There was something in Gavi that Xavi noticed when he last visited La Masia. It caught his attention and he simply couldn't take his eyes off the boy. Not because of how awfully attractive he is, but because of how efficiently he controls the ball at his feet with such focus in his eyes that he only saw last in Messi when they both were still young and playing for Barca's first eleven.
Xavi could see the sparkles of passion in his eyes when the ball would finally hit his feet and that's when he'd start to show his masterclass. Everything about the 16 year old clicked for him. He could see that Gavi has passion for what he does.
Thinking of how remarkably great he performed amongst the seniors in la masia, he decided to visit him again. And yet again, Gavi didn't fail to amaze.
His pace was perfect, his control was great, and his focus and determination to win the ball was so astonishing that it won Xavi over.
But it wouldn't be a year until he'd get a chance to play in the first eleven in Barca's senior squad.
It'd be his first match with the senior squad, and to ensure that he stays in the senior squad, he has to prove himself better than he did in La masia. The competition is bigger here, and as a youngster he must prove himself to Xavi.
Gavi was more than ready, and Xavi really wanted to keep him. And so Gavi, once again, didn't disappoint.
The talent he's made of himself at such a young age is simply remarkable and eye catching to Xavi. His patience with the ball is on an insanely great level, but the same can't be said about his personal patience with the world.
He fouled a player and managed to get a yellow card. He wouldn't have gotten the yellow card if it wasn't for him pushing the opponent team players when they tried to confront him.
The sass was very hard to not notice. The anger in his eyes was visible, as far as Xavi can remember.
But in general, he's the embodiment of what a youngster is supposed to be. Full of energy, interacting with everyone, pushing his body to it's limits and simply never admitting to give up although his body always screamed of exhaustion the most at the end of practice.
He's quite talkative too, but Xavi doesn't mind, because Pedri and Ferran are always around him to supervise if anything happens to go wrong. They're somewhat like Gavi's guardians, but outside the house.
It's possible to stop him from blabbering out of anger off pitch, which is quite easy to handle. But off pitch, it gets physical, and it gets near to impossible to stop him from punching everyone in the face.
When he's angry, he looks stupid and immature from afar, because he sort of is, bur in reality, this is the anger that most players suppress in a game, but Gavi simply supports the idea of expressing it instead.
Xavi sighs as the refereee blows the whistle, a bit pissed to know what's about to be coming up.
The referee walks up to Gavi and pulls out a red card, to which Gavi goes ballistic. He stands up from the ground, taking a second to recover from the tackle and red card, before his lips curved to a frown and growls emerged.
- "Oh no.."
Xavi whimpered. He can see Vinicius walking up to the commotion between Gavi and the referee, as if he didn't just quitw very harshly tackle Gavi, although his intention exactly wasn't to be so harsh, it simply came out reflex.
Gavi immediately faced Vini, connecting foreheads, shouting at his face, all while Vini simply said shut up and laughed at his immature behaviour.
Vini's smile grew as he slid his hand to Gavi's waist, trying to catch him off guard, although this is quite literally the same as playing with fire.
Luckily, Gavi gets caught in the moment and quickly shuts up from the sudden touch, blushing furiously and pushing him away from anywhere near him, not being able to process much. What did he just do..?
Gavi tries to lunge forward after realization hit him but Pedri held him back by his hands, as Vini only winked playfully and turned his back on Gavi, igniting an inextinguishable fire inside of the teen.
Nonetheless, he continues to play efficiently, trying his best not to lunge himself at the players of their long time rival, Real Madrid.
---
- "Coach..?"
Gavi calls and wanders, before Xavi comes into sight.
- "Oh yes, Gavi. I wanted to talk to you about something very important that I've been giving you some ease with, and I think you know what it is."
Gavi stared at him blankly as a response, with confusion written all over his face.
- "You need to try to control yourself on pitch, Gavi. I want you to have a good reputation amongst the senior players in the squad, okay? You're one of the many talented young players we've had in a long time ever since Messi, and I want you to prove yourself of your worth instead of degrading yourself with such shit behaviour."
