Who even am I?
Mateo was quietly freaking out inside his own head as they reached the door of the restaurant.
He got there first and pulled it open.
"Let me get that for you."
Olivia turned her head, and she smiled at him, and she said, "Thanks," and stepped inside.
And Mateo stood there holding the door and thought, seriously, honestly, who am I?
It was the same thing from earlier. The same thing he had been thinking on the street. The words just kept coming out of him, smooth, easy, like he had been saying things like that his whole life. Let me get that for you. Where was that coming from? He did not talk like that. He had never talked like that.
What is this girl doing to me.
He shook his head at himself and went in after her.
Olivia stepped inside and stopped.
The first thing was the smell. Old wood and garlic and something slow-cooking somewhere in the back, a smell that had been building in these walls for decades and was never fully going to leave them.
Then the room.
It was small, and it was old, and it was beautiful in a way that had nothing to do with money. The walls were a warm faded ochre, hung with framed photographs gone soft and yellow with age, black and white pictures of people nobody would ever name again, a football team from some decade long gone, a wedding, a christening. The floor was worn terracotta tile, dipped in the middle where a hundred years of feet had crossed it. Dark wooden beams ran across a low ceiling. There were maybe ten tables, each one with a checked cloth and a squat little candle and a single flower in a glass. A long bar down one side, its wood polished to a deep shine by decades of elbows. Bottles behind it catching the low light. A ceiling fan turning slowly, not really doing anything, just turning because it always had.
It was not trying to be anything. That was the thing. It had simply been loved, in the same place, by the same people, for a very long time, and it had a soul because of it.
Olivia loved restaurants. She loved cafes, little bars, places with corners and character. She collected them the way some people collect photographs.
And this one was one of the most beautiful she had ever walked into.
"Wow," she breathed.
She turned slowly, taking all of it in, her eyes moving over the photographs, the bar, the beams.
And that was when she noticed the old man.
He was sitting at a table near the back, a newspaper held up in front of his face, a small cup of coffee at his elbow. He had not looked up when they came in.
Then, slowly, he lowered the paper.
And he stared at her.
Olivia startled slightly.
"Good after." She caught herself and started again, respectful, warm. "Good afternoon."
The old man did not answer.
He squinted at her. He squinted at her for a long, long second.
Then he turned his head toward the back of the restaurant and shouted, at the absolute top of his lungs.
"AVIA!"
Olivia jumped.
"Why are you screaming, you old fart?" A woman's voice came back, older, sharp, muffled by a wall. "Do you want to wake the children up?"
The old man shouted back, only slightly quieter this time.
"There is a customer."
"I am on my way."
The old man looked back at Olivia. Olivia, recovering, gave him a small nod and a smile.
The old man nodded back.
That was the entire conversation.
And that was when Mateo finally came in.
He crossed to Olivia and put a hand lightly on the small of her back.
"Sorry, I was."
He did not finish.
Because Francisco, who had gone back to squinting but had now clocked the second person coming through his door, sat up straight, and his whole face changed, and his voice came out high and delighted.
"Kid. It is you."
Mateo turned. His face broke into a grin.
"Old man Francisco."
He laughed, crossing the room toward him.
And then the woman's voice came again, closer now.
"Who are you talking to?"
An old woman appeared from the back, wiping her hands on the front of her apron, dusting flour off herself, still half-turned toward whatever she had left cooking.
Mateo and Olivia turned to face her.
Mateo smiled.
"Manuela."
The woman looked up. She went still for a second, and then her whole face opened.
"Mateo."
He was still grinning.
"How are you?" She was already coming toward him, both arms out. "Why are you just standing there? Come here. Come here."
"Haha."
She wrapped him in a hug, small and fierce, patting his back.
"Congratulations on the league, mi cielo. Congratulations."
"Thank you." Mateo laughed into it. "Thank you, Manuela."
She pulled back and held his face for a second, then turned, and smacked her husband on the arm.
"Why did you not tell me it was Mateo?"
Francisco flinched, then glared up at her, wounded.
"It was not him that came in first." He gestured, aggrieved, at the whole situation. "There was another one. I called you for the other one."
