Chapter Text
i.
“–edri, hey! are you even listening?” ferran waves a hand in front of his face, snapping pedri away from daydreams of hot showers and heated blankets. a puff of his breath condenses as it leaves his mouth and yeah, it’s way too cold for this.
“sure, i was,” he lamely rebutts. he most definitely wasn’t.
pedri loves ferran, he really does. he’s like family to him at this point, but wow can he ramble on for ages. his brother would always describe the two of them as the ideal best friend duo: one who talks a lot and the other who tunes it all out.
ferran’s latest monologue is on the topic of iconic goal celebrations. he thinks. how that came up, pedri has no idea. their conversation started with the older fawning all about the new nike boots, but he’s always been good at veering off topic.
“but seriously, you don’t have to like the guy to admit his celebration is the best,” ferran says matter of factly.
pedri rolls his eyes at his friend. “it’s just a stupid pose–”
“who are we talking about?” gavi walks up to them with a water bottle in hand.
“cristiano’s celebration,” ferran turns to gavi, half-pleading and desperate to get anyone on his side. pedri watches on in unveiled amusement as gavi’s face immediately and predictably scrunches up in distaste at the mere mention of the name.
“i mean, it has to be one of the most iconic ever, right?” ferran continues pointlessly. “actual athletes from other sports do that celebration.”
“so what? it can be the most annoying one ever, maybe,” gavi mutters.
“of course you’d say that,” ferran sighs and gives up easily, quickly waving the younger boy away.
“hey! you asked for it. i don't know why you're surprised,” gavi retorts.
“no, i get it. they probably spoon feed you anti-cristiano propaganda for breakfast at la masia,” pedri knows that ferran is just goading the younger boy at this point, and some part of him gets it. gavi’s face is so naturally expressive that he looks almost like a cartoon character when he sputters.
pedri doesn’t actually care that much, but seeing this more snappy side to gavi, usually so shy, makes him want to continue egging the conversation on.
“no but seriously, what is it even supposed to mean?” he ribs ferran.
“no way you’re talking about meaningful celebrations, mr. goggle eyes!” ferran looks at him with an incredulous look.
“nuh-uh,” pedri shook his head. “any slight on my celebration is a slight on my father.” ferran gapes at him.
“wait, that celebration is for your dad?” gavi butts in. his head is tilted to the right with shaggy brown hair falling over his forehead. his eyes are peering right at pedri, and wow those are the roundest eyes he's ever seen.
pedri feels the smile creep up on his face. he’s only known the 16-year-old for a couple weeks, but there’s something inherently endearing about gavi. hard earned muscle and the beginnings of uneven stubble not enough to mask the youth that softens his sharpened edges.
“yeah, they’re supposed to be glasses, like those my dad wears,” pedri answers. he leaves it at that, but if his mom were here she’d probably be talking gavi’s ears off already.
she’s always been good at that. whoever it might be that she’s entertaining at home, she’d somehow find an opening to drag them over to the living room and bring out that dreaded photo album. she’d waft through the pages with exaggerated gasps and coos, always with a story behind every photo.
her favorite story to recount was about the first time pedri saw his father barefaced. somehow, his father's glasses had gone missing, and pedrito made sure it was everyone's problem. no amount of calming and pleading would stop him from wailing at the stranger who’d suddenly replaced his papa. he was only pacified when his father, tired and desperate, made “glasses” with his bare hands around his eyes. somehow, that little trick was enough to fool pedri.
later on, when pedri first started scoring goals for their little local club in the island, yet early enough that messi and football were still completely synonymous in his mind, the only celebration that he thought to do was messi's. head tilted up and two tiny fingers pointed to the sky.
but when the cool captain from one age group above him said that goal celebrations should always be unique and meaningful to each player, little pedri wasn’t stumped for long.
he remembered midday naps and waking up to his father and fer cheering at the beat-up tv in the living room; he remembered sneaking out of bed and climbing up his father’s lap to watch the tiny men running on the screen; he remembered getting old enough to actually understand what was happening without his brother shushing him for every pesky question.
he remembered being five and starry-eyed and falling in love for the very first time.
so when the cool captain who always called him hermanito and ruffled his hair asked him what his new celebration meant, pedri told him all about his papa.
“i won’t lie, i thought they were supposed to be binoculars,” gavi replies with a timid smile.
pedri snorted. “yeah, wouldn't be the first time.”
“that just means that it’s ineffective,” ferran cuts in, still stubborn from their earlier disagreement.
