Work Text:
Ødegaard loved winter. He didn’t care if it seemed a little cliche (which it wasn’t, he’d met plenty of Norwegians who preferred avoiding cold weather at all costs), and the elevated mood around the training ground tended to make him smile. Key word being tended to.
Because this time, Ødegaard was lonelier than usual. Xhaka was all the way in Germany, and Ramsdale was either training with the other backup keepers or hanging out with Ben White. Plus, he had a not-so-secret longing to be on Merseyside right now, snuggled up under a blanket with Mac Allister. Watching a movie with a cup of hot cocoa, preferably with marshmallows—never mind, you get the point.
So when the cold weather rolled in and shop owners started planning their Christmas sale schemes, Ødegaard decided to distract himself with festive cheer.
*
He went to Martinelli’s room, which was more like a basement den than a bedroom. Posters of footballers and musicians covered the entirety of one wall, and his violin things were propped up in one corner of the room. Also, there was hardly just Martinelli in the room; there was always at least one person with him, causing chaos.
This time, Ødegaard was treated to four people in the room. Sitting on the bed sat Martinelli, along with Saka, Smith-Rowe and Nketiah. They were going through a box, talking so quickly that Ødegaard struggled to keep up.
“What’s going on here?” He finally decided to break the insanely fast chatter in the room. “Are you planning to break into a bank again?”
“Clearly not! Such missions are plebeian trifles for us sophisticated gentlemen.” Martinelli thrust the box into Ødegaard’s hands, nearly knocking his captain over. “We’re getting ready to decorate the Hale End Boys Christmas tree.”
Ødegaard raised an eyebrow. “The what?”
“Emile, Eddie and I grew up in the academy together,” Saka explained, thankfully much slower than Martinelli. “We celebrated Christmas in the academy with a little pine tree we’d rescued from a roadside while walking back from school. It became our Christmas tree—”
“—and when Gabi came, he became an adopted Hale End Boy.” Nketiah finished, holding up a handful of decorations. “It’s a tradition!”
Upon further inspection, Ødegaard recognized the garland as painted and glitter-bombed Cheerios. He didn’t know how ants hadn’t gotten to the cereal yet, but he decided not to ask. It was cute, and encouraging the youngsters to preserve the environment was never a bad idea.
“Can I help?” Ødegaard picked up a pair of ornaments that were actually earrings. “I mean, there must be a lot of ornaments to hang—”
Smith-Rowe interrupted him. “Four people means eight hands, Martino. We’ll be fine.”
“Clearly, a Hale End Boys tradition means only Hale End Boys can do it!” Martinelli got up from the bed and grabbed Ødegaard by the hand, dragging him out of the room. “That means a lot of elbow grease, and so you don’t need to help! As a matter of fact, we don’t even need you in the room! Adios, capitan!”
And with that, Ødegaard was locked out of the Hale End Boys’ room. He didn’t pay much attention to Martinelli’s last words—Martinelli tended to have no filter anyways—but one word echoed in his mind: tradition.
*
“Aaron! I just wanted to see if you were free, because they’re showing some cute Christmas movies at the cinema and— YIKES! ” Ødegaard poked his head into the kitchen, only to narrowly dodge a flying frying pan. “What the heck are you doing?”
Ramsdale and Raya stood across from each other on opposite sides of the counter, hurling cutlery at each other. An open recipe book stood in the middle of the counter, along with a bottle of cranberry spirits and three six-packs of beer.
“Christmas pudding!”
“ Roscón de Reyes!”
“Mince pies!”
“ Marzapán!”
“Is that even a dessert?”
“It’s got sugar in it, it’s a dessert!”
“Chewing gum has sugar, is that a dessert?”
“You judgmental piece of—”
“Please, stop it!” Ødegaard prevented Raya from tossing a pair of butter knives at Ramsdale. “What has gotten into you both?! You’re going to get hurt!”
The two goalkeepers exchanged looks, and for a moment Ødegaard worried that they would carry on fighting. But instead, they started laughing.
“This isn’t funny!” Ødegaard insisted. “You’re fighting and throwing knives at each other…aren’t you?”
Raya finally caught his breath, leaning on the counter for support. “ Ay, Dios lo bendiga, Martin. We’re not fighting, we’re just carrying out a tradition!”
There was that word again. “What kind of tradition is trying to spear each other?!”
“Oh, just some healthy discourse, that’s all.” Ramsdale held the recipe book up. “See, us goalkeepers have a unique place in the squad. Only one of us can play at a time, and the rest of us have to miss out. So around Christmas, we argue over which Christmas recipe to make, and we get feisty.”
“It’s a way of venting all the insults we’ve wanted to say at each other the whole year,” Raya continued. “And we usually end up agreeing anyway. It’s a tradition!”
Ødegaard ran out screaming, wondering why he hadn’t just stayed in Regio Madrid. Then he remembered Ramos and thanked his lucky stars that he’d come to England.
