Chapter 3 Big Dog #3
‘Gonna ask her over?’ Kingy asks.
‘Reckon I will,’ I say, making a show of grinning and tapping on my phone like I’m sending her a reply. ‘Clear out, fellas. I gotta smash.’
I’ve done this for years. It’s never been questioned. The chicks are real, after all, and the pics and DMs are evidence. I always tell the boys I’m gonna ask the girls over, and they believe I do, and I always have enough nudes flowing through to keep the image up.
I wait until the boys leave the apartment, send the girl a side-eye emoji by way of flirting and to encourage her to keep sending nudes, then forget about her.
I check my main messages. The chicks who flirt with me always get added to my permitted ‘general’ folder, or if they’re hot influencers or we’ve met in person at some swanky function, they go to the ‘primary’ folder.
My ex-girlfriend Richelle is in my ‘primary’ folder still.
Her last message was only a week ago. We were on-again, off-again for years.
I reckon she liked the thrill of being a WAG more than she liked me, but having her on my arm on awards nights worked for us both.
When she wanted me to commit to a relationship two years ago, I couldn’t.
Richelle’s a wellness yoga influencer now, and even as we split she had this whole focus on us being ‘present and conscious and kind’ as we ‘uncoupled’.
It was a tad cuckoo bananas, but nicer than her hating me.
We still chat, still send nudes when we’re drunk, and when I’m in Melbourne to play footy every other weekend, we sometimes catch up for a drink or a selfie.
But I get way more messages from blokes than birds.
Those ones stay in my ‘message requests’ folder. The reality is, if you’re a public figure and show your muscles off online, you cop horny dudes by the truckload. I’ve had more guys than chicks in my DMs forever. Any bodybuilder will tell you the same.
I never reply, but I always look. I’m terrified one day I’ll hit ‘like’ on a guy’s nude pic and out myself by mistake.
But not terrified enough to stop looking.
Today I have a buttload of guys fire-reacting to my shower selfie.
Three have sent nudes. One sent videos of himself in the shower, as if inviting me to join him.
He has incredible abs and a tattoo of a lion on his pec.
Another bastard is old and gross and I delete him.
A third sends me a full porno video of him taking a giant red dildo up his arse and moaning as it goes in and out.
The third bloke has sent me messages too. You’re such an Alpha Stud. I would worship your big footy boy muscles like the King you are, Sir. Please reply, I’ll be discreet.
I jack off to the first and third blokes, but mostly the third.
It’s not about his arse or the dildo. It’s how he called me an alpha.
I live for that shit. Undiluted, unrelenting praise of my superiority makes me feel like an absolute god.
If there’s a drug I ever overdose on, it’ll be that.
I’d inject it into my eyeballs if I could.
It always reminds me of how he looked at me, the one guy I ever rooted: like I was so superior to him. That night was the only proper time I did anything with a guy, and I’ve revisited it so many wanks since cos it can always make me shoot my load.
Just like tonight.
I cum all over the balcony tiles, spraying my seed like an animal. I don’t bother to clean it up. Cum is only white for a few minutes then it goes all clear and nobody can tell it apart from water.
I delete all the message requests and woosh, it’s like none of this ever happened, is happening, or ever will happen again.
But tonight, it doesn’t feel as deletable. This shit has been brought into my work life now.
I don’t fully think it through. I grab my phone, open Insta and start tapping out a story. Pride Round? Seriously? Why do they have to shove this down our throats? Can’t footy ever just be about footy?
After I’ve typed it, I hesitate. But no, I didn’t use the word faggot. I didn’t attack anyone. Just a general comment about keeping politics out of footy, right?
‘Fuck it,’ I say to today’s West on the table. ‘I’m allowed to say what I want.’
I hit send on the Insta story, chuck my phone onto the glass table and head inside for a final beer. I max out at two beers during the season – any more will affect my performance.
As I unscrew my beer cap, my phone starts pinging.
Righto, here we go. Maybe I should delete it. But we’re all thinking it, right? Someone had to say it, and if it has to be me, it’s me. If everyone stays silent, these people win.
My phone starts pinging faster, and then starts to vibrate with a call.
From my manager.
DM #1
Hey Big Dog,
U really think ur a big tuff man making homophobic comments? What are u in primary school? Fuck u man. Doesn’t matter if u deleted that story cos I got the screenshot.
U better think hard before u ever say anything like this in public again, especially since coming from you, anything anti-gay is a bit hypocritical, isn’t it?
Yeh that’s right.
I know.
Your Worst Nightmare