"Thank you for hosting us."
"Thank you so much."
"Genuinely, thank you."
They were clustered in the hallway near the front door and not one of them was standing still.
Balde had a hand on the back of Gavi's neck. Fermín was trying to get past both of them and being blocked. Casadó had somebody's jacket that was not his and had not yet worked that out.
But every single one of them, in between shoving each other, was being extremely polite.
"Thank you for letting us come, Antonella."
"The food was unbelievable."
"Seriously, thank you. That was the best night."
"Thank you, sir."
"Thank you."
And Leo was just laughing at them.
"Oh, stop it."
Antonella waved both hands.
"Stop. You do not need to keep saying it."
"No, but seriously—"
"I have heard it eleven times."
"HAHAHA."
And Olivia and Aina had gone to her properly.
"Thank you so much for having us."
"It was a beautiful party."
"It genuinely was. Everything. The lights, the table—"
"Oh, stop."
Antonella put a hand over her own mouth and laughed.
"Stop it."
"We had the best time."
"Well." She reached out and squeezed Olivia's arm. "Good. That is what it was for."
And off to one side, Leo had got hold of Mateo's shoulder.
"Hey."
Mateo looked over.
"Tomorrow."
"Ah."
"The check-up."
"Yeah, no, I know."
"Nine o'clock."
"I know, I know."
Mateo rubbed the back of his own head and laughed the awkward laugh of a boy being told something he has been told three times already.
"I am going. I promise. I am going."
"BIG MATEOOOOO!"
Every head in that hallway turned.
A very small boy in pyjamas came round the corner at a dead sprint.
And Mateo got his hands under him and swung him straight up off the floor, and spun him once, and the shriek that came out of that child could probably be heard in the garden.
"HAHAHA!"
"Mateo."
Antonella had both hands on her hips.
"Mateo Messi."
"Uh oh."
"Should you not be in bed?"
Little Mateo, still hanging in the air with his feet about a foot off the ground, looked at his mother with complete calm.
"I was already sleeping."
"You were—"
"I was already sleeping." He pointed. "I just wanted to talk to Big Mateo before he left."
"HAHAHA."
Mateo put him down and crouched slightly and ruffled his hair with one hand.
"Okay."
He leaned in.
"Talk to me. What do you want?"
And little Mateo just beamed at him.
"I wanted to say goodnight."
There was a pause in that hallway.
Mateo blinked.
"Oh."
"HAHAHAHA!"
"AWWWW!"
Balde had both hands on his own chest.
Fermín was laughing into Gavi's shoulder.
Olivia had gone soft entirely and had a hand over her mouth.
And Pedri was shaking his head slowly at the floor, smiling.
"That is it?"
"That is it."
"You came all the way down here for that?"
"Yes."
And Antonella's eyes went wide.
"You."
She pointed at her own son.
"You came downstairs for that?"
"Mm-hm."
"You got out of bed."
"Mm-hm."
"You got out of bed and came all the way down here to say goodnight to Mateo."
"Yes."
"And what about your mother?"
Little Mateo considered this.
"I already said goodnight to you."
"HAHAHAHAHA!"
"OHHHHH!"
"AHHHH!"
And Leo was gone. Head back, laughing properly, one hand on the door frame.
It was already half past ten.
A few people had left before them, because getting out of that area late is not a fun thing to do, and Mateo and the rest had decided it was time to go too.
Antonella stood in that doorway with little Mateo up on her hip and one hand raised.
"Get home safe."
"We will."
"Do you need somebody to—" Leo started.
"No, no." Mateo waved a hand. "We are good. We have got a ride, he is just outside the gate."
"Okay."
"Thank you again. Genuinely."
"Goodnight, boys."
"Goodnight!"
"Goodnight, Antonella!"
"Bye!"
"Say bye," Antonella said.
And little Mateo waved with his whole arm until the door shut.
Out on the long walkway from that house down to the main gate, eight people were still reeling.
Because it had been a genuinely wonderful night.
The dinner, the lights, that table, the noise, the whole thing. It was about as good a way to close out a season as anybody could have designed, and even now, walking toward a van parked out on the road, none of them had stopped talking about it.
"AH—"
Balde staggered forward about four steps.
