Work Text:
"Come and stay," Leo says, a few days before the final.
He hadn't asked before. Leo's not the kind of person who asks for a lot, and usually he doesn't have to open his mouth, not with Sergio.
Before, it wouldn't even have been a question. Sergio Aguero was Leo Messi's roommate, wherever they went. It was his rightful place. Now -
Sergio clears his throat. "You sure?"
"Of course I'm sure, idiot," Leo says impatiently. "Just don't leave the TV on when I'm trying to sleep."
That old argument again. Sergio can't resist teasing him. "You sound like such an old man."
Leo grins. "I am an old man."
They're both old men, for what they do. Leo started the call by asking how he was feeling, if he still had that headache, if he'd checked in with his doctor lately.
Sergio likes to tell him off, are you my mother? Just to get calm, polite, appropriate Leo Messi riled up, to turn the guy who can get kicked from one side of the pitch to another with no change of expression into an unreasonable child. Just to prove that he can still do it.
He was there in the beginning, before Messi existed, when Leo was just Leo, the quiet, headstrong kid who didn't know anything but how to play football, and didn't have to learn.
He saw all of it, the good and the bad:
Grinning at each other like idiots on a scorching hot day in Beijing, gold medals around their necks and already dreaming about the World Cup to come in two years time.
Then the catastrophe with Diego, holding Leo while he howled in the locker room after that horrible loss, whispering urgently about next time -
Walking past the Cup at the Maracana.
That goddamn penalty miss in the Copa.
When it looked like they might not even make it out of the group in Russia, and Leo said with a jagged little laugh If we go out tomorrow, we can never go home again. They'll kill us all.
When Leo paid for their flights out of his own pocket, and then half the federation's wages too, because someone had to.
When the fans cursed his name, burned his shirt, drew all over his statue, called him a mercenary and told him to stay in Europe.
Cold chested, they said. And even if Leo took his still beating heart out and showed them, it wouldn't have made any difference.
Sometimes Sergio wants to shout it from the rooftops. If only they knew, if only they could see how Leo takes everyone and everything on his shoulders, how much he cares, how he empties himself for the team.
He wants to tell them that Leo's just a person. Flesh and blood, not a god, not a superhero. He has bad days and gets sick and bleeds if you kick him hard enough. He can't bear the resentment of an entire country.
Messi's team is true in that Leo thinks the result is his responsibility and his alone, no matter what. Sergio's been that guy, but not for a while, not since he was a kid. Usually there are others to carry that weight with him. But with Leo, it's all on him.
The things they ask of him they'd never ask of anyone else.
"It's because I left," Leo used to say. "Nothing will ever be enough, because I left."
*
After Russia, Sergio thought about walking away too, but only until Leo rang and told him he was going to carry on.
"I'm 31, not dead. I want to keep going. I want to win something, even if it's not…"
"I'll be there," he'd said, without hesitation.
There was no world in which he could just leave Leo to it.
*
Giannina asked him once, does Leo know? Have you told him?
Sergio hasn't, not in words. What would be the point?
Leo doesn't belong to him. He doesn't even belong to Antonela. She has to share him with not just Sergio but the entire world, and she does it with more grace than he'd be able to manage, if Leo had been his before anyone else came along.
But Leo's still more his than anyone else's in some small ways, and some big ones. Sergio's a jealous bastard; he's more than willing to guard those with his life.
What? Unlike half his teammates, he can just think it instead of blurting it out to the nearest camera. Anyway, Leo knows. He doesn't need to be told.
It's clear in all the times Leo got up to go somewhere and stopped for him.
"You coming?"
Casual, not even looking at him, like he already knew the answer. And he did, because Sergio would already be up and shoving him to walk faster, old man.
That part's not special. The entire team and half the country would follow Leo into hell. But Sergio's still the only one Leo asks, and he'll take that to the grave.
*
He's as blindsided as anyone when Leo gets serious about leaving Barca. Of course he's seen all the signs, he's not an idiot. He'd just never imagined it getting to this point.
Leo hadn't picked up the phone to Sergio first; no need. Pep's the one he has to talk to, the one who can save him, take him away from the hysterical hot mess of a club in constant crisis and give him an environment with nothing to worry about again. But he calls Sergio right after.
"So are you finally going to listen to me after all this time?" Sergio says, all cheek. He doesn't really believe it and fully expects Leo to brush him aside, gently but firmly. Like always.
Instead, there's a long silence.
"What would you do if you were me?"
"Fuck, don't ask me, do you know what you're asking me?" Sergio snaps. "I can't tell you that."
