Page 23 of Off the Pitch

That’s why I was here. If there was one person I could trust to speak sense and tell me whether I was doing the right thing, it was my mother.

“Hello?” I called, sticking my head through the front door. “Mum?”

“Christian? Is that you?” Mum’s head appeared from around the living room door, her eyebrow raised. “What’s wrong?”

“I just wanted to see you. Is that a crime?” I joked. I slipped off my trainers and wrapped her in a giant hug, breathing in her soft scent that always reminded me of home.

“Mmhmm, and pigs can fly,” she said, fixing me with that one look all mums have. The one that says ‘you’re a horrible liar’. “You never drop in like this unless something’s bothering you.”

“That’s not true,” I protested, even though it was a bald-faced lie and we both knew it. “Do you want a cup of tea?” I said, trying to change the subject.

Mum fixed me with another look and then smiled. “Go on then, if you make it. There’s biscuits in the tin if you want one.”

“Just one?”

“Two, then. But you’re not eating the whole pack.”

“Love you.”

When I returned, two mugs of tea and two chocolate biscuits in hand, Mum patted the sofa next to her, muting the quiz show she was watching. I said nothing. Instead, I focused on carefully dunking my biscuits into my tea, trying not to lose bits in the milky void.

“So, how’re things going with David?” There was a soft splash as half my chocolate digestive dropped into my tea.

“What?” I spluttered, losing all sense of cool. Which, let’s face it, I never possessed in the first place.

“Lily said you’re friends again,” Mum said, peering at me over the rim of her mug and fixing me with her soul-piercing look. Did she know? I hadn’t even told Lily we were dating, so there was no way my sneaky sister had spilled the details.

“Yeah,” I said, my voice coming out far squeakier than I wanted. “Yeah, we are.”

“Good. He was always good for you. I was sad when you lost touch.” Mum smiled and immediately headed for the killer blow. “Are you going to get back together?”

“Um… errr…” Curse her and her inbuilt ability to know everything without me telling her. “Maybe?” I sighed, staring down into my tea, unwilling to face her. “Yes… I mean, we kinda already did?”

“You don’t sound sure,” Mum said. “Don’t you want to be with him?”

“Yeah, no, I mean, I do… but…”

“But what?”

I sighed, finally voicing the feelings that had been building over the last twenty-four hours. “I’m scared.” My voice cracked, eyes stinging as I tried to hold back tears of fear. “What if I’m not good enough for him? What if I can’t balance him and football? What if he tells someone? What if… what if people find out I’m gay?”

“Oh, baby.” Mum’s face dropped. Before I could blink, she’d put her tea down and pulled me into a hug, squeezing me so tightly I didn’t think I could breathe and crushing my mug into my ribs. “That’s what happens when you put yourself out there. You have to trust the other person. It’s scary to do that, to put your heart in someone else’s hands. But this is David we’re talking about, not some random stranger. That boy has loved you since he met you, and he’s not about to go telling someone your secrets for a payday. He’s better than that. And besides, if he was gonna do it, don’t you think he’d have done it by now?”

“I guess.” I shrugged weakly, sitting back to escape her death grip. Part of me hated when she used logic on me, because I knew she was right. The only reason I was feeling like this was because I was scared.

“See? Have you told him you feel like this?”

“No,” I squeaked.

“Well, damn well grow up and tell him. If not, how’s he supposed to know how you feel? How’re you gonna have a relationship if you don’t talk to him?”

Ugh, why did she have to be so logical? She was right, of course, as usual. If I wanted to be with David, I had to open up to him. Knowing him, he’d already guessed, and it was probably why he’d insisted on talking everything through yesterday and laying out ground rules so we knew where we stood. A rush of gratitude filled my chest because without even realising it, David was already looking out for me and trying to protect me from myself.

“And anyway,” Mum continued. “What does it matter if people find out you like boys?”

That was the million-dollar question. Did it matter anymore?

Things were changing so much. There were so many calls for more players to come out, most of the teams had LGBT fan organisations, and there were other gay sportsmen and women all over the world. Heck, Casey Stoney, the former England Ladies Captain, had a wife and three children, and nobody cared. She was now manager of the Manchester United women’s team too. I was pretty sure everyone at the club would support me. I mean, I knew that Liam and Jordan’s first port of call would be to set me up some sort of Grindr profile, whether they were gay or not. They just seemed to want me to get laid. If anything, they’d be more upset that I hadn’t told them sooner.

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