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magicfootballstuff · 8 months

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Dirty Little Secret - part 5 (leila ouahabi x reader)

Summary: A love story about secrets, flirty messages, football rivalries, and useless lesbians who don’t know how to communicate. And it all starts with one badly timed challenge in the Champions League.

Leila Ouahabi x Arsenal!reader

Part 5/?

Read other parts here.

———

You’ve hardly spoken to Leila since the news broke that she’ll be playing for Manchester City next season, and not at all since the tournament began. You’re completely focused on your goal of winning the Euros, as Leila probably is too, and you immerse yourself in the bubble of the Lionesses camp while trying to block out outside noise. That includes talking to Leila.

You watch her games though. In between your own matches and the intense training schedule, there’s plenty of downtime and you manage to catch quite a few of the other games on the large screen in the Lionesses’ television room, including the Spanish team’s group games. You act like you’re watching them out of professional curiosity, knowing the likelihood of having to face Spain in the knockout rounds, but you’re as focused on Leila as an individual as you are on the Spanish team as a whole.

Sure enough, after a successful unbeaten group stage, England have to play against Spain in their quarter final match and it might be the hardest game you’ve ever played so far in your career.

It’s not just the physical aspect - one hundred and twenty minutes on a muggy summer evening against a team that has the majority of the possession - but also the mental side. When Spain go ahead, it’s the first goal that England have conceded all tournament, the first time you’ve found yourselves in a losing position, and it takes resilience like you’ve never seen before to pull yourself back not just level, but into the lead.

You almost forget that you’re playing against Leila’s team. She’s on the bench, which you feel conflicted about, having been looking forward to facing her on the pitch again, but at least it removes that possible distraction.

The final whistle blows and thanks to Georgia’s extra time worldie, England are through to the semi-finals.

You walk around the pitch, grinning and hugging your own teammates in celebration, while shaking the hands of the heartbroken Spanish players. Some of them, you know from the Copa de la Reina afterparty, where you were Leila’s guest, and it’s hard to look them in the eye knowing that you’ve just crushed their dreams of progressing further in this tournament.

You walk past Ona Batlle, who you’ve played against many times in the league, and who is being comforted by Rachel. Then Mapi Leon, who you know is one of Leila’s closest friends, lets you pull her in for a brief one-armed hug, but all the time you’re looking for one person.

You spot Leila from across the pitch, still wearing her purple substitute bib, and she must see you too because you end up slowly meandering towards each other as you do the rounds on the pitch.

Leila isn’t quite crying, not like some of her teammates who left everything out on the pitch in one hundred and twenty minutes of gruelling football, but the look in her eyes is one of heartbreak.

You don’t know what to say.

In the end, words aren’t needed. You’re not sure who initiates it, but you end up in each other’s arms. Leila is slightly taller than you and her arms wrap around your shoulders, one hand cradling the back of your head as you lean into her and wrap your own arms around her back. The warmth of her body against yours is comforting and you almost drown out the sound of the jubilant crowd singing Sweet Caroline because suddenly the only thing that matters is Leila.

“I’m sorry,” you mumble into Leila’s shoulder.

“Don’t say sorry,” Leila replies. “You’ll make me cry.”

You want to apologise for that too, but you obey Leila and stay quiet instead, still full of adrenaline from the game and knowing that seeing Leila cry will probably set you off too.

You wish you could freeze this moment, to exist just the two of you in each other’s arms, as you did for those short days in Barcelona a few weeks ago. Leila’s body fits against your own in a way that you’ve never fully appreciated before, but you feel like this is where you belong. She’s just a little bit taller than you, her hand cradling the back of your head, and though it should probably be you comforting her now that you’ve knocked her team out of the tournament, the embrace is as much of a comfort to you.

Though you’d like to remain in Leila’s arms forever, you eventually break apart, but with promises that you’ll talk properly as soon as all the formalities are done and you can get a moment of privacy.

