Chapter Text
Don’t stay at the club past four, Aurora’s words rang in his ears.
Why? Pablo had teased when she’d first said it. He wasn’t much of a dancer or a drinker. If they got to the place at midnight, by two he’d be bored and looking for every excuse to leave, by four he’d be home, showered, and tucked into bed. Aurora didn’t need to know that though, it was much more fun to disagree.
Because deranged shit starts happening.
Right, Pablo had said at the time, a smirk on his lips. Like the little ghosts living underground coming to eat you for being a bad bad girl and dancing like an eyesore, he’d continued, a nod to the silly stories their grandma would tell them when they were kids and how much stock gullible little Aurora used to put into them.
She’d thrown a pillow at his face and left the room, thoroughly owned.
She’d also had a point. About the deranged shit that was.
Pablo checked the time again, swiping away his poor phone’s fifth low-battery warning of the night. 04:31. The sun would be rising in like two hours.
“Oh, Jude, you’re just such a darling,” the blond girl said, laughing loudly as though someone in the circle had made a joke (they hadn’t) and pressing herself as good as flush against the said Jude’s shoulder and side. The rest of the group laughed at her laugh, mumbling non-nonsensical things between them. The second girl sitting on the other side of Jude seemed to have been feeling left out because she too tried with the subtlety of a sledgehammer to get her manicured hands on him.
Watching a bunch of women not shady in the slightest enthusiastically trying to get into Jude Bellingham’s pants was not how Pablo expected this evening to go when Fermin and Mario forced him out here because his ‘desperate need for pussy’ was ‘dragging all of them down’. Cristo hadn’t said anything, but Gavi could tell he agreed. Bunch of idiots. His mood had little to do with girls and a lot to do with football, though they seemed to have trouble understanding that. Turned out celebrating a trophy you didn’t get to win or contribute to, as fun as it was, didn’t do great things for your confidence and psyche. Or maybe they did understand that, but crapping on Gavi was just their excuse to spend time until the early morning at the beach bar that had become their favorite after several trips to Ibiza. He’d lost all of them an hour in and he was the designated driver of their little rental, so all he could have to kill time was water and enough nonalcoholic cocktails to set back his recovery by two months.
By mere coincidence, he’d ended up at the bar, its circular and open shape making it a pretty elite place to sit and people-watch. This was one of the island’s most famous nighttime spots. Half the reason they loved it was the sheer mass of club-goers, which made it easier to get lost in the crowds unrecognized. Many also knew a lot of footballers and other celebrities came here to do just that, so they infiltrated the place with the sole goal of “accidentally” landing into bed or doing business with one or the other. You had freedom, but if you weren’t careful you’d get hunted.
Pablo had a hunch that was exactly what was happening to Bellingham.
And the idiot didn’t even seem to realize it.
“Thirsty, baby?” one of the girls seemed to ask, in Spanish for some reason, helping him tip the crystal glass full of vividly colored liquid into his mouth. The fourth girl of the group had put her massive vape down to nose at a carefully arranged white line on her fist.
Pablo had to wince. Party drugs were largely banned for them even in the off-season — the federations screened for that stuff on the regular. Of course, some still used, colluding with their clubs to avoid drug tests by pretending they were sick or injured when a check was due, but none of the officials appreciated it when they had to hide your coke habit.
It’s not like he’s the one doing it, Gavi reasoned, taking a sip of his lemon soda to wet his paper-dry mouth. Yeah, not right now, his own head challenged, eyes raking over the credit card next to the powder baggie on the table he had a hunch did not belong to one of the ladies. There was a little urge to look away and stop spying on Bellingham’s private moment, but it was quickly squashed by curiosity. It was simply weird, the whole thing. A complete derailing of the serious, responsible, professional image of Bellingham Pablo had learned to know through the papers.
So Pablo kept watching.
It might have been an eye-roll-worthy thing, cocky little Bellingham who thinks he’s hot shit trying to bag not one not two but four fucking girls at once, if not for how… unengaged Bellingham seemed.
He laughed out of time to the rest of the group. He spoke English in a messed up accent while they made no effort to match. His gaze was hazy, unfocused, and sat like staying upright was a chore. Every time one of the girls rubbed up to him, he’d give little or no reaction, highly focused on his next fix of alcohol. Pablo also found it hard to believe he knew any of the people he was sitting with — a baby could’ve smelled they were not good crowd from a mile away.
That meant Bellingham was so fucked up he couldn’t even reason to baby-level.
That was… weird.
It got weirder when the blonde chick decided it was time to be bold and straight up put her hand on Bellingham’s lap. Pablo knew this was his cue to look away, but it was as much of a disaster as a five-vehicle car crash. He couldn't. Bellingham twitched a little, looked lost for about two seconds before the girl whispered something to him while moving her hand in very deliberate motions, causing an idiotic grin to spread on his face. Pablo still doubted he knew who was feeling him up, or where he even was for that matter.
What do you care, freak? Stop gawking. People get fucked up and enjoy themselves. There ’s nothing bad about it.
