Chapter 3 #3
After years of sharing locker rooms with plenty of half-naked, athletic men, Lee had perfected his ability to ignore his surroundings.
So when Alex returned from his own workout just before dinner and stripped down to dark blue boxer briefs right there in the middle of the room, Lee remained resolutely focused on his phone.
Only when Alex was heading for the bathroom, clothes in a pile at the foot of his bed and his back to Lee, did Lee allow himself one quick, covert glance from where he was lying diagonally on top of the covers of his own bed.
Yeah, Alex was really bloody fit. Moving on.
Lee didn’t look up again when Alex reemerged from the bathroom in a cloud of steam and completely naked, ambling over to the wardrobe where he took his sweet time choosing an outfit. Well, hey. At least it confirmed that Alex truly didn’t suspect any undue interest on Lee’s part.
“You realize it’s not a fashion show, right?” Lee asked after Alex had considered and dismissed three similar jeans-and-T-shirt combinations, and right, so much for Lee keeping his full attention on his phone.
Alex threw him a glance, perfectly at ease in another pair of boxer briefs—rightfully so, with a body like that. “Don’t you ever get tired of jogging bottoms and fitness tops?”
“Not really, no.” Lee looked down at his ensemble in white and blue. “Nothing wrong with the official team outfit, is there?”
“Nothing at all. If, you know,”—Alex’s smirk was far off the sweet smile he tended to flash for the cameras—“you’re into being boring.”
“I’m into being efficient,” Lee countered, sitting up against the headboard of his bed. “Taking five minutes to combine a pair of dark blue jeans with a white T-shirt seems like a bit of a waste.”
“Spoken like a true ignoramus,” Alex said, and Lee strove to keep his focus on Alex’s face rather than let it venture down to his pecs, defined abs, or the tantalizing peaks of his hip bones.
“You’re a lot more sarcastic than you let on.”
“I pick my moments.” Alex reached for the pair of jeans that sat between two others on the bed. Other than a minor deviation in color, they looked no different than the ones on the right or the ones on the left.
When Lee said as much, Alex paused in buttoning them up. “First off, they’re a different brand. Secondly, it’s a different cut.”
Lee blinked and filed the visual of Alex’s slender fingers against his partly undone jeans away into a dark corner at the back of his mind. “Still looks the same, though.”
“Lord help me—you’re worse than Jeff.” The words were infused with just a hint of amusement.
“What’s wrong with him?”
“Have you ever seen him voluntarily wear anything other than sports clothing?”
“And I repeat—what’s wrong with him?”
Alex finished buttoning up his jeans. “Try wearing a proper outfit to a bar for a change. Women will look at you differently, especially the ones who don’t know who you are.”
Because that was what kept Lee up at night, yeah. “Thanks,” he said dryly. “But I’m good.”
“Yeah, I guess you’d do okay either way.
” Alex assessed Lee with a quick look before he tilted his head, his mouth pulling into a thoughtful line.
“Okay, how about this—if we win our first match, you let me dress you for the party afterwards. See if you’ll feel differently in clothes that don’t come with a sweat-wicking claim. ”
Boy, they’d sure made some progress in the last few hours—unless Alex planned to dress Lee in a clown costume, of course. Lee considered him for a few seconds. “What’s it to you?”
“I like fashion.” When Alex grinned, there was nothing sweet about it. “I also like hearing that I’m right.”
“You know what’s weird?” Lee asked before he could think better of it.
“People who drink English Breakfast in the evening?”
It startled a snort out of Lee. “Yeah, that too. I meant more how you’ve got this reputation as, like… the darling of the Premier League when you aren’t half as sweet as you like to pretend.”
The way Alex’s eyes narrowed suggested he was weighing whether to take offense.
In the end, he simply shrugged. “It’s not all fake, you know?
I think there is a certain obligation on people like us to model good behavior.
But you were all… stand-offish with me when we met, so I guess I stopped bothering. ”
Stand-offish? That was not how Lee remembered it.
He remembered feeling strangely intimidated by Alex, unsettled by Alex’s polished language and boyish charm, unable to pinpoint the cause of his unease until they’d ended up talking after one practice session and Lee had suddenly realized that he was attracted to Alex.
More than just a passing appreciation for a fit guy that Lee had been able to reason away in the past, but a proper crush, which, bloody hell.
He was pretty sure he’d high-tailed it out of there, although he couldn’t recall the details.
