16 years | l. messi

8. fear and rejections.

LEO

It's a beautiful tragedy to think how a single word can destroy or make your life within an eye's blink; say yes to a man on his knees to marry you and you make him the happiest man alive, say no to him, and you make him realise that not only did you waste several years of his life but also didn't deserve them.

You let them down

A simple no changed my life all over again, just like I had witnessed the tables turn sixteen years ago.

The air in my lungs seemed to have constricted, I was finding difficult breathing in the Barcelona air again.

It just didn't feel like home again, not without her.

Maybe it was if I forget her, maybe, only maybe.

The night we had shared that day, it led to me to believe that she still loved me like before and was willing to sacrifice everything, except little Leo of course, to be with me.

But I was wrong.

She didn't agree to coming with me and perhaps that was the final nail in the coffin, for me to finally forget her and move on with who I was.

"I'm sorry." Gerrard looked sympathetic as he patted my shoulder. He had been the only one who had known her and her history with me.

I didn't say anything back to him because I knew that if I did try to speak something, I'd only end up embarrassing myself with a demeanour that didn't reek of me in the slightest.

The journey from the airport to my house was unbearable, every thought I had was consumed by her. No matter how much I tried to block the striking image of her naked under me that night, it didn't help one bit.

I only prayed that her memory will leave my veins for once and for all, for I was done hurting myself over a girl who just didn't care about me anymore.

•••

A month, or two maybe.

Training was good, my heart wasn't, but slowly and steadily, I think I was managing. It wasn't easy to let someone out of the little house you've built for them in your heart for sixteen years, after all.

The club had given me the captain's band for a lifetime, I didn't want it because I still think Andres deserved it more than me.

"Leo, someone says he's here to see you and I don't think he's a fan." Gerrard noticed my confused expression at our trainer's words.

"What makes you think he's not a fan?" He asked for me.

I sent him a mental thanks.

"Because he has a sour mood on his face." Our trainer, Lee, scrunched up his nose. "The security isn't letting him in of course, but he's just..."

"You know the rules, Lee, no one can enter the place except for the players and the staff." Gerrard rolled his eyes while I eyed the two men warily.

Something must have been up but I chose to ignore it, deciding to side with Gerrard, "Its probably nothing, Lee." I waved him off.

Little did I know, it was a lot more than what I thought it was.

•••

The place I had called home, my house, suddenly felt empty and so lonely. I couldn't not imagine her little son running around the whole living room and making noises until his mother told him to stop, the mother I was hopelessly in love with, the mother I imaged sleeping in the bed next to me.

A loud banging noise on my door snapped me out of my thoughts and I scurried over to the door, turning the door knob, I'm face to face with someone I months ago.

"Where is Leon?" He yells at me and grabs me from the collar of shirt. I remember him but I dare not say it, too many emotions would've been flooded then and there. Hastily, I tried to pry the man off me.

"What are you talking about?" I finally managed to push him off me and fall to the ground myself. The man, Emery, I recall was his name, the father of Leon.

That was all it took for him to lose his composure and crumble to the floor. I saw Emery clench his jaw and then closing his eyes, all the time wondering what the hell happened. "What are you talking about?" I repeated myself, crouching down to the floor myself. It was odd to see him like that, though I had seen him only once in my life and didn't know him at all, I still felt bad at whatever he was going through.

"Leon," he managed to say after a few muffled words, "I can't find him since two months." My eyes shot open. "I don't know where to look for him—"

"Why don't you come in and sit down, eh? I can get you water." I managed to let out, even when my heart was in a million different places, why, how, when, all these questions wouldn't leave me. When he let out a little nod, I took at as my cue to get in ahead so he could follow. My hands shook as to what would have happened to that little boy, and what about Lana?

Suddenly all of the air on my lungs is knocked out — where was she? How was she? Did she know that her little boy was missing for two months? Did she try to contact me but none of the people told me?

"Emery." I speak once I give him a glass of water with shaking hands, he must have noticed my state that he decided to speak. "I'm sorry but I can't assure you anything about Lana too." His eyes were a teary mess but so was my heart.

"They just—" he said, voice low and unsteady, almost fearful of being heard. "Lana and Leon have been missing since the last two months, one moment they lived in that crappy apartment and the next, they're gone. I didn't know what to think, I still don't." I saw the tall man run a hand through his jet black hair and then wipe his eyes with the back of his button up's sleeve. "When I saw you that day for the first time with her, I knew you weren't going to give up on her, she's told me about you, said she didn't want to commit to anyone else other than you." He chuckled and my heart skipped a beat.

She really said that? Why didn't she ever tell me?

"And I thought, that maybe just maybe, she was here with you so I could see my little boy again." He put his head in his lap and cried like there was no tomorrow — what a mood. "I was hoping you had taken her to Spain so at least I'd know where I'd have to go to find my little boy."

So many words to say, yet nothing to say at all at the same time — on which note did I begin my lullaby of sorrow?

"And— I don't know what has she told you about me but, being away two months from my child has made me realise that what I am, who I am— is because of him only, yes, he was a mistake, but I'd rather have him as a beautifully mistaken memory than a horrible regret of not having him near me at all." His words were sincere, you could see it in his tears.

"I promise you, Emery, we'll find them both." I told him. "We're both not ready to loose them just yet."