Exactly. Sure it was risky but maybe Bellingham was into this kind of thing. He’d chosen to come here, to get fucked up and sit with those girls. He was trying to have fun without getting looked at sideways. The only creep here was Pablo.
There was this empty feeling in his stomach and no amount of lemon soda would make it go away.
For the next five minutes or so he tried to look at other people. Pretty girls, pretty guys, dancers, some folks he recognized doing things worth gossiping with Fermin about. He also hoped for his phone to buzz and save him from whatever this was, for the guys to finally text they were done and wanted to go home, but the only notifications he got were even more low-battery warnings.
Finally, he gave in and looked back at Bellingham’s little spot. The girl had moved on to stroking under his pants now, doing her best to inch herself onto his lap. Ew. On instinct, Pablo’s gaze swept the area for any cameras. There were none, of course, the place banned them and made them sticker their phones, but it was better safe than sorry.
He almost breathed a sigh of relief when Bellingham stumbled up despite the girl mouthing at his neck too and grabbed, go figure, his credit card, ruining the new white lines ready on the table. The girls cursed at him in that half-flirting way, but he didn’t even seem to notice, too busy forcing himself toward the bar on unsteady legs. Pablo had half a mind to hide, but Bellingham was so drunk or high or both that he probably wouldn’t have recognized his own mum, never mind Pablo with a hat on.
He said and did nothing, only listened. They were about a meter apart now, separated only by being on opposite sides of the circle. “D’you mind givin’ me another one, mate?” he asked the bartender, his accent so thickened by intoxication the guy probably didn’t understand a word of it. The waved credit card was a universal sign, however, so Pablo guessed that was how he got the message and started to ask what kind of other one Bellingham wanted. Bellingham did not understand. The bartender didn’t either. Their attempts at communication got old fast so Pablo swapped to looking back at Bellingham’s circle of friends.
They were chatting, more adept at keeping quiet than they’d let on earlier. The third girl dug into her tiny purse for another packet of powder, foil instead of clear plastic. It was hard to get a clear look at them, the air thick with smoke and his line of sight constantly disrupted by moving people. The girl ripped the top open the packet and handed it to the blond one while number two swirled the remnants of alcohol in Bellingham’s cup around, as though deeming it “enough”. They proceeded to dump in the mystery powder and attempt to dissolve it with their nasty fingers
Holy hell.
This guy Jude Bellingham was about to get drugged, and he was too busy slurring at the bartender to notice.
And what was Pablo about to do? Watch it happen?
The empty feeling in his stomach intensified. He felt lightheaded from the smell of perfume and sea salt and weed attacking his nostrils. There had never been a worse moment to be so stone-cold sober in his life.
Pablo didn’t think.
He got up at a moment where the crowds were particularly thick, grabbed Bellingham by the back of his fancy white linen shirt, told the bartender, “Forget about it, bro, sorry about the hassle,” and began to drag the guy away. Away where? He didn’t fucking know. Anywhere Bellingham’s little party wasn’t.
“What the fuck are you—“ he began to say so loudly Pablo had to close his mouth with a hand to continue dragging him. He was a big guy, heavy too, but Pablo wasn’t a weakling, and all the drugs in his system meant Bellingham had the coordination of a toddler. It wasn’t difficult to move him as Pablo pleased.
“Wallet? Phone?” he asked curtly in English once he’d found a secluded corner of the wooden structure far away from the bar to shove Bellingham against. The guy was disoriented as hell.
“Who the fuck are you?”
“Wallet? Phone? Do you have them?” he asked again, taking his hat off, which somehow made a very meaningful difference to Bellingham if the way he yelled “Gavi?!” loud enough to turn some heads was anything to go by.
“Wrong guy,” he said quickly to the onlookers, firing off a quick, “You’re hallucinating,” to the lone voice insisting but that’s Jude Bellingham, before dragging Bellingham even deeper into the body of the bar. He felt flustered, his face hot and his heart hammering. He wasn’t made for stupid encounters like this.
“I asked you a question.”
“What the fuck is going on—“
“Do you have your phone and wallet—“
“Let go of me—“ Bellingham demanded, trying and failing to yank his hand out of Gavi’s grip.
“I asked one fucking question—“ Pablo insisted.
“Why the hell do you care—“ His breath stank of vodka and beer and weed and all sorts of nasty things.
“So I can go get it for you,” he said, adding dimwit under his breath in Spanish for good measure.
“Why the fuck would you do that— let go of me— are you mad—“ continued Bellingham even as Gavi managed to drag him to the one quiet hallway in the club, the one that led to the bathrooms.
“Are you mad?” Pablo fired back gripping his wrist hard. “You’re drunk—“
“No I’m not—“
“Yes you are—“ Pablo said, looking straight at him. Bellingham met his gaze with fire, like a little kid who’d had his playtime inexplicably interrupted. His eyes were bloodshot, unclear. “Did you ask those girls who were feeling you up to put things in your drink?”
In the typical fashion of a disoriented drunkard, Bellingham’s fierce stare quickly grew confused.
“What?”
“I watched them put things in your drink when you went to the bar.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Bellingham spat out. “You’re crazy! No — no one was even feeling me up—!”
