The Young Club Footballer Who Took a Year to Give In

This happened quite a few years ago, but I still remember it with the clarity of things one keeps without meaning to. Back then I was forty-two, skinny, dark-haired, with a good body thanks to years of biking and little patience at the table, and I lived alone downtown after my separation. A group of colleagues had invited me to train in football two afternoons a week at a club on the outskirts, with grass pitches and a simple snack bar where we ended up sharing beer and empanadas after every match.

I signed up without thinking too much about it. I needed to move my body, to do something that wasn’t the office. The club was about six kilometers from my apartment, in an area where the houses were modest and most people knew one another. The first trainings were disastrous. I arrived out of breath before the first half was over, played with concrete blocks for feet, and went home sore in places I didn’t even know I had.

It was on one of those first days that I saw him. He was sitting on the wire fence, one leg dangling outside, waiting for one of us to get hurt or get tired so he could come in as a substitute. He lived right across from the club. They called him Tobías, though later I learned that at home they called him Toby. He had just turned eighteen, was thin, tall, olive-skinned, and had dark hair that the evening light outlined as if it were looking for him on purpose.

—Want to come in? —one of mine asked him.

Tobías nodded without smiling, hopped the fence in one motion, and went onto the pitch. In the first ten minutes it was clear he played at another level. Glued to the sideline, he beat men with a short touch and looked up before sending in the cross. I followed him with my eyes more than I should have, and at some point he looked back at me. It was nothing, just a moment. But we both registered it.

During the third half we sat close by. We talked about the match, about the pitch, about anything. I asked him if he played anywhere and he told me he’d been in the youth setup of a club in the area until recently, but had quit for reasons he preferred not to go into. I told him, half jokingly, that I needed a private coach because I was a disaster. He laughed for the first time that night.

—If you want, I can give you some tips —he said, shrugging as if it were just an ordinary idea—. I live across the street, it’s no trouble.

We exchanged numbers before either of us had time to think about it too much.

***

The lessons started the following week. I’d arrive at the club half an hour before official training, and he’d show up with a ball under his arm and a pair of worn-out sneakers. He corrected my stance, taught me how to stop the ball with the sole, how to strike with my left without falling over. He had a strange patience for a boy his age, as if he liked teaching more than playing. And I liked being there, silent, watching him explain.

Little by little we started texting outside the club too. Silly things at first: a meme, a question about the next match, a music recommendation. Then longer messages, conversations that stretched past one in the morning. I didn’t tell anyone. There was nothing to tell, really. Or so I told myself.

One afternoon, during the third half, Tobías left early without saying goodbye to me. I hadn’t paid much attention because I was tangled up in an argument about the team’s formation with two teammates. When I went looking for him, he was already gone. His younger brother, who sometimes came with him, approached with an innocent face.

—Tobi left upset —he told me—. He says you don’t pay attention to him anymore.

I froze, the plastic cup in my hand. That night I drove back to my apartment with a mixture of confusion and something darker I couldn’t name right away. Was he jealous? An eighteen-year-old kid couldn’t be jealous of a forty-year-old man who was supposedly giving him football lessons. It made no sense. And yet I fell asleep thinking about him, about the curve of his shoulders, about the way he bit the inside of his cheek when he hesitated before speaking.

***

The next training session he acted as if nothing had happened. I greeted him in my usual tone and he returned a short hug, one of those that lasts a second longer than necessary. That night he texted late.

—I’m bored. Why don’t you come get me?

—And what’s your family going to say? That you’re going out with someone older.

—It’s fine. Are you coming to get me or what?

I took twenty minutes changing my shirt three times. When I got to his block, he was already outside, sitting on the curb with his phone in his hand. That night we drove around aimlessly, ending up in a dive bar drinking a warm beer and talking about anything except what was happening between us. At two in the morning I dropped him at his door and went back to my apartment feeling that something had shifted forever.

From then on, we went out twice a week. Bars, a burger joint downtown, once even a dance night at a nightclub he got into using a cousin’s ID. He got to know my apartment. He knew where the sugar was, what shampoo I used, which drawer I kept the spoons in. But nothing ever happened. I took care not to move forward. He didn’t take the step either.

***

One night, after a barbecue we had both gone to in my car, we ended up sitting on a bench in an empty square. I had left music playing on the car speakers, the doors open, and the yellow streetlight painted half our faces. I’d been turning over one question in my head for months, and that night I let it out.

—Tobi, what’s going on? Sometimes you get weird with me. You get mad if I don’t text, you get upset if I stop paying attention to you. Could it be there’s something more between us than this?

He took a while to answer. When he did, he was looking at the tips of his sneakers.

