Chapter 3
3
Hey, Aquarius. I’m just letting you know that Simon’s staying with Wendy and Viv until late tonight. I want us to spend some time together xx
I n the hours that followed Beth’s text, Byron tried to convince himself nothing was wrong. Sure, she’d never gotten a sitter on her own before, let alone on a random Tuesday night, but it probably wasn’t a big deal. Yet, as he sat in Dukes Bar and Grill, trying to talk with his mates, part of him was panicking. He’d attempted to call a couple of times, but Beth just texted back, saying she was busy and to have a good flight. He was having a few drinks with the boys before he was due at the airport, and after two pints, he found he couldn’t keep his stress to himself.
“Beth wants to see me when I get home,” he told Derek. “Hang out, just the two of us. She got a sitter.”
His best friend blinked across the beer-stained table. “Anniversary?”
“Nah.”
“Probably wants a divorce, then.”
Former midfielder Sloan ‘Willow’ Williams choked on his beer, and Byron glared at Derek. “Thanks.”
“Anytime.”
“I’d want a divorce,” Willow chipped in. “You barely talk, Byzo. And let’s be real—you’re not aging like you wanna be.”
“Yeah, you can shut up any time you want, Ginger.”
“Maybe you should put one of those tracking things on her car?” Patrick ‘Psycho’ Normal, captain of the Hammerhead Sharks, suggested.
Byron scowled at him. The guys on a team ribbed each other, but they usually weren’t dumb enough to rib the coaches. Then again, Patrick had been friends with Derek and Willow for years, and he clearly thought the rules didn’t apply to him, at least not over beers on a Tuesday afternoon.
“You looking to see a lot of the bench next year, Psycho?” Byron asked.
“Ah, none of that,” Derek said easily. “Pub embargo applies.”
“I dunno what you mean,” Patrick said, eyes wide with fake innocence. “I’m being serious. I hear trackers are real cheap online…”
Byron wished he’d kept his mouth shut about Beth. “None of you ask me for anything ever again.”
“Oh yeah, it’s so fucking hard for you with your new coaching gig and your hot wife,” Willow said comfortably. “Another beer?”
“If you’re buying.”
“Fair enough. Come on, Psycho; let’s go look at the footy medals behind the bar.”
Willow and Patrick exited the booth, leaving him and Derek alone together. The gleam in Byron’s mate’s eyes said he wasn’t done hanging shit, and he resisted the urge to get up and leave as well.
He was keen to return to his inbuilt Melbourne social system, but part of him dreaded it, too. He’d miss his small world with only Beth and Simon and whatever club he worked for. He loved his friends, but they were knobs. And the bastards all knew too much.
“Beth probably doesn’t want a divorce,” Derek said.
“Shockingly, I’d come to that conclusion on my own, bloke.”
“What did she actually say in her message?”
“I told you, something about a sitter and…” Flustered, Byron pulled out his phone and recited the message word for word.
Derek stared at him like he had two heads. “She wants to fuck you.”
“Huh?”
“You can’t still be this dense about your own missus. She’s gonna jump you at the door.”
It was Byron’s turn to stare in confusion. “How’d you get that from this? It’s a Tuesday, and I won’t be in ‘til?—”
“Sometimes I worry about you, bloke. Just do yourself a favour and buy flowers when you get off the plane.” Derek squinted at him. “Maybe drink some coffee?”
Byron’s face burned. He’d never been good at this stuff. Understanding what people wanted outside of football. Talking about anything that wasn’t football. How was he supposed to tell Derek that after the year they’d had, Beth wanting to hook up was the last thing he’d assume when she did something out of character?
Derek leaned across the table. “Things okay with you guys?”
He nodded. Derek knew what had gone down after Simon was born, so he didn’t feel like he was betraying Beth by saying, “It was rough for a while, though. Not just us, just… everything.”
“Lots going on for you guys between the new job and the move and all that, too.”
“Yeah,” Byron told the tabletop. “Been busy.”
“You’re still fucking her, yeah?”
He looked up so fast that his neck twinged.
Derek spread his fingers wide. “Not having you on. Actually asking.”
The fight left Byron as quickly as it had come, leaving only embarrassment in its wake. “I… Yeah. A fair bit, actually.”
“That’s good.” Derek frowned. “Any reason she’d want the extra time?”
Byron’s stomach sank. A month ago, he’d stupidly mentioned his hot nanny thing to Beth. He could tell he’d freaked her out, but before he could say he meant she’d make a hot nanny, the cheating scandal broke, and he’d barely had time to blink.
She’d dropped little hints about what he’d said since, and he’d wanted to punch himself in the face. After the year she’d had, Beth didn’t need to think he was turned on by anyone who’d looked after Simon. But he knew Beth. Of course, she’d voluntarily booked a sitter to do something nice for him . She’d taken his offhand comment and planned a roleplay date, thinking it was what he wanted. He groaned.