- "But he-"
- "Gavi, no. Just give it a try, okay? I'm saying this for both you and the team's benefit, and it's best that you take this advice."
Gavi grumbled and mumbled out a 'fine' before stomping out of the room, pissed.
But it wouldn't be too long before his anger would water down to guilt that's starting to make him feel sick in the guts as he's leaving the training center.
A wave of guilt washed over him once again as he suddenly pictured himself screaming into Vini's face that day. Usually, he never feels guilty for what he's done, and never cares to apologize. But since the very beginning of the day, everything has been going bad for him, and he constantly feels the urge to say sorry although that's not something a Gavi would do.
He decides to somehow make it up to Vinicius, let it be a simple apology orally or a long ass message, even though he thinks it'd be a very cowardly of him to simply message him after screaming at his face.
Whatever it is, he's not letting himself get away with this until the sick feeling in his gut dies down to nothing.
---
- "He's definitely asking you out dude."
- "Are you out of your mind? I think he's well aware that he's handsome and can get anyone he likes grasped at the tip of his fingers doing the the bare minimum. So it's unlikely that he asks me, a nobody, to a date. And why the fuck would you think he's a gay dude?"
Vinicius cringed, while Rodrygo cackled.
- "That's because he is gay, stupid."
Vinicius looked at him in confusion, looking for answers. Rodrygo completely faced him, sniggering.
- "Quite surprised that you don't know this- it's a secret of Gavi, but now it's become quite an open secret really."
Vinicius continued to stare at him and nodded as a response to continue, so Rodrygo did.
- "In the past, he had a huge crush of Pedri. Although it lasted for quite a long time, eventually, Gavi simply lost hope and started to rely on fate, well that's what he said. So, yeah."
- "Wait. So you're telling me...Gavi is gay?"
Vinicius paused and pondered in disbelief.
- "Not like I haven't said it a hundred times already but YES, he IS gay, for your kind information."
Vinicius nodded, contemplating. Could it possible be a date that Gavi is inviting him over to? Or else, what else is there that Gavi could give as a reasoning to invite him for dinner to a fancy place, just for them?
---
Vinicius had completely forgotten about the game incident. He should've remembered.
Because he dressed up in his finest clothes and tried to keep it simple and much more different than his usual aesthetic. Most importantly, he was expecting this to be somewhat of a date, as Rodrygo had successfully convinced him to believe so.
Only now he's discovered that it was the incident Gavi wanted to apologize for. Vinicius felt bad as he had expected alot, but he kept on a smile, constantly saying it's okay as Gavi kept repeating sorry's, not used to apologizing ever.
- "Gavi, it's okay, mistakes happen."
Vinicius stopped Gavi's hands from moving around by his own, sighing. Gavi stared at him, noticing that his eyes are dull, but finding no reasoning behind it. Maybe he's wrong.
- "But I-"
- "No..Gavi, seriously. I'm not angry, trust me."
Gavi went silent, fiddling with the stray string hanging off the pocket of his jeans.
Vinicius sighed with a pang in his heart. Maybe he shouldn't have expected so much.
- "I guess I'll leave now, bye."
Vinicius said in a hushed and quick tone as if in a rush and walked away quickly, not giving Gavi enough time to explain.
Gavi thought that after this he'd be able spend the night in peace, but seeing Vinicius, his guilt just added on to the stress he was already dealing with.
It's not been too long since their meet up and Vinicius seems to not have forgotten about it yet. Not because it turned out to be what was the most obvious but out of his expectations, but because it was Gavi. He wanted to at least talk a bit more to the young Spaniard, but Gavi didn't seem to be quite interested in that and looked as if he wanted to get it over with.
It doesn't hurt as much now as it did the first time, but it's still lingering. It makes him zone out whenever he thinks about it, and arises an uncomfortable churning in his stomach and makes his heart race.
He just simply can't distract himself from thinking about Gavi, even though it makes him feel bad in the gut and uncomfortable all around. Even though it is quite a pain in the ass, he wants to bear it.
He isn't in love, is he?
___________