Cue some soul-searching and a couple of sleepless nights followed by the infamous pretty boy incident, and here they were.
Not something he could explain to Alex, though.
“Okay, listen.” Lee set his phone aside and crossed his legs, making an effort to hold Alex’s gaze. “I know this is gonna sound like a line, but it wasn’t you. I was still a bit shy back then, and you were”—effortlessly charming—“rather hard to ignore.”
“You were shy,” Alex repeated flatly. He paused, then shook his head. “Why? Everyone knew it was only a matter of time before you’d be moved to the first team.”
“This may come as a surprise to you, but being shy isn’t rational.” Lee could have left it at that, but if he was at least partly to blame for how vastly they’d got their signals crossed… “Plus, my teenage years were kind of rough.”
It was the extent of what Lee was willing to offer, and maybe Alex could tell because he nodded and finally, finally reached for a T-shirt. “Thanks for telling me, I guess.”
Well, well. Look who packed some manners for the trip.
“You’re welcome,” Lee told him and wondered whether he should avert his eyes. Probably not, right? “Also, okay.”
“Okay?”
“We win against the Dutch, you get to pick an outfit for me—if I deem it acceptable. Not sure where you’ll find one here, but I guess that’s your problem, not mine.”
“There’s this thing called the internet, Lee. It delivers.”
Smartass.
“There’s also this thing called dinner, Alex. It awaits.”
Alex tugged at the hem of his off-white T-shirt. Admittedly it fit him well, but it was still just… Well, it was still just a T-shirt. “I’m almost done, but feel free to go ahead.”
“It’ll look better if we show up together.”
Alex slid Lee a surprised look that instantly raised Lee’s hackles. He countered it with a pointed stare, and Alex’s face relaxed into a smile. “Chill, mate. It’s just nice that you don’t take your spot in the starting eleven for granted—that you’re willing to make an effort, you know.”
“I don’t think there are any guarantees with Kieran.” Lee considered it briefly. “Other than Oliver, maybe. Unless he breaks both his arms, he’s playing.”
“Don’t jinx it,” Alex muttered. “Okay, gimme just a sec, then I’m ready.” With that, he dashed into the bathroom, and when he came back out, he smelled like some expensive cologne—noticeable but not overpowering, cedar wood and something else. Frankincense?
There was a comment at the tip of Lee’s tongue about how Alex better not expect Lee to use more than deodorant because yeah, not happening. He opted against it and got off the bed to join Alex by the door.
“Dinner?” Alex asked, and Lee nodded.
“Lead the way.”
They didn’t talk much on the way down, just a comment here and there about how the Soccer Association must have instructed the hotel to dot the common areas with England flags and historical team pictures.
Lee was acutely aware of Alex by his side, still struggling to rearrange his perception of him into one that accounted for what he’d learned today.
Not a homophobe. Possibly self-conscious about his upbringing. Healthy sense of sarcasm.
“At least,” Alex spoke into Lee’s thought process, “the hotel staff here can’t judge us too harshly for basking in past victories.” He gestured at a range of pictures from 1966. “I mean, Spain won just once too, even if theirs is a bit more recent. And they stand a much better chance than we do.”
“Because we’re a young team?” Lee asked. “As far as I’m concerned, that’s our chance right there—let them underestimate us.”
“Right.” Alex was quiet for a beat, the usual confidence he projected muted for once. “You really think we have a shot?”
“Honestly?” Lee stopped next to the door that led to the hotel restaurant’s patio, abruptly reminded that Alex was only twenty-three.
Sure, Lee was just two years older, but this was his second World Cup even if the first hadn’t been something to write home about.
“Yeah, it’s a snowball’s chance in hell.
But crazier things have happened, right? ”
One corner of Alex’s mouth pulled up. “Like how a few soccer matches triggered a war between Honduras and El Salvador?”
“Way to look first right, then left, and then pick the depressing option. I was more thinking of how rats laugh when you tickle them.”
The other corner of Alex’s mouth pulled up too. “Really?”
“Yeah.” Lee stepped aside to let Lewis pass.
He gave them a cautious look, likely wondering whether an intervention was in order, but then moved on without comment.
“My sister studies biology,” Lee continued.
“I didn’t believe her at first, but there’s solid research and all.
It’s these high-pitched chirping sounds that are outside our hearing range so you need special equipment to hear them but…
yeah. It’s real. And apparently, rats enjoy being tickled because they actually seek it out. ”
“That?” Alex’s whole face lit up. “Is amazing.”
