Chapter 3 #2
“You know, you’re pretty quick,” he said. “For a second row, anyway.”
Something warm and unexpected flared in her chest, but she pushed it down with a teasing grin. “Careful there, sir. Almost sounds like a compliment.”
Matt just held her gaze for a moment, something lingering in the way he looked at her.
Then, with a slow smile, he said, “Maybe it was.”
***
Georgia leaned against the vanity, watching as the hairdresser attempted to wrestle Tam’s wild hair into a complicated, twisting updo.
The bridal suite was a mess - with half-drunk cups of tea, empty bottles of prosecco, open makeup bags, towels and hairbrushes and discarded dressing gowns strewn over the bed.
It had been decorated in the same style as the guesthouse – all fussy chintz and pastel patterned wallpaper.
Georgia had been ready for at least an hour, and she checked her appearance once more in the long, gilt-framed mirror on the wall, hardly recognising the woman staring back.
No mud, no tape, no jersey. The way the dress clung to her did nothing to hide her shoulders, the definition in her arms and thighs.
All it did was make her strength look deliberate.
The short waves of her hair were loose, framing her face gently.
They'd started to braid it into a half-up style, but it felt too much like the way she wore it on the pitch and she'd taken it out again.
They'd tried a tortoiseshell claw clip, but it hadn't stayed in, sliding drunkenly down her neck.
In the end, the hairdresser had simply curled it and tucked it behind her ears.
Tam was still in her pyjamas, frowning at her reflection like she was solving a particularly difficult puzzle.
“I don’t know why you’re making such a fuss,” Georgia said, smirking. “You’ll look great no matter what.”
Tam glared at her through the mirror. “That’s what people say when they don’t have to look at the wedding photos forever.”
A low chuckle came from behind them, and Georgia turned to see the photographer, camera raised to eye height, leaning against the doorframe.
“Don’t worry,” she said, lowering the camera away from her face and shooting Tam a grin. “I’ll make sure you look great – at least in all the pictures I send across.”
Georgia laughed. The photographer looked familiar, like Georgia had met her, seen her somewhere before.
The undercut over her ear said queer, as did the outfit.
She was dressed all in black: flowing trousers and a tight black T-shirt that highlighted the slimness of her shoulders.
Over the top she wore a leather harness, her cameras dangling at her side.
The harness was fit, Georgia thought. Kind of bondage-y.
"Can I ask," the photographer continued, "you are Georgia Hotchkiss, right? The rugby player?"
"She is, yes." Tam jumped in before she could answer. "Westcliffe, England, British and Irish Lions. And – I have to say it – she learnt everything from me."
Georgia smiled self-consciously. She still found it weird that people recognised her in the street, that she was some kind of niche celebrity.
"That's me, yeah. And, for the record, that last bit isn't even remotely true.
" She gestured in Tam's direction with her thumb. "She learnt everything from me."
The photographer let her camera hang from the harness, and pulled a phone out of her trouser pocket. "Would you mind if I got a selfie with you? My friends will flip."
Georgia posed awkwardly while the photographer snapped a picture of the two of them.
"Thanks," the photographer said, scrolling back through her gallery to look at the selfie for a long moment. "It's really cool to meet you in person. We came to a Six Nations game last year, and a couple of your home matches at Westcliffe."
Georgia winced and stepped away, leaning on the edge of the dressing table next to Tam. "Oh, sorry about the results of those."
"No, no. I'm a big fan." The photographer pushed an imaginary strand of hair from her undercut behind her ear. She was starstruck, which was crazy. Georgia was just Georgia.
The girl laughed again and bit her lip, as though she was contemplating saying something else. "Anyway, I've got to just, um…" She waved vaguely in the direction of the door, flashed a quick, awkward smile, and disappeared out of it.
"Another one falls under the Hotchkiss spell." Tam sighed dramatically but pulled Georgia down onto the chair next to her, laughing too as Georgia sprawled inelegantly in her pre-wedding kimono.
As the hairdresser worked, carefully curling strands of Tam’s thick hair, Tam smirked. “So. Speaking of falling under spells. You and Matt.”
Georgia groaned. “Not this again.”
“What? I’m just making an observation,” Tam said. “And that observation is that you were practically purring last night.”