Fermín had jumped straight onto his back with no warning at all and had both arms round his neck.
"GET OFF."
"Carry me."
"GET OFF, BRO."
"Carry me home."
"HAHAHAHA!"
"You are going to break my SPINE."
"Did you guys see that trophy cabinet, though?"
Gavi had both hands on top of his own head.
"Did you actually see it?"
Pedri whistled.
"It gets me every single time."
"Every time?" Gavi turned round. "You have SEEN it before?"
"Twice."
"TWICE?"
"Bro." Balde was still carrying Fermín. "Bro, that is the type of greed they warn you about in the Bible."
"HAHAHAHAHA!"
"BALDE!"
"I am serious! There were four Ballon d'Ors in ONE ROW."
"Six."
"SIX?"
"There are six, Balde."
"WHERE WAS THE OTHER TWO?"
"HAHAHA!"
Mateo came up alongside Casadó and threw an arm across his shoulders and pointed off toward the side of the drive.
"Hey. Hey. See that beauty?"
Casadó looked.
And stopped walking.
Sitting there, parked, red and low and entirely unbothered, was a Ferrari F430 Spider.
"Oh."
"Ohhhh."
Everybody had stopped now.
Somebody whistled.
"That is—"
"Do not touch it."
"I am not touching it."
"You are going toward it."
"I am LOOKING at it."
"Look with your eyes."
"HAHAHA."
"You know what got me, though?"
Fermín, still on Balde's back, pointed back at the house.
"The pitch."
"Ohhh."
"The FIELD, bro. A full pitch. In the garden."
"With markings."
"WITH MARKINGS."
He shook his head.
"Bro, there is genuinely no other way to live. That is it. That is the goal. A big field in the back garden and nothing else matters."
"HAHAHAHA!"
"He has found his purpose."
"That is his whole dream now."
"That is all he wants out of life."
And a few steps behind all of that, the two girls were walking arm in arm.
Or rather, Aina had attached herself to Olivia like a small animal and had not let go since the gate.
Both of them had a phone out.
"Oh."
Olivia turned her screen slightly.
"This one. This one is so cute."
It was the three of them. Her, Aina, and Shakira, all leaning in, all laughing at something somebody had said off to the side.
"Mm."
"Aina."
"Mm-hm."
"You are not looking."
"I am looking."
Then Aina groaned with her entire body and put more of her weight onto Olivia's arm.
"I am so TIRED."
"You have been saying that since three o'clock."
"Because it has been true since three o'clock."
She tilted her head against Olivia's shoulder.
"Hey."
"Hm?"
"Can we finish packing tomorrow morning?"
And she turned her face up with the eyes.
The full ones.
Olivia started laughing.
"Yes."
"YESSSS!"
Aina was off her arm and bouncing before the word was out.
"YES. Thank you. THANK you."
"BUT."
"Oh no."
"But." Olivia pointed at her. "We are getting up early. Five thirty. Sharp."
"Five—"
"Five thirty."
"Livie."
"We still have to go and see your parents before we leave, and I am not doing that at a sprint."
And Aina waved a hand, already laughing.
"No problem. Honestly, no problem."
She hooked back onto Olivia's arm.
"I already told them we are going tomorrow anyway. They know. They just want to see us before we fly."
"Good."
"Five thirty."
"Five thirty."
"I heard you."
"I do not think you did."
"HAHAHA."
They came out through the main gate.
And a few feet up the road, parked with its lights on, was the van.
Adrián got out of the driver's side and shut the door and stood there with his arms folded, grinning at the eight of them coming toward him.
"So."
He spread his hands.
"How was the party?"
And they all answered at once.
"It was INSANE."
"Bro, it was perfect."
"The food."
"The FOOD."
"I am so full I cannot walk."
"There was a pitch in his garden."
"There was a FERRARI."
"He has got six Ballon d'Ors in a cabinet, bro."
"Five."
"SIX."
"And you call yourself a Culé bro, 09,10,11,12,15 and 19 bro"
Adrián was laughing.
He looked at Mateo.
"And you?"
Mateo shrugged.
"It was fine."
"HAHAHA."
"It was fine."
Then Mateo put a hand out.
"Thanks for coming to get us, man. Seriously."
