The very next morning, Leo woke up smiling, which was a stark contrast to how mushed up he had been the previous morning.
He lay there for a moment, being aware of it, and then got up before he could think too much about why.
He brushed up, got showered and got dressed before coming out of his room, still without the smile vanishing.
As he did so, he found Mia in the hallway mirror, fixing her hair with the focused dissatisfaction of someone losing an argument with their own reflection.
But that didn’t stop him from ruffling it on the way past.
"What the hell," she fired, but he kept moving into the kitchen where Sofia was at the counter.
He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek before she’d registered he was coming, and she turned around with the expression of someone who had been mildly surprised by something they were also quietly glad about.
"What’s gotten into you?" she said.
"Just life," Leo said. "Being eighteen."
Mia appeared in the kitchen doorway with her hair now worse than before, pointing at him.
"That’s not how it works," she said.
She went on to berate him for a bit, but as she did, Leo remembered something.
"Actually," he said, holding up a finger, "I’ve been meaning to show you something."
Mia and Sofia looked at each other briefly with the mutual expression of confusion, wondering what their brother/nephew wanted to show them.
While they were still held in thought, Leo went back to his room and came back a few seconds later with the white envelope in his hand, and both of them looked at it because it was the only thing that had changed about him after coming back from the room.
The moment he got near, he set the envelope on the table.
"I kept forgetting to show you," he said.
"Read it when you get a chance."
Sofia looked at it, then glanced back up at Leo.
"What is it?"
Leo checked his watch without answering and reached for the sidebag he’d left on the chair before looping it over his shoulder.
"Read it," he said, and moved toward the door.
"Where are you going?" Mia called after him.
"DW," he said. "Meeting Noah."
"To do what?"
He looked at her blankly, like he was going to answer and then stopped.
He opened the front door and stepped out, all while Mia hurled curses at him and then held onto the handle from outside and waited.
Then, half a minute later, he heard a shriek, one that he could tell was from Sofia.
Then in the next moment, Mia’s came much louder than he expected.
Leo shook his head at their reactions, which he understood were somewhat valid, let go of the handle, and walked away down the corridor.
Despite the season being over, the DW was less than quiet.
All around, people in construction reflectors moved around, each going about their jobs.
The DW was sizable and enough for a Premier League stadium, but that didn’t stop the management from trying their hardest to increase the capacity by the slightest, trying to get it to 30,000 from the 25,000 it was.
And also, the VAR, which was something that was required, was being set up in the stadium too to meet the standards of the Premier League.
After watching for a while, Leo continued and came up through the walkways and found the executive box where Noah had messaged him about.
After getting to the door, he knocked once and then stuck his head through the small opening he made after opening it slightly.
In the room, Noah was already there, seated at one side of a table, his face giving nothing away about his thoughts regarding the current battle that was ahead for him.
Across from him was Xavier, and beside Xavier were two others Leo didn’t recognise.
Assistants by the look of them and the way they already had their notepads and laptops out.
And then at the far end of the table, slightly apart from the rest, an older man Leo couldn’t place, who looked back at him with a crude smile that made Leo feel scrutinised.
"What the hell," he muttered to himself as Xavier got to his feet.
"Leo, come in. Take a seat."
Leo closed the door behind him, crossed the room and sat down beside Noah, who glanced at him briefly.
Xavier sat back down after that, glanced around the table and then began speaking.
"We all know why we’re here," he said, which got quiet nods from around the room.
"But before we get into it, there’s someone I should introduce."
He glanced toward the older man at the end of the table, whom Leo had still been watching since he sat down, trying to place him but getting nothing concrete back.
"You’ll all have heard about the change of ownership at the club," Xavier said.
"It became official recently, and most of it has been in the papers."
After saying that, he looked at Leo directly.
"Meet Mike Danson. The new owner of Wigan Athletic."
Leo blinked, a slight gasp escaping with his breath.
Besides, Noah didn’t blink.
He had already recognised the man the moment he walked through the door and had already been trying to come up with the thought process for his being here.
Mike Danson smiled at Leo across the table with the smile of a man who had been looking forward to this particular introduction.
"You might be wondering why he’s here," Xavier continued, reading Leo’s expression accurately.
"It’s not to intimidate. He simply wanted to be present. His words were that he wanted to meet the other owner of WIgan. The player who might be at the centre of what this club becomes."
Danson leaned forward slightly.
"Pleased to meet you," he said, extending his hand across the table toward Leo.
Leo reached across and took it. "Likewise."
Danson held the handshake a beat longer than necessary, still smiling, and then settled back.
Xavier looked around the table one last time.
"Right," he said. "Introductions done. Let’s get into it."