就算我們暫時做不到，希望阿森納撐住了，不要讓曼聯的SB們笑話了去。

041. cup

“Where’s my cup?” Robin calls from the kitchen.

Cesc looks confused as he tries to find his socks and decides that trying to distinguish his from Robin’s isn’t going to work.

“What cup?” Cesc yells, throwing both socks into the bag.

“My cup! The one I always use when I’m here.”

Curious, Cesc goes to the kitchen. “You have a cup?”

“The Arsenal one,” Robin says.

Cesc opens the dishwasher and pulls the mug out. “Since when is it yours?”

He thinks of the orange toothbrush sitting in his medicine cabinet and silently hands him the mug without further question.


042. brother

“The Boss is the grandpa, a kind of scary grandpa. Jens is the crazy uncle you don’t really talk about,” Emmanuel Adebayor says to Kolo on the bus as they travel home. “Cesc is the little brother you weren’t sure you wanted, but glad you have. Alex is… the fun uncle.”

Kolo laughs. “Then who am I?”

“The older brother.”

“I don’t want to be the older brother.”

“The cool older brother?”

“No. Can I be the father?”

“Well, that’s Thierry and Gilberto.”

“No mother?”

“You could be the-”

“I’ll stick with being the older brother.”

“The cool older brother.”


043. sister

“¿Hola, Cesc?”
hello, cesc?

“¿Carlota? ¿Como estas? ¿Por que me llamas?”
Carlota? How are you? Why are you calling me?

“¿Necesito un razon para llamarte?”
I need a reason to call you?

“Sí.”
Yes.

“Bueno, yo tengo un favor pequeño.”
Fine, I have a small favor.

“¿Que quieres?”
What do you want?

“¿Puedes conseguir un autógrafo de Robin van Persie?”
Could you get Robin van Persie's autograph?

“¿Que? ¡No!”
What? No!

“No me te gusta.”
I don't like you.

Cesc hangs up and looks at a bemused Robin beside him.

“Who was that?” Robin asks, flipping through channels.

“My sister.”

“What did she say?”

“That she hates you.”

Robin looks confused. “She called to just say she hates me? Why?”

“She didn’t exactly say she hated you. More like… she wanted me to get her your autograph.”

Robin grins. “Jealous?”

Cesc pauses. “No.”


044. mouse

Alex decides in the darkness of the team bus, beside Tomas who is half on top of him asleep, that he likes Tomas’s hair the best. Unlike the black hair of Robin van Persie or Cesc, it’s a gentle mousy brown. It’s lighter than Robert’s was and darker than Philippe’s or his own. He spies Jens and Manuel, but neither have the length that Tomas grows his hair out to.

“Perfect for grabbing,” he thinks with a wicked grin and a small chuckle.

“What are you doing?” Tomas asks groggily.

Alex laughs awkwardly and takes his hand from Tomas’s hair.


045. computer

Robin will never admit to it, but he checks Alex’s website after every match. He tries not to wake Cesc while sneaking out of bed and turns on the computer.

“Fortunately, we got these three points on the "boxing day". This win in Watford was a hard work to do, but I think at the end it was absolutely correct. Grace to Robin van Persie, we succeeded there!”

He finds himself with a silly grin and wanting to call Alex until Cesc groggily asks what he’s doing. Robin quickly closes the window, feeling slightly guilty and not entirely sure why.


046. pin

When Robin asked Cesc to stop by, he wasn’t sure what to think.

“I read an article about Ashley saying you were the one who threw the pizza and thought we might do something about it,” Robin says, leading them to his living room.

Cesc laughs out right at the picture of Ashley pinned to a dart board. “What’s this?”

“His eyes will be worth 10 points each and his nose will be the bulls eye,” Robin says as he hands some darts to Cesc.

Cesc wins that day, but he has a sneaking suspicion it’s because Robin let him.


47. rubber

Cesc glances at the rubber band on Robin’s left wrist and doesn’t take much note of it. After the third day, Cesc begins to wonder what the significance of his rubber band is and whether it’s for a charity he’s never heard of. By the fifth day, Cesc figures it must be a good luck charm and buys a bag of rubber bands of his own. On the sixth day, Robin laughs and pulls the rubber band off.

“I’ve been meaning to take this off every time I shower, but keep forgetting,” he says before shooting it in Thierry’s direction.


048. restaurant

Robin sits across from Cesc at a sushi restaurant that he insisted they eat at and remembers the awkwardness of their first non-date date - the weirdness of going to a restaurant together for the first time without the excuse of the other boys there to ease the tension. Then there was the paranoia that everyone was staring at them having dinner together. And of course the food poisoning that followed and fighting Cesc for the toilet, deciding that if they can vomit together without being disgusted enough to leave the other, there might be hope for a future together.


049. coins

“Does it really hurt that much?” Alex asks, checking the back of Robin’s head for a cut.

“Yes, just wait til you’ve been hit in the head by a coin,” he grouses.

“I have a scar,” Jens interjects from a few seats ahead on the bus.

“I think someone got a concussion last week,” Cesc pipes from behind.

“Well, I don’t see anything,” Alex says, giving up his search and letting Robin sit up.

Robin rubs at the back of his head. “You could kiss it to make it better.”