You have to wait until after the huddles, when some of the girls are still doing media duties and you’re back in your tracksuit after a shower, but you get a message from Leila on your phone.

Leila Can I see you? Is there somewhere we can go?

Knowing that your time is limited before both teams have to leave the stadium, you reply straight away.

You Meet me outside the changing rooms?

You pull a hoodie over your head and slip your socked feet into your sliders, then leave the England changing room. Leila emerges from the Spanish dressing room within seconds, and you silently lead her in the opposite direction from the media zone, until you find a deserted hallway deep within the underbelly of the stadium. There, you end up on the floor, side by side with your backs against the wall, thighs pressed together and your fingers intertwined with Leila’s in her lap.

You’re reminded of the only other time you and Leila snuck away after a game - after the second Champions League game at the Emirates. Back then, your actions were fuelled by lust and secrecy. Today, you just want Leila’s company for as long as you’re allowed to have it, and you don’t care about getting caught.

“Are you mad?” you ask Leila, as you trace your thumb over the small tattoo on the back of her hand. “That we knocked you out?”

“Some of the girls are angry,” Leila says with a shrug. “Like Aitana - I think her head might explode. But I’m not mad. Just sad. We wanted to win. We really wanted to win for Alexia.”

“I’m sorry,” you apologise, leaning into Leila’s side and letting your head fall against Leila’s shoulder.

“It’s not your fault,” she tells you, her fingers still absently toying with yours.

“It kind of is,” you point out.

“No,” Leila insists, shaking her head firmly. “We have such good players but you need something extra to win a tournament. It feels like there’s always something missing with us. I can’t describe what it is, but I know your team has it.”

You think you know what Leila means. You’ve played in many different teams over the years - youth teams, professional clubs, national sides - and with that you’ve experienced the full range of success levels. The teams you’ve been a part of that have won titles have all had that special something that Leila refers to, a connection between teammates, the two-way trust between the coach and the players, the special spark that allows you all to push through, even when it’s tough.

You think that the Lionesses have probably demonstrated that tonight. You’ve played in so many teams that would have crumbled as soon as they went one goal down against one of the best sides in Europe, yet you came from behind to earn your place in the semi final. That’s the mark of a team that has something special.

Spain, for whatever reason, doesn’t have that, despite the obvious talent in their squad. You wonder if Leila is more mad at that than she is at you for knocking them out of the tournament.

“You’re gonna win this whole competition, you know that, right?” Leila tells you.

If there’s one thing that Sarina has brought to this England team it’s belief, but while you know this team is more than capable of winning the Euros, you’re still not sure whether it will actually happen.

“You think so?” you ask Leila.

She nods and says, “I hate it. My heart says anybody but England. But I also want it for you. You deserve it.”

“I know it’s the whole point of sport, that only one team can win, and don’t get me wrong, I love winning. But sometimes I hate it when my dreams have to come at the expense of my friends’ dreams.”

“Is that what we are?” Leila asks, and when you lift your head from her shoulder to look at her, she’s smirking back at you. “Friends?”

She gives your hand a performative squeeze, as if to emphasise the beyond-friendliness of your relationship.

You open your mouth to say something witty in response, then close it again. Because the thing is, you and Leila haven’t actually defined what you are. Football rivals with benefits is probably the most appropriate term, because to be honest, you’re not entirely sure if you know Leila well enough to call yourselves friends yet.

But with Leila looking at you with curiosity in her eyes, eyebrows half raised as if she’s expecting you to confirm the exact nature of your relationship, you don’t know what to say. You could joke, but that would just be deflecting. You could be honest, and tell her that you don’t know what you want but that you like the way that things have been going. Or you could field the adrenaline still coursing through your body from the match into telling Leila that you’d like to maybe explore making things a little more serious when she moves to England soon.

What if she doesn’t want things to be more serious? What if she’s more than happy with just an occasional hookup? More to the point, are you sure that you want anything more than what’s currently going on between you?

