that post going around recently about sincaraz’ first match in the challenger and carlos winning but going out in the very next round made me think of like. ok jannik clearly recognises immediately that this guy is Special and goes out of his way to talk to him after and is so affected by that match that he still talks about it a year later. meanwhile this is carlos’ first match at this level, so what if he assumes that the tingly feeling it gave him is just what it’s like when you play this level of tennis bc he has no benchmark to compare it against. until he plays the next round and it’s like oh. no tingly feeling. he can’t even really get into it fr. maybe some ppl’s tennis is just more fun than others. starts thinking about jannik more and seeing his ig posts and develops a cute little crush on the older kid whose tennis made him feel tingly. they don’t play each other again until paris two years later and yeah maybe carlos has felt that tingly feeling in other matches by now, but never quite this intensity. but he doesn’t know if it’s all in his head though, just him and his dumb crush, so he doesn’t say anything. but then *jannik* acknowledges it, this feeling, leans in and whispers to him that he hopes they play more times. and carlos’ crush EXPLODES into this obsessive, all-consuming thing. he can’t stop talking about jannik to anyone who will listen, publicly declares him as his rival to the confusion of literally everyone, is giddy with excitement when they get to play each other and other people start to see it to, sitting up and noticing the magic they make together. fate is real and it brought jannik to him that day.
10/10 i love this so much. jannik harbours a small manageable crush for years (he knows what they have is special), meanwhile it's not until paris bercy 2021 that carlos fully realises that Spark is sinnerball-dependent and jannik is his god-given tennis soulmate (and wow isn't he pretty). and then the carlosworld chaos begins in earnest...
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