Alex laughs and flicks Robin’s head, much to his displeasure.


050. copper

Robert had asked him once why he had copper pots hanging in his kitchen when neither he nor Nicole were very prolific cooks. They had been a wedding gift from his mother, and while they didn’t have much functional value, he still liked having them to remind him of family and home.

Thierry sits in his kitchen thinking of the time Robert had attempted to cook something. The scorch marks never completely came out of the small saucepan hidden in the middle. He could never explain to Nicole how he can have favorites with pots and pans they never used.


051. smelly

“What is that?”

Robin looks confused. “What’s what?”

“That smell, like old feet dipped in vinegar.”

“That’s very precise.”

Cesc tells him to stop being smart and help him find the source. They search around the bedroom until Cesc finds a dirty pair of red and white knee high socks under the bed. He looks bewildered as he brandishes them accusingly at Robin.

“Why’d you leave these here?”

“How do you know they’re mine and not yours?” Robin asks calmly.

Cesc turns and tosses the socks into the trashcan. Though he won’t say it, he’s sure they belong to Robin.


052. sleep

With six matches in three weeks and a new baby, Robin desperately needs rest. When Alex opens the door to see him standing on his front step one night with a small duffel bag and bags under his eyes to match, he silently moves aside and lets Robin take the guest room upstairs. He resumes cooking dinner. When twenty minutes pass without Robin’s emergence from the room, Alex goes to check on him. He’s lying on his side on top of the covers, still fully clothed, clutching his bag. Laughing, Alex takes off the man’s shoes and lets him sleep.


053. grass

Robin slots in a shot from an impossible angle that will surely seal the match in their favor. He wheels away, fist held aloft as he jogs slowly down the flank of the field facing the home crowd. Despite the exuberance of the fans and the technically perfect shot, it isn’t until he’s eating grass with a pile of bodies are scrambling over and around him, with ten voices out shouting the crowd in frenzied incoherence, and with arms and legs sliding and poking and entwining themselves into one red and white mass that it feels like a proper goal.


054. bird

After the last frustrating loss, Cesc sits in the locker room, shirt half off, grass stained shorts, socks, and boots still on, slumped in defeat. Robin watches as he dresses and sits beside him on the bench, saying nothing until they’re the only two left in the room. He silently takes Cesc’s hand, tugs down the shirt, and leads them to the empty stands. They sit just behind the goal and talk about absolutely nothing until the pre-dawn chill has Robin wrap the man in his jacket and the birds begin to sing somewhere beyond the lip of the stadium.


055. chestnut

Theo leads them down the brightly decorated street, jabbering excitedly as he pulls Thierry towards a small cart.

“You have to have chestnuts on Christmas,” he says, buying a bag.

Thierry watches as he patiently peels the small brown nut and offers him the small morsel. He takes it and eats it, all while Theo watches him expectantly. He makes exaggerated moans of delight while Theo laughs and tells him to stop being so dramatic. Thierry rubs Theo’s head with an affectionate smile and slings a long arm around his shoulder as they look for the rest of the boys.


057. Christmas

Phil sits beside a dejected Cesc on the couch. “Feliz Navidad.” Merry Christmas

Cesc briefly smiles and returns the gesture.

“Que quieres?” What do you want?

Cesc sits quietly for a moment, though the answer is obvious. “Mi familia.”My family

Phil puts a comforting arm around his shoulders as he offers him a small gift. “No es tu familia, pero espero que te guste.” It's not your family, but I hope you like it.

A small smile creeps onto Cesc’s face as he rips it open unceremoniously. He opens the box and laughs when he pulls out an Arsenal mug and touches the shiny lettering.

“Me le encanta,” he says simply and covers Phil’s hand with his own.
I love it.


058. love

Cesc loves the massive piling after every goal. He loves joking with and the loud relationship he has with Kolo and Alex. He loves the quiet understanding he has with Phil. He loves the quiet, easy relationship he has with Robin. He loves the elegant humor of Thierry. He loves late night bus rides. He loves winding up Jens then running for his life. He loves Tomas’s small, quiet, fluttery ways. He loves Arsene’s fierce serious look. He loves the shiny new grounds, though never more than Highbury, because she’ll always be his first.

Cesc decides that Arsenal… is love.


059. beer

Jens laughs at Cesc’s pink drink, which he sips carefully.

“What are you drinking?”

“A cosmo, why?”

“It’s pink.”

“So? It’s good. I don’t like tasting the alcohol.”

Jens holds up the dark beer in his glass. “This is a drink.”

“This is too,” Cesc says a bit defensively.

“Just try it. You haven’t had beer until you’ve has a nice German beer,” he says, sliding the dark brew across the wet bar top.

Cesc eyes it warily before taking a small tentative sip. It still tastes horrible, but with Jens watching him expectantly, he swears it tastes of ambrosia.


060. safe

While Kolo loves playing with the younger players, there are certain times that he worries. Eboue tackles the ball away, but the ball is cleared into the path of another opposition player. He rushes over to take the ball away, but can’t get there in time. He watches with trepidation as the player breaks toward goal and he takes a shot. Jens deflects it, stretching across the mouth to bat it away. Jens gets back up and screams at them to do their jobs and Kolo takes up his position again, feeling safe at the thought of Jens behind him.