The door at the end of the hallway crashes open before you can even begin to vocalise any of the confusion in your mind, and your head jerks up to see that it’s Mapi who is interrupting you, stopping in her tracks when she sees the two of you sitting together on the floor in the middle of the corridor.

“Shit, my bad,” Mapi says in English, before she switches to Spanish and addresses Leila.

You let your fingers slip out from between Leila’s as they converse and use your hand to play with your hair instead, running your fingertips through the damp strands, until eventually Leila turns back to you and says, “Sorry, I have to go. We’re leaving soon.”

Leila pushes herself to her feet, then offers out a hand to help you to yours. You keep your hand in hers as you follow Mapi down the hallway, only letting it drop when you pass into a more public area where there might be some media. The last thing you need is for pictures of the two of you holding hands to appear on social media before you even get the chance to figure out how to label what Leila is to you.

There are a few more people around, and one of those is your captain Leah, whose frowning face relaxes when she sees you.

“Oh, there you are,” Leah says to you. “I’ve been looking for you. Nobody knew where you were. The bus is leaving soon.”

Leah’s eyes flick curiously between you and the two Spanish players, but if she suspects anything, she doesn’t comment on it.

Mapi leaves you, entering the Spanish dressing room, but Leila stays and you know it’s time to say goodbye. At least this time, with Leila’s move to Manchester imminent, you hope there will be chances to see her again sooner than usual once your own tournament is over.

You migrate towards each other and wrap your arms around Leila as she pulls you against her chest, burying your face against her shoulder. She smells divine, and you try to commit it to memory as you inhale.

“Good luck,” Leila murmurs into your hair, her voice soft enough that only you can hear her. “I’ll be cheering for you.”

“For me or for England?” you can’t help but tease her.

“You,” Leila says, speaking at a normal level again as she pulls out of the embrace. “Fuck England.”

There’s an amused glint in her eyes as she says this, but it quickly vanishes when she realises she’s still standing within earshot of the England captain, and you can’t stop yourself from grinning as Leila raises an apologetic hand in Leah’s direction.

“Sorry,” she says.

“No need to apologise,” Leah replies diplomatically. “In your position, I’d probably feel that way about us too.”

You think about going in for a goodbye kiss with Leila, but Leah’s presence causes you to hesitate, and before you can make a decision Leila has already said her final goodbye and followed Mapi into the Spanish changing room.

“You alright?” Leah asks, now that it’s just the two of you.

You and Leah know each other incredibly well, playing alongside each other for over a decade, first in the same England youth age groups, then at club level with Arsenal. And while you can tell Leah is curious about the interaction she saw between you and Leila, and that her question isn’t so much asking about your well-being as it is inviting you to open up to her, you also know that she’s not going to push you to tell her anything that you’re not ready to share.

“All good,” you respond.

Leah drapes an arm around your shoulders and pulls you into her side as you re-enter the now almost empty England changing room.

“You bossed it tonight,” she tells you. “I’m so fucking proud of you.”

“You too, captain.”

She smiles at you - the whole England captain thing still hasn’t fully sunk in yet, for either of you, and while you can’t quite believe that the skinny girl with the white blonde hair and the gangly legs who you first met over ten years ago is now leading her country to a European Championship semi final, you know that this is something Leah has always been destined for.

You don’t want to get ahead of yourself but you’re still on such a high from the game that you dare to wonder if Leah is the person who will finally lead England to a major trophy.

“Two games left,” Leah tells you, and you know that she’s reminding herself as much as you. “Two games left to change our lives.”

———

“You’ve got a new girlfriend, I see,” Georgia grins at you as you sit down for breakfast the morning after the Spain game.

“What?” you ask, nearly choking on your granola.

“That’s what Twitter thinks, anyway.”

“Show me.”

Georgia flips her phone around and shows you a tweet that reads “new woso couple alert?” accompanied by a couple of pictures of you and Leila embracing on the pitch after the game. You can feel your cheeks start to heat up and you hope they don’t visibly redden, especially as you feel Leah’s eyes on you, the only person around the table who might be able to guess how close to the truth this fan ‘rumour’ actually is.