Georgia reached out and tugged, a little harder than necessary, on a not-yet-wrangled section of Tam’s hair. “I was not.”
“You so were.” Tam grinned. “The whole flirty banter, the way you looked at him— practically K-I-S-S-I-N-G.” She said it in the sing-song way of the playground song, as though she were about to chant out the whole sitting in a tree thing.
Thank God that Tam’s sister, Mia, who was her other bridesmaid, had drifted away into the kitchen for breakfast. Georgia rolled her eyes. “Matt flirts with everyone. It’s just how he is.”
“Maybe.” Tam twisted in the chair slightly, catching Georgia’s gaze in the mirror. “But you don’t flirt with everyone.”
Georgia hesitated. That was annoyingly true. She didn't flirt with anyone. At least, not deliberately.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “It’s just easy with him. He knows me, I know him, there’s no... awkwardness.”
Tam smirked. “No, just a decade of unresolved tension.”
Georgia kicked her ankle under the dressing table, drawing a tut from the hairdresser as Tam twisted to avoid her. “Shut up.”
Tam laughed but let it go, at least for now. No doubt she’d come back to it later, tenacious as a terrier with a bone. The room settled into a comfortable silence as the hairdresser finished curling the last few pieces of Tam’s hair.
“Speaking of awkward,” Georgia said after a moment, “Erin.”
Tam hummed. “What about her?”
“Well…” Georgia hesitated. “It’s just that…”
The hairdresser placed the straightener down and began working her fingers through Tam’s curls, softening them, checking for stray flat sections she’d missed. She was listening intently, Georgia was certain. Enjoying the gossip about people Georgia hoped to high hell she didn’t know.
“It’s just awkward between us, that’s all. I could basically see my breath all night, it was that frosty.”
It wasn’t Tam’s fault, she supposed. Georgia had never told her what happened that afternoon in the clubhouse. Tam knew something had happened, but Georgia had never been able to tell her the full truth. She had never dug through the shame.
Tam gave her a look.
“Erin’s had a bit of a tough time recently. It’s made her careful with people. She doesn’t let her guard down easily.”
Georgia considered that. They were never close when they were teenagers, but there had been a time when they changed in the same locker rooms and played on the same pitches. And yet, Erin had never been as guarded with her as she was now.
Tam nudged her. “Don’t take it personally. If she was being polite and sweet, then you’d really have a reason to be worried.”
Georgia snorted. “Noted.”
Tam studied her for a moment before grinning. “Oh my God.”
“What?”
Tam wiggled her eyebrows. “Do you still have a thing for Erin?”
“No!”
She did not. Absolutely, definitely, most decidedly did not. In her experience, crushing on straight women never ended well. And Erin was so straight they could use her as a mould in a ruler factory.
There was no way she had a crush on Erin. And no way she’d want anything other than to get through the weekend unscathed. She only wanted to avoid her in their shared room, and avert her eyes from the inevitable flash of skin where her pyjama top had ridden up. Keep her distance.
Georgia deflected the conversation by reaching for the rest of her croissant and stuffing it in her mouth. Tam didn’t need to know just how right she was. “For God’s sake, can we just focus on making you look wedding-appropriate?”
Tam cackled, enjoying herself far too much. She leant back as the hairdresser made the final touches to her complicated twist, a little smile still playing on her lips. Georgia hoped she’d let it drop, get too distracted by her own wedding to meddle in Georgia’s almost entirely dormant love life.
Tam’s mother stuck her head around the doorframe, as though summoned by Georgia’s raging blush. “Are you girls alright in here?"
Georgia nodded. "All good, Mrs Curran."
Tam's mum gave her a soppy look. "Oh Georgia," she said, "you don't still have to call me that.
Not after all these years, not now you're grown up and on the TV.
You can call me Debbie, you know." She stepped forward, pulling Georgia down for a hug and smushing her face against her ample, chiffon-clad chest. Georgia let her hold her for a moment, and then pulled back.
Tam's mum stepped out of the hug. Her eyes were slightly watery as she looked between them. "Cup of tea? Glass of prosecco?”
“Prosecco,” Georgia agreed. The day had barely begun, and she already needed another drink.