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Jude doesn’t see the chat until he arrives in his hotel room, hours after the match had ended.
I’m sorry about the match.
Let me know when I can call you.
Please?
He throws himself into bed and lets his phone slip from the loose grip of his fingers, face down onto the sheets. He really, really doesn’t want to talk to anyone right now, not even Erling. In fact, all he wants is to fall asleep—or maybe fall apart, he isn’t that picky; it isn’t like either option will change the outcome.
Jude Bellingham is familiar with defeat. How could he not, after years of playing professional football. But he also knows that there are degrees to these things. That some defeats are more harrowing than others is simply a fact, and when the worst in that spectrum finally happens, he only has two options ahead: bear it and live with it and breathe with it, or let it destroy him entirely.
Jude knows which one he’s choosing, but he also knows that he has a long painful road ahead of him. Been here, done this before, just not quite on this scale, with this much hurt and guilt. It’s only been a couple of hours, but it feels like he has born it for days.
Thank God for his family. His parents have been nothing short of a rock. He can only imagine how terrified they must have been to watch him being targeted and tossed around the entire first half of the match, and yet they made scarce any mention of it when he finally came to see them. They only took him into his arms and let him become what he has always been to them: their beloved son.
Jobe, too; Jude has never seen his Alpha brother so angry. He genuinely believes that Jobe would have attacked a group of the opposite team’s fans who had sauntered near them and thrown smug smirks their way, if Jude hadn’t held him back.
“Fucking hurt you,” Jobe muttered after Jude had scolded him and, well, there was nothing he could say to that. In the end, the people who love him simply care too much, and he is overwhelmingly glad to have them.
This is also why he finally reaches for his phone and type in a reply.
Jus wanna sleep.
The answer arrives at once, as if Erling has had his attention glued to his phone the entire time.
Ofc ofc
I’ll just call you in the morning, shall I?
Your morning I mean.
Or you can call me.
Anytime you want.
I’ll wait.
Good night :)
The barrage of messages, clearly anxious but also incredibly sweet, almost breaks something in him. It’s also the thought that Erling has waited the entire night for him to reply, and that makes it just that much more unbearable.
Jude takes a deep breath. Better just to get it done and over with.
He presses call.
It takes Erling less than a second to answer.
“Jude?”
Jude opens his mouth, but any reply he could have made seems to have stuck inside his throat. Flustered and yet still numb, he focuses on breathing, in and out, listening to the lingering echo of Jude Jude Jude inside his head. There is something incredibly reassuring about Erling that even though he’s so far across the ocean, he can still make Jude feel.
When Erling suddenly speaks again, his voice has gone several degrees softer. “How are you?”
This time, Jude manages to untangle a few words. “So tired,” he murmurs, putting the phone on loudspeaker and placing it on the bed, next to his ear.
“Then you should’ve gone to bed instead of calling me.”
“Am in bed.”
“Good. Then you should fluff your pillow, close your eyes, and in just a minute, you’ll be asleep. I’ll wait.”
Jude makes a soft snort. “Creep.”
“If by ‘creep’ you mean the most caring person in the world,” Erling says with utmost seriousness, “then yes I’m a creep. I’m a weirdo. What the hell am I–”
“Oh my God, this is your idea of getting me to sleep?”
Erling doesn’t reply. Jude imagines him smiling, that gentle, slightly crooked smile that never fails to set his heart aflutter.
It doesn’t exactly flutter right now, still a stone inside his chest, but Jude is now experienced enough to know that a few moments with Erling Haaland is all it needs to turn itself back into something human and vulnerable. It has happened way too many times for him not to take at least a few notes.
“Are you alright?” Erling asks quietly, his voice softer than a butterfly’s wings. “I saw them pushing you around.”
Jude manages a mirthless laugh. “Yeah. Bruises mostly, but nothing serious. I’m pretty tough.”
“You are.” Erling’s tone carries a smile between each syllable. “The toughest Omega in the world.”
“Why does it sound like an insult when you say it like that.”
“My bad. The toughest footballer in the world.”
Jude sniffs. “Now that’s definitely an insult, coming from you.”
“...I’m just not going to win this, am I?”
Any other time, Jude would have smiled. Now, he sinks into the gulf of silence that exists between him and wherever Erling is. If he tries to listen hard enough, then he can hear the sound of the sea in the background—whispering, soothing, lulling. He thinks he would give anything to be where Erling is right now, instead of trapped alone inside this dark hotel room.
“Sorry.” The word has left his mouth before he’s even conscious of its existence.