“Fuck I’m stupid.”
“What?” Derek asked.
He shook his head. Some guys could talk about sex, but he wasn’t one of them. He wasn’t a prude, at least he didn’t think he was, but getting into the details of that stuff made him want to binge drink. He couldn’t open up that way with anyone but Beth.
Derek scowled, serious as the CIA. “Mate, keep in mind I don’t wanna talk about this either, but you’re spiralling, and if you fuck things up with Beth, Mara’ll kill me. So, let’s speedrun. Beth wants it tonight, yeah? That’s why she got a sitter?”
“I think so…” he squinted. “She’s probably gonna…”
“Go all out?”
Byron had never truly appreciated Derek’s ability to take awkward, complicated things and turn them into blokey little asides. “Yeah. But I dunno if I can…”
“Treat the mother of your kid like that?”
He nodded gratefully.
“But you’re still into her?”
Byron shot him a hard look, and Derek held up his hands once again. “Don’t get at me. I’ve heard too much shit from other blokes not to ask.”
“More like, you know too many cunts.”
“Probably.”
“Definitely. Beth’s still… she’s really…”
“Oh, she’s gold,” Derek said casually. “Solid gold.”
Byron resumed staring at the table. When she had been in a bad way, nothing had fucked with his head more than the total collapse of Beth’s self-confidence. He’d always had no idea why she couldn’t see herself the way he did. How her brown eyes shone, her skin was peachy, and her smile was second to none. How she looked more like Bella Thorne than Bella Thorne these days because her hair was still red, and she didn’t have crazy metallic nails. How when Beth shone her light on someone, they always seemed to fall a little bit in love with her.
He wasn’t like that. People wanted to look at him, and that was it. One day, they wouldn’t even want to do that anymore. Beth was so scared he’d hook up with someone else when he couldn’t sleep some nights from stressing she’d meet another guy. Someone more open. Who could guess what she needed and give it to her at the right time, instead of letting things fall apart the way he had.
“Bloke?” Derek asked. “You MIA?”
Byron closed his eyes. “I guess.”
“Tired?”
“In every fucking way.”
“You—”
“I’m fine,” Byron pre-empted. “Not depressed. Just wrecked.”
“About work?”
“Work and the move and getting Si on a regular sleep schedule and now Beth… I know she wants us to get back to where we used to be, but I don’t wanna push her.”
“Push her?”
“You know she had a hard time after Si. I feel like I dropped the ball. I don’t wanna fuck it up again.”
“I get that.”
Byron felt another surge of gratitude. He didn’t know if he could handle describing Beth, zombified and barely able to look him in the face, as he tried to keep ten different plates spinning and still give her comfort.
“It doesn’t seem like you need to worry,” Derek said. “She’s handling that side of things. All you need to do tonight is show up and play the game.”
“You don’t know what she wants to get up to,” Byron muttered. He considered saying the hot nanny thing, then shook his head. Derek would laugh himself sideways, and he already had enough problems.
“So, we’re back where we started,” Derek announced. “You’re stuck in fourth gear about run-of-the-mill couple shit.”
Byron remembered the look on Beth’s face when he’d told her she’d make a sexy nanny. “It’s not run of the mill.”
“Bloke,” Derek said. “Look at me.”
Frowning, Byron glanced up to see Derek’s face barely five inches from his own. He sucked his teeth in mock disgust. “You tryna kiss me or something? Warm me up?”
“You fuckin’ wish.” Derek checked the coast was clear over both shoulders, then spoke in a low voice. “Since I can see Psycho and Will are still at the bar, I’m gonna bring down the cone of silence and tell you, me and Mara do sicker shit on a Tuesday than you could ever dream of. So whatever judgement you think’s coming, it’s not gonna come from me.”
Byron scanned his mate’s face. Derek wasn’t smiling. Wasn’t taking the piss at all.
“Urgh,” he said with a grin. “Hang on, are you tryna claim you’re a bigger freak than me?”
Derek shrugged.
“Fuck you. You don’t know that.”
“I’ll never know anything if you don’t tell me, bloke.”
“Fine.” Longing for another pint and a last chance not to engage, Byron also looked over his shoulder. Sure enough, Willow and Patrick were deep in conversation with the bartender. He sighed. “Beth wants to do this cheating thing. Pretend she’s the kid’s nanny.”
Derek raised his eyebrows. “Nice. Problem?”
“The cheating thing at my old club was so fucking stupid I wanted to castrate everyone?”
“Yeah, pretty close to home. Some stuff sticks, hey?”
“It does.”
