observes me any longer, he’s going to see the fear in my eyes.
Manchester United and Real Madrid are meeting again.
We’re bound for Spain.
I’m going to back to my dear Madrid.
I’m going back into Santiago Bernabéu Stadium.
I’m going to have to step out onto that pitch and see my old team again.
I’m going to see my beloved again.
Alejo.
It’s been three months since I quit Real Madrid.
Got a little lost. Found a new path.
Still not sure where it’s taking me but I know I have to follow it and see where I end up.
Today, I’m ending up in Madrid.
A place my heart wants to call home.
God, I’m so fucking terrified.
I pull an Alejo and put on noise-cancelling headphones the moment I board the plane, having a playlist ready that will get me pumped and positive.
It doesn’t really work.
Sure it drowns out everyone around me, but it finetunes my focus until the game is all I can think about, more specifically, who I’ll see during the game.
All I can think about is Alejo.
How will I feel when I see him?
How will he feel when he sees me?
Does he still hate me? He must. He never contacted me after I left. Not that I expected him to, not that I’m upset that he didn’t. It was my own doing and he probably harbors even greater resentment after I left without saying goodbye and ended up back in Manchester.
Or maybe he was grateful. Maybe me leaving was like the Band-aid being pulled off all at once. It forced him to forget me and move on.
I wish I could say it did the same for me.
The man still holds my heart in his hands, a very crucial part of me, making it impossible to forget him. What we shared together can’t be erased, not with time, not with anything.
Instinctively I reach for the pocket watch I keep around my neck. I’ve been wearing it these days, it gives me comfort to open it up and see that time is still ticking, to pretend his words Thalia Te Amo will withstand the seconds, minutes, hours, days.
I’m still sleeping with it under my pillow.
Maybe it’s kind of pathetic to still be pining for someone like this. Maybe I should start moving on, but I can’t.
Not yet. I’m not ready.
Maybe after tonight, you will be.
I swallow the thought down. My nerves are on fire, stomach in a thousand tiny knots. Am I even going to survive this?
As the plane starts its descent, I catch a glimpse of Valdebebas out the window and my anxiety really starts to kick into high gear, melding with the sadness.
That’s my home. Right there below us, that’s my home.
The thought won’t go away. It lives in me, growing like a weed.
My home, those pitches, that building.
My heart lives there with that club. The chances of them actually being inside right now and eating lunch are high. I should be there with them. I should be sitting with Alejo and Rene and Luciano and even the Slovakian. Luciano should be telling me some Portuguese saying that makes no sense, Rene should be talking about some girl he scored over the weekend. Mateo should be there in the distance, trying to ignore everyone and think strategy.
And Alejo…I would be glancing up at Alejo from time to time, giving him a secret smile. His eyes would tell me a story. They would tell me that I was his and that I belonged to him and that we have nothing but time on our side.
How wrong he was. We had so little time together.
And yet I could have spent the rest of my life with him.
It’s not too late. It’s never too late.
I close my eyes as the plane touches down and I keep on breathing.
A bus takes us into Madrid, down the familiar streets, past the gorgeous squares. The city looks like it’s coming alive, having already shed its winter skin. The sun is shining softly, there are buds on the trees and white cherry blossoms blowing in the air. It nearly brings tears to my eyes, afflicting me with acute homesickness that feels painful.
How am I even going to get through this game if I can’t get through the bus ride to the stadium?
But somehow I do.
The stadium looms before me, thousands upon thousands of Madridistas on the street around it, wearing white, waving flags and banners. Their energy is so infectious that it makes the chatter on the bus come to a hush.