There is a pause, and then Erling demands, incredulous, “What could you possibly be sorry for?”
“Promised you I’d get the cup.”
Another pause, longer this time. “Well, to be fair,” Erling finally says, all gravity and earnestness, “you didn’t specify when you would get it, so technically you haven’t broken your word. Yet. So I guess you still have a couple more chances before I get to call you a liar hmm?”
It’s these light-hearted words and teasing that finally break him. Jude presses his balled fist against his mouth, stifling any sound that might slip out as he curls into himself and lets silent sobs wreck his entire frame.
“Jude?”
Erling sounds slightly worried, but Jude cannot bring himself to answer. He knows his voice will break the moment he attempts any sort of speech.
Erling clears his throat. “I can’t believe I’m going to do this but… here goes nothing. Hey, Jude, don’t make it baaad…”
“Shut up,” Jude hisses, half crying and half laughing, all the way painfully aware that Erling can now hear every broken sob. “Your singing is horrible.”
“Hey, you’re talking to a Spotify-charting rapper here.”
“Wannabe rapper.”
“Not according to Spotify!”
Jude is surprised to find himself really smiling this time. The lull that comes afterwards is no longer as heavy; in fact, it’s almost easy, with a touch of tranquility to it. Wiping the tears from his face, he settles more comfortably into his pillow and closes his eyes. The thoughts inside his head have quietened. Suddenly, sleep doesn’t seem like such an impossible thing anymore.
“Ask me what I’m doing right now,” Erling suddenly speaks again.
“If you say sailing the Mediterranean Sea, I’m going to hang up.”
“Ask me.”
Jude affects a loud, long-suffering sigh. “What are you doing, Mr Erling Haaland?”
“I’m looking up flights to the US.”
That makes Jude blink his eyes open once more, frowning. “What. Why would you do that.”
“Because I’m going over there.”
“Why.”
“Because I’m calling this unfair. You were with me when I lost. I want to do the same.”
“Look, Haaland–”
“Don’t jump into conclusion that I’m doing it for you,” Erling interrupts, his tone wry. “Ever occurred to you that maybe I just wanna gloat? Ha ha, England lost.”
“I’m fine, for fuck’s sake.”
“Maybe I wanna see John, not you.”
“Shut up. Listen–”
“Or Marc, or Nico–”
“–it’s in Miami,” Jude continues, ignoring this stream of nonsense. “The third-place match.”
There is another pause. And then: “So?”
“That’s where I destroyed your team, remember?”
Erling snorts. “You destroyed nothing, Bellingham, don’t flatter yourself. In fact, if we’re comparing achievements here, I just met my king a couple of days ago. Have you even met yours?”
“Oh.” Jude feels the corners of his lips twitch. “So that’s how you want to play it?”
“I’m sorry, I can’t hear what you’re saying over the sound of how awesome I am.”
“I’m hanging up.”
“No, wait, wait!” Erling sounds genuinely panicked that Jude has to bite down a smile for real. Not that he has to, come to think of it. He’s alone in his room, and yet, for some reasons, it no longer feels like he is. He can almost trick himself into thinking that Erling is here, next to him, pouring seventeen kinds of nonsense into his ear. That is how huge his presence is.
“Seriously, I’m fine,” Jude repeats, more firmly. “You just stay where you are and enjoy your holiday. I’ll come and visit when you’re back in Manchester.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
There’s a long, slow exhalation. “Fine.”
Jude nods, smiling—and that’s also when he realises that he’ll be fine even if Erling never comes to regard him as anything other than a friend. Because this, everything Erling has done today, everything he has done until now, his loyalty and steadiness to be a friend who will always bump Jude’s shoulder whenever things get tough, is already the most precious gift there is.
“I’m just going to say this once,” Erling says, his voice suddenly low and hard-edged, “and never again until you say I can. But seriously, Jude, fuck them. Fuck them all very much. You’re going to get them next time because… fuck them.”
Jude bursts into a laugh, tears streaming down his face and soaking his pillow. It still hurts; everything still hurts so much and no doubt will continue to hurt for some time, but he thinks he can bear it and live with it and breathe with it.
“And now, you’re going to get some sleep,” Erling finishes with the air of a narrator at the end of a bedtime story.
“Yes, Mum,” Jude says dryly. “And you go back to your sailing. Or whatever you do over there.”
“Wish you were here though.”
Jude finds a smile waiting on the curve of his lips. “Same.”
“One day.”
“One day.”
End