“hey, as long as my dad knows that it’s for him, then it’s perfectly fine,” pedri reasons.
he looks at gavi then, “what about you? do you have a goal celebration?” the younger’s eyes widen a fraction at the sudden shift of attention.
“oh, i don’t know … usually i’m too pumped up when i score to keep up with a signature celebration besides just kissing the badge.” gavi tugs at his ear. cute, the thought comes to pedri unbidden.
“i could’ve sworn you did something in one of those clips that coach diego showed us, though?” ferran questions. gavi flushes at the mention of the video like he always does. pedri doesn’t really fault him. he can only imagine how horrifying it would be like for a compilation of your youth highlights from back when you hadn’t even hit puberty yet to be shown to the first team, including legends you’ve spent your entire life idolizing.
when the younger midfielder had only trained with the first team once or twice before, one of the coaches had sat with a group of them during lunch break. he had an ipad with him, and a 6 and a half minute long highlight reel of that one kid from juvenil a that no one was quite sure what to make of yet. all throughout, pedri couldn't help but notice how the coach’s eyes sparkled with a fierce sort of pride and—yeah, the kid was really good.
gavi had complained at coach diego when he found out that he’d showed them the video. for those few minutes, he’d stopped putting up that mature facade he adopted after entering first team dynamics and just whined at the adult like any other kid his age.
pedri is pretty sure that they didn’t know he was watching. it felt oddly domestic, like gavi had done this a hundred times before. and maybe he had. maybe diego had known the younger since he was only a terrified wisp of a boy from seville. maybe he’d practically raised him as his own.
it isn’t just diego either. almost all of the staff treat him like their own son. pedri often finds himself watching on with fascination. he likes to pretend that the sting he feels between his ribs isn’t envy.
“do you mean that ‘x’ i made with my fingers?” gavi clarified with a tilt of his head. when ferran nodded, gavi continued. “oh, that was for xavi—xavi simons i mean. an old teammate.” understanding dawned on ferran’s face, but it only intrigued pedri further.
“wait why?”
“he was injured. i just wanted to show support to him.”
“i’ve never seen someone do that before,” pedri hummed thoughtfully. he’d had seen goals dedicated to parents, grandparents, babies, but nothing like this.
“i guess it became a sort of tradition? dedicating goals to injured friends to show them support … at least back in the academy. i don’t know about anywhere else,” gavi explains.
“that’s really cute,” pedri can’t help but say out loud.
pedri wouldn’t trade las palmas and spending the time he did back at home with his family for the world, but he’d be lying if he said that he didn't often think about how things could’ve gone if one of those trials he went to at 13 ended up a little differently.
it’s not like he goes out of his way to ask the academy kids questions, but at times like these when they divulge the information themselves, pedri can’t help but lap it up. la masia has always been the big one while growing up in the youth ranks. almost everyone had their sights set on the same place guardiola, messi, and iniesta learned their football.
“it is cute. my friend back at valencia once dedicated a goal to me for my birthday,” ferran adds.
pedri takes up a playfully upset expression. “no one’s ever dedicated a goal to me.”
ferran, the jerk, only laughs at him, but gavi’s face is strikingly earnest when he says, “i’ll dedicate one to you.”
→
pedri is curled up on the grass, arms tucked in and trying to preserve what little heat his body is generating while the other half of the squad plays their scrimmage. he must make quite a sight, but he’s past the point of embarrassment. silently, he’s willing one of the staff members to just have mercy on him and hand him a blanket or a heatpack or anything. ansu is standing over him, chuckling at his plight yet rubbing at his shoulders all the same. it’s at times like these when it always feels like the cold is out to get him more than anyone else. if his mom were here, she'd point it to his “island blood” showing.
well he’s not at the island now—this is just inconvenient.
at this point, he’s just waiting for their turn on the training pitch so that the blood in his veins that he’s pretty sure has turned into sludge can start flowing again. pedri watches on with poorly concealed jealousy as the other team cheers and hoots at each other—evidently not freezing their asses off.
for the nth time that day, he finds his eyes flickering over to one particular player.
gavi plays football with an inherent hunger unlike anything else pedri’s ever seen, even just for training. just from watching him play for a minute, anyone can immediately tell that there’s enough fuel in those limbs to last for hours.
at one of the last plays of the game—surely, please just end this—nico lobs the ball over three other players, and gavi meets it head-on and redirects it towards the back of the net. noise erupts from half of the players on the pitch, and gavi runs to and launches himself at nico's arms. he’s beaming with a joy so infectious that even pedri’s surly mood doesn’t stop the smile from creeping up his face.