“Mhm,” Pablo said, glancing down quickly, prompting Bellingham to do the same.
“Oh,” he said upon noticing how sloppily his pants laid. He braced himself against the hallway wall. “I don’t— I didn’t— I didn’t know— I mean— remember— I forgot she— um—“
“It’s okay,” Pablo said, though it really wasn’t. “Do I need to get your phone and wallet for you?”
“No,” said Bellingham, all the fight knocked out of him. “I— um—“ he rummaged his pockets, producing both items and fixing his pants at the same time. “Have them— um—“
“Good. Any other personal stuff? Bag maybe?”
“No—“ Bellingham swallowed. “I don’t know—“
“You should go home,” Pablo said. “Did you know those girls?”
He shook his head.
“So who are you here with?”
“I don’t know.”
“How can you not know?”
“I don’t remember—“
God, he was really making Pablo do everything the hard way, huh? So much for being a good person. “Your England teammates?”
“Fuck England.”
Right.
“Madrid?”
“Fuck Madrid.”
Oh wow. If the situation weren’t so dire Pablo would’ve wished to record this.
“Family?”
“Keep my family out of your fucking mouth—“ The bastard even had the audacity to grab Pablo’s shirt in the shittiest attempt at intimidation ever.
“Okay, jesus, fuck off,” Gavi said, pushing him back hard with two hands to the chest. It was a bad idea. The sudden jolt was no good for fucked up Bellingham’s balance. He swayed on his feet and made to lurch.
Gavi somehow managed to push him into a toilet stall before he vomited all over the floor.
+++
“You have to aim at the toilet, Bellingham—“ Pablo reminded, absentmindedly rubbing circles into his back. He wasn’t sure who it was meant to soothe, the drunk guy or himself.
“Bellingham Bellingham,” he said, wiping his mouth after his third round of puking. “ Who the fuck is Bellingham?”
“…You are?”
“My name is Jude.”
“Jude Bellingham.”
“Shut the fuck up.”
Why was Pablo doing this again?
He could leave the asshole here to pass out and drown in the toilet.
Oh right. Because, unlike Bellingham, he wasn’t a fucking asshole.
“Where the fuck are we?” Jude said, leaning against the wall. The stall was tiny, barely fitting the two of them, but at least it was flush from head to toe, which meant no one could see or hear them. Small mercies.
“The bathroom.”
“What the fuck are we doing here?”
“You literally just puked.”
Bellingham turned his head towards the toilet at snail’s pace, looked at the vomit, which reminded Pablo to flush, and went, “Oh. I forgot.”
“But you’re not drunk?”
“Definitely not.”
He was so drunk it wasn’t even funny.
Pablo sighed deeply, helping Bellingham up. He was so weak on his feet that he needed to use the wall for balance.
“Who are you here with?” Pablo tried to ask again.
“Nobody,” said Bellingham.
“You said you didn’t remember, earlier.”
“No I didn’t.”
Pablo felt the beginnings of a migraine. “Just tell me who you’re here with so they can take you wherever you’re staying.”
Bellingham didn’t respond. Pablo nabbed his phone out of his pants despite his protests. “Fine,” he said. “Call them yourself.”
“Okay,” said Bellingham surprisingly. The phone’s blue light illuminated his fucked up face. He seemed to be having trouble looking at it.
Finally. Pablo thought. There was light at the end of this tunnel yet. Then one, two, three minutes went by with little to no movement from Bellingham aside from staring at his screen.
“What are you waiting for?”
“…I’m not— I’m not here with anybody.”
“Okay, so where are you staying? I can call you a taxi.” God, this guy was really stretching both Pablo's English and his patience paper thin.
“I’m not staying anywhere.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I don’t have one— I mean— I didn’t book a hotel.”
Was he serious or had he forgotten?
“How the fuck can you not book a hotel? Stop fucking with me.”
“Well, I didn’t, bloody hell,” Bellingham said, his voice all wobbly on the volume. He looked like he was having trouble getting air in.
Too exhausted to find the right words, Pablo made a motion with his hand and head universal for have you lost your mind?
“Maybe I have!” Bellingham yelled, full-on heaving now.
“So you’re alone. And you don’t have a hotel. And you’re hanging out with people you don’t know doing drugs we’re not allowed to do—“
“Maybe I am!? What’s in it to you? Are you my mum or what—?”
“Sorry, I’m not an asshole! Next time I’ll let you alone to get— to get—“ He couldn’t even find the right words in English.
“Leave.”
“What?”
“It’s leave you alone. Not let.”
“Oh fuck off—“
“Sorry,” said Bellingham inexplicably, his face scrunching up. “Sorry. I— I’m a mess and I don’t— I don’t feel g—good—“ He pressed himself to the tiled wall, closed his eyes like keeping them open made him dizzy. “Fuck—“
Pablo made his second terrible decision of the night.
He texted Fermin.
Need the car and the room.
Deal with it.
Fermin fired back quickly like the phone addicted little shit that he was.