Even if he wants to. Especially if he wants to.
The next silence has a distinctively annoyed quality. Most people's silences aren't so eloquent; most people aren't Leo.
"Okay, okay, calm down, idiot. Forget I asked," Leo says.
If Leo came to Manchester, they could see each other every day. But Sergio knows even as he's thinking it that there's no way. Where Leo's concerned, he's been losing to Barca for years. Nothing's going to change that short of a brain transplant.
Some things are immovable, like Barcelona's stained glass windows, etched in ink on Leo's arm. In the end, not even the one who built Leo his own cathedral could make him walk away.
Leo's the most loyal person he knows. Most times, Sergio loves him for it.
*
That's fine. Since Leo won't come to him, he'll just have to go to Leo. And they'll still have the national team.
The national team, with all the recrimination, the doubts, the abuse, the endless speculation and media bullshit.
Only friends of Messi get to play, what nonsense.
"I'm a friend of Messi and I still can't get on the pitch," Sergio says. He laughs to show that he's just joking, not actually mad at Scaloni. Ha ha, nothing to see here.
Anyway, he knows he's worth the call up on his own merit, even aside from being Leo's friend. He's one of the top scorers in the Premier League, not a goddamn mascot.
He can get away with saying a lot, not like Leo. The journalists are all used to his sense of humour, and he's always been obliging with a quote. Who else are they going to bother? Higuain's gone. Mascherano too.
Just a few of the old guard left, battered and bruised and still going because they can't give in. Can't let everyone who doubted and abused them be right, even if they have to fight not just the opponent but their own media and their disaster of a federation.
Sergio's worth a call up but not a starting spot and no matter what jokes he makes to the media that does sting, especially when he's losing out to one of the brats who spend all their time staring at Leo with stars in their eyes.
They're all so in awe - or, something even more powerful than awe. Something Kun recognises. He copes by giving Leo no end of shit about it.
"Do these guys know you used to pull the power plug if you were gonna lose at FIFA?"
"I did not," Leo says.
"You did! And you cheat at Truco."
"That's the entire point of Truco," Leo says outrageously.
"No, it's not! If Rodri told you that, he's lying. No wonder you guys always win."
A fond smile steals onto Leo's face. "Rodri's a good kid. Reliable."
Sergio rolls his eyes. There's a sour taste in his mouth at that word, reliable. He swallows to get rid of it. "He's a bastard. They're all bastards, they only act like school boys around you."
He's not being unfair, not in the least. They're a pack of wolves, these boys, grade A shitheads and street fighters in the classic tradition, all bloody smiles and mad eyes. And they're maddest about Leo.
This generation isn't like his own. Leo's not just Leo to them. They were all raised on his glories, and on his suffering. They know about everything he's done. They cried for him before he even knew they existed.
Sergio can't imagine what that's like, how potent it must be. To them it must be like playing with a superhero.
And they don't respect a prior claim. He's constantly having to fight to defend his own turf, even on his own turf.
"Christ knows what you'd be like if I wasn't here," he says, giving Paredes a friendly shove off his bed.
"As if you're any different to the rest of us," Paredes mutters, because he's a dick, but he does take the hint and stands up. "I heard you asking him who he was staying with, back when you were out of the team."
"You heard me?" Sergio repeats suspiciously.
"Leo put you on speakerphone," Paredes replies with great relish. "Don't worry, I didn't nap in your bed."
At least he knows it's Sergio's bed. "You better not."
Paredes continues as if Sergio hadn't spoken. " - Rodri might have, though."
"No, he didn't," Leo yells through the bathroom door. Or at least that's what it sounds like through a mouthful of foam, making his accent even more of a mumble than usual. "Lea's just fucking with you because he's an asshole."
Paredes' serial killer face cracks very briefly into the kind of look Benjamin gets when his mom catches him doing something he shouldn't.
"I'm just making sure Kun doesn't get complacent," he says defensively. "Don't get mad at me again, Leo, I can't take it."
If he had a tail, he'd be wagging it.
Sergio swings a kick at him. "Get out of my room, asshole."
By the time Leo comes out of the bathroom he's finally chased Paredes off, much to Leo's amusement.
"See, Lea only looks scary," he says.
"You're so nice to these kids," Sergio says in his best sad sack voice. "You're never that nice to me."
Leo's mouth drops open. "What are you talking about. All the shit I let you get away with?"
"No, you don't. You're always annoying me. If everyone knew how annoying you could be, they'd be amazed."
