Chapter Twenty #2
It had been stupid, and Marcos had rolled his eyes at it before moving on and keeping his focus on training.
Sebastian didn’t.
MID MAY
“You can see it in the way Nguyen seems to be able to read the field before Reyes is even in the air.” The commentator’s voice filled Sebastian’s apartment, travelling to the kitchen where Marcos sat.
“Now, we know they played against each other as kids growing up. So, I guess after all that time they’d be natural at reading each—”
The television shut off, returning to a black screen, and Marcos’ eyes flicked toward the stove where Sebastian was standing, the remote clattering onto the counter.
Marcos raised his eyebrow.
“What?” Sebastian asked, looking down at the pan.
Marcos couldn’t quite see what he was cooking, but he wasn’t going to complain about whatever ended up in front of him tonight.
Sebastian had been quiet since Marcos arrived.
He’d made comments about Marcos’ clothes and how he smelled, told him to take his shoes off like Marcos had somehow forgotten the rules of the apartment, and asked if he wanted water before disappearing into the kitchen. But the quiet sat under all of it.
It had been sitting under him for weeks.
Marcos shrugged. “Not a fan of recaps?”
“I see enough of it in our reviews.” Sebastian pulled some plates down from the cupboard and laid them out. “Besides, praise doesn’t make me a better player.”
Marcos tilted his head at that.
Sebastian wasn’t wrong. Praise didn’t make anyone better.
It didn’t fix the missed pressure, the bad kick, the late run, or the one piece of hesitation that could turn a clean passage into a turnover.
But the bluntness in Sebastian’s voice threw Marcos slightly.
It sounded like Sebastian didn’t want the words in the apartment with them.
The commentator had been talking about their last two games—the Canberra Knights and the Hobart Heat. The Mustangs had won both quite easily, with margins over thirty points each time, and the footage had been hard to argue with. Marcos and Sebastian had been in sync through both matches.
Marcos had watched enough of the replay before Sebastian killed it to see what the commentators meant.
At the centre bounce against Canberra, Marcos had gone up against a ruck who tried to body him out early.
He had taken the contact, adjusted in the air, and palmed the ball wide without looking.
Sebastian had already cut across the space, taking it at pace and sending the kick inside fifty before the Knights’ Rover had fully turned.
Against Hobart, they had done it again, this time off a throw-in near the boundary.
Marcos had knocked the ball down behind him, and Sebastian had gathered it cleanly, almost like he had known where the tap would land before Marcos decided.
“Thinking for the other,” the commentator had said.
Marcos didn’t quite understand it as a compliment. It made them sound stranger than they were. Like football had become something private. Like people could see a shape between them that Marcos still didn’t have proper words for.
The rest of the team had moulded around it, too, catching up to each play without missing a beat.
It all worked.
Which might have been the problem.
On-field, everything between Marcos and Sebastian had started making more sense. Off-field, it kept shifting under Marcos’ feet.
Sebastian had been coming to training with more focus.
More than usual, even for him. Marcos hadn’t asked if something was going on, but he had felt the slight pull from him.
Fewer looks his way. Fewer gentle touches in the gym.
Less of the small, private amusement that had started to build between them after their night together.
Sebastian still spoke to him when they needed to work through a drill or review a passage of play, but anything outside of that had become thinner.
Not gone, which was the part that kept catching Marcos.
Sebastian could avoid him all morning, then stand too close during a stoppage reset. He could go cold through an entire weights session, then let his fingers brush Marcos’ hand when passing him a bottle.
They had barely spoken properly through the two weeks before Sebastian had invited him over.
It had been after a long day of centre drills, the kind Jacob liked because everyone hated them.
By the end, the rest of the centre group had already hit the showers, but Marcos and Sebastian had stayed on the oval, running the same tap pattern until it finally landed exactly where it was supposed to.
When they left the field, it had been the first time they’d been alone together since the night at Sebastian’s apartment.
Marcos had suggested they exchange phone numbers. Sebastian had agreed, then he had invited Marcos over.
Marcos had been happy to see him outside the club again.
Happier than he had admitted to himself on the drive over.