*
After stopping by the cafeteria to grab a cinnamon spice bagel, Ødegaard set off to find Tomiyasu. It was probably the dumbest thing he’d done all day—and that was considering he’d already gone to Martinelli’s room—but Ødegaard was desperate for a tradition that he could get involved in. He wasn’t a Hale End Boy, natural or adopted, and he certainly was not part of the Goalkeepers’ Union. So he thought that if there was one group that he would be part of, it was the defenders’ union.
Yes, he was technically a midfielder. But at the rate he was saving Arsenal from swallowing four in a match, he might as well have considered himself a defender.
He opened the door to the auditorium, Tomiyasu’s favorite room. He considered closing the door and escaping when he saw Tomiyasu on the stage, leading a whole group of defenders in an increasingly stupid line dance.
“What the—oh, never mind. I won’t waste my swears on you.” Ødegaard leaned against the doorway, munching on his bagel. At this rate, the ring of dough was the only thing keeping him sane. “Why is there a Vanilla Ice song on the speakers?”
“Oh, that’s easy!” Saliba released himself from the conga line, acknowledging Ødegaard’s presence in the room. The rest kept on dancing. “We’re going to put on a performance for the holidays.”
“I thought holiday shows had holiday music.”
“Well, usually they do.” Tomiyasu paused the music, signaling for his dancers to stop. “But my life has always been about adaptability. And since nobody here can sing to save their crap, I thought that we should just utilize Dec’s rapping skills.”
“It’s a tradition!” everybody chorused in the way that said “and you’re not included in it whatsoever.”
He restarted the music and tossed a microphone to Rice. “ Declan on the M-I-C!”
Ødegaard internally prayed that Rice would suddenly get a phone call from his mother or have a doctor’s appointment to attend. But Rice was painfully free to start reciting the stupid rap from the infamous Youtube parody channel, with a few edits.
Rice, baby!
Declan Rice, baby!
Alright stop! Sign and date and listen!
Mikel’s back with a team reinvention!
Mikel! He’s the modern day Gaudi
Binned off Granit, gave Luton our Sambi!
In my old team, I bossed midfield like a vandal!
Won a trophy without any handles!
Partied in London, made a big racket
Became iconic while modeling jackets!
And as if it couldn’t get any worse, the others joined in. Tomiyasu even began dancing.
Ødegaard wanted to melt in embarrassment.
Love it and then leave it!
It’s the #WestHamWay!
We’re gonna win the league
Without Saudi pay!
Wherever there’s a ball, I’ll go and tackle it
Yo, starboy! Then I’ll pass Scamma it!
Ødegaard didn’t wait around. He slunk off, bagel in tow, and decided to find something to keep him busy in Arteta’s office. Surely it couldn’t be as dumb as whatever was going on around Colney Ground.
*
Ødegaard regretted living when he saw Arteta singing and dancing around a tactics board while wearing a Santa beard.
“Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree, with Kai as our new left-back! ” Arteta moved the little magnetic 7 on his board to the left back. “And Takehiro as our goalie, and Martin as a No. 3!”
Despite logic, Ødegaard stepped into the office. “Let me guess, another tradition that doesn’t involve me.”
Arteta froze for a moment, his expression a mixture of confusion and annoyance at being interrupted. He quickly composed himself and said, "What do you mean?"
"It's nothing! Gabi and his friends have a tradition, David and Aaron have a tradition. The entire defense has a tradition, and none of them want me to join, so..." Ødegaard stared at the shag carpeting below him until his eyes hurt. He knew it was kind of silly to get down over a stupid tradition, but he was upset nonetheless. "Did you do this with your teammates?"
"With Pep. We'd make the most crazy formations and discuss if they'd actually work. Usually, we had a good bottle of red wine with us from Pep's cellar, and we'd talk about that. It's our personal...thing we do.” Arteta finally seemed to realize what was going on. "Do you have anything you do around the holidays?”
"Well last year, I'd picked up Granit's groceries for him so he could avoid all the Christmas festivities going on. Oh, how he proclaimed his hate for it; yet when I returned with his things he'd always have hot chocolate ready for us. He made mine with marshmallows and peppermint, and his was plain. I'm not even sure there was milk in it." Ødegaard laughed for the first time that day, then his smile hardened into a straight, thin line. “But you sold him.”
“None of us wanted to sell him. He wanted a new challenge.” Arteta’s expression softened into what Ødegaard could only call sympathy. “I think you should take the rest of today off, Martin. Unfortunately the schedule’s too close-cut for you to visit your family right now, but maybe you could hang out with some friends or something. Just…I don’t know, I’m not good at this whole ‘emotions’ thing.”
“I think I should stay here. Between the youngsters and Takehiro, somebody has to help.” Ødegaard took a seat in the office and took a deep breath. “So what kind of red wine do you like best?”