“But I mean, without me knowing the blokes involved, that was just ego bullshit. Fucking the big dog’s wife in his own house. You’re just giving him the finger, aren’t you?”
“Pretty much.”
Derek’s nostrils flared. “I’d’ve murdered the cunt. Anyone even thinks about going near Mara?—”
“Yeah, yeah, we all know you’re the toughest, Big D. My point is, I don’t want Beth getting the idea she needs to be someone else for me to be into her.”
Derek relaxed back into the booth. “Ah, but that’s different, bloke. If you were actually getting antsy, I’d tell you to sort your shit out. But playing around with your own missus isn’t the same thing.”
“But sometimes Beth does get freaked out thinking I’m gonna fuck someone else.”
Derek shot him a look.
“I haven’t given her a fucking reason! I just know she thinks about it. She’s always said I’m, like…” Byron’s ears went hot. There was no way he was telling Derek Hardiman his wife thought he was better-looking than she was. He’d never hear the end of it. “… she gets worked up about the age difference, is all.”
Derek snorted. “What age difference? You’ve got the brain of a ninety-year-old. With ringworms.”
“Tell Beth that.”
“Maybe I will…”
“Shut up. Heard you and Mara choke each other out on weeknights.”
“And how.” Derek stretched his arms over his head. “You guys do this kinda… Sex stuff… Before the kid?”
Byron nodded.
“Then I still don’t see the problem. You’ll rock up at the house; she’ll pretend to be… y’know. And it’ll all go from there.”
Byron tried to imagine talking to Beth as though she was someone else. A nanny the two of them had hired to look after Simon. “I don’t think I can.”
“Explain.”
“Fuck off.”
“One last push, bloke. Say the words.”
Byron rolled his eyes. “Fine. I don’t wanna tell her we can’t mess around, but I don’t think Beth knows how hard the depression hit her. I don’t think I can make things feel like they did before.”
“Which is probably why she’s taking the lead?”
Derek’s know-it-all tone was getting on Byron’s last nerve. “And if it fucks her up?”
“Trust her.”
“I do fucking trust her! But I want her to get back on her feet and feel good about herself before we do something like this.”
“Maybe it’s how she’ll feel good about herself, feeling a bit more like the person she was before.”
The statement was so perceptive, Byron would have had a hard time believing it came out of Derek’s mouth if he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes. “Not a bad turn of phrase, bloke.”
“Yeah, well…” It was Derek’s turn to look uncomfortable. He was a full-time fantasy writer now, as much as the guys on the footy panel shows wouldn’t have believed it. His novels were doing well, but he was still incredibly self-conscious about being an author.
Glad to have recovered at least a small sense of personal power, Byron tapped the table. “We done talking?”
“Almost,” Derek narrowed his black eyes. “Get outta your head. You’re allowed to have the jitters, but if you don’t start treating Beth the way she wants in the sack, she’ll start thinking about finding someone who will. There’s plenty around.”
Byron glared at him.
“Not me.” Derek shot him a stupid grin. “I mean, unless…?”
“Get stuffed! Beth wouldn’t fuck you with my dick.”
“I’d fuck Beth with my dick,” Willow said, sitting down, a pint in each hand. “Respectfully. I mean, my wife would be there, too.”
Byron laughed in spite of himself. “How’s the medals?”
“Old bloke took some down,” Willow said gloomily. “Still got the ‘66 final one, though.”
Patrick also slid back into the booth, and the four of them talked medals as though he and Derek had never had a heart-to-heart. Energised and aware of his impending flight, Byron drained his pint quickly. He was on the verge of bowing out when Patrick waved a tall bloke over. “Hey, Curt! Come say hi.”
With a jolt, Byron recognised the Sharks half-back, Curtis Ingram. He and Curt had been mates once upon a time. They’d played together his first year at the Sharks and hung out a lot while Byron was still living at home. He’d lost touch with Curtis when he’d done his hamstring, the same way he’d lost touch with pretty much everyone footy-related who wasn’t Derek.
Yet here he was, same big grin, same shaggy brown hair, loping over to say hello.
“Psycho. Hardo. Will. BT,” Curt said, shaking each of their hands in turn. “Or is it ‘Coach Thomas’ now?”
“Whatever works,” Byron said as Willow and Derek sniggered.
“‘Coach Thomas’ got a good ring to it.” Curtis grinned. “Looking forward to having you back onside.”
“Cheers. Good to be back.”
“No doubt. How’s your sister?”
Derek outright laughed, and Byron had to stop himself from standing and asking Curtis what the fuck he thought he was playing at. He’d met Sal a few times back in the day, but that was when Sal still identified as a girl, had long hair and way less tattoos.
“Sal’s good,” he said coldly. “Just got a job as a teaching assistant.”
