A few hours later, our whole team, including Jonatan and Rafel Navarro, one of our assistant coaches, was sitting at a long table in an Italian restaurant. I had just finished a whole salami pizza and my stomach felt like it was literally about to explode at any moment, so I tried to undo the top button of my jeans.

Next to me, Alexia laughed softly. "Better undo those pants all the way, Jonatan ordered tiramisu for all of us. "

"Thank God, I don't like tiramisu" I grinned. "Otherwise, I'd really have a problem right now."

Horrified, Alexia looked at me with her big, green eyes. "What do you mean, you don't like tiramisu? What's wrong with you?"

"I should be the one asking this question, you said my pizza tastes like crap!"

She rolled her eyes. "That's something else. Pineapple just doesn't belong on a pizza, everyone knows that. It makes me sick" Alexia defended herself.

I shook my head in disbelief. "Well, at least I'll never have to invite you over to my place for dinner."

Alexia grabbed a small bowl of tiramisu from the waiter's tray. "And you really don't want any?" When I shook my head, she grinned in satisfaction and grabbed a second portion. "Better for me then, but don't tell Jonatan!"

Meanwhile, I was thinking about how I was going to get home from here. I had no idea where exactly we were in the city right now. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and tried to find the nearest subway station, but the screen stayed black. "Fuck" I cursed quietly. Of course, my phone just had to run out of battery now.

"What's wrong?" Alexia asked curiously.

Annoyed, I showed her my phone. "I don't know how to get home from here. I might just take a cab now."

"Bullshit, one of us will take you." Alexia offered. "Where do you have to go?"

I told her the closest station to my apartment and the number of the subway I usually take.

"Okay, that's really far. I'd take you, but I'm going to Jenni's later. Wait a minute."

She bent over the table and talked to Claudia Pina, one of our best forwards, and Mapi. As hard as I tried, I couldn't understand a word she was saying because of how loud it was in the restaurant.

Alexia sat back into her chair and clapped her hands enthusiastically. "Problem solved! Mapi will take you to the metro station because she lives nearby. I told you she'd come around if you let me handle it!"

"I thought you had nothing to do with it." I winked.

"I'm speaking hypothetically, of course."

I sighed. The thought of walking through dark alleys with Mapi for I don't know how long made me feel quite uneasy. Surely, she hadn't agreed to be my personal tour guide out of friendliness, because as far as I was concerned, she never did anything for that reason. Would she even take me to the right station? I secretly hoped she would forget about it and just leave without me, but shortly after, as everyone had already stood up and was saying their goodbyes outside the restaurant, I heard her distinctive voice behind me.

"Would you allow me to accompany you to your castle, Princesa? "

I winced. Why did she always have to sneak up on me.

Mapi motioned for me to follow her. We were walking next to each other in total silence. I couldn't help but notice how effortlessly beautiful she was. She had tied her hair into a slightly messy bun after her swim earlier. One strand had come loose and danced up and down in front of her face with every step she took. She wore white fabric shorts and a loose crop top, in the same color, under which her dark bikini top showed through. While looking at her gold necklace, I thought about how to put an end to the awkward silence, but she beat me to it.

"How did you like team night?" she wanted to know without lifting her eyes from the floor.

At first, I didn't know what to say. If only she wasn't that scary, I wouldn't lose my words every time I was speaking to her !

"Um...great. The food was delicious. What about you?" I replied awkwardly.

"It wasn't anything special" she shrugged her shoulders. "The food was good, but it's really starting to annoy me that Jonatan orders tiramisu for us every time. I hate that stuff."

"Me too!" I exclaimed a little too loudly, to which Mapi looked at me with amusement.

"We have something in common after all, Princesa. I'm quite surprised."

"To celebrate that, you could stop calling me that name" I suggested to her.

Mapi threw me a cheeky grin. "Princesa? I'm afraid I can't do that, but I have a better suggestion. Do you like ice cream?"

I frowned. What did that have to do with anything now? "Of course."

"Flavor?"

I stopped and looked at her questioningly. "I don't know, something fruity I guess?" I finally replied.

"Fruity, I see. I could have guessed that." She winked at me.

I blushed. Seriously, fruity? It's like I want her to make fun of me.

"Wait here. I'll be back in a minute" Mapi ordered.

Completely overwhelmed, I did what she told me to and leaned against the nearest wall of a house. What had just happened? Why was Mapi suddenly so nice?

Before I could start overthinking, Mapi reappeared. In her hand she held two ice creams. "Here you go, Princesa. A scoop of mango and a scoop of strawberry, from the best gelateria in the whole city. Is that fruity enough or would you like some rainbow sprinkles?"

"Wow. Thank you" I stammered, completely ignoring her joke. "You're not trying to poison me, are you?"

She gently punched me in the arm and laughed. "I'm not as bad as you think, I promise. Looks can be deceiving, you know? Come on, let's sit on those stairs over there."