“Oh, because I consoled a player after a game now I’m dating her?”

You scroll through some of the comments. There’s nothing too outrageous there - some about the length of the hug, some speculating how or even if you and Leila actually know each other, mixed in with a couple of theories that it’s purely professional and that Manchester City will soon be announcing your return to the club where you spent your formative years thanks to “agent Leila”. It’s not new either. You’re no stranger to being shipped with other footballers, it sort of comes with the territory of being semi-famous in a fanbase of mostly queer women, but never has a rumour about your dating life been so close to the truth.

Suddenly, you’re wondering if you were wrong to hug Leila in public after the game. At the time you followed your instinct, wanting to comfort somebody who means a lot to you. But if you’d waited until you were alone to do that, you wouldn’t have strangers on the internet speculating about the nature of a relationship that you can’t even define yourself yet. Leila was hurting, but was being there for her in that moment really worth potentially outing this to everybody before it even has a label?

Stewing over a decision that you made in the heat of the moment and didn’t think twice about, you return Georgia’s phone.

“It’s just the fans though,” Georgia says with a shrug. “They come up with all sorts of crazy theories sometimes.”

“Yeah, there’s some fans that think I’m dating Ella,” Alessia interjects with a laugh.

“Wait, are you not?” Leah asks, managing to keep her expression deadpan for a few seconds, before it cracks open into a grin.

“Alessia wishes she was dating me,” Ella says.

“I do actually,” Alessia replies, reaching out for one of Ella’s hands as she adds, “El, I’ve been waiting for the right time to tell you how I really feel…”

“Shut up!” Ella snatches her hand away and rolls her eyes as the rest of the group descends into a fit of laughter.

With the group’s attention now elsewhere, any opportunity you might have had to finally admit to your friends what’s going on between you and Leila has passed.

There’ll be other times. When the tournament is over, maybe then you’ll tell them. But with a semi final coming up and the possibility of a final too, you can’t deal with any distractions, whether those come from outside opinions on social media or your friends teasing you about the developments in your personal life.

You feel Leah’s eyes on you and you suspect she knows the truth, but you’re grateful for her silence.

———

England makes it past Sweden with relative ease and you can hardly believe that you’ve made it this far. The final at Wembley is all that stands between you and your wildest dream, but it also means you have to face up to the dilemma that’s been on your mind since you knocked Spain out in the quarter finals.

Should you invite Leila to watch the final as your guest?

You haven’t actually talked to Leila since the quarter final. You know that she’s probably been busy getting ready to move to England, meanwhile you’ve been caught in the bubble of the Lionesses camp.

But once the excitement of winning the semi final has passed and you’re back to focusing on training for the final, you realise that you want Leila there to support you. Just as you went to see her play in the Champions League and Copa de la Reina finals, you want her in the crowd as you compete for the European Championship trophy.

But you don’t know if she wants to come, especially after it was your team who knocked hers out of the same competition.

Plus, though Twitter moved on from the hypothetical of you and Leila after a matter of hours when something else became more interesting, you’re sure that a sighting of Leila in the crowd at Wembley, in the England friends and family section no less, will be sure to bring those rumours right back to the attention of the fans.

After a day of deliberating, you eventually decide that it’s a risk you’re happy to take, if it means Leila might be in the crowd to watch you play the most important game of your entire career.

You text her on your way to lunch after a conditioning session in the gym two days before the big final.

You Do you want to come to the final? I can get you a ticket…

And then, you add a second message as an afterthought.

You Don’t worry, I won’t make you wear an England shirt 😉

Leila doesn’t reply immediately

Leila Sorry I move to Manchester this week 😔 but good luck!

You’re disappointed, but you knew this was a likely outcome. Besides, it’s probably for the best. If Leila had accepted the offer, not only would you have had to explain everything to your teammates, but you’d probably have ended up introducing Leila to your entire family too, which sounds like way too much for somebody who isn’t even officially your girlfriend.