Slut
It was all he said, assuming Pablo needed their room to himself to spend the night with someone. He wasn’t wrong, technically speaking. The said someone just wasn’t a pretty girl he could have some fun times with, but a piss drunk Madridista on the verge of a mental breakdown.
He would’ve felt bad about leaving his friends hanging, but he knew none of them were stupid with alcohol and Fermin could more than afford the cab for the fifteen-minute drive to their Airbnb, so Pablo had to cut his losses here.
It was either this, or wake up to Jude Bellingham dies of alcohol poisoning in Ibiza hospital plastered all over the front pages tomorrow, and as nice as that thought might’ve been for Barca’s La Liga aspirations, somewhere along this deranged night Pablo had gotten invested.
He didn’t half-ass shit. Never.
+++
Pablo decided it would be better to put Bellingham in the back, too scared of a sudden uncoordinated movement from the guy sending them crashing into a real accident. He’d done most of the work, dragging him to the car without anyone noticing them much — laying him down in the reclined back passenger seats wasn’t very difficult. It also helped hide him from any unlikely paparazzi. The back windows were tinted.
“Stop kidnapping me,” Bellingham said. Okay, this did feel a little bit like smuggling, but kidnapping was taking things too far. “Take me back to the bar. What the fuck is wrong with you?”
He said all this while so weak he couldn’t sit up straight on his reclined seat.
“Shut up.”
“No, you shut up and take me back to the bar.” Pablo was reminded of his cousin Antonio. Antonio was four.
“You don’t want to go back to the bar.”
“Yes I do,” Bellingham said.
“If you have even a single drop of vodka more you’re going to fucking die, on the spot,” Pablo reminded harshly.
“…What about beer?”
There was no winning with this guy.
“Should’ve known you were an alcoholic like all your fellow englishmen,” Pablo muttered under his breath, in Spanish.
“Kiss my arse,” said Bellingham. “I’m not an alcoholic.” What, did Pablo need to start speaking Catalan now to have some thoughts to himself?
“That’s exactly what an alcoholic would say.”
“I’m not even drunk, you knob.”
“Knob is not a word.”
“Alright. Take me back to the club you short fuck. Are those words?”
“Wow. First of all, fuck you, I’m not fucking short. Second of all, is this how you show gratitude?”
“Take me back to the club you polvo corto.”
Traitorously, the stupidity of that statement stole a laugh out of Pablo. Someone had been learning Spanish from Google Translate. Though it made sense, Pablo too would rather talk to Google than have a conversation longer than a mutual vamos with Dani Carvajal and Dani Ceballos.
“I’m trying to help you. Shut up and let me help you.”
“No, you’re not.” He hiccuped, dragging his words. “You’re ruining my fun.”
“Fun? You don’t even know where you are.”
“Yeah, I do— Yeah. Ibiza.”
“Wrong, we’re in Tenerife.”
“…Seriously?” Bellingham asked seriously.
“Of course not you knob, you’re piss drunk.”
“And you’re a pisshead—“
“This isn’t preschool,” Pablo interrupted, resisting the urge to fire back with an even kiddier insult, his inner voice of reason (which somehow sounded like Ferran) laughing at his minuscule fuse, finally having had enough. “I know they say what happens in Ibiza stays in Ibiza and put stickers on our phones and shit, but tonight could’ve gone seriously wrong for you. This isn’t a joke. You could’ve flushed your career down the drain.”
They tended to get away with a lot, footballers, but that didn’t mean they had a totally free pass to do dumb shit. Judging from the amount he’d puked, his repeated lapses of memory and incoherence, Pablo would wager the guy had come very close to an unsolicited familiarization with Ibiza General Hospital’s ER, or even worse. And if those girls had gone through with drugging him… all sorts of bad shit could’ve happened. Sleeping with the wrong people, way too out of it to consent. Drunk driving, if he really was here alone. Alcohol poisoning. Overdoses. The whole kitchen sink.
Maybe getting mobbed by half a dozen creeps disguised in pretty dresses was drunk Bellingham’s idea of fun, but Pablo had a feeling he wouldn’t find it quite as fun if they came knocking with baby Bellinghams in hand nine months later and he didn’t even remember it.
“Fuck my career,” Bellingham spat out. “Everything’s always about my bloody career, isn’t it?”
Oh. Seemed Pablo had hit a nerve. The angry lashing out reminded him a lot of himself.
He didn’t like it.
“Fine, fuck your career,” Pablo agreed. “But you could’ve flushed your life too. Do you have a death wish?”
“No,” said Bellingham. “Maybe,” he corrected.
“God,” Pablo muttered in Spanish. This night had gone from simple people-watching to uncovering the deepest secrets of Jude Bellingham’s psyche in less than an hour. Things were spiraling fast and Pablo was not controlling them.
“I didn’t— I didn’t mean that—“ Bellingham backtracked when the silence in the car got a little too unbearable.
“Great,” said Pablo.
“I’m sorry,” said Bellingham. “I’m sorry Pablo. Don’t be mad at me.”