After we sat down, I was trying to find a way to break the silence, but Mapi beat me to it once again.

"Why do you play football? "

I looked at her confused. Was she making fun of my football skills? As quickly as the idea had come, I dismissed it again, because Mapi's sincere gaze rested on me. A little nervously I poked around in my ice cream.

"When I was a kid, I wanted to try every hobby there was on this planet" I finally began hesitantly. "But after a few weeks, it got boring and I wanted to try something new. My parents hated me for it, but it didn't stop until I started playing football and then I just never stopped playing. I just love everything about it, the game itself, all the tactics behind it and of course playing on a team. Well, mostly anyway. What about you?"

Now it was Mapi's turn to be silent while I shoved a spoonful of mango ice cream into my mouth. Delicious. It was indeed the best ice cream in the world.

Mapi cleared her throat softly.

"It was kinda the same for me" she began as she wrapped a strand her hair around her long, tattooed index finger. "I actually grew up playing volleyball and even baseball, but one day when I was 11 I was playing football with my brother and David, who'd later become my coach at Zaragoza, spotted me and wanted me to join their youth team, so I did and I stuck with it.  I love everything about this sport, well expect for losing. But I think my favorite part is how it connects people from all over the world. Just look at our team and where we all come from."

I tried hard to imagine Mapi as a little girl playing football, but I just couldn't reconcile her confident, dominant, almost scary look with that of a child.

"It's really nice what football can do. Two years ago, I spent a day at an orphanage with my old club. The atmosphere was very tense at the beginning, but as soon as we started playing, the kids started warming up to us almost immediately" I told her.

Mapi nodded in agreement. "I play with refugee kids sometimes, it's amazing."

"You?" I exclaimed surprised.

She threw me an amused look and then carefully took my right hand into hers. Her hand guided mine to her neck. A shiver went down my spine when my fingers got to feel the warmth of her soft skin.

"What does it say here?" She asked, referring to her stupid neck tattoo.

"Looks can be deceiving" I laughed confused.

"Right, I think that's something you need to learn" Mapi winked.

I just rolled my eyes and turned my hand around, so I could grab hers and guided it to my throat.

"What does it say here?" I grinned.

"Nothing?"

"Wrong, it says maybe if you don't behave like a total dick when you first meet someone, your look wouldn't be deceiving."

"Fair point" Mapi laughed, still resting her hand on my neck.

Feeling as if this situation was to become really awkward soon, I cleared my throat and glanced at my watch. Half past eleven already! Mapi seemed to have noticed my glance, removed her hand and hastily stood up.

"Come on, I'll take you to the metro now or Alexia will kill me."

"So, Alexia tells you what to do" I said jokingly while following her into an alley.

"No one tells me what to do."

The metro station wasn't far and soon we were walking down a long flight of stairs that ended on a small track.

"You don't have to wait with me" I offered, but she waved it off.

"You were right, Alexia would rip my head off if you don't get home safely, because she's the boss of me. Do you know where to get off? "

I nodded with a grin. "Yes, thank you, I should just be able to manage that."

Mapi looked on with innocent puppy eyes. "I just want to make sure, because I can't offer you a carriage with a prince, Princesa" she joked.

"I..." I started to answer, but out of nowhere, the loud sound of the rapidly approaching metro appeared.

Mapi took a step closer to me. "So, see you tomorrow?" she shouted in my ear, trying to outdo the loud sound of the subway.

"Of course. And thanks for bringing me!" I screamed back.

The red and white, old-fashioned metro came to a screeching stop and the doors opened with a beep.

Before I could react, Mapi pulled me into a quick hug. For the first time, I took in her scent, a mixture of floral perfume and sunscreen. She smelled like summer, sun, and the beach. "Goodbye, Princesa" she murmured in my ear and disappeared almost immediately amidst a noisy group of tourists who had just left the subway.

Slightly confused, I sat down onto one of the hard plastic seats on the metro and looked out the window as the metro slowly started moving again. Only now did I realize what had really happened in the past hour. Although I found it hard to believe, I had actually gotten to know a nice, helpful Mapi.

I thought back to Alexia's words in the bar earlier this week. I wondered if Mapi seriously hadn't always been like that or if Alexia just said that to protect her friend. But if she was right, what had really happened to Mapi? Surely a breakup with her girlfriend couldn't be everything. Or could it? To be fair, I didn't have much of a say here, because I'd only been in a relationship once before and had honestly been quite happy when it ended. Maybe I had more in common with Mapi than I wanted to admit. Relationships weren't really my thing, I found it way more exciting to get involved with someone for a few dates until I eventually got bored. Apart from that, I preferred being alone. My dating life reminded me a little bit of my childhood when I'd always change my hobbies when I got bored. I wonder if I'd ever meet someone I'd want to keep in my life, like football back then.

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