautaro was the polar opposite of Kun; he was still slow, but he much preferred cucumbers and spaghetti squash to carrots and radish tops. Lautaro had a peculiar habit of turning on Mac Allister's Spotify playlist to play "Hotline Bling" at 3:21 in the morning, which woke up Mac Allister and Nunez. And if Mac Allister accidentally left his phone on the Bluetooth speaker, then everyone else in the building could hear the song.
Leo, though, was Nunez's favorite. Not because Nunez liked snails--he hated them--but because Leo knew how to be a normal snail. His favorite activity was climbing onto his rock, eating some lettuce, and watching the world go by. He was content and peaceful, nothing like the other snails who were always trying to escape their terrarium. Nunez loved how he could easily forget about Leo's existence.
But today, a snake had other ideas. He'd snatched Leo while Mac Allister had taken the three snails out to get some sunshine. Mac Allister had tried to stop the snake, but it gulped Leo down like a gummy bear, leaving only the poor snail's tattooed shell.
That was why they were where they were now. Nunez stood in front of his bed, watching Mac Allister. The Argentine had been devastated by Leo’s untimely demise, and despite Nunez's attempts to get him to move on, he'd absolutely refused. To make matters worse, he'd wrapped himself in all of Pitaluga's blankets, which attracted Pitaluga's very confused attention.
"It's okay, Alexis! Really, it is!" Nunez was running out of words to say to Mac Allister. What was he supposed to say when he'd disliked Leo from day one? "Look on the bright side—you can get another snail!"
Alisson glared at Nunez. “Seriously, Darwin?"
Mac Allister stuck his head out of his blanket cocoon. His eyes were still red-rimmed from crying for half an hour. "We need to have a funeral."
Pitaluga wordlessly left the room, Alisson went to sit on the bed next to Mac Allister, and Nunez tried to keep himself from combusting on the spot.
Finally, his mind came up with something that wasn't the granddaddy of all swear bombs. "A snail funeral?”
"What do you expect me to do?" Mac Allister cradled the tattooed shell in his hand like it still had a living snail inside it. "It's what Leo would've wanted. It's what Lautaro and Kun want, too."
Nunez glanced at the terrarium. The two remaining snails moved just as slowly as usual, but seemed slightly limp. Upon further investigation, Nunez noticed that Lautaro hadn't touched his cucumbers.
Alisson glanced at Nunez, shrugged, and turned to Mac Allister. "Alright, let's do it. What now?”
"You're agreeing to this?!" Nunez hissed in what he liked to call a whisper-shout. In reality, the others could hear it from the other side of the hall. "A snail funeral--"
"Is exactly what we need to say goodbye to Leo." Mac Allister unwrapped himself from his blanket pile, still holding Leo's old shell. "I'll go find a coffin. You two get dressed in black.”
Once Mac Allister was gone from the room, Nunez pounced upon the bed, trapping Alisson in a chokehold. "WHY did you agree to that? There's literally nothing left to bury except that tattooed skeleton of a shell!”
Alisson pried Nunez's hands off his neck, scooting towards the edge of the bed. "Did you see Lexi's expression there? He's devastated.”
Nunez still didn't get it. All he could think about was how Mac Allister had stolen Pitaluga's blankets and crashed on his bed. "It's a snail, Alisson! A forklifting snail! If it was a goldfish, we could just flush it down the toilet. But no, he has to have a snail burial."
"Darwin Gabriel Nunez Ribena--I meant Ribeiro." Alisson glared at Nunez. Judging by how he was only six inches away from Nunez, Alisson was taking this very seriously. "I must admit, I'm not a giant fan of snails myself. But Lexi loves them, and he loved Leo. So what do you say that you give him this one moment and go through the snail funeral without any wisecracking?"
Normally, Nunez would've put up an argument. But the part of his heart that loved Mac Allister like a brother had already made up its mind. Plus, he knew better than to disagree with Alisson when he was hellbent on a course of action, especially when it involved emotional intelligence.
“Fine.”
*
"Alisson Becker." Mac Allister shook Alisson' hand firmly with a tiny, empty smile. "Thank you for wearing a tuxedo to a funeral like a normal person."
Alisson glanced down at the small, thick wooden box in Mac Allister's hand. "Why so specific?" I thought Darwin was wearing black as well. At least he'd better be wearing black.”
Mac Allister shook his head, his brown eyes glassy with unshed tears. "Darwin's wearing a black motorcycle jacket and leather pants."
Before Alisson could react, Nunez ran down the stairs, nearly tripping over each one. His hair was down and styled in a style reminiscent of a Jheri curl. He wore black leather everything, and what couldn't be leather was black except for a single silver ring on his middle finger.
Alisson tried not to roll his eyes at Nunez's get-up. "When I told you to wear black, I didn't mean go full Michael Jackson on the Bad album.”
"You didn't say it had to be a tuxedo." Nunez removed his black sunglasses, hanging them from the collar of his shirt. "I'm still wondering where you found a black dress shirt in your closet full of every color shirt but black."
