Chapter Text
Being a foreigner was already hard enough. It was even harder if you had every single media spotlight focused on you. Khusanov’s first few months at City proved to be more than a difficult challenge. His debut coupled with his recent injury had made it hard for him to get on the fan’s side but he worked tirelessly nonetheless. After all, if you didn’t have your head up to talk, you kept it down to train. To say he felt isolated would be an understatement. It was something that frustrated him greatly, even others who weren’t that great at English could still find an occasional conversation. Compared to people who radiated like the sun (like Cherki did), Khusa felt more like the moon (fated to only ever reflect the light of the sun, never be the light themselves).
The team had recently been hit with a series of unfortunate injuries related to the backline. Prior to the match with Brighton, Khusanov had only managed to speak enough with Alleyne to catch his name, much less get to know him. The Uzbek had seen Max as a chance to make a new friend, both of them being defenders and newcomers and all, but injury and poor performances had taken the poor lad too. This is why when Khusa heard of City signing a new defender, he didn’t exactly get his hopes up. Guéhi was everything that Khusanov was not: confident, reliable, likable, and he didn’t have to struggle with a language barrier. The former Crystal Palace captain was leagues and years above him, so Khusa believed he wouldn’t even spare a second glance towards him. Regardless, the night before Guéhi’s first day at City, Khusa still found himself practicing how to say his name.
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Their first meeting went better than expected. Despite numerous rehearsals, Khusa still stammered out his introduction, followed by the usual profuse apologies and the usual “Sorry, my English is not good.” Midway through his stammering, Guéhi interrupted him to say that he didn’t mind and that so long as they could communicate on pitch, that was all that mattered. Great, one chance of impressing his new centreback partner and he screwed it up. While Guéhi said his introduction, Khusa tried to read his face to no avail. The other man was as unreadable as English (how ironic). Khusa suddenly realises his hypocrisy in calling the other unreadable when he himself wore the same facial expression day through night, month to month. Moving on, if he were to take the English national’s words to heart, he’d better learn how his partner played. At least, that was the excuse he gave himself while watching Crystal Palace matches late at night. The way he captained on field was incomprehensible to Khusa, patience in his tracking, no hesitation in his passes. He committed everything to memory.
Staring at his ceiling after lights out, he reminisced about what his mother had told him before he departed for Europe:
“Train hard but don’t forget to make some friends too! I’d hate for you to be lonely.”
Train hard he had, but what did he have to show the latter part? Damn it, he just can’t control the lump in his throat every time he tries to speak. Could barely make eye contact either, they could be sneering at him and he wouldn’t even know. Guéhi would probably throw him aside after realising how boring he was. Hell, why even bother when he had his fellow countrymen already? These intrusive thoughts ran circles in his mind every time he closed his eyes. Oh well, it’s not as if this was the first time anyways. New teammate, same old social anxiety. The boy drifted off to sleep eventually, clutching his pillow harder than necessary.
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Khusa had made a habit of arriving early to training grounds. It was easier to concentrate when there were no scrutinising eyes on you. To his dismay, someone was already there, visible through Manchester’s morning fog. Of course with his discipline he’d get there the earliest. Khusa tried to turn around and leave but came face to face with a pole. He looked in Guéhi’s direction and saw him give a wave. It was now social courtesy that he had to approach the only other person at the training ground right now.
“Didn’t know you were going to show up so early, we need more people like you in football, to be honest,” Guéhi said, barely even looking up from where he was doing dribbling practice. “Care to join me?”, Khusa merely nodded and hopped in line. They trained in comfortable silence, darting between training cones. The number of words exchanged between them the entire time could’ve been rounded to zero. Khusa could take his mind off external troubles and focus on the ball at his feet. As the players jogged to Pep for the morning debrief, Guéhi remarked, “You’re good with your feet, speedy too.” He’d never admit it, but Khusa replayed that in his head far more times than needed.
At lunchtime, the Uzbek would camp out alone in a corner and try to get his meal over as fast as humanly possible. Today was different however (the most unassuming person was disrupting his schedule?!), when Khusa was heading back with his plate, Guéhi patted the empty seat next to him. “Since we’re playing our first match together in only a few more days, it’d be best to know each other’s playing style better. By the way, just call me Marc,” he had said. Small talk, Khusa couldn’t do, but he could make an exception for football. They talked back n’ forth about how they liked to play, Khusa trying not to give away how obsessively he’d been studying Marc’s abilities. This was the first time in a long while that he’d actually made it past introductions, so when his new friend - too soon - partner offered for them to stay back together and look at match footage, he immediately jumped at the prospect.
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As the cool chill of night settled in the city, the two centrebacks found themselves huddled near the screen in the media room. Clipped analysis and suggestions flowed freely between the two of them. With the blue light reflecting off Marc’s face, Khusa noticed how much more relaxed he looked compared to earlier in the day. He even cracked a few jokes here n’ there, which Khusa laughed at even if he didn’t fully understand. When Khusa noticed that he was staring at Marc more than the actual match footage, he decided that it was probably time to call it quits for the day (him being distracted is merely due to fatigue!!!). They walked to the parking lot together, and before they left - exchanged numbers with each other under the guise of staying up to date. Even in the frigid, miserable weather of England, this gesture still lighted a stubborn flame in his heart. This flame still burned hot later in bed, when he found his finger hovering over Marc’s contact in his phone. Tonight, he would struggle to fall asleep for a completely different reason~