And Adrián shook it and waved the whole thing away with his other hand.
"Ah, it was nothing."
He pulled the side door open.
"Get in, all of you. And nobody eat anything in this van."
And the crew finally piled into the car.
...
"Okay, man. See you tomorrow."
"Sure, sure."
The van had pulled up outside the La Masia residence, and it had taken no time at all to get there.
There was no traffic left by this hour, and the Messi house is not far from the training ground in the first place, so the whole journey had been about twelve minutes.
Mateo was out on the pavement shaking hands.
"Later, bro."
"Later."
"Text me about the barber thing."
"I will."
Gavi went first, then Fermín, then Casadó, all of it the same handshake and pull-in and back-slap, four times.
And Pedri got out and did the same.
"Yeah, man."
"Later."
"Later, Pedri."
And then Balde stopped at the side door, leaned in, and grinned into the van.
"Byeeee, ladies."
"HAHAHA."
"BYE, BALDE."
"Bye, Baldeee."
He was absolutely delighted with himself.
Casadó rolled his eyes so hard it was audible, grabbed a fistful of the back of Balde's jacket, and pulled him away from the vehicle.
"Come on."
"What?"
"Move."
"BYEE!"
"Bye, guys!"
"Byeee!"
And the girls waved back through the glass.
Mateo stood there on the pavement for a second and watched them go.
Four boys walking up toward that gate at half past ten at night, hooking arms round each other's necks, shoving somebody off the path, one of them doing an impression of something that had happened at dinner while the other three lost their minds about it.
He laughed at them.
"Okay."
Adrián had put his window down.
"We can start moving."
And then Mateo felt something warm slide over his hand.
He looked down.
Olivia had leaned out of the open door and put her hand on top of his on the frame, and when he looked up she was just smiling at him.
Not saying anything.
Just that.
And Mateo turned his hand over and closed it around hers and squeezed, and smiled back.
With the La Masia boys gone, that van was a considerably more peaceful place.
Adrián drove.
And at some point he glanced up into the rear-view mirror, the way you do, and then did not look away as quickly as he should have.
Because there were two couples back there.
Pedri and Aina on one side, leaning into each other, talking about something in a register too low to hear, her head more or less on his shoulder.
And Mateo and Olivia on the other, both of them hunched over one phone, shoulder to shoulder.
As he watched, Olivia gasped and made a grab for it and Mateo pulled it straight out of her reach and held it at arm's length against the window, and she was hitting his arm and laughing and he was laughing too hard to defend himself properly.
And Adrián, thirty-one years old and extremely single, caught himself giggling at the road like an idiot.
It did not take long to reach the apartment complex either.
"Thanks, man."
Mateo shut the side door and came round to the window.
Adrián waved a hand.
"Ah, I am just doing my job."
"Either way. Thanks."
"HAHAHA."
He leaned on the sill.
"So. Tomorrow."
"Oh." Mateo shook his head. "No, no, you do not need to stress yourself about that. Me and Pedri are going to the same place. He is taking me."
"Ah, okay."
"Yeah."
"Okay, that is fine, then." Adrián nodded. "That works."
He put the van back into gear.
"Right. I need to start heading off."
"Oh, yeah. Later, man."
Adrián leaned forward and waved past him at the other three.
"See you all!"
"Bye, Adrián!"
"Bye!"
"Thank you!"
And he waved one more time, pulled out, and drove off.
The four of them went in through the front of the building, still talking about the night.
Because that is the other half of a party. Not the party. The hour afterwards, when you go back through the whole thing with the people who were also there.
"Did you see the—"
"With the thing?"
"Yes! With the thing!"
"I SAW."
"What were they even talking about?"
"I have no idea. I was just nodding."
"HAHAHA."
"Me too. I was nodding for about ten minutes."
"Honestly, though."
Aina had her arm through Olivia's on the stairs.
"Your friend Balde."
"HAHAHA."
"Your friend Balde is a whole vibe."
"Ohhh, I am in love with him," Olivia said. "Genuinely. I love him."
"Right?"
"You can just tell that he is completely himself. All the time. There is no version of him that is not that."
"That is what I am saying."
"Byeeee, ladies."
"HAHAHAHA."