“Calm down,” he said, weirded out despite knowing full well this was little but drunken rambling. Gavi was surprised Bellingham actually knew his first name. “I’m not mad.” He was always a little mad but that was beside the point. “We don’t know each other like that.” Though it hadn’t felt like it. Drunk Bellingham was oddly easy to be frank with, despite his penchant for memory loss and his general lack of reason. Maybe because he was unlikely to remember any of this tomorrow Gavi felt at ease about acting like himself around him without any of the usual feeling out he needed to get comfortable around people. No eggshells. No hiding. No manners owed. Tomorrow, all of this would be nothing at all.
“But you saved me.”
“I thought I ruined your fun?”
“No— I don’t know— I don’t know anything.”
Bellingham didn’t speak again until they made it to the Airbnb.
+++
They stayed at these cute little beach-side bungalows whenever they came here for longer than a weekend. There were many of them next to each other, most had a fully outfitted bathroom and kitchen. Not that they were cooking or cleaning a lot, but having that possibility made Pablo feel less like a ditzy new money kid in over his head at five-star hotels and more like a normal young tourist. His friends didn’t all have wild footballer salaries either, a lot of them had quit academies years ago and just did it as a hobby, and Pablo himself wasn’t exactly in the highest bracket of earners yet, so splashing big on accommodation they barely stayed at was a major waste. Like this, he could convince himself it was a class trip with his best friends, in a way, and maybe he was into that because he’d never gotten to experience it growing up outside the context of football.
The setup came in major handy tonight. He unlocked the front door, pushed Bellingham inside, and closed it behind them with his foot, locking it quickly in case Fermin and the rest got any unfunny prank ideas.
“Where are we?” asked Bellingham, waddling around like a drunk penguin. The Airbnb looked well, it looked like a bunch of twenty-year-old men stayed in it. It was a bit of a mess, but the biggest mess in the room was the guy currently “exploring” it. He babbled as he did so. “Nice ceiling.” “Look at the sea, Pablo!” “My head hurts.” “Is the room spinning for you too?” “Where are we?” “I don’t feel very good.” “I feel great.”
Gavi sighed. He knew as soon as Bellingham started using the walls to hold himself up again the guy needed a cold shower, water, and sleep asap.
“Come on, dumbass,” he said, leading him into the spacious bathroom. He didn’t protest, almost seemed to enjoy getting manhandled. Gavi pointed towards the large bathtub. “Strip.”
“I’m not into that.”
Gavi felt himself flush and had to push down the intense urge to smack him.
“I said strip and get in the tub to have a fucking shower. You reek.”
“Oh.”
He was too inebriated to do it on his own. Pablo had to help him get his clothes off, had to help him into the tub then had to help him with the water too. He’d tried to let the guy do it himself, but, as with the toilet, the chances of him collapsing face first and drowning were low but never zero.
“It’s too cold,” he dared to say. “Make it a bit warmer. My stomach hurts.”
“Spoiled cunt,” Gavi mumbled but complied though he knew the cold was better for him. Bellingham groaned as Pablo washed his hair with lukewarm water. His bitching in the car was forgotten, replaced by the mannerisms of a pampered princess. How many types of drunk could be contained in a single person? Pablo had lost count.
“You’re so good at that, mate.” He groaned again, sinking further into the bubbly water. “Can you do my shoulder too? It always hurts like a bitch—”
“I’m not your personal masseuse—” said Gavi, grabbing the showerhead to rinse Bellingham off. He pressed the button that would drain the tub at the same time. “Come on,” he said, ignoring the guy’s whining and complaining. “You need to get dressed.”
After he tried and failed to get out of the tub on his own, Pablo wrapped him in a towel right where he sat and went to his room to find any sort of viable clothing. It was a little hard, considering the only member of their group who was vaguely Bellingham’s size was Mario and he was rooming with Cristo some bungalows away, but he managed to find one of his own extra large pajama sets. Old, at the beginning of ratty, Barca-themed, but at least clean and big enough.
When he came back, he found Bellingham staring at the ceiling with his head resting on the edge of the jacuzzi. For a second, Pablo feared he’d passed out.
“The ceiling is spinning Pablooooo—”
Unfortunately not.
Wrangling him into the new clothes was a task in and of itself. He had to stop halfway through to let Bellingham puke again. By the end he was noticeably greyish, so Pablo knew he had to get some water in the guy asap.
“You’re really strong,” Bellingham babbled when Gavi hooked his shoulder underneath his arm and hauled him to the main room. He’d wanted to put the guy on the couch, but it became quickly clear he’d never fit. Or he wouldn’t be comfortable, at least. He was too tall and his legs would likely hang over.
Pablo wasn’t sure why he cared about Bellingham’s comfort at all, but he begrudgingly brought him to his room and flopped him onto his large double bed anyway.
“Mhm,” said Bellingham, stretching his limbs all over Pablo’s nice clean sheets. Pablo cringed. “The stars look so nice today.” Pablo cringed again. You could see no stars, not through the closed curtains. Bellingham was staring at the dark accent wall and adding the stars from his own imagination. Great.
Gavi positioned him half upright against the headboard so he wouldn’t choke on his own vomit and went into the kitchen for water.
He came back to Bellingham counting the wrinkles on the fitted sheet.