gavi’s earlier declaration had been in the forefront of pedri’s mind since he said it, but he’d honestly assumed that the other would forget. but when gavi ducks out of the huddle of teammates that’s surrounded him, and turns to where pedri is sat by the coolers, mouth wide in a toothy grin, he lifts his hands up to his eyes and—well. it looks more like he’s trying to gouge his eyeballs out than anything, but the warmth that spreads throughout pedri’s body suddenly makes the harsh wind on his skin a mere second thought.
he doesn't complain of the cold once for the rest of the day.
ii.
it isn’t a very big game, and the stadium isn’t completely full, but pedri thinks that the cheers he receives as he lifts the golden boy award up to the stands are those he’ll remember forever. he never set out to win any individual awards, but after a season that left him with an unflappable bone-deep fatigue he’s never experienced before, the recognition makes the strain on his chest a little lighter.
winning the kopa at the ceremony itself was one thing—in front of dozens of players and legends of the game, trying to put up a calm totally not freaking out face to the world—but seeing the fans’ reception first hand was something else entirely. he had hoped, of course, but some small part of him had doubted if the fans would ever love him like they do their la masia graduates—if they’d ever care about him like they do their hundred million euro stars. but then time and time again, they’d chant that same familiar tune. pedri, pedri, pedri. and his heart soars to its rhythm every time.
still, when he hands the award over to the staff to be packed up, and when he makes his way over to the stands, that small insufferable part of his brain calls him fraud. what use are shiny awards when you can’t play?
he pushes the thought away. he knows it’s irrational. it’s not like he wanted to get injured. what he wanted was to be able to present his award to the fans and immediately back it up after. he wanted to prove it to them again and again and again. it’s worth it. i’m worth it.
he shakes the frustration away. it doesn't matter now. he takes the seat between ansu and ronald, and makes himself comfortable.
→
they're 1-0 up by the 17th minute. he’s midway through turning towards ronald to comment on one of elche’s center-backs, when ansu lets out a stream of incoherent shouts.
when his eyes snap back on the field, the ball is only just leaving ousmane’s foot to find sergio at the center of the pitch. the ball is then passed to gavi and he turns and he makes the run through. pedri automatically rises from his seat, heartbeat speeding up in his chest. gavi charges past another player, and with a swift strike from his right, the ball whizzes past 2 others and—
goal.
oh wow.
he’s startled out of his split second shock when ansu shakes him by the shoulders and shouts right into his ear. ronald bellows loudly by pedri’s other side. “vamos niño!”
the entire stadium is on its feet, cheers too loud for a mere second goal in a 2-0 lead against a club bordering relegation—but it’s different. it's special because it’s gavi and it’s gavi’s first goal and it was fucking brilliant.
pedri’s eyes are glued on the tiny figure with the 30 on its back. gavi charges at the stands, grasping at his shirt and bringing the cloth up to his mouth in a rush. the rest of the team descends on him like a pack of hyenas, hitting and slapping and pushing in a frenzy. it's borderline concerning, but pedri knows from experience that gavi would be too high up on cloud nine to care.
he certainly looks like it. pedri is too far to see his face, but from his movements alone, bursting and tinged with blistering energy, he knows that gavi’s just been dosed threefold from the seemingly endless supply of adrenaline in his body.
he expects gavi’s head to float up to the heavens for the next few minutes before getting into the game again, but then he turns around and searches the stands, right where they’re sat and—he lifts his hands up to his eyes and—okay. with three finger flicked up, it looks more like the OK gesture than anything else, but then gavi points right at him, leaving little room for interpretation, and pedri is caught so off-guard that his brain stutters for a second.
oh.
he had no idea that gavi was planning to do that.
pedri recalls their last conversation, in the dressing room right before the match started.
“how are you holding up?” gavi had asked him with soft eyes.
“restless. not playing always makes me feel restless,” pedri had shrugged.
that was an understatement. he was miserable, but he thought he’d hidden it well. in hindsight, he should’ve known that gavi was much more perceptive than he let on.
“i’ll wow you with my amazing football skills, don’t worry,” gavi had said solemnly, with the corners of his mouth twitching up. pedri wished the younger boy would just let the smile take over his face.