He wanted the more relaxed version of Sebastian, the one who didn’t seem to be holding himself in a different shape, the one who could lean against his own counter and smirk like he wasn’t holding something back.
But something was still off. Marcos couldn’t pin it down, and he wasn’t sure how to bring it up.
“Here you go,” Sebastian said, pushing a plate in front of Marcos.
Marcos stared at it. The plate had small, dark cubes of beef sitting on wilted greens, the edges crisped and glossy in a dark sauce.
“What is this?” he asked, pushing it around with his fork.
“Bò lúc l?c,” Sebastian answered, coming to sit next to Marcos. “It’s beef. And other stuff.”
Marcos took a bite while Sebastian watched him. “It’s good.”
Sebastian didn’t comment and focused on his own plate.
Marcos kept his eyes on him, flexing his jaw once, before continuing to eat.
They sat in silence, the apartment holding it too easily.
The quiet here always hit differently from the quiet at Marcos’ house.
At home, silence was something passing between noise.
A pause before Becca yelled from another room or Diana called out in Spanish or Paula stomped on the floor to get his attention.
Here, silence stayed where it was put. It sat over the kitchen and the living room, over the black television screen and the dark windows beyond it, and it made every scrape of cutlery sound larger than it was.
Sebastian ate like he wasn’t bothered by it.
Once they finished eating, he got up without a word and grabbed both plates, walking to the dishwasher.
Marcos sighed. “Okay, I feel like there’s something wrong.”
Sebastian’s eyes snapped up, and he rolled his shoulders. “Nothing’s wrong.”
“Okay,” Marcos said slowly, getting to his feet. “It’s just I’ve kinda been trying to wrap my head around…this.” Marcos gestured between himself and Sebastian. “You know, I spent my whole life thinking I only liked women. Then we had sex, and you’ve been…on and off.”
“Right.” Sebastian clicked his tongue. “Like how you bolted from here after I sucked your dick after you came here and kissed me?”
“Okay, what the fuck?” Marcos took a step back, his shoulders rising.
It was too fast. Too sharp. The words hit with a force he hadn’t braced for because he had thought they were finally speaking about the same thing. He could feel his own body answer before his head did, shoulders tightening, hands lifting slightly away from his sides.
Sebastian didn’t look proud of saying it.
That somehow made it worse.
“If I’m on and off. Why don’t you just go and sleep with a chick?” Sebastian shifted to the side of the counter. “That’s easier, right? Less of a joke.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Marcos questioned, shaking his head, fingers finding the stitching of his pants to pick at.
Sebastian pinched the bridge of his nose before flattening his palm over his eyes. He took a deep breath. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I…”
Sebastian stayed frozen in the position, sentence half finished, and Marcos took a step forward, hand outstretched to rest on his shoulder.
“Is this about what Parker said the other week?” Marcos asked, his voice lowering.
The comment had been stupid. It hadn’t meant anything, though. That was the thing Marcos kept coming back to.
“No. No. I’m just…angry.” Sebastian dropped his hand to his side, and his gaze met Marcos’. “Just life stuff.”
Marcos nodded slowly, his hand gripping Sebastian tighter. “What kind of stuff?”
“We aren’t really…that.”
Marcos dropped his arm. “Aren’t what?”
“I don’t know. Close.”
Marcos’ heart weighed down in his chest, dragging his shoulders with it. “Yeah, I…guess. Isn’t that why I’m here, though?”
“I don’t know.”
“Alright, I’m fucking confused.”
“Maybe you should leave then.” Sebastian’s hand curled into a fist at his side, and Marcos eyed it.
“What? You’re going to hit me again?” Marcos pressed, taking another step forward.
“No, I’m not going to…” Sebastian took another deep breath, his fist relaxing. “Look, I like you.”
The words sat between them.
Marcos adjusted himself. “Okay.”
“You don’t understand how complicated that is for me.”
“And it isn’t complicated for me?”
“I’ve liked you since I was fourteen.”
That hit Marcos differently. “You hated me.”
“Well, that was easier than admitting I was gay.”
For a second, Marcos only watched him.