And that's good, that's perfect. He wouldn't want Leo to be Messi with him. Humble, patient Messi is for everyone else. Leo who's kind of an obsessive, unreasonable asshole is a secret just for Sergio.
Some might say they're just too used to each other. Habit.
We're an old married couple, Sergio likes to say. We definitely fight like one.
That's the habit of half a lifetime now. No one else can say that. No one else has been around the whole time, seen him nervous and dejected and happy and sad and now, at last, at ease.
Leo's having fun in the shirt again, finally. It reminds Sergio of when they were kids, back in the youth team, everyone tuned to his every move, going where he led them, running on his eyes and brain, truly his team.
For a while there even determinedly unsuperstitious Sergio felt like God was out to get them. That he who had given both so much would not give them the one thing they wanted most: glory, yes; but more than that, as the scar tissue built up, one on top of the other, every time Sergio saw Leo's quietly devastated face he wished more than anything else for Leo to have peace.
When it arrives at the Maracana, he can hardly believe it.
"Finally. Finally."
Leo seems to have lost all his other words. Not that he needs them. He's crying, has been on and off since the final whistle, when the entire team ran toward him and buried him in their arms.
"Finally," Sergio repeats. "After all that suffering."
Finally, it was over.
*
And then -
The first thing Leo says is sorry.
"What, you think I came out here just for you?" Sergio retorts. "The size of your head!"
They both know why he did what he did. Everyone on earth knows it. Leo couldn't give up on Barcelona to come to Manchester, so he came to Barcelona. And now, there will still be the beaches and the sun, but no Leo.
There's not even any time for his own pity party. Not when Leo's grief is so quiet and so heavy, a black hole devouring everything around it.
Any day now, he'd said. Any day now. The club promised me. They promised.
Sergio's got no one else but himself to blame for this mess. Normal, sane people move clubs and countries for their own careers. He hasn't got too many years left, he should be making the most of it. Rake in the money while he still can.
A part of him still thinks he'll be back on the street one day, kicking bottles around, that clawing ache in his tummy from being hungry all the time.
He knew it as a kid: think of yourself first, because no one else will.
He's had a pretty good career. People think well of him in England and in Madrid and, sometimes, even in Argentina. He won titles on the whistle. There's a literal statue of him in Manchester.
But for a lot of people, he's Leo Messi's best friend first. The sun's brighter than any star.
The maddest part, maybe, is that Sergio's fine with it. More than fine: he's smug. Leo Messi's best friend is a trophy as shiny as any he's won on the pitch.
*
And then -
Turns out his heart's broken. That's kind of funny.
When Sergio was sixteen, his club lost two young goalkeepers named Molina in the space of six months. First Lucas, and then his friend Emiliano.
Emiliano was the same age as Sergio, and had come up with him in the youth team. He got into a bad car crash and the doctors couldn't fix him. It happened when Sergio was in the Netherlands, playing in the Youth World Cup.
He still remembers the moment Leo told him. He hadn't had any time to react, because they were about to play a semi-final against Brazil.
Lucas was a little different. He died in his sleep of a heart attack. He'd been twenty.
The game's infinite - there's always another day, another tomorrow. But careers aren't infinite. Sergio's over thirty, at the tail-end. He had known it was coming, but not so soon. It's too soon.
On the pitch, nothing hurts, not even being kicked. Off it, there's life. What is he if not a footballer? He's not ready to answer yet.
"I'm sorry," Leo says again.
"What, you didn't give me a bad heart."
"I'm sorry for you."
He can't cry in front of Leo. He's the one who always has a smile on his face, the guy with the jokes, the one who keeps the conversation moving in a room of guys who don't know how. Being whatever the group needs. The one who can make Leo laugh no matter how bad things are.
He hasn't cried in front of Leo since they were both children, when Leo told him your friend Emi, I just saw it on the news - I'm sorry -
Leo had cried with him then, just sat there with him until he was empty. He'd do the same now, if that was what Sergio needed.
Ah, fuck, he's doing it again.
"I'm sorry," Sergio says, through the tears. "I wanted to keep going. I - "
He didn't want to leave Leo alone, the way everyone else had. He'd wanted to be there until the end, the only one who managed to stay with Leo the whole time, who hadn't ever abandoned him for anything or anyone, not even himself.
He's not ready to go. They had one final promise to fulfil, the old guard. They'd promised it to each other.
The last dance. Theirs, and his.
"Shut up." Leo wraps his arms around Sergio and lays his head on his chest, right over the surgery scar. "I like you alive. That's what I care about."
*
And now -
After all the false dawns and shitty endings, there's this, more unbelievable than the script of any movie: the two of them on the eve of another World Cup final, even if only one of them will get to play in it.