“i’m sure you will.” pedri had replied as sincerely as he could, and he had relished the startled but wide grin gavi flashed at him after.
now, pedri's heart does an uncharacteristic skip. gavi had known. he’d known that pedri’s facade was a farce. he’d known that pedri would be looking for him, and he’d looked straight back at him.
pedri, who’s so used to running cold, has never felt so warm in his life.
iii.
he did it right this time...
pedri has no clue he’s doing it until fer passes by the couch and slaps him upside the head, muttering something vaguely along the lines of stupid lovesick face.
he’s snapped out of his haze and realizes with a jolt that he’s been hunched five inches over his phone for the past two minutes, a continuous loop of gavi turning to the camera and doing his celebration—again—zoomed in on on the screen.
fer’s cackles fade as he leaves the room, and pedri flushes down to his neck. he really needs to kick that jackass out soon.
his brother has been keeping him company for the past week. he’d brought nothing but his phone, wallet, and an automatic assumption of free reign on all of pedri’s things—the kind of entitlement only an older brother can have.
pedri would bitch about it more, but fer is single handedly making sure he doesn’t overdose on takeout-msg, so he holds his tongue. some part of him still feels bitter that only one of them got the chef gene from their parents, and it definitely isn’t pedri.
he’d joked that the food was the only reason he’s letting fer live off of him rent-free, but they both know why he’s really here. pedri appreciates it more than he shows, but he knows that fer knows.
he doesn’t like thinking much about the reason. frankly, based on all of his friends’ and family’s efforts, they don’t want him thinking about it too. dwelling on it for more than a couple seconds at a time never ends well.
but what else is he supposed to do? in the quiet of the night, when the window is left open, with only the rustling of the wind outside keeping him company, his mind can’t help but wander.
and his mind is always the cruelest to himself past midnight. he can barely remember a night spent without that suffocating feeling, thick and heavy along his throat and around his heart, pressing down on his ribs until he has to physically sit up to remind himself how to breathe.
over and over and over.
he hasn’t cried, and he probably won’t either. he cried after the first injury, not immediately, but after the frustration of watching the team play without him got too much. now, he just feels like he doesn’t deserve to.
wake up at 5am. don’t complain. fifty sit-ups in the morning. don’t cry. call the physiotherapist before they call you. don’t slip. follow the diet even if you don’t need to. don’t stop. don’t think. don’t feel—
pointless little games he makes himself play just to do something. just to prove a point. to who? what point?
the voice at the back of his head whispers, to prove you're still useful. to prove they still need you. to prove you're trying and you’re killing yourself trying and god—you’re trying.
but then he always wakes up the next day.
then the rational part of his brain always takes over again.
then he squints at the sun shining through his blinds and hears his brother’s playlist in the kitchen, the stomach-churning smell of banana-chocolate pancakes making him leap from bed.
then the clock strikes 11:45 and his phone starts pinging every other second with notifications from the team chat, badgering him with jokes and questions and stories all throughout their limited lunch break.
then the night creeps up and he watches their game and sees this heart-shaped boy turn to the camera in the midst of the chaos, right after scoring his first goal in a difficult start of the season, and dedicate it to pedri—to him.
out in the sunlight and in the gaze of all the people he loves and who love him, dealing with the weight of the world suddenly becomes the easiest thing in the world.
how could he despair and rot in his own self-pity? he couldn't possibly. not when he has a brother and a family who’ll stick by him completely unconditionally; not when there's a club and a team and a fanbase waiting for him; not when his limbs ache, not due to pain or injury, but from the itch to run and play; not when gavi messages him every night, i miss playing with you, and sometimes, on nights when he’s a little braver, i miss you.
snap out of it. it's still looping on his screen. just one of the dozens of tweets with this same video. this specific fan’s username is some unfortunate pun on his name and bananas, and the caption is a blunt “if i were pedri, i’d ask gavi what we were.”
he bookmarks it for reasons even he’s unsure of, and exits the app in record time. he immediately opens instagram, and the first post that pops up on his feed is la liga’s: a collage of him and gavi on the first slide, and that same clip of the dedication in the second. and yeah, pedri watches it a couple more times, just for reassurance, sue him.
he goes to share the post on his story, and his fingers hover over his keyboard for a good minute before he types out, grande hermano.
hermano. brother. family. the most important things in pedri’s life—and yet, somehow, that word still feels like a cop-out. somehow feels … wrong … but he can’t think of a single word that could possibly encapsulate everything gavi means to him, so he clicks on the your story button all the same and tries not to feel completely see-through.
for a while, he mindlessly clicks through his following’s stories until he reaches fer’s close friends story. it takes him a second to comprehend what he’s looking at, but when he does, he feels his face heat up.
it’s a photo uploaded only minutes ago of pedri from earlier, slumped on the couch with his phone held up to his face. at the very top are three barfing emojis, and okay, maybe he sort of gets it now.
the eyes—the smile—the way he’s practically lit up from inside out. he’s pretty sure there are tiny love hearts trailing over the top of his head if he squinted hard enough.
he’s fucked.