"Oh." Mateo's face lit up. "Oh, yeah. Let me introduce you."
He turned and gestured for Olivia to come over.
"Oh." Olivia straightened, suddenly a little nervous, and came forward.
Mateo reached out and took her hand.
"This is my. Ehm."
He paused.
Just for a beat. Just the smallest hesitation, because he had never done this before, never said it out loud to another person, and the word felt enormous and new in his mouth.
He glanced at Olivia. She glanced at him.
He smiled.
"This is my girlfriend. Olivia."
And the moment he said it, something in his chest lifted. It was the first time he had ever introduced her to anyone as his girlfriend, and he loved the way it sounded coming out of him.
Beside him, Olivia's face was doing something soft, and she squeezed his hand a little tighter.
"My girlfriend," he said again, just because he could, just because he liked it. He nodded at her. "She was the one that came in first."
Olivia, who had been floating somewhere up above her own head for a second, came back down and realised both old people were now looking at her.
"Oh." She turned to them, and her nervousness came back, and with it a careful, lovely politeness. "It is so nice to meet you both. Truly. Mateo talks about you." She wasn't sure that was strictly true but it felt right to say. "You have such a beautiful place."
The old couple looked at each other.
Manuela's face melted.
"Oh, honey."
She came and took both of Olivia's hands in her own, looking her up and down, beaming.
"Look at you. Look at this face. You are so pretty. So pretty."
"Thank you," Olivia said, going a little pink.
Francisco leaned forward in his chair and squinted at her again, then jerked his thumb at Mateo.
"Yes. So what are you doing with this smock?"
Olivia burst out laughing. Manuela laughed too and reached over and swatted her husband on the shoulder.
"Be nice."
Off to the side, Mateo just shook his head slowly, muttering to himself.
"Who still says smock."
Olivia turned to look at him, still laughing, and he was standing there looking wounded, and she laughed harder.
She turned back to the couple, wiping at her eye.
"No, I mean it. You both have a lovely place. It is gorgeous."
She looked around again as she said it, and the admiration was written all over her face, plain and real, her eyes going back to the photographs and the beams and the candlelit tables.
Manuela watched her look at the room, and something pleased and quiet crossed the old woman's face.
"Thank you, dear."
Mateo spoke up.
"We were at an event not far from here. It was getting a bit stuffy, so I thought we would come here." He shrugged. "Plus I am hungry."
Manuela's eyes brightened.
"Then you came at the perfect time."
She led them over to a table in the corner.
It was the best one in the place, tucked into an angle where two ochre walls met, under a small window and a photograph of a young couple from another century. The candle was already lit. Olivia slid into her seat and looked around from it and could not stop smiling.
Mateo sat down across from her.
Manuela stood over them, hands folded, looking down at the two of them with open delight.
"Now. Is there anything you do not eat?"
"Oh, no, I." Mateo started.
"I was not talking to you."
"Oh." Olivia laughed. "Oh. No, nothing, really. I do not have anything I cannot eat."
"Good." Manuela nodded, satisfied. "Then let me go and find something for you two young people. Give me twenty minutes. It will be ready."
"Oh, I cannot wait." Mateo sat forward. "I am starving."
Manuela smiled at him. And as she turned to go, she caught Mateo's eye, and she winked at him, and gave him a small thumbs up.
Mateo laughed.
Manuela crossed back toward her husband first.
Francisco watched her coming, and he leaned in, and he started up in a low, scandalised whisper.
"What is Alejandro teaching them in that place, eh? The boy is not even a grown man yet and he already has a." He gestured vaguely, delighted and appalled all at once. "In my time, I would never have allowed them to."
"Thank God it is not your time, you outdated old man." Manuela rolled her eyes at him.
She reached down and took his hand.
"Come with me."
Francisco frowned up at her.
"Where are we going?"
"We are leaving them alone." She started tugging. "Lord knows they do not want to sit through a date with a cranky old man watching from the corner."
Francisco did not move fast enough, so she dug her fingers into his side and started tickling him, and he yelped and jerked and started laughing despite himself.
"Okay. Okay. Okay, I am up, I am up."
He hauled himself out of the chair with an enormous huff, one hand going to his lower back.
