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The whole thing was kind of obvious in hindsight.
Not the marriage part—of course not—but the relationship part.
Which was why, when the actual news hit, Anthony didn’t need to question who Pedri's partner was.
(And he’ll honestly always be thankful for that; one shock that huge in one day was more than enough.)
The relatively calm and quiet atmosphere of the locker room was ruined by the loud slam of a door opening.
“It’s gone!” Pedri screamed in lieu of a greeting.
Lamine glanced up from where he was tying his shoes. “Huh? What’s gone?”
“His ring,” Gavi deadpanned, hot on Pedri’s heels. “He lost his ring.”
Dani whistled. “Shit, man,” he said. “Where is it?”
Anthony looked at him in disbelief while Pedri shot daggers at him with his eyes. “Well, if I knew—”
“I think he meant where do you last remember having it,” Eric corrected gently.
But Pedri, much to Anthony’s surprise, had completely moved on. He was throwing each and every one of their lockers open and rummaging through them.
And the fact that nobody was protesting? Well, that was even more surprising to Anthony.
“What ring?” he asked cautiously.
Gavi glanced at him with an expression. “His wedding ring.”
“Oh,” Anthony said with a nod. “That makes sense.”
Then the words registered—and they decidedly did not make sense. Not in the slightest.
“Wait, his wedding ring?” he sputtered. “What do you mean his wedding ring?”
Gavi raised an eyebrow. “I mean his wedding ring.”
Anthony held Gavi’s gaze for a moment. When the younger man said nothing else Anthony sighed and looked away; clearly Gavi would be no help. He turned to Eric. “Pedri is married?”
“For all intents and purposes, yeah,” Eric told him with a shrug.
“You do realize that saying ‘for all intents and purposes’ is basically just a nice way of saying that he’s not married, right?” Adeyemi asked, clearly just as lost as Anthony.
The suspicion in Adeyemi’s tone proved to be enough to break through Pedri’s trance, because he suddenly whipped around to glare at them. “No, I am married!”
“So you said the vows?” Adeyemi asked. “You did the whole ‘do you take this man’ thing?”
“Yes.”
“And you have the papers?”
“Signed, stamped, and everything,” Pedri confirmed flatly.
Anthony stared at him with wide eyes. “So Eric is…lying?” he hedged cautiously.
Eric sputtered. “I’m not lying.”
“But they have the papers?” Anthony asked slowly.
Dani nodded. “Yep.”
“And they did the whole—”
“Yes, they did the whole ‘do you take this man’ thing,” Fermín interrupted. “Why exactly are we recapping this?”
Adeyemi hummed. “So they are married.”
“Yes,” Fermín deadpanned.
“But Eric just said they weren’t,” Anthony protested, if for no other reason than to discover why.
Lamine frowned once the implications finally hit him. “Yeah, why did you say that?”
“Because Ferran doesn’t think it really counts if it’s just the two of them in a court house on a random Tuesday,” Dani explained dryly.
Gavi turned to Eric with a scoff. “You do realize that Ferran saying it doesn’t automatically make it true, right?”
Eric shrugged. “But he’s my best friend,” he argued. “I need to stay loyal, you know?”
“Staying loyal and being factually accurate aren’t mutually exclusive,” Cubarsí pointed out, not unkindly.
Eric opened his mouth to protest, but Anthony gently spoke up before he could. “I feel like we’re getting off track.”
Dani snorted. “I don’t think there’s ever actually been a track, but sure. Steady on.”
“No, no,” Cuba argued. “The track is the wedding ring, remember?”
Anthony inclined his head in agreement. “Right. So I’ve never seen a ring.“ He turned to Pedri. “How could you lose it if you don’t have it on you?”
“Thanks for finally making purposeful and direct effort to address that I’m in the room,” Pedri said absently; he still didn’t look away from his ongoing locker search. “I wear it around my neck most of the time. Under my shirt.”
Anthony considered this. “Okay,” he said. “But what about the other times?”
The question went completely unacknowledged—they’d lost Pedri again.
Gavi rolled his eyes when he noticed this. “Pedri wears it on his finger every once in a while,” he said, filling in for the man in question.
“Though I’m not sure how many of those times he chooses to go through our things during,” Lamine added lightly; and it was about time somebody called Pedri’s questionable searching properties into question.
“Well, for all I know one of you idiots stole it,” Pedri snapped.
Anthony’s grasp on the language was clearly still shoddy, because it seemed like he was the only one who thought Pedri sounded even the slightest bit serious.
“The ring is nice, sure, but it isn’t that nice,” Dani said with a laugh. “Like, the ring I get Laura will be a thousand times better. So you’ve got nothing to fear from me, hermano.”
Pedri squawked. “Excuse me? Isn’t that nice? Are you actually on drugs right now?”
Gavi scoffed. “You’re blinded by love,” he said. “You’d probably say that a toy ring was perfect as long as it was Ferri who gave it to you.”
“And you would probably accept a proposal from Bellingham if he did it with a half-eaten ring pop,” Pedri deadpanned. “So don’t you dare come after me.”
“Wait, what?” someone screeched. “Gavi and Bellingham? Hell, Gavi and a Madridista?”
Anthony was suddenly very, very glad he’d already had his suspicions about Jude and Gavi, because the information overload would’ve been way too much if he hadn’t.
(After all, he’d just spent a month straight with Jude during the World Cup only to immediately switch to spending a bunch of time with Gavi. He’d put it together pretty quick.)
Gavi winced. “I really think we should get back to the point.”
Pedri squinted. “Oh, so now you want to get back to the point?”
Anthony cleared his throat awkwardly. “Your ring is still missing?” he offered cautiously.
It was as if Pedri shut down and was rebooted. “My ring!”
Cubarsí appeared to be trying—and failing—to bite back laughter. Lamine and Eric had no such qualms.
“I can’t believe Gavi ragebaited you into forgetting your ring, Pepi,” Dani said, drawing out the nickname cheekily.
“Don’t call me that,” Pedri snapped distractedly; he was too busy with his search, which he’d thrown himself into with renewed vigor.
Dani opened his mouth—presumably to keep teasing him, though about what Anthony had no idea—but he was cut off before he had the chance by Raphinha walking into the room.
“Is there a party going on in here without me?” he asked dryly, leaning against the threshold of the door.
“An end of the world party, maybe,” Fermín corrected, sounding both concerned and exasperated. “Pedri lost his ring.”
“I see,” Rapha said as he took his hand out of his pocket, revealing a silver ring held between his thumb and forefinger. “It wouldn’t happen to be this little thing, would it?”
Pedri’s head whipped around so quickly that his neck cracked. When he saw the ring he practically sprinted toward their captain, snatching it away and holding it to his chest as if it was the most precious thing in the world.
(Anthony couldn’t help but think that to Pedri, it probably was.)
“Where was it?” Eric asked.
Raphinha threw his head back with a laugh. “Ferran’s old unofficially official seat in the dugout.”
Adeyemi frowned and asked, “We get unofficially official assigned seats?” at the same time Anthony asked, “Why would it be there?”
“He was probably just sulking and pining for Ferri,” Dani told him with a laugh.
“Or, you know, trying to soak in any of Ferran’s remaining ambiance,” Lamine added.
Eric snorted. “Or—”
“I’m done with this conversation,” Pedri announced loudly. “The search has been successfully completed, and we are all now free to move on.” He clapped his hands together. “Let’s get to practice.”
With that Pedri stalked out the door with his head held high and a silver band on his ring finger.
Anthony watched him go, utterly speechless.