—Not even close. I’m not mad. I don’t feel anything weird. I’m not gay.

I asked once and didn’t push it. I went home with my stomach knotted and my mind full. I told myself he was new to this, that I had to let him breathe, that if I forced it I’d lose him. I decided to let go. If it had to happen, it would happen on its own.

***

For a couple of months we saw each other less. He stopped texting so often. I forced myself not to look for him. At the club we greeted each other with the naturalness of any two teammates. I thought I’d closed the chapter, until one Saturday in January, with forty degrees in the shade and the city half empty for the holidays, my phone rang.

—What are you doing? Where are we going out today?

It was him. Capricious as always.

—Where do you want to go? You tell me.

—Let’s have a drink and go dancing. Just the two of us, come on.

I bought drinks at the corner Chinese shop, showered, changed three times again, and at exactly eleven I was parked in front of his place. Tobías came out in a white T-shirt clinging to his body and black pants that showed everything. He got into the car with a smile I’d never seen before, the smile of a boy who knows exactly what he’s doing.

The club was packed and we danced in the middle of the floor like any other two people. After the second gin and tonic he fixed me with a look that could no longer be mistaken for anything else.

—Let’s go.

—It’s still a while until closing time.

—Let’s go to your apartment. I want to leave now.

He said it without drama, the way someone asks for the check.

***

In the elevator we didn’t touch. I went in first, turned on only the floor lamp, put on some low music, and poured two glasses. He stood in front of the big mirror in the living room, the one my ex had left behind when she went. He started moving to the rhythm of the song, slowly, singing under his breath, watching his own reflection as if I weren’t there.

I watched him from the sofa for a few minutes. He was too beautiful that night. The light fell diagonally across his jaw, and his T-shirt had ridden up just enough to show the dark line running down from his navel. I stood up, set the glasses on the table, and moved behind him. I wrapped my arms around his waist, slowly, without squeezing.

Tobías didn’t move. He looked at me through the mirror and smiled. It wasn’t the smile from the dance floor. It was a smaller, stranger smile. One that said I’ve got you crazy.

We danced like that for a long while, my right arm across his abdomen, my chest against his back, the rhythm getting slower and slower. I began to move just a little, drawing him toward me, and I noticed he let himself rest there. That he adjusted so my cock, hard under my jeans, fit between his ass cheeks. There was no way to hide anything anymore.

Suddenly his left hand went back and he touched me over the fabric. He squeezed once, twice. I stopped thinking. I opened the button of his pants without taking my eyes off him in the mirror and he helped me unzip mine. My jeans dropped to the floor and he pulled my cock out with a hand that no longer trembled.

I turned him around. I lowered his pants, then his briefs. He had soft skin, almost no body hair, and a smell of cheap cologne mixed with sweat that got under my skin. I cupped his face with both hands and kissed him. It was the first kiss. His mouth was warm and smelled of gin.

—Are you sure? —I asked him, my forehead pressed to his.

—Shut up.

***

He knelt without being asked. At first he was shy, just the tip, a short kiss over the glans, then the tongue tasting slowly, as if he were recognizing something new. His eyes shone in the low light of the living room and from just enough alcohol, his mouth wet, his jaw clenching and unclenching while he worked me with his tongue. I rested a hand on the back of his neck and didn’t push him; I let him set the pace so he wouldn’t feel like he was being made to do it. But very soon the thing changed. He opened his mouth wider, took me deeper, moving his head in and out with the beautiful awkwardness of someone learning and at the same time wanting to prove he could. The sound of his saliva going up and down made me close my eyes. When he moaned against my cock, the shiver went all the way up to my stomach.

—Like that, pretty little faggot —I murmured, without thinking about what I was saying.

He liked it. I saw it in the way his neck tightened. He reached for his own cock, already hard, and touched himself over the boxer briefs while still sucking me. I was about to come in the mouth of a kid who’d had me chewing on this for weeks. I pulled him off before I lost control, and he looked at me with his mouth wet, breathing through his nose.

—Not yet —I told him—. I want to see you all the way.

I led him to the bed by the hand. He sat on the edge, legs open, looking up at me with that sly face he’d had from the first day. I pulled down his shirt and licked his chest, hard under my lips, pinching his nipples with my fingers until a short moan slipped out of him. I became obsessed with the texture of his skin: taut in the shoulders, softer on the stomach, hot from the night and from the excitement. I yanked down his pants and boxer briefs together, and his cock sprang against his abdomen, thin but heavy, the glans shining, damp with need.

—Look at how hard you’ve got it —I said, taking it in my hand—. You’re dripping.