→
fer comes back from the kitchen with a glass of water and a stray arm darting for pedri’s head. after twenty years, the following duck has been drilled into pedri’s instincts. he sticks his tongue out at his brother, and fer makes such an ugly face back that it startles a laugh out of pedri.
fer’s grin is self-satisfied, and his eyes are knowing in the same way pedri always tries so hard to ignore.
“at this rate, i’m gonna have to demand compensation from gavi for forcing me to suffer through your heart-eyed bullshit.” he raises an eyebrow at pedri, the stupid smirk deep set in the corners of his mouth.
pedri suspects that the middle schooler comebacks that are infuriatingly the only things his mind can come up with at the moment would only get him made fun of more, so he just doesn’t dignify fer with a response.
fer plops on the couch next to him and prods at his side, saying in an exaggerated offended tone, “i’ve cooked your breakfast, lunch, and dinner, everyday for the past week, yet you’ve never smiled at me like that. what’s up with that, man?”
“okay listen here you idiot–” so much for no middle school comebacks.
“ah–ah–nevermind!” fer cuts in. “i wouldn’t want you looking at me like that anyway. horribly horribly down bad–” pedri lunges for his neck.
i thought we’d grown out of play wrestling, pedri thinks to himself. i guess not.
after, when fer is on the floor and he’s on the couch, labored breathing coming from the both of them, his brother nudges at his feet.
his voice is different this time, serious but uncharacteristically gentle. “i haven’t seen you like this before.”
and pedri could so easily act dumb—not that fer would let him—but he could.
instead, he takes a deep breath in, and confesses, “it’s just that… i guess it’s nice to be reminded that he–they miss me, i guess.”
fer lets out a disbelieving chuckle, “gavi tells you he misses you like every night, man. i know that for a fact.”
“well, yeah… this is different though.”
“different how?” fer inquires. pedri doesn’t quite know how to express it fully.
“it’s just… you know, during the actual games, everything gets so muddled and heated that you can barely even think about everything happening on the pitch, much less whatever’s off it.”
he gathers enough courage to look fer in the eye. the teasing glint that’s somehow always there is tampered down now, replaced with something softer. it spurs him to continue, to voice out something he’d never put into words before.
“i guess it just feels nice… to know that despite all that, he–they’re still thinking of me.”
pedri can’t keep his gaze for long. fer has always been good at making him feel completely transparent. it makes words unnecessary between them. it’s convenient most of the time, yet at other times, he just despises it.
“well, he certainly always thinks of you,” fer answers with conviction. “this is, what? the second time he’s dedicated a goal to you?”
“third, technically.”
“that’s … not a lot of players can say that– actually, nevermind. i can’t think of anyone else who can say the same.”
“i…” pedri hadn’t thought about it like that before. hadn’t stop to think about what it would look like from a wider perspective.
pedri had seen gavi and his bottomless reserve of affection, he’d seen the carefree way he showed it off to the world, and he didn’t think to question it once in the past three years.
gavi had always been the one with the loud declarations and his heart permanently stitched on his sleeve, of course he’d do so in the best way he knows how: through the game.
pedri himself has never been the type for it. he’s always been too afraid of getting hurt to parade it out to the world in such an irreversible way.
but this is different. gavi is different.
because everything gavi does, he does with every fiber of his being. when he scores, he brings the badge to his lips and dedicates it to the club that’s held his heart for as long as he’s been aware enough to give it away. so afterwards, when he brings his hands up to his eyes and dedicates it to pedri, it might just be the clearest, purest form of love pedri’s ever been shown.
he doesn’t think he could hurt himself on that kind of love if he tried.
even without the ball between them and the rhythm of the game tying them together, even without the spark of electricity keeping them acutely aware of each other from across the pitch, gavi still says with no words at all—i was thinking of you—i miss you—that was for you.
not for the first time, pedri wonders what he did in his past life to deserve this. to deserve him. he wonders how the rest of the people in gavi’s life haven’t long since drowned in all the love he pours out like it’s nothing. he wonders how gavi can be so unabashed, so unafraid of it all running out.
then again, pedri’s always known that gavi was better than him.
gavi who leaves his all and more on the pitch. gavi who doesn't ask for anything in return. gavi who deserves more. more than some measly text message, or half-genuine instagram story, or even a phone call. all too suddenly, pedri feels his words too inadequate to express the gratitude that fills him. his skin itches to return it. to show gavi even a fraction of what the other has given him after all this time.
he gets his chance to, eventually. he didn’t want it to be like this though.