You No problem! Good luck with the move!

———

Leila was right - this England team does have something special.

It hits you, strangely enough, not when the final whistle blows nor when Leah lifts the trophy and a shower of confetti rains down over you, but when you crash Sarina’s post-final press conference with the rest of the team. It’s so ridiculous, your socked feet slipping against the floor, Mary shimmying her hips as she dances on the tables, two dozen journalists watching on in amused disbelief, but there’s no group of people you’d rather have done the last month and a half with. And the medal around your neck, hanging heavy with the sheer importance of what you’ve just achieved, is a permanent reminder of the best summer of your life.

You return to the dressing room, where an England-branded bucket hat somehow finds its way onto your head, and sit down in your cubby to check your phone. Messages have been flying in since full time - friends, family, even distant acquaintances you haven’t seen in over a decade, all wanting to congratulate you on the win. But there’s only one person you’ve been waiting to hear from, and you feel giddy when you see her name in the list of notifications.

Leila Congrats campeonaaaa! I told you that you were gonna win 😋

She’s accompanied the message with a picture, a selfie in which she’s wearing the England shirt emblazoned with your number that you traded for hers during the Arnold Clark Cup.

You take a selfie to send back, keeping the ridiculous hat on your head and lifting up your medal to catch it between your teeth. You grin as you snap the photo and send it to Leila.

Almost as soon as you send it, your phone starts ringing with an incoming FaceTime. You’ve ignored a few calls since you won, overwhelmed by the number of people trying to congratulate you already, but when you see Leila’s name, you accept immediately.

“Hey,” you say, when Leila’s face appears on the screen of your phone.

“Nice hat,” she greets you, stifling a laugh.

You raise your eyebrows, then say, “Sexy, huh?”

Leila gives you an incredulous look, before she says, “Show me your medal then.”

The dressing room is already noisy, but somebody turns the speaker up and it’s almost impossible to hear Leila, so you make your way out of the central changing area and towards the showers, where it’s slightly quieter, before lifting the medal so that it’s in the frame of your front-facing camera.

“Does it suit me?” you ask, shooting her a teasing smile.

“I like it,” Leila tells you. “Winning is very sexy.”

You open your mouth to flirt back, but you’re interrupted by a shout from a few metres away. When you glance up, Leah has emerged from round the corner, a half empty bottle of champagne clutched in one of her hands.

“Oi!” she cries out. “Come and dance with us.”

“Two minutes,” you say to Leah.

Leah’s eyes flit between your face and the phone in your hand, and realisation washes over her face, perhaps remembering the interactions she saw between you and Leila after you played against each other last week.

“Oh!” she says, eyes wide. “Take your time!”

“I’ll be there in a second,” you promise Leah, before turning back to your phone.

“Go and celebrate,” Leila urges you.

“I wish I was celebrating with you,” you admit.

“Sorry,” Leila says with a grimace.

“No!” you interject. “I’m not blaming you for not being here! How did the move go?”

“It was good,” Leila shrugs. “The apartment is nice but I need to go to IKEA to get some furniture.”

“Maybe I can come and visit when you’ve settled in?” you suggest optimistically.

“Okay, but you lose the hat,” Leila tells you, and it’s more of an order than a suggestion.

A thought pops into your brain, probably fuelled the bottle of beer you just downed on top of a shit ton of adrenaline from the match, and you cheekily ask, “What if I’m wearing just the hat?”

“No,” Leila warns you firmly, though she rolls her eyes playfully.

“Fine,” you concede.

“Go,” Leila tells you. “I don’t want to stop you celebrating.”

“Okay,” you say, trying to draw out the goodbye as long as you can. “But I’ll see you soon, right?”

“See you soon, champion.”

#woso x reader #woso imagine #leila ouahabi imagine #leila ouahabi x reader #dirty little secret

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