I don't want anything if it's not with Leo, like they sing on the terraces.
Even more surreal is Rodrigo following him all the way to their room. He's like a big golden retriever. One that can't stop licking its owner's face.
Sergio has to suppress a laugh at the thought.
"What, Rodri, are you gonna follow me in here too?"
Rodrigo grins. "Can I not?"
"No," Sergio says firmly. "It's my room."
Rodrigo looks past him, to the shadow of Leo on the bed. He might as well not be there.
"Make sure he gets some rest," Rodrigo says.
"Next you'll be telling me how he likes his mate," Sergio replies.
Rodrigo opens his mouth because he's a shithead. Sergio starts to shut the door in his face.
"Kun, wait - just." Rodrigo lowers his voice. "It's good you're here. Take care of him."
Like he's giving permission or something. Clearly Sergio needs to stick around to keep these kids' heads from getting too big.
When Antonela says it, that's giving permission. Everyone else can get in line.
"Go to sleep, Rodri," Sergio says. Then he does shut the door in Rodrigo's face.
Leo has a funny look on his face when he gets inside.
"What?"
"Just something Anto said. I can't believe you talk about me."
"Of course we talk about you."
Leo covers his face. "Urgh, just thinking about it scares me."
Sergio laughs. "Well, I said it. If I couldn't be a footballer, I'd be a footballer's wife."
Leo goes bright splotchy red under his thick beard. "I don't know how you can say things like that."
"What? I don't care." Sergio throws himself onto Leo's bed. It's not a big bed - good thing neither of them are giants. "No one else gets to do this."
He steals a glance up at Leo just in time to catch him grinning. "Move over then."
With the lights off, all the sharper angles and wrinkles disappear; he could be looking at Leo's face from ten, even eighteen years ago. The same guileless eyes, the same artless expression.
They've been here a hundred times. But never like this. Even the night before the Maracana final, it hadn't been like this, with the certain knowledge of what tomorrow would bring - the only tomorrow left - sitting like lead in his stomach. And he's not even going to be on the pitch.
The fifth time he catches himself turning over, he sits up instead.
Leo's hand lands on his arm before he can stand.
"Where are you going?"
"I'm too nervous, I'm going to leave so you can sleep," Sergio says. And he is - more nervous than he's ever been.
Leo snorts. "Why are you nervous? I'm not."
Sergio throws himself at Leo - in comical slow motion because they're both old and he's minding Leo's entire, priceless body. He ends up carefully hunched over Leo, their chests pressed together. "Asshole."
He can feel it when Leo laughs. "So are you."
"Hey."
"What?"
"You're gonna do it," Sergio whispers.
He's been too afraid to say it. But it's easier in the dark.
Easier still, in the face of Leo's smile. "I know. There's no such thing as coincidence, Kun. It was always meant to be, you'll see."
Leo had said that before the Copa final last year, and it came true then. Maybe because they all believed it and wanted it so much.
Sergio twines their fingers together. "Yeah. I know."
Let it happen, he begs. Please. Please just give me this. Give him this.
So many people want this for Leo. Surely that does something.
There might be a hundred possible sad endings to their story. They've had more than a few already. They've both cried enough, and picked themselves up to keep going, to try for a better finale.
Their definitive ending can't be a tragedy. Sergio doesn't believe in a god that would do that to Leo.
He believes in Leo, to find the right pass, the right finish, to unlock their happy ending.
*
Leo's crying, just a little, wiping at his eyes like a little kid.
Sergio's seen him cry before, too many times. He cried so much after losing in South Africa, howling like a heartbroken child, and it scared the hell out of Sergio. He cried when he was holed up at Sergio's place after 2014 and refusing to speak to anyone, so quietly that Sergio's heart broke for him and that stupid beautiful gold trophy, forever just out of reach. He's seen Leo wake up with tears in his eyes because he had the same dream again, of that cursed final.
He was afraid he'd never get Leo back, after that. Just an empty shell of a man. He didn't know then that it could be worse. That what was left of Leo's heart could still shatter. That happened two years later, with the penalty.
Three lost finals in three years. Enough to crush anyone.
Sergio hadn't blamed Leo for quitting. But he hadn't been surprised when he started wavering either.
"What would you do?" Leo had said, sounding more lost than he'd ever been.
Sergio had no idea what would come out when he opened his mouth, just that he hated seeing Leo look so shattered and uncertain.
"I'd probably stop. But you shouldn't."
Leo's brows furrowed more, but he nodded for Sergio to continue.