"My knee is killing me."
"Yeah, yeah." Manuela gave him a little push toward the back. "I will rub it for you when we get inside."
And the two of them shuffled off toward the kitchen together, him grumbling about his knee, her steering him by the elbow, and just before they disappeared through the door she said something to him that made him laugh, low and creaky, and then they were gone.
...
"They are so cute," Olivia said. She was watching the old couple go, her chin on her hand, a soft smile on her face. She kept watching the doorway they had disappeared through even after they were gone. "They are really so cute."
Mateo was not watching the doorway. He was watching her. He watched the candlelight move on her face, and the way she was smiling at the empty space where two old people had been, and he said, quietly, not really to her: "So cute." He was not talking about the old couple.
Olivia's eyes moved off the doorway and around the room again, going over the photographs, the beams, the little glowing bar. "And this place is so beautiful," she said. "It is honestly one of the most beautiful places I have ever been."
Mateo was still looking at her. "So beautiful," he said, absently. He was not talking about the place either.
Olivia turned. And she caught him looking at her. "What?" She said it with a laugh already in it, a small giggle escaping, colour coming up in her cheeks.
Mateo did not look away. He just kept looking at her, and he said it simply. "You look so beautiful."
And she did. The black dress with its little row of buttons. Her hair loose over one shoulder. The candle on the table throwing warm light up across her face, and the old firelit gold of the whole room behind her, the ochre walls and the yellowed photographs, so that she did not look like she was sitting in the restaurant so much as she looked like she belonged to it, like she had been there in one of those old photographs all along. She looked like she had walked out of the most beautiful part of the place.
Olivia laughed and looked down. "You." She reached for the nearest change of subject. "Your dad also owns a restaurant, right?"
"Yeah." Mateo finally sat back a little. "It is more out in the open than this place, though. Busier street. Different vibe."
Olivia looked at him. "What was it like?"
"What was what like?"
"You know." She gestured around them. "Growing up in a restaurant." Then she looked around the room again, and her voice went a little softer, a little lower. "It would be so perfect to own somewhere like this. I have always felt that. That when I am not singing, or writing, or whatever, I would have a place I could just disappear into."
Mateo looked around too, taking it in. "Yeah. It would be nice."
"Yeah," Olivia said, and the word came out low and trailing.
Mateo looked back at her. "As for growing up in a restaurant, though. I cannot really say much about that."
She tilted her head.
"Well, I went off to the academy pretty young," he said. "And most of the time, when I had breaks, I was out at the farm, with Aina and the rest of the family. So I was not really home that much."
"Oh."
"But." He thought about it, actually reaching back for it now. "The times I was home. It was. Ehm." He turned it over, trying to remember how those days had actually gone. "It was honestly not that eventful. I helped around the kitchen. If there was a match on, I would go upstairs and watch it. If they did not need me in the kitchen, I would help serve customers. I played football with the neighbourhood kids. Swept up here and there. And then hopped on the game and played more football." He shrugged. "Like I said. Very uneventful."
Olivia was smiling at him. "You really love football."
Mateo laughed. He opened his mouth, and then closed it, visibly working out how to say obviously without saying it rudely. "Well. It is."
Olivia laughed. "No, not like that. I mean." She leaned in a little. "It just seems like football is everything to you. Like you have no other hobbies."
"Now that is not true."
"Oh?" She raised an eyebrow. "Then I am intrigued."
"I mean, see." Mateo held up his hand and started counting on his fingers. "I love playing football." He put up a second finger. "I love watching football." He put up a third. "And I also love playing football on the game." He spread the three fingers at her. "That is three completely different hobbies right there."
They both cracked up.
"But seriously." Mateo was still grinning. "Football is not a hobby. It is a full-time lifestyle."
"No, I get that." Olivia nodded. "That is exactly how music is for me. Music is my whole everything." Then she tilted her head. "But I still have other hobbies. I like acting. I love watching movies. I like going to the opera. There is a whole life around the music, you know?"
Mateo just shrugged. "I guess other things just do not interest me that much. Apart from football."
Olivia stared at him. "Are you serious? Like, nothing else? At all?"