“Drink,” he ordered, handing Bellingham an open bottle. He seemed to think drinking entailed pouring the water all over his chin and collarbones. “Stop— stop— idiot—” Pablo muttered, yanking the bottle away. Bellingham actually looked hurt, which made his stomach curl with guilt. He rushed back into the kitchen for a cup and a straw.
“Try this,” he said after pouring some water into the cup, holding it up for him and as good as feeding the straw into Bellingham’s mouth.
“Don’t want to, Pablo,” he mumbled against the straw.
“You need to,” Gavi insisted. He’d vomited too much and lost way too much liquid. “Come on. It’s not hard.”
“Can you put some tequila in it?”
“No.”
Bellingham grumbled but gave into the urge to suck on the straw. The water level in the cup quickly began to drop. Bellingham coughed.
“Slowly, idiot, it’s not gonna disappear.”
“But— but you said driiiink.”
“Drink slowly.”
When the majority of the cup was drained Gavi took it away, set it on the nightstand with more water inside in case Bellingham wanted more.
“You hungry?” he asked then, considering the guy’s still pitiful state.
Bellingham grunted.
“Want me to order pizza?”
“I want to die.”
Right. Pizza it was.
He found the closest of the many twenty four hour joints in the area and ordered the simplest, safest stuff possible. Then he reentered his room and stood there against the doorframe, staring at Bellingham and re-questioning his life choices.
“Do you also want to die or is it just me?”
Lovely stuff.
“Just you.”
“What’s wrong with me?”
“You’re a loser,” said Gavi, in no mood to pander to him.
“I am,” said Bellingham, nodding solemnly. “What’s wrong with me?” he asked after a few seconds.
“You’re an idiot.”
“I am,” Bellingham nodded again.
This was weird. Gavi didn’t like it. “Okay, seriously, what is wrong with you? What are you even doing here?”
“Partying.”
“With people you don’t know?”
“I know them.”
Gavi scoffed. “You said you didn’t earlier.”
“You’re lying.”
“Okay, so tell me their names then.”
Bellingham was silent for a long while. “…I think one was Rapha— Raphaella?—“
He stopped trying the longer Pablo leveled him an unimpressed look.
“Wanted to do something fun,” he reiterated. “Partying is fun. And I heard it’s nice here—” he leaned up. “Can you sit down? I can’t see the stars with you in the way, You’re stressing me out—”
“No,” said Pablo immediately. “Why would you come here alone to get piss drunk?”
“You’re piss drunk?”
“No, you’re piss drunk.”
“I’m not.” He paused for a second then, “D’you wanna get piss drunk together?”
The pizza guy ringing the doorbell saved him from answering that stupid question. Pablo quickly paid the tired-looking man, locked the front door, leaving the keys inside in case Fermin got the bright idea to use his own, and hauled the two pizza boxes into his room.
“You okay with Margherita?”
“I’m not hungry.”
Pablo took that as a yes. He put the box on the bed in front of Bellingham and opened it. It smelled strong, but also delicious. Bellingham’s eyes swept over it with clear desire.
“Take it,” Pablo said. He’d paid fifteen Euros each for these overpriced things, plus ten shipping. They better have been sent straight from Naples.
“Only if you sit with me.”
“I don’t want to sit with you.”
“Sit with me please— please Pablo— please—” He looked like a literal toddler on the verge of throwing a tantrum and the last thing Gavi needed was his sheets smeared with overturned pizza so he quickly sat down at the foot of the bed, grabbed a slice and took a bite out of it, as if to prove this wasn’t an attempted poisoning.
Like a true toddler, Bellingham followed suit, vacuuming up two slices of pizza folded on top of each other. He was too uncoordinated to eat cleanly, but Pablo didn’t bother pointing it out.
“S’good,” he said between mouthfuls.
Pablo wanted to laugh at the speed at which half the box was gone. “I thought you weren’t hungry.”
“I’m not,” Bellingham lied even as he ate half a slice in one bite. This felt like the twilight zone. It was almost the equivalent of eating with a friend, which would’ve been weird if Bellingham weren’t piss drunk, because sober Bellingham wasn’t a friend.
“You really hadn’t you eaten at all today?”
Bellingham scrunched his face up. “I think one of the cocktails came with peanuts?”
This guy was insane.
“That’s not normal, you know.”
“What?”
“Never mind. Drink some water too.”
They ate quietly for a while, nothing filling the room but chewing noises and the occasional sip and burp.
“Did you check on me?” Bellingham asked eventually. “I didn’t do anything weird did I?”
This was the definition of weird.
But maybe Bellingham understood the world differently.
“What kind of weird?”
“I don’t know. Bad…? I didn’t do anything weird did I?” God, drunk people were no fun when you weren’t also drunk.
“You might’ve taken some drugs on the banned list, but you should be fine for pre-season.”
“Fuck… I didn’t do anything weird did it?”
He was exhausted already.
“You didn’t run anyone over or get anyone pregnant, no.” He hoped.
“Why would I have done that?”
“I’m pretty sure all your friends earlier were trying to fuck you.”