He bit his lip. He didn’t answer. I kissed his neck, the hollow below his ear, and when I wanted to turn him face down he stopped me with his hand on my chest.

—No, not like that.

—Then tell me how.

—I want to see you first.

He yanked my boxer briefs down and touched my cock with a confidence that shook me through. He grabbed it at the base, slid his hand up and down, squeezing right where it hurts so good, and then put his face between my legs without asking questions. He licked my balls hungrily, sucked the tip, ran his tongue along the frenulum as if he wanted to learn every inch. I was trembling over him. It was obvious he wasn’t playing at being an expert: he was hungry. That was worse. Or better. I lifted one leg to open myself wider and he went in all the way, taking as much as he could into his mouth, swallowing saliva, breathing hot against my skin.

—Yeah, like that, keep going —I told him, grabbing his hair—. Fuck my head up.

He laughed against my cock, a tiny sound, almost insolent, and kept sucking me with less and less inhibition. When I felt I wasn’t going to last much longer, I pulled away again, threw him onto the bed, and pried his legs open with my knees.

I wanted to see his face. I wanted to know if he was really still there, if he wasn’t going to regret it when I touched him for real. I pressed the tips of my fingers to his ass and opened him slowly, smearing saliva at the entrance, massaging the area until I felt him relax. Tobías clenched his teeth at first, then let out a breath and let me do it. His hole was tiny, completely closed, a beautiful first-time tightness. I slid one finger in, just the first, and saw him arch his back.

—Breathe —I ordered.

—Don’t tell me what to do.

—Then loosen up.

His body gave little by little. I put the second finger in once he was wet and slick, moving them inside to open him properly, searching for that pressure that makes everything possible. With my other hand I massaged his cock, hard as stone, and he started moaning without hiding it, leaving his mouth half open and his gaze lost in the ceiling.

When I felt him ready, I turned him over again. I wanted to see his face while I fucked him. I tucked a pillow under his hips, moistened my fingers with saliva again, and pressed the tip against his entrance. He held my gaze, breathing fast, his face red, lips swollen from biting them so much.

—Come on —he said, barely a thread of a voice—. Put it in me.

I went in slowly, feeling how he took me in with a tight pressure that made me stop at every centimeter. Tobías closed his eyes, let out a low moan, and gripped the sheet with white knuckles. I stayed still inside him, so the burning could settle, so I wouldn’t break anything. When I finally stopped feeling that taut barrier, I began to move just a little. First out and in only a little, then a bit more, setting a short rhythm that made us slide with sweat. He opened his eyes and looked at me with a mix of pain and hunger that made me lose my mind.

—More —he begged, swallowing—. Harder.

—Like this?

I gave him more, yes. I drove all my cock into him with a deeper thrust and the mattress creaked under us. His ass adjusted to my size in a kind of delicious resistance. A loud moan escaped him, but he didn’t pull away. On the contrary: he lifted his hips to take me better, offering his whole body as if he had been waiting for this moment before he even knew it. I spread his ass cheeks with one hand and with the other took his cock, pumping him while I shoved him into the mattress.

—Look at how I’m fucking you, Tobías —I told him in his ear—. You love it, don’t you?

—Yes —he answered, voice broken—. Don’t stop, don’t stop.

It was no longer a shy scene or a twisted conversation. It was pure flesh. The bed creaked, the headboard hit the wall with every thrust, and the air in the room filled with our panting and the animal smell of two bodies sweating at the limit. I changed the angle by lifting his legs onto my shoulders, and then I went in even deeper, slamming into him with a force that tore a cry out of him. His abdomen showed when he tensed, his thin thighs tightened, and every time I came out, his ass pulled me back in as if it didn’t want to let me go.

He came first. He went rigid, threw his head back, and came over his belly and chest, a thick white stream splashing his stomach and staining my fingers. Seeing him finish like that, twisting beneath me, made me lose the last of my sanity. I kept moving a couple more times, jaw clenched, and came inside him with a long orgasm that left me empty all at once. I felt him tighten even more, felt the orgasm drain me to the root and loosen my legs. I couldn’t hold myself up; I fell on top of him, breathing into his neck, both of us smeared with sweat, spit, and semen.

We stayed still, pressed together, saying nothing, listening to the low music in the background and a dog far away.

***

After that night we kept seeing each other for a few more months, but it never felt the same again. The intensity had burned itself out in a single night. Over time he started dating a girl from the neighborhood, stopped coming to the club, stopped answering messages. I ran into him two years ago on the street, pushing a stroller, looking tired and a few kilos heavier. We greeted each other with a brief hug and each went on our way.

It was the best night of my life and, in some strange way, also the last one of something. This is my confession. It’s the first time I’ve written it down. Regards.