Luce di Stella • Kenan Yildiz

Chapter 3: Un Caffè al Bar

🎶 Ma il cielo è sempre più blu — Rino Gaetano 🎶

I leaned onto the wall across from the men's locker room and waited - Dean and I had agreed to go for coffee after their training and catch up. The first few players started to leave and we nodded at each other, murmuring some Ciaos. Finally, I was approached by a figure, but when I looked up from my phone, it wasn't Dean standing in front of me.

"Hello?" I asked confusedly.
"Hi! I wanted to introduce myself personally. I'm Kenan" he said and extended his hand. My gosh, he looked handsome.
"Beatrice" I replied and shook his hand.
"What are you doing here?" he asked and the question kind of annoyed me, because it was none of his business.
"Waiting for someone" I simply replied, but this guy was not giving up.

"You're close with the players?" he asked and I furrowed my eyebrows. What was the deal with this guy?
"Here you are" Dean said as he finally came over. "Oh, you two met" he commented amusedly, his eyes ping-pong-ing between me and this Kenan guy.
"We did." he replied, his eyes still piercing through me.
"We wanted to grab a coffee, want to join us?" Dean asked and I up looked at him in confusion. What the fuck?

"Oh, I wouldn't want to get between... something" Kenan replied, his eyes still on me.
"Nonsense, Bea is cool, you'll love her" he chuckled and I tried my best to keep my facial expressions in check.
"Cool, thanks" Kenan said and smiled. Ok, his smile was dreamy.
"Zucca is our spot. See you there" I said curtly, trying not to make him feel too much that I didn't want him there, crashing my hangout with my best friend.

Dean put his arm on my shoulder and I put mine around his waist as we walked away to the parking lot, this other guy following us like a shadow.
"Cool car" he commented when I clicked on the remote to open my small Abarth.
"Every Fiat car is cool" I replied with a smug grin, but he just looked at me confusedly as I stood by my car's door.
"That's an Abarth, though" he said and my face fell.
"Are you fucking stupid or what?" I asked and wing the door open to my car before sitting down, slamming it shut again in front of his nose and making the motor roar as I reversed out of my parking spot.

How the fuck could a guy not know that Abarth belonged to Fiat? Did he also think that Jeep wasn't Fiat either? Idiot. I sped back home and parked in my garage before making my way outside onto the streets of the city centre. I expected to arrive earlier than the boys as they still had to find a parking spot, which wasn't an easy task around here. When I arrived at the bar, the waiter immediately gave me a table, they knew me here. Well, to be honest, I was known pretty much everywhere in Turin.

"Grazie" I told him as I sat down and took my bag to scramble around, trying to find my Iqos. As I took my second puff, I saw Dean and this Kenan guy approaching.
"I always forget how empty the bars are during summertime" Dean chuckled as he sat down next to me and Kenan did the same, across from me.
"Yeah, fucking great to be stuck in the city for work" I huffed, remembering all the fun Instagram stories from my friends in Portofino or the Argentario.

"There could be worse things than having a job" Kenan chuckled and I looked at him weirdly.
"Yeah, for example having to straighten out some stupid man's mistakes" I shot back before taking a deep pull on the Iqos and closing my eyes.
"So... How do you guys know each other?" Kenan asked, nodding at Dean and me and we both smiled as we recalled the memory of our first meeting.

"I literally owe Bea my career" Dean replied and I rolled my eyes jokingly.
"You owe your career to your skills and hard work" I corrected him.
"Tryouts for the academy, my mum packed my bag and... I forgot that my football boots were still in our basement, so I arrived there and panicked when I didn't find them. I was panicking but somehow I ran into Bea who stole del Piero's boots from the men's locker room for me" Dean explained and Kenan's eyes widened.
"Wait a minute... You tried out in Alessandro del Piero's boots?" he asked, his jaw basically on the floor. "That's how you knew my locker was his!" he added.

"You got del Piero's locker?" I now asked surprisedly and he nodded.
"What can I say? Bea's the best. We've been best friends ever since" Dean said and put his hand over mine, shooting me an adoring smile.
"I don't have many real friends, so it's special to have someone with whom to share such a bonding memory" I chuckled and winked at my best friend.

"How are you feeling in Turin?" I asked Kenan now, genuinely curious. He looked surprised by my question, or by the fact that I showed some interest in him.
"Lonely, a lot of the time. I do hang out with the Next Gen guys and Dean is my closest friend here, but... it was hard to leave my family behind in Germany" he sighed and Dean shot him a sympathetic smile, putting his hand on his arm to show some support.
"I couldn't imagine life without my family either. I moved to Milan last year for uni, but... when family calls, I answer" I sighed, reminiscing my time away at uni, being a normal student going out with her friends, studying 50% of the time and partying the other 50%. Now I had to transfer back here and work instead of having fun with people my age.

"Could I have a Campari Spritz?" I asked the waiter as he passed by, who nodded and walked back inside to prepare my order.
"Weren't you driving?" Kenan asked me confusedly.
"I live around the corner" I replied. What was this concern? It was one Campari, not twenty straight vodka shots.
"You don't live on the hills?" he asked and Dean laughed. Mostly everyone from Juve lived on one side of the Po, on the hillside, overlooking the city down to the Mole, Turin's landmark. And our archrivals from FC Torino lived in the city center, it was kind of an unspoken rule and a thing you learned pretty quickly when joining Juve.

Dean laughed out loud. "Bea lives right above a Torino player. Every night before one of his match days, she stomps on her floor until 3am." he explained and both me and Kenan laughed.
"Can't he call the police?" he asked and now it was my turn to laugh.
"We're in Italy, not Germany!" I chuckled and he looked more confused than ever.
"We've got to integrate him a bit more into Italian culture, he's still... behind" Dean said and my eyes shimmered.
"Poor guy doesn't know what's coming" I giggled and poor Kenan sat there with a blank face, probably wishing he had never set one foot in Italy.

"So, any gossip? Who are we signing?" Dean asked curiously.
"Can't tell you, but we have one almost closed deal. I'm not really convinced, but maybe we can raise his value and sell him for more than we bought him next year" I said and shrugged.
"So that's how you guys think of us!" Kenan gasped in a mix of surprise and amusement.
"She's ruthless" "It's business" Dean and I said in unison.

"Oh, and Fabio is extending! This was my call" I said proudly.
"Miretti?" Kenan asked.
"Yeah, why?" I asked back.
"No, just asking" he replied and looked at his coffee.