“Oh.” He licked his lips. “But I didn’t do anything weir—”
“This is the definition of weird, Bellingham. I don’t know. I’m not your chaperone. Stop asking me stupid questions.”
“…Sorry,” said Bellingham quietly, making Pablo feel bad yet again. God, this guy was a master manipulator. Gavi couldn’t remember the last time he’d invoked god so often. Drunk Bellingham was making him rediscover religion. Maybe those people who swore off alcohol had a point. “You’re nice to me, Pablo. Why are you so nice?”
“I’m a normal human being,” said Gavi, taking the now empty boxes away. Bellingham looked incredibly soft slumped against Gavi’s headboard, the barca pajamas just right on him. They kind of… fit. “Not all of us are just nice to the cameras. Why are you so fucked up?”
“Don’t know,” said Bellingham.
“Why’d you drink so much?” Gavi rephrased.
“I think— think— I think I’m tired. I didn’t drink a lot. I could have some more—”
Gavi ignored that second part. “What are you even tired of?” Praise? Awards? Winning?
No way the Euros he'd get three more swings at had fucked him up this badly after the fantastic season he’d just had. No way.
“Everything.” Damn. Dramatic much? He sounded dangerously close to crying, so Pablo decided it was time for him to go to bed.
“How about we sleep now, yeah?”
“I don’t want to sle—”
“Yes you do,” said Pablo, grabbing a wet wipe from his dresser and walking over to wipe the guy’s face before he smeared sauce all over Pablo’s pillows. They had no washing machine and as much as he wanted to, he was not in the mood to spend his holiday washing sheets and bedding.
“What are you—”
“You’re not getting my pillows dirty.” He wasn’t super gentle, but he made sure not to be harsh either. It should’ve been weird, doing this for a stranger, but drunk Bellingham barely registered as a person to Gavi. Bellingham seemed to like getting pampered though, because he quickly shut up.
“It smells nice,” he said, staring up at Gavi with dilated eyes.
“What? The wipe?”
“No, your room. Your bed. Your clothes—”
“It’s normal laundry detergent,” Gavi quickly dismissed. “I don’t even know the brand—”
He was going to step away to dispose of the wipe when Bellingham quite literally yanked him closer by the arm and kissed him. Not on the cheek, not on the head (both would have been weird regardless), no, no, square on the lips. He tasted like pizza and kissed with about as much coordination as everything else he’d done that night, meaning none. But he pulled Gavi closer with his hands, tightened one of them around his tee right over the small of his back like Gavi pulling away would physically hurt him and despite the inebriation, the signs that he was normally a very good kisser were very much there.
It hit Pablo’s head like a sledgehammer. His vision went black, his body dizzy and tingling. His heart hurt, everything hurt, his shoulder, his knee, every damn muscle fiber and bone he was composed of. For about two seconds, he felt like he was getting his soul violently yanked out from underneath him. Then he heard a long ripping sound he was fairly sure he was imagining and his mind cleared, returning to reality.
The reality where Bellingham was still kissing him.
Pablo finally pulled away when the guy tried to lick into his mouth. His limbs prickled with pins like they’d lost oxygen supply. It was almost like Bellingham had transferred whatever bullshit he’d spent the day taking into Pablo’s bloodstream, because Pablo’s skull felt so heavy it was a miracle he kept being able to stand.
What the fuck. What the fuck was that?
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he spat out, quickly wiping at his face.
“You looked so pretty.”
“That doesn’t mean you can just kiss me!” Pablo said, idnignated. The tingling was slowly disappearing, his orientation slowly coming back, but his lips still felt bruised, his body foreign. He regretted his decision all over again and wished mightily for the night to be over. Had Bellingham somehow realized Pablo was into men? Was this all some big sick joke? What if all this time, he wasn’t drunk at all? “You like boys?”
“I don’t,” said Bellingham. At least he was also still dazed and loopy, clearly out of it. Pablo prayed again he’d remember none of this given a few hours of sleep.“But I— you— I really wanted to.”
Pablo also really wanted to beat the shit out of him. That didn’t mean he’d do it. Because he wasn’t fucking insane.
He had to sit down. He had to calm himself down.
“You’re a freak.”
“I liked when you touched me— in the last Clasico.”
What the fuck was this guy talking about? “You mean— on the fucking pitch?” That shit was a year ago, and also decidedly not sexy.
Bellingham nodded. “You’re so strong for your size. You were manhandling me. It’s hot.”
“You’re drunk.”
“You’re hot,” Bellingham repeated. If it hadn’t felt like the Twilight Zone before, it definitely did now. Pablo’s brain was screaming abort, abort the mission.
“Go to bed, man. This is weird as hell.”
“I’m kind of worked up though. D’you wanna get off?”
Was— was Jude Bellingham asking him to have sex? This could not be real.
“No, I don’t wanna get off.”
“We can…um… just like— rub one out— like with mates and stuff— don’t tell me you’ve never done it before—”
Of course, he had to make it as straight as possible. The last of any goodwill the night had built up was thrown out the window. Pablo felt like he was the one who needed to vomit. His heart was still beating like a drum.
