flashes ✦ julian draxler

vingt et un : meeting the family

march twenty-second | dortmund, germany

IT WAS THE MORNING OF the match, and Julian was oh-so nervous, but unusually, it wasn't because he was about to play in a match that was highly publicised. He was nervous because his girlfriend of a couple of days was about to meet his family.

He had confidence of both parties of course; Stella was going to love his family, and his family would love Stella. Of course, they'd have to play down the whole 'we've only been officially together for two days' thing, although it didn't really matter. They've been emotionally and physically together for a while now. They were adults, so they didn't really need the whole 'will you go out with me?' primary school kind-of-thing.

The players were let out for the morning to relax themselves, although most were sleeping in to rest. Julian let himself sleep earlier than the players who gathered to play FIFA and hang out, just so he could attend the breakfast at his childhood home. Gladbeck was not far at all from Dortmund, and Marco generously lent his car to Julian.

"You seem sleepy," he commented quietly to his girlfriend, who was leaning on the window with her eyes fluttery.

"Up late with a business call. Something about publicity for me and a show in Milan and that. You don't know how badly I just wanted to slam the laptop shut," she mumbled, leaning up.

Julian smiled sympathetically, "I'm sorry, love. Now you have to go through all this meeting my family thing. I can cancel if you want; you can meet them at the match."

Stella shook her head furiously, "We're already halfway there, Jule, and it's so wonderful that i'm meeting your family. Don't worry, I can suck it up."

Julian took his opportunity and snorted, "That's what she said."

Her eyes widened as she yelped, "Julian!"

"It was there for the taking," he shrugged.

-

Unlike Julian, she wasn't initially nervous that day. Julian's parents must be amazing to have created such a wonderful, nice human being. However, it all set in as they approached the doorstep to the large house with the neat front garden and flower bushes. First impressions are lasting impressions, they say, so Stella really wanted to make her first impression good.

"Just act like your lovely self," Julian mumbled into her hair as he placed a reassuring kiss there and squeezed her shoulder. He raised a hand to the tainted glass panel of the door and knocked a few times, "It's weird having to knock at my own home. I left my key in Paris."

Before she could respond, there was a shuffle and a click from the other side of the door. It swung open merrily to show Julian's brother.

"Julian! Finally!" Patrick exclaimed, taking his brother in for a hug. He turned to Stella and smiled welcomingly, "And you must be Stella. I'm Patrick, Jule's brother, as i'm sure he's told you."

"Not really," Julian retorted.

The older Draxler rolled his eyes playfully and invited the girl in for a hug, "We do hugs in the Draxler house,"

Julian released her from his arms, encouraging the exchange between two important people in his life. He stepped in and closed the door behind him.

"I'm home!" he yelled into the house, grinning. Julian was a very big family man; he didn't mind long travels from Wolfsburg just to come and spend time with his family. Now that he was in Paris, he's very much so unable to do that as often as he did it in Germany.

"Kitchen!" he heard his father shout. The trio followed into the kitchen.

Stella and Patrick, much to Julian's amusement, had actually started some small talk.