"Just keep going. Just keep going and eventually you'll be somewhere better. If you stop now this is all it'll ever be, and that's wrong. You know it is."
His heart was thumping in his ears by the time he finished, and Leo was staring at him.
"You're right, I can't stand it." He shook his head with a chuckle. "Since when did you give sage advice?"
"You're the one who asked me," Sergio retorted.
He can't fix his own heart, but he helped mend Leo's. He'll take that to the grave.
And for a reward Sergio got to watch Leo run like it was his last match on earth, like he was eighteen again; and run faster than he's ever run to meet Leo down on the pitch; and have Leo look up at him in the pile of bodies and pull him in until their foreheads met and their breath mingled and for a brief moment no one else existed.
The pitch is a madhouse. Sergio's ears are ringing from all the shouting, the fans singing their song, the boys bellowing along tunelessly:
Veni veni, canta conmigo,
Que un amigo vas a encontrar
Y de la mano, de Leo Messi.
Toda la vuelta vamos a dar.
"And by the hand of Leo Messi - "
Sergio grins at Leo as he sings his name to find him bashfully mouthing along, beaming and flushed, almost glowing with happiness.
He's done it. Delivered the ultimate prize. No one can ask for anything more. Now all he has to do is accept all their love, from the fans in the terraces to the boys in the team to Sergio, with an arm around him.
Sergio's too young to remember 1986, but he's seen the photos. He folds down and gestures for Leo to climb on to his shoulders.
Leo looks sceptical when Sergio twists his head back.
"You sure?"
"Sure I'm sure. Hop on."
For someone so big Leo is so small. So light. He always thought so.
A long time ago Sergio put his arms around Leo and lifted him up as he held the World Cup trophy. Small, silver, not the big gold thing. Like a toy.
They were young then and had the whole world ahead of them.
We all grow up and get old, Pep once said.
Growing up is great and getting old is terrible. They both have creaking limbs and scars and Sergio's got a chip in his heart. His son's almost as old as Sergio was when he was first called up by the youth team. His knee hurts when it's about to rain.
And here they are, at the top of the world. Leo on his shoulders, the Cup - that beautiful awful thing that's haunted all their dreams all for so long - in his hands. Surrounded by their friends and family, everyone singing the same song.
*
Hours later, they're still singing, in increasingly hoarse voices, in between shots and champagne spray and beer and dancing.
Sergio's lost track of how much Fernet he's had. Just that Leo took one look at him and snatched his jug away.
"Stop that. Go eat something."
He's still the most stupidly devoted person Sergio knows.
He's no good at speaking, but he doesn't have to speak. You know when Leo loves you, Antonela had said, as they watched Benjamin chase a squealing Mateo around an Ibiza pool.
Sergio was there before almost anyone else, but she was there even before that. He thought about that a lot during the wedding and at the reception, as they danced together on stage, Leo with an arm around Antonela and another around Sergio, his usual awkward, shy manner stolen away by beaming joy.
"I love you, Leo."
It comes out slurred. Leo rolls his eyes.
"I know. For fuck's sake, eat something."
"What? If something is going to happen, let it happen here."
Sergio's heart is racing and he's never cared less. He can't ask for any more from life. If this is it, so what?
Leo shoves him. It takes him two tries; he's also had a lot of Fernet.
"Shut up, what are you saying, you dick?"
He shouts it into Sergio's ear, his accent even thicker than usual.
Sergio shouts back.
"I don't care, we're world champions, I fucking love you, we're world champions."
Leo kisses him. It's terrible, worse than their first kiss, like they haven't done this a thousand times. They both taste like Fernet. Their noses bump. Leo's teeth get in the way, somehow, but he keeps pressing forward; Sergio's gonna have a bruise later like he's been punched in the mouth.
Leo draws back just far enough to yell at him.
"Shut up, dumbass. Don't even think of it. Stay here."
"You mean tomorrow?"
But I have to go pick up Benjamin, Sergio thinks dumbly.
"Even when you're too old to carry me," Leo says.
He mumbles it real quiet, but somehow it cuts through the noise like one of his defence splitting passes, and it freezes Sergio in place like one of those duped defenders. The roof could fall in and he wouldn't notice.
He coughs to clear his throat. "I'm already too old for that, dumbass. That was a one time deal. You're fucking heavy. My back hurts."
Leo knocks his fist against Sergio's chest, giggling. "Nonsense, you seem pretty well to me."
Hearts break. And if you're lucky Leo Messi, who works miracles, might mend yours.
"Yeah. I am."