“I thought so too. There’s a National Geographic video about it—I can show it to you after dinner.”
Before Alex could reply, Jeff joined them with a, “Well, what’s this? Am I being replaced? I am scandalized, Alex. Scandalized.”
Lee didn’t know Jeff all that well, but the fact that Alex barely reacted seemed to suggest this wasn’t unusual behavior. “You told me to play nice,” Alex told Jeff. “Happy?”
“Very,” Jeff said with a decisive nod, and right, Lee should have expected that Alex had received an earful about their interactions too—why else would he have made an effort to clear the air between them? They weren’t becoming friends after two semi-pleasant conversations.
“We thought we’d arrive together,” Lee contributed. “Give everyone a minor heart attack at seeing us act like civilized people around each other.”
Jeff grinned. “I like it. Give me a minute so I can find a good seat for the show.” With that, he slipped out onto the patio, leaving behind a momentary gust of warm evening air and silence that felt tinged with just a hint of awkwardness.
“So, uh.” Alex shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “Topic suggestions for what we can talk about when we walk in?”
“The state of the world?” Lee offered.
“Depressing.” Alex’s lips quirked. “Whether you snore?”
Right. Because they’d be sleeping next to each other.
“I don’t,” Lee said with dignity.
“How do you know, though?”
“My ex would have told me.” Giovanni truly would have—he hadn’t been the type to censor his words. “What about you?”
“Whether I snore?” Alex held the door for Lee and followed suit before he replied. “Nah, my ex definitely would have told me. She did complain about how I steal the covers, but that’s not exactly going to be an issue with us.”
She. Of course.
Lee snorted softly, aware that several heads turned at their appearance. “Only if you sleepwalk across the room and climb in with me.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake. Why had he said that?
“No sleepwalking,” Alex promised lightly. “I don’t fancy a kick in the nuts.”
“And on that delightful note…” Lee tilted his head as he smiled at Alex, making sure to let his eyes crinkle at the corners for the sake of their audience in general and Kieran in particular. “Enjoy your dinner, and I’ll see you later?”
“Inevitably,” Alex returned with a smile of his own that didn’t look fake. They stood like that for a second, then Lee turned to claim the free seat next to Oliver at a table for four while Alex moved over to where Jeff was sitting.
After reaching for a bread roll, Lee took in his surroundings.
The evening sun drowned the golf course in golden hues, all gently sloping hills and lush grass, and he knew it was only a matter of time until Oliver would comment on the insanity of maintaining a golf course in an area that was starved of precipitation. Oliver wasn’t wrong, of course.
He was also staring at Lee with a shrewd expression.
Lee kept his voice low. “Okay, so you were right.”
“Oh, excuse me.” Oliver leaned closer, grinning broadly. “Can you speak up, please?”
“You heard me.” Lee glanced at Finley and Declan who were sharing their table. Fortunately, they appeared engrossed in a conversation about Argentina post-Messi and Portugal post-Ronaldo.
Smug was not a good look on Oliver. “So,” he said in an undertone. “I was right, huh? I take it he’s not a homophobic prick, then?”
“No.” Lee shot a look at where Alex was laughing at something Jeff had said, head thrown back. Stop staring. Lee tore a piece off his bread roll and returned his focus to Oliver. “Still painfully posh, though.”
“Is he now?” Oliver’s lips twitched into a teasing curve. “And how’s that crush doing?”
“Oh, shut up.” It wasn’t exactly the mother of all comebacks, but it was the best Lee had.
Oliver elbowed him. “Never.”
“I’ll call Sanna and tell her you’re being mean to me.
” Fat lot of good it would do given that Oliver’s wife was likely to just laugh at Lee and tell him to get laid because “feeling another human’s touch is important for your sanity, Lee, and I’m not volunteering my husband”, to which Lee would ask who the hell had been crazy enough to hand her a therapist license. Sanna was great.
“Like she’d believe you over me,” Oliver said.
“Hey, she likes me.”
“Wonder why,” Oliver grumbled, then bumped their knees together. “Hey, I’m glad it’s not what you thought it was.”
“Me too.” Lee sent Alex another look, and yeah, he really was glad it had been a misunderstanding and that Alex was maybe kind of all right, after all.
None of that made it a good idea for Lee to let his guard down and indulge in lingering glances, though, because sooner or later, Alex might catch him staring and then what?
Safer to stay at a distance.