Chapter Nine #2
“Like I said, that doesn’t always matter. Plus, it’s been weeks now and he still hasn’t asked us for help relocating his wife from Spain. Usually that’s the first thing they ask when they transfer.”
“Who’s ‘us’?”
“The Player Liaison team. Basically, whatever makes the players’ lives easier, we do. And your man Ramsay hasn’t said a word about the missus. In fact, I heard he told one of the physios that she’s not planning to move here at all and they’re going to separate.”
This revelation sets my mind whirling, though at this point I guess I shouldn’t be surprised—clearly, Lachlan and Claire have an atypical relationship, or perhaps just a failing one.
“I promise, we’re just friends,” I say. I can tell my voice is a little strangled, my hand gestures a little too “the lady doth protest too much,” but I can’t help it: Sadie’s observation makes me squirm.
What if other people have seen us together and made the same assumption?
What if Charlotte has seen? My mouth goes dry.
Set aside what it says about me and my WAG aspirations—Lachlan deserves space to figure out his marriage without rumors hanging over him.
“I hope I haven’t offended you?” Sadie inflects it like a question but doesn’t seem too concerned about it either way.
“Honestly, I’m flattered you think I could hook up with one of them.”
“You definitely could. Most of the lads love a bit of banter, and you’ve got it. Plus, you’ve got some truly fantastic tits.”
“This is somehow the most mortifying and gratifying conversation of my life.”
She laughs. “You’re welcome.”
“Have you ever…” I start, but blush furiously and shake my head. “No, sorry, it’s none of my business.”
“It’s okay. Yes, I’ve hooked up with loads of them. Highlights include Nando Herrera last year before he got engaged, Joe Lancaster before he moved to Arsenal, and a long-standing kind of…arrangement with Billy Ashburn. Defenders are the hottest—they’re absolutely savage in bed.”
“Ashburn? He seems like he can’t string two sentences together.”
“And yet, he is very good with his mouth.”
I fiddle with my bangs, hoping they help disguise how red my face is. “I’ll take your word for it.”
“If you want to take more than my word for it, have at it. We’re not exclusive or anything. That’s the key with these guys: They either want to wife you up when you’re twenty-two or just fuck around forever. There’s no in-between.”
I don’t know what to say to that. Billy Ashburn, affectionately known as Bashie, originally hails from Scotland, like Lachlan—and that’s about where the similarities end.
Where Lachlan is classically handsome in his noughties Jude Law way, Bashie looks a bit like someone who has repeatedly taken a shovel to the face.
He used to play rugby, which is how he got the gnarly scar that runs along his left temple.
It also must be where he got his enormous, impressive thighs.
He’s not exactly my cup of tea, but I guess I can see where Sadie’s coming from.
He has the biggest personality on the team, which I can appreciate, even if I can barely understand the words that are coming out of his mouth (God knows where in the country you have to be from to produce an accent like that).
But I don’t appreciate his banter enough to hook up with him. Not nearly enough to risk my job and my visa and my reputation.
Maybe Sadie can sense my incredulity, because for the first time, she bristles.
“Look, it’s not so scandalous. In any other workplace, there will always be hookups and office romances.
The players are employees, too, just better paid and more important than us peons. But it’s not like it’s illegal.”
“I think my boss might disagree with you.”
“Charlotte Collins, right? Yeah, she is weirdly strict about that sort of thing. I think it’s because there was a girl here a couple of years ago who basically turned the Mersey Instagram into her own personal love note to one of the strikers.
It was bizarre. But you should come over to the PL team—no one gives a shit.
A girl who used to work here actually told me a story about an orgy she threw at Party. ”
“Are you serious?”
“Well, she was a bit shifty, so I don’t know if it was true, but I like to think so.
And my doubts haven’t stopped me from trying to replicate the experience.
These guys are unbelievably sexual. All athletes are.
Did you know the sweat of Roman gladiators was sold as an aphrodisiac?
Augustus literally arranged the seating at the games so that the women were as far away from the fighting as possible, because they’d get themselves in a frenzy by watching the men. ”
“That is…not something I expected to learn tonight.”
“Sorry, I read classics at uni. It comes out when you least expect it.”
“How on earth did you end up here?”
“It’s not exactly a seller’s market for classicists. And I like football just fine, plus I love the men that play it.”
I can’t quite believe how blatant she is about her lust, but I admire it.
Though I’m not a prude, it’s hard for me to fathom initiating this kind of conversation with a coworker.
But I decide to give her some honesty right back.
“I appreciate your candor—and I will always take more fun facts about Rome—but the truth is, I’m just out of a long relationship that ended horribly, so even if I could hook up with one of them, I shouldn’t. ”
“On the other hand: What better way to rebound than with an athlete in the prime of his life?” She smiles and holds her beer out for another cheers, and I have to clink it because, well, it’s a pretty compelling argument.
I would love to see the look on Steven’s face if he ever found out—although seeing Steven’s face again might be even less likely than me shagging a footballer.
We chitchat a bit more until a familiar guitar lick comes on the karaoke speakers.
Beto Gomez, a young fullback from Colombia, has taken the mic, flanked by several backup singers-slash-midfielders.
“Oh, I love this song,” I say, before I can stop myself.
“My high school Spanish teacher made us listen to it to learn about prepositions.”
“You should go up there.”
“No, no. I don’t want to steal Gomez’s thunder.”
“Don’t be so wet.” Then, much to my chagrin, she cups her hand around her mouth and shouts, “Beto! Abby knows this song.” She points at me, as if the entire room isn’t already staring.
“En serio? Come up, come up, ven aquí.” He beckons to me with the microphone.
I protest, but it only makes the small mob grow more agitated. Then Lachlan’s at my side, and he’s literally dragging me up onto the stage, where Nando Herrera thrusts a mic into my hands. “A little bit of liquid courage,” Lachlan says as he passes me a shot of tequila.
I down it, and with the encouragement of the crowd, muddle my way through the song with Gomez and my rusty-as-hell Spanish.
It’s terrifying and yet thrilling at the same time—plus, I’m pretty sure I saw “Do drunken karaoke” on Erica’s List, so at least I get another checkmark.
The song ends and Beto high-fives me and says something in rapid-fire Spanish that I’m too addled to process quickly, but before I can respond, about five more players rush the stage as the first notes of “Mr. Brightside” play: The British have chosen their opener.
I haven’t heard this song since college, but I’m delighted to realize it still slaps.
I’m pulled into the throng of men bouncing up and down and belting—mostly off-key—to the Killers.
Lachlan throws his arm around my shoulder as we crescendo into the chorus.
I catch Sadie’s eye across the room and she just raises her eyebrows, a look on her face like “I told you so.”
And maybe I should pull away, or at least throw my arm around Beto, bopping along next to me.
But then I notice that he clearly doesn’t know the words and is basically just shouting nonsense syllables half a beat too late.
And Bashie is there, scream-singing the chorus in a key that is somehow sharp and flat at the same time.
And Matt Fletcher is wailing on air guitar and Kieran Campbell has his eyes closed and one arm thrust in the air like he’s at church, and I realize that actually, at this moment, I don’t care what Sadie—or anyone—thinks.
The only thing I care about is a sensation, deep in my chest, like ice cracking, splintering what’s been frozen inside of me since the day Steven walked out.
It’s the first hint of a thaw, a real one, and I’m going to do whatever I can to keep it going.