“That’s—”
“I’m gonna head for the airport,” he told his friends, getting to his feet. “See ya later.”
“Bye, Coach Thomas,” Willow and Psycho said at the same time.
“Have fun,” Derek added. “Don’t do anything I’d do.”
“Not the expression, bloke,” Byron said.
He made eye contact with Curtis, who smiled weakly, and he suspected his old friend was about to ask him to say hi to Sal. Or possibly if they were single. Byron walked away without shaking hands with anyone. Curt had always been a decent guy, but he could get fucked.
Derek might know rising stars liked nothing better than fucking an ex-legend’s wife, but Byron knew all about players having a laugh by smashing the coach’s daughter, girlfriend, sister, anything. No one was doing that to Sal. They were still performing in drag shows, and Christ knew what else, but they’d found stability since moving back to Melbourne and getting their early childhood qualification. He’d be damned if the likes of Ingram were going to fuck that up for them.
Becoming a dad had given Byron a new appreciation for his sister. Sal had been there late at night when he’d needed someone to play 3am Minecraft with. They’d come to visit Simon a half-dozen times, paying for their plane ticket and refusing to take his money. He was looking forward to spending more time with Sal in Melbourne, but that picture did not include letting them within ten feet of some boneheaded defender who thought ‘non-binary’ was a computer thing.
Nope, Curtis Ingram could get all the way fucked.
As he settled into an Uber, his thoughts returned to Beth and the night that lay ahead of him. He pictured coming home and felt a pang. He missed his wife. His son. Right now, all he wanted to do was order dumplings and cuddle on the couch.
Derek spoke in his head. Horny fantasy, bloke. Not gonna lead to frustration on Beth’s end, I’m sure.
Groaning, Byron stared up at the car ceiling.
“Get rhythm,” he told himself. “Do it.”
He pictured Beth in bed, all sweet and sleepy, her pretty eyes half open… but that was too cosy. He pulled out his phone and opened his folder of Beth photos. There were plenty of hot ones, but that only increased his longing to hold her and tell her how beautiful she was. Scrolling, he stumbled on a picture he didn’t recognise.
It showed Beth kneeling on a picnic blanket in shorts and a tight white t-shirt, pouting her lips, and he remembered saving it off her Instagram right after they first met. He’d been so fucking jealous of whoever had taken the picture. He knew it was a guy, probably her asshole ex-boyfriend, Stephen. The man who’d been able to fuck her that night instead of him.
Studying the image now, Byron saw Beth was holding a wineglass—a blast from the past because the woman he knew never drank. She had to be in her late twenties, at least, but she looked like a uni student. Her cheeks were round, and her freckles stark, and he just wanted to chew on her pretty pink lips. That wholesome, redheaded, good-girl thing had always driven him wild.
He’d dated a few models before Beth, but what he could never make her understand was how her warmth—obvious even in an old, out-of-focus photo—shone in a way he’d choose over his exes every single time.
Lucky you married her then, bloke.
Suddenly, it came to him: how tonight could work. If Beth was going to be his hot nanny, she couldn’t be his wife. The role of his wife needed to be temporarily played by someone else. And it was all too easy to imagine who. His last serious girlfriend, the one he’d stupidly considered marrying when he was too dumb to know better, had been one of the models. Audrey was tall and skinny and Beth fucking haaaaaaaaated her. They’d run into Audrey at one of Willow’s parties months ago, and while he’d felt nothing for his ex-girlfriend, she’d gotten shitfaced and put her arms around his neck, slurring about how she missed them being together. But before Byron could disentangle himself, Beth—four months pregnant and stone sober—had grabbed Audrey’s ponytail and yanked her backward.
“Get your hands off my husband and crawl back into the malnourished hole you jumped out of,” she’d hissed. “And if you’ve got any fucking sense, stay there.”
Audrey had run off like a scared ferret, and Byron had gotten laid like flat-pack furniture that night, Beth riding him hell for leather while she all but audibly cursed Audrey’s name.
It was a little risky, bringing up his ex during roleplay, but it also seemed in keeping with the fantasy. Beth would probably like nothing better than to home-wreck the woman who’d tried to do the same thing to her. And if Byron was being honest, he liked the idea, too. It was all too easy to picture him and Audrey, unhappily married with a kid and nothing to talk about.
“… Until the sexy redhead with big tits comes in,” he muttered, grinning from ear to ear. “What’s a man to do?”
“Say something, mate?” The Uber driver called.
“Nope. It’s all good.”
Byron exited Beth’s photo and opened the messaging app. It took him a while to compose the right text, but he had it right by the time he arrived at Tullamarine Airport.
Thanks for staying late with the little guy, Beth. Audrey and I really appreciate it. I’ll drive you home when I get in. Thanks for being such a great nanny. Byron x