#I don't think I've ever seen transcontinental loans before or I don't remember

[nostalgicatsea]

If you’ve been following me long enough, you know I’ve been trying to write a soccer/football/fútbol/whatever-you-call-it-in-your-area-of-the-world AU. I finally wrote words for it for @lightsonparkave round 34! I didn’t have a prompt in mind while writing it, but this one has a similar theme.

This is a story where Tony, a young talented player who’s become so jaded that he doesn’t know if he loves soccer anymore or if he ever really did, goes to the U.S. to be on the same team as Steve, who lives and breathes soccer. They dislike each other instantly, but they learn to be teammates and fall in love. 

—

“It’ll be a fresh start,” Pepper had told him, tapping the signature line with her “special occasions only” Montblanc—as if downgrading to the U.S. from Spain was a momentous event that deserved to be celebrated—and the best and worst part of it was that she had sincerely believed it.

Between the pen and the optimism brimming in her eyes, Tony had found himself believing it too. Or at least believing that he wasn’t throwing his life away entirely. The contract wouldn’t have even been on the table if Pepper hadn’t thought it was worth his time. She wasn’t the type to latch herself to a sinking ship; she was a loyal friend, of course, but she was also his agent and much more crucially, not an idiot. Tony had come across his fair share of clueless agents who had no idea what they were doing and Pepper was their opposite. One day, she was going to be a superagent (except not evil) and take over the world (in a non-evil way). 

But Pepper was known to be wrong on the rare occasion and Tony knew there were few places he could go where Howard’s shadow didn’t reach and his own reputation didn’t precede him. Having such a large social following and being a tabloid darling made that hard. 

Not to mention, he thought bitterly, his new club was led by Steve Rogers, the apple of Howard Stark’s eye, the guy who captured enough hearts to be dubbed Captain America even before he became captain of anything. Not exactly the most logical place to go when you’re aiming for a low profile, though maybe the rivalry was mostly in his head since they played on two different continents and weren’t even on the same national team. If he was going to give his career another shot, it could do him some good to start over away from the spotlight that would follow him no matter where he was in Europe.

Here in New York, he at least had a chance at anonymity. The MLS wasn’t the league where superstars went to retire anymore, but despite its growth, it was still a ways from being the most-watched sports league in the States. 

Here, he wouldn’t have to fight as much to reinvent himself. He could lay low, put in the work, stay away from the party life, and maybe, just maybe, not have to deal with every move he made being scrutinized and sensationalized. Or even wholly made up. Admittedly, he had fed the flames, doing things like going out to clubs the night before a match and staying until the early hours more than once, but it wasn’t like he had let that affect his on-pitch performance or even more absurdly, insisted on having a clause in his contract that Real Madrid would allow him to go clubbing at least once a week.

No one could be stupid enough to believe that—Tony could argue about why it was stupid for days, and the maxim that no player was bigger than the club was a maxim for a reason—but considering how the “news” was received, apparently most people were convinced that there was at least a kernel of truth to the rumor even if it wasn’t entirely true.

And so was his new captain, apparently. Steve Rogers could pretend all he wanted that he was as upstanding and accepting as everyone who fawned over him claimed him to be, but Tony was better at reading people than most gave him credit for. He could tell by the way Rogers painstakingly tried to fix a neutral expression on his face like any sudden move would make it slip off that he knew exactly who Tony was and he didn’t like what he saw.

A spoiled brat who got away with murder because he was so gifted and his dad and godfather were important people.

Not for the first time, Tony wondered if there was even a point in trying to change if everyone only saw him the way they wanted to see him.