Alisson' face fell for a moment, but then hardened into the calm, deceptively stoic facade he'd put on ever since Mac Allister had told them about Leo. "Let's go. Alexis, have you chosen a place?”
Mac Allister nodded slowly, opening the door. "I was thinking about the botanical garden.”
*
Nunez could feel chills running down his spine as he stood next to Alisson in the botanical garden. The weeping willow trees (how appropriate, Nunez thought) hung like curtains, blocking out the sun. Klopp didn't like the players coming to the botanical garden, claiming it was haunted. Alisson had previously said that he agreed with Klopp, but now he stood in front of the little grave that Mac Allister had dug for Leo, serious yet somber.
Mac Allister had gone all-out on Leo's funeral, even asking the participants to hold lit candles. Alisson followed along with everything, while Nunez could feel steam pouring out of his ears. Leo had been a snail, a slimy, weird snail that sat on a rock all day going slower than any animal on earth could've gone.
"We are here today for Leo the Great Super-Bad Ninja the Third." Mac Allister set his candle on the ground next to the tiny headstone he'd fashioned for the snail. "He loved lettuce, chilling, and the tattoos on his back that made him extra cool. He crawled over my World Cup medal, and he seemed to know what it meant.”
"You mean he covered it with slime that has god-knows how many bacteria," Nunez grumbled under his breath.
“...a rose, a World Cup, a Copa America that we poached from Brazil…”
Alisson nudged Nunez, sending a pointed glare his way. Nunez knew what it meant and shut up...for three microseconds.
"Is it even a funeral if there's no body to bury?"
"...in Miami, Florida, I found him in a pear tree…”
Alisson groaned and buried his face in his hands. "Seriously, Darwin? Not now, not here." He sighed and looked up at the cloudy sky. "This isn't the time for jokes.”
"...in Lautaro, Kun and I's hearts, forever and always." Mac Allister finished his eulogy and cleared his throat. "Alright, since Lautaro and Kun can't speak, Darwin will speak next.”
Nunez stood next to Mac Allister, brushing his hair away from his forehead. He could see Alisson glaring at him as if to say: don't mess this up.
"We are here today for a snail called Leo." An excellent start. No wisecracking. "A snail that once decided that stealing my salad was an excellent idea.”
Alisson facepalmed, while Mac Allister made a sound that was a cross between a chuckle and a sigh. Nunez took it as a hint to carry on.
"Umm...I appreciated his ability to act like a normal snail instead of blasting Drake's discography at hell o'clock in the morning. Thank you.”
"Okay, then." Mac Allister knelt in front of the tiny headstone, waving Alisson and Nunez off. "If you don't mind…”
"Of course we don't. Call us if you want a ride home, okay?" With that, Alisson pulled Nunez away from Mac Allister, careful not to let their candles catch anything on fire.
*
"Why did you say that?" Alisson hissed once the two were out of earshot. “Ale looked like he was going to break down. I know you don't like snails Darwino, but did you have to take it out on him? I thought I told you no wisecracking.”
"I wasn't wisecracking! I was just being honest. Look, I get why the snails are important to Alexis. They’re like his kids with slime and shells. And I’m his best friend, so of course I have to be there for him. I get it now.”
Nunez glared at Alisson, arms crossed in defiance. “But why should you care? Who do you think you are, my dad?”
As soon as the words were out, Nunez clapped a hand over his mouth. In his anger, he had forgotten what Alisson had told him after finding one of his old family pictures.
"That's why you went along with everything, isn't it?" Nunez realized. "You never got to go back.”
"No! I mean...seeing Lexi that way made it hard for me to say no, even if the candles were a little extra." Alisson sighed, his voice strained and quiet. "I guess I was just trying to make up for not being able to say goodbye to my dad. It's complicated and messy.”
Alisson pulled Nunez close to him, hugging the Uruguayan tightly. Nunez was more than used to it by now, having played with Alisson for fourteen months now. "I'm sorry. I micromanaged you through the whole funeral. It probably just made you more annoyed.”
"Bro, we're good. I get it." Nunez leaned against the gate of the botanical gardens, blowing more hair away from his face. He started to regret wearing his hair loose in all this wind. "Life's messy. We adopt snails as pets, we try to pull off Michael Jackson's 1990s style, and we somehow end up dark-haired with greenish-blue eyes. And then we try to eat cake donuts in one bite, even though it's impossible.”
"I guess you're right." Alisson peered into the distance, his expression lighting up as he recognized a shape in the shadows. "Hey, Lexi's back. We should probably go back to Kirkby now, it'll start to rain any time now.”
Nunez rolled his eyes, pulling his hair back into a ponytail. "Since when were you Señor Responsabilidad ?"
"Sharing a room with a twenty-year-old Prince fan teaches you quite a bit." Alisson carefully placed his dying candle by the gate. The candle's flame weakly flickered in the wind, pooling black wax on the concrete. “Let's go.”