“I don’t want to rub one out. You’re drunk. This is weird. We’re going to bed.”
“It’ll feel really good,” Bellingham insisted, promised, far too honest. “It’s more exciting when there’s someone else there.”
So he’d gone from disoriented to mad to sad to horny in the span of less than two hours. Was violent also on the list or…?
“I don’t care. We’re going to bed.”
“But, it tingles, and I feel— I feel—”
“No, Jude. I said we are going to bed. And you’re not masturbating on my sheets. So suck it up and fucking sleep before I throw you out.”
They stared at each other for a few seconds before the guy finally gave up.
“Okay,” he said. “Okay. You’re right.”
Gavi loitered around the hall, still lightheaded, until he heard snoring.
+++
It felt like what he imagined a sudden bout of anemia would feel like. He was weak, so weak he couldn’t stand longer than two seconds to fill himself a glass of water. About five minutes passed in a loop — standing to let the tap run a little, crouching down against the kitchen cabinets to collect himself before he collapsed, standing back up to pour more water. Somehow, he managed to gulp a cup down, hoping it would fix him, but he continued to feel faint, so much so that the journey to the couch he’d be sleeping on for what little remained of this night was a major drag.
He lay down — stared at the ceiling while attempting to collect himself. He wasn’t anemic. He didn’t have iron deficiency or any deficiency for that matter. Something similar had happened to him before, at the academy — he’d forgotten to eat before an evening training game and the physical exertion had made his blood sugar drop so massively he’d nearly fainted — but this scenario wasn’t the same at all.
He’d just had two fat slices of pizza and fucking Bellingham fucking kissing him could not be classified as physical exertion.
His shoulder hurt and his head was heavy. His legs felt too short, his arms foreign. He set his eyes on the sea-facing window (the only one whose curtains he hadn’t drawn because the guys had no way of looking in from outside) — on the beginnings of a sunrise over the plane of the Mediterranean — and tried his best to breathe.
A soft early morning breeze wafted through the room, swayed the lacy curtains. He too yearned for a shower, knew he smelled and looked like shit, but he couldn’t stand long enough to take one, right then. The homey couch was soft, soft enough you could sink into it. Bellingham's snoring in the background became an almost pleasant white noise, reminding him of those videos Mario had taken that one night where Pablo was the one snoring.
When Gavi closed his eyes, moments of the night were projected on repeat onto his eyelids, culminating with that idiotic kiss. What was he meant to do, when Bellingham woke up? Tell him everything that had happened, kiss included, or give few details besides the barebones? What would cause less of a mess? He supposed that depended on how much Bellingham remembered, though Pablo had a feeling it wouldn’t be a lot.
And as far as how Pablo was dealing?
He didn’t fucking know.
Getting kissed by Bellingham was weird and uncalled for and so strange it had caused an inexplicable bout of low blood sugar or whatever this was. He’d never thought about Bellingham in that way, because he rarely ever randomly thought that way about total strangers, much less enemies. Having grown up around so many athletic men who had the means to take care of themselves, pure looks were something he was desensitized to. You also had to learn to control that shit to avoid getting your feelings hurt, it was safe to assume all these said guys were straight until proven otherwise, which happened about one in a thousand times, nowhere near enough. Kissing Bellingham had never been a desire, because kissing Bellingham had never been a possibility. And now that it had happened, and the shock was mostly old news, Pablo found he hadn’t… hated kissing Bellingham.
“Fuck,” he mumbled to himself lowly and almost jumped out of his skin when he opened his eyes to see a cat on the windowsill. It was jet black with light eyes, perched with all the grace of someone who owned the house. He’d never seen it around before, and he hadn’t heard it climb up either, but stray cats did exist on the island, and at this point he was just grateful the intruder was just a cat and not, fuck if he knew, a ninja hired by Florentino Perez to assassinate him and bury any memory of this fucked up night.
Pablo was too tired to get up and chase the cat away. It wasn’t doing anything, at the end of the day. It was just a cat. Probably hung around knowing it could get some food and attention from giddy tourists.
He didn’t move even when it jumped from the windowsill into the living room and took a chance to explore. There was little light pollution over the ocean, so you could see the stars, the real ones that was, twinkling. Fer and the rest would probably be back soon. Pablo needed some shut-eye if he wanted to sort this Bellingham thing out tomorrow without them finding out about it.
They were good guys, so it was no big deal if they did find out, his logical side knew that. Besides, they wouldn’t know about the kiss unless Pablo told them, and Pablo had no intention of telling them.
But he’d rather… he’d rather nobody found out at all.
The cat decided Pablo’s arm, the one lying over the edge of the couch and nearly grazing the floor, would be a good thing to rub up against. Its fur was cold, almost unsettlingly so, but it was soft too.
“I’m so fucked,” he told the cat as though it could understand, finding enough strength to roll around and pet it a little. It purred, curling into his hand. The tips of his fingers began to tingle like they were falling asleep. “Do you think I’m fucked?”
It didn’t look like it cared.
“This must be a dream anyway,” he said.
Pablo didn’t remember falling asleep.