Work Text:
The morning sun shone through the windows, signalling the start of the last day of summer. Lively music played through the speakers and floated through the halls-- including the stairwell, where Alexander Isak was trying to lug a large cardboard moving box up the stairs. He'd thought the stairs would provide enough leverage for the job to be easy, but that had clearly not proven to be the case.
At that moment, Ekitike danced down the stairs. He seemed entirely wrapped up in his own rhythm, but stopped when he saw Isak struggling with the box.
"Hey, birthday boy! Want some help!"
Isak rolled his eyes, trying to move the box up the steps. "Birthday man. And no thanks."
Ekitike didn't seem offended, instead extending his hand to Isak's. "Alright, birthday man. Wanna dance? There's some really good music playing on the PA system."
"Good?" Isak grunted, putting all his weight into tugging the box. It still didn't budge. "It's only the worst joke ever. Playing 'September' on the twenty-first day of September? Cringe."
"Sounds like sour grapes to me."
"Huh?"
"It's a Greek fable I learned about in school. This fox wants grapes, but he can't reach them. So why can't you get the grapes, my fox?"
Isak groaned and kicked the box down the stairs, letting gravity take it back towards the enormous pile of moving boxes in the foyer. "The rest of the things from my old house just came today. I know I don't really need all of it now that I'm living here, but I do need to decorate my new bedroom, and I really don't feel like doing it even though I need to."
"I get it. We get to put our individual touches everywhere, but our bedrooms are the only spots that are entirely us." Ekitike's eyes lit up as he got an idea. "How about I help you?"
"You'll help?"
"Why not? Decorating may be fun."
Isak shrugged, stepping aside so Ekitike could descend the stairs. "Here are my things, then. Beware of spiders."
Ekitike's eyes widened to a comical size as he took a few steps back. "Spiders?!"
For the first time that day, Isak laughed. "I'm joking. No spiders, don't worry."
"Phew!" Ekitike's shoulders sagged in relief as he skipped down the stairs. "Now, let's see how heavy these boxes are."
*
Moving the boxes from the foyer to Isak's room was short work. However, Isak was still annoyed because Ekitike kept poking fun of him for struggling with the boxes.
"I'm just saying," Ekitike wheezed, finally catching his breath after laughing for thirty seconds straight, "that you couldn't lift a cardboard box of clothes."
Isak tried not to let Ekitike see his reddened cheeks as he cut open the tape on the box containing his bedding. "There was a lamp in there!"
"Still, that's light!" Ekitike lifted a blanket out of the box and spread it on the bed. "Who packed these boxes?"
"Um..." Isak hesitated, contemplated the benefits of lying, and ultimately decided to tell the truth. "I did."
"I would laugh, but my abs hurt too much from laughing for the past twenty-seven minutes." Ekitike sighed, dusting off a lamp from a different box. "You want this on the bedside table, or somewhere else?"
Isak shook out the contents of the box--pillows. "Side table."
"So..." Ekitike looked up from the ground, pausing his search for a wall outlet plug. "Jerry showed me a video of you celebrating my goal."
Ikitika shrugged, fluffing his pillows. "Yeah, I was."
"It means a lot to me, y'know." Ekitike's voice grew quiet as he plugged the lamp into the wall socket and stood up, dusting off his knees. "Back in my old club, there was this guy called Omar. He was the main scorer and was more valued by the media than I was, but he was never a jerk about it. We worked as a team."
Isak didn't know what to make of that, but before he could think of what to say, he blurted, "I'm not a jerk."
"I know you aren't," Ekitike responded, surprised.
"I wanted to come here so badly," Isak mused, arranging the pillows on the bed, "that I did some ridiculous things. I was selfish, and irrational, and I burnt all my bridges back at Oldcastle."
"Yeah, I don't think your ex-coach is going to forget you putting a restraining order on him," Ekitike wryly agreed. His voice softened as he turned to Isak, lamp forgotten. "But you've got a second chance now, because we like you, and we value you, and we think you can be somebody great. Don't ruin that."
Isak nodded firmly. "I won't."
After that, Ekitike and Isak worked in silence. They made the bed, put away the clothes--Ekitike hung up what needed to be hung, while Isak folded the rest and stowed them in a chest of drawers--and arranged a few knick-knacks on the wall shelf.
"Check this out," Isak chuckled, pulling a light brown bulletin board out from a box.
Ekitike raised a confused eyebrow. "A bulletin board?"
"I can never decide what I want to hang permanently," Isak explained, sticking pins into the wall, "so I swap my pictures and other hangable things out on these."
"'Hangable'?" Ekitike repeated with a toothy grin.
"Yeah." Isak shrugged, unable to fight his smile. Even when Ekitike was teasing him, his joy was infectious. "By the way, I watched you dancing when the fans sang your name. I need to teach you how to dance."
Ekitike smirked, leaning against the wall. "Can you dance?"
"No. Can you sing?" Isak shot back, pinning some photos and ticket stubs on the walls.
"Not really," Ekitike admitted with a shrug. "I just do it because it's fun."
"Why don't you join the Twig choir? Victor told me it's pretty fun."
Ekitike chuckled nervously, taping a poster onto the wall where Isak had asked him to. "Would you believe me when I say I've got stage fright?"
"Uh, no. You thrive in the spotlight. I saw you today!"
"That's football. I'm not that good at singing, so I'm more likely to make a fool of myself under pressure."
"Don't you watch a lot of Premier League football games to prepare for your own?"
"Yeah, but--"
"Then you can do the same with singing. I'm twenty-six, so I won't be in the choir, but you're still young."
"I'm three years younger than you!"
"Then go make this senior citizen proud."
Ekitike playfully smacked Isak with pillow. "Idiot."
"Hey! I just fluffed that."
"Whatever. It's still fluffy." Ekitike taped the last poster and stepped back, surveying the room. "And we're done."
Isak marvelled at the newly-decorated room. The bed was made, his clothes hung neatly on colour-coded hangers, and his posters were all arranged without a wrinkle. "Wow. That was fast."
"Well, many hands make the work lighter," Ekitike remarked, standing proudly with his hands on his hips. "Do you like it, birthday man?"
Isak, instead of rolling his eyes like earlier, smiled. "I do. Thanks, Hugo."
"You mean La Baguette." Ekitike switched to an exaggerated French accent, pasting a smug grin onto his face. "And I am more than happy to bring assistance, Al-ex-aaaaaandeeeeer."
"Okay, La Baguette, what do you say we join our teammates in the gym?" Isak puffed out his chest. "They must be begging to see the birthday man."
Ekitike grinned, opening the door with a dramatic flourish. "Lead the way, birthday man."
They laughed at their new inside joke and left the room, closing the door behind them with a loud click.