And then Aina let out a long breath and looked up the stairwell.
"Arghh."
She leaned her head against Olivia's shoulder as they walked.
"I am going to miss Spain so much."
They reached the second floor.
Pedri slowed down.
"Ah. This is me."
"Oh."
Mateo turned round.
"Yeah. Yeah, of course."
And the two of them shook hands and pulled in, one shoulder each.
"Later, bro."
"Later."
"Bye, Pedri."
"Bye, Olivia."
And then Aina cleared her throat.
"Ehm."
Mateo and Olivia both looked over.
Aina had not moved off the landing.
"You two should go on up."
She made a small shooing motion with one hand.
"I am on my way."
Mateo and Olivia looked at each other.
And both of them just smiled, and did not say anything about it at all, and went up the stairs.
"And you should have seen the way he said it."
Mateo was laughing, fishing the key out of his pocket with one hand and talking with the other.
"Like it was nothing. Like a completely normal sentence."
He got the key in.
"Honestly, I do not even know how effective any of that campaign stuff actually is, but just imagine it. Just picture it for one second—"
He pushed the door open and walked in.
"Ohhh."
He let out a breath.
"Finally. Home sweet home."
He turned round in the middle of the room, still going.
"Oh, and he said he is going to tell the club to get behind me as well. The actual club. Like, officially."
He shook his head and laughed at the ceiling.
"But imagine it, though. Me. The Ballon d'Or."
And then he looked at her.
Olivia was standing just inside the door.
She had not moved since she came in. She had not taken her shoes off or put her bag down or said one word.
The door was shut behind her.
And she had locked it.
And she was looking straight at him with the brightest smile he had ever seen on her face.
"HAHAHA."
Mateo looked down at himself and then back up.
"What?"
He spread his hands.
"What is it?"
And Olivia laughed, and started walking toward him.
"Nothing."
She kissed him.
Not the way she had kissed him in a doorway a week ago. Not that at all. That was too innocent.
Mateo's brain, which had been mid-sentence about an award ceremony in Paris, simply stopped producing anything, and he had a hand in her hair and the key was on the floor and he had absolutely no memory of dropping it.
When they finally came apart he was breathing like he had run somewhere.
"Wait."
He blinked.
"Wait, what a—"
Olivia put two fingers over his mouth.
"You."
She was still smiling.
"You talk too much."
And she kissed him again, harder, and the two of them started moving, and neither of them was particularly careful about what they walked into on the way.
Now.
The ancients tell us that the Great Dao cannot be walked alone.
It is written in the old texts that Heaven above and Earth below were once one undivided thing, and that only in their parting did the ten thousand things come into being. Yin cannot exist without Yang. Yang has no meaning without Yin. And where the two meet in harmony, there the Dao itself is revealed, and all things are nourished, and the myriad forms flourish.
The scholars of old spoke of dual cultivation as a path of great peril and greater reward. They warned that a practitioner who attempts it before his foundation is stable will scatter his qi and ruin his meridians. But they also wrote that for one whose foundation is solid, whose heart is sincere, and whose partner is willing, the union of the two energies may carry a cultivator through a bottleneck that a thousand years of solitary meditation could not.
It is said that when the Yin and the Yang are in true accord, the Heavenly Tribulation gathers above the mountain.
It is said that the clouds turn, and the thunder answers, and that the qi of the entire region flows toward one place.
It is said that the man who survives such a tribulation emerges transformed.
His impurities burned away. His meridians widened. His golden core condensed.
And the scriptures are quite clear that when such a breakthrough occurs, the cultivator will often find that he has ascended an entire realm overnight.
To cut a long story short.
Mateo King had said, on several previous occasions, that this or that night had been the best night of his life.
Let us be gracious about it and call those statements the ramblings of a boy who did not yet understand the way of the world.
Because just as the twenty-ninth of May was a day that Mateo King was never going to forget for as long as he lived, the thirtieth of May is right there beside it.
Thierry Henry had been right.
The day after you win the Champions League is every bit as good as the night itself, and quite possibly better.
Now, whether that holds true for everybody will vary somewhat depending on who you ask.
But for Mateo King, on that particular night, in that particular apartment.
It held.
A/N
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