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"Have you seen Ali anywhere?" Van Dijk stuck his head into the kitchen. "He's not in his room or with Marcinho."
Nemmer looked up from the chestnuts she was glazing and shook her head. "I haven't seen him, Virg. Try the canteen."
Van Dijk shrugged and went to the canteen, his long strides making the journey short. He’d been worried about Alisson since the hamstring injury he sustained in the draw against City. Even though Alisson would only be out for two weeks, and had celebrated as enthusiastically as the others had when Kelleher kept his first clean sheet of the season the day before, Van Dijk still wasn’t convinced that his boyfriend wasn’t mentally affected by his spell on the sidelines.
He opened the canteen door. Just like Nemmer had suggested, he found the Brazilian at one of the tables by the window, staring up at the sky.
"There you are! I've been looking for you." Van Dijk sat down opposite Alisson, glancing out the window. The sky was light grey and dotted with small, fluffy clouds, but there wasn't much to write home about in terms of interesting things. "What are you doing here?"
Alisson smiled, his expression softening as he realized who was with him. "I'm wishing for snow."
"You're wishing for snow?" Van Dijk couldn't believe it. Alisson usually hated being cold, not to mention how cold weather was supposed to make injuries hurt more."I thought you always complained about how cold it was around here."
"Yeah, but it's so pretty outside. And I like snow. We never got much of it when I was a kid. Just a dusting if we were lucky. Although there was this one time that there was a lot of snow, and then Muriel stepped outside and all this snow fell on his head..."
As Alisson went on about snow and snow days, Van Dijk felt a bit of nostalgia wash over him. He remembered the days he spent playing in the snow as a young child in the Netherlands, sledding and snowball fights with his brother and sister. Snow days, and the holidays in general, had lost a bit of that magic for him as he'd grown up, but for Alisson, they still seemed to hold a childlike wonder.
"I was thinking that this year, we could do a photoshoot with the kids! Wouldn't Aya be adorable dressed up as a tiny sugarplum fairy? And Tristan would be a great snowman. That Olaf plushie we gave him will fall apart any moment now. He's loving that thing to pieces."
"Oh, yeah." Van Dijk internally wondered how the conversation had shifted from Christmas 1999 to the team photoshoot. He guessed that he had zoned out during the monologue. "I don't think it's going to snow today, though. It was cold when I went outside, but not snow-cold."
"Too bad. Because if it did, I thought we could trick the others into believing that Santa Claus came." Alisson reached into his backpack and pulled out a Santa hat, tossing it across the table to Van Dijk. "You can be Papai Noel."
"Or Sinterklaas." Van Dijk pulled the hat on, flipping the pom-pom from side to side. "What do you think?"
Alisson nodded in approval. "Add a white beard and a red suit, and we've got a deal. But you're right about you being a better Sinterklaas. Papai Noel's round and chubby, and Sinterklaas is tall and skinny."
"You calling me skinny?" Van Dijk pretended to be offended, crossing his arms and pouting. "You talk like you never knew Flaco."
"I'm just kidding, Virg! You make a good-looking Santa Claus." Alisson leaned on the table, his blue eyes twinkling. "Seriously, that suit shows off your figure. All that gym work's paying off and morphing into some nice abs."
Van Dijk could feel the heat on his face. Alisson didn't often manage to make him blush, but when it happened it happened. Both of his cheeks would turn red, and whatever reply he tried to get out would come out stuttered and twisted.
Well, he wasn't going to let Alisson get away with the last flirty comment. "Oh, well, then you'd make a cute elf."
Van Dijk watched on in triumphant amusement as Alisson' face became the human equivalent of an unopened wheel of Edam cheese. "You think so?"
"I know so! I can see you in that cute little elf hat already. Plus," Van Dijk winked, "you'd get to sit next to me on the sleigh. So find a costume, get dressed and let's go!"
Alisson sighed, gesturing to the still-grassy training pitch outside. "But we can't have a sleigh ride without snow."
Van Dijk' excitement dimmed as he realized that Alisson was right. "Then I guess I'll have to wish for snow with you."
*
"Rise and shine!"
Van Dijk groggily arose from his sleep. It didn't take him long to find out what had woken him up, as the cause of his forcibly awakened state lay right next to him. "Are you kidding me, Ali? It's nighttime, there will be no rise or shine except the shine on my manbun. You interrupted my dream."
"Sorry." Alisson chuckled sheepishly, pulling away from Van Dijk. "Was it a good one?"
"Of course, it was a good one! Any dream of us beating Undivided is a good dream." Van Dijk wished he hadn't mentioned how Alisson would make a good elf. He'd entirely forgotten the fact that in most folklore and movies, elves were either very light sleepers or entirely incapable of sleeping. "Look at you, you're all awake. I thought I was the insomniac. Now I'm sleeping and you go wake me up again."
"Grumpy, aren't we?" Alisson got on his knees, leaning over to open the window behind the bed. "This should cheer you up. Look outside!"
Van Dijk, sleepy and moody as he was, obliged. It was dark outside, minus the hints of moonlight peeking through the clouds, but it was the stuff on the ground that got Van Dijk' attention. "It's snowing?"
"Yes! I've been watching it for five minutes now, and it's just getting stronger. The whole ground will be blanketed by morning at this rate." Alisson sighed happily, pressing his face to the ice-crusted window. "Isn't it beautiful?"
Van Dijk had to admit that it was beautiful. There was snow everywhere: on Friedhelm the sycamore tree, on the privacy wall, on the tulip bed that had been planted that spring. If it wasn't the middle of the night and he wasn't sleepy, he would've suggested heading out at that very moment.
He tore his gaze off the sparkling scenes outside and looked over at Alisson. The keeper didn't say anything, but Van Dijk could see that whatever admiration he had for the snowfall paled in comparison to Alisson' excitement. His eyes, the color of both aquamarine and jade, sparkled in the moonlight as he gazed at the snow. A snowflake stuck to the window, lacy and delicate, and he pressed his finger to the spot over the window, tracing the pattern on it.
Van Dijk felt something stir within him, a feeling he was used to by now. At least, he thought it was love; it was love and something else very peculiar. Here he was, grouching over an interrupted dream, and there was a winter wonderland out there waiting to be explored. Snow, waiting to be traversed by Sinterklaas and his beloved elf.
Maybe he would be all right after all.