"Not really. But." He paused, and then something surfaced. "Oh. I guess there was a time, maybe two years ago, there was no match on, so me and the guys watched a basketball game." He nodded, remembering. "Yeah. That was kind of nice. I have not watched another one since then, but that was kind of cool."
Olivia looked at him the way you look at an alien who has just landed a small ship on your table. "Wow." Then she narrowed her eyes. "What about music?"
He looked at her.
"I mean, music is universal, right? I get that you are not into it the way I am, but there is no way, no way, that you do not listen to some songs here and there."
"Oh, of course I listen to songs," Mateo said.
Olivia let out a breath. "Oh, thank God. Whew. I was starting to think you were some kind of."
"I mean, when you open FIFA, they have some absolute banger songs on there. It is insane."
Olivia stopped. "FIFA?"
Mateo smiled at her. "Oh. That is the name of the football game they release every year. FIFA." His face lit up. "And they always pick a big star to be on the cover. Last year's was Hazard." Then his voice went somewhere wistful. "One of my dreams has always been to be on that cover." He laughed at himself, a little embarrassed, but his eyes were bright. "How sick would that be, honestly."
Olivia watched him. She watched the whole thing move across his face, the longing and the joy and the boy of it. "I am sure you will get it," she said softly.
"I hope so. It would just be so incredible."
She had a sweet, small smile on her face. "I am sure." Then she sat up. "But. On that note. That does not count."
Mateo frowned. "What?"
"The FIFA songs. They do not count." She pointed at him. "The only reason you listened to those songs is because of football. So it does not count as you liking music."
"Oh, come on." Mateo sat forward. "That is not fair."
"No. I am not giving you that one." She thought for a second. "Okay. Do you know, like, Justin Bieber? You have to know Justin Bieber."
"Oh, I know him." Mateo nodded. "I mean, I know of him. I might not really listen to them, but I know some of them. Like, Drake. Bruno Mars. Bad Bunny. I know of them."
"Okay." Olivia nodded. "Okay, that is something. What about Taylor Swift? I mean, it is genuinely not possible to not know at least one of her songs."
Mateo frowned. He turned the name over. "Taylor Swift. The name sounds familiar." He squinted, trying to place where he had heard it before.
Olivia's face fell open. "Wait. You actually do not know Taylor Swift? I thought you were joking the last time."
"Oh." Something clicked. "Oh, that is true. Is that not the musician you told me contacted you that time? The one who wanted you in some promotion?"
Olivia's mouth dropped open. "Wow." She put a hand to her chest. "Taylor Swift being called 'the musician who contacted me.' That is just."
Mateo looked at her, amused. "Is she not a singer?"
"She is so much more than a singer, Mateo." Olivia was fully lit up now, leaning across the table. "Taylor is literally." She was gesturing, searching for it, completely in her element, and Mateo sat back and watched her get animated and enjoyed every second of it. "Okay. How do I describe this." She looked at him. "In football. Who is, like, the top, top, top person? The absolute biggest."
Mateo did not even have to think. "Messi."
"Okay." Olivia pointed at him. "Taylor is exactly that. For the entire music industry."
"Wow." Mateo sat back. "Wow. Wow."
Olivia beamed. "What?"
"I guess this Miss, or Missus, Taylor of yours is very incredible." He held up a hand. "But please. Please do not compare her to Messi. I mean, Messi is."
Olivia rolled her eyes so hard her whole head went with it. "Forget it." But she was smiling as she said it, and she shook her head, and she looked at him across the little candlelit table with something warm and disbelieving and delighted. "I cannot believe I am going to have to introduce you to Taylor Swift."
And the night went on like that. The food came, and it was extraordinary, and Manuela did not once come out to check on them because Manuela knew exactly what she was doing. They ate, and they talked, and they argued about music and football, and Olivia laughed so hard at one point that she snorted, and then hit Mateo across the table for pointing it out.
The candle burned lower. The ceiling fan turned. The old photographs watched them from the walls.
And there, in a small, old, beautiful restaurant on a quiet street, tucked into a corner table with nobody else in the world around them, Mateo King and Olivia Rodrigo had their first date.
And it was beautiful.