Page 9 of Lord of the Lock

Finn continued. “So I did the one thing I could. I hit the gym. Exercise made me happier, and the guys who used the gym played for the school rugby team. Getting big helped me to feel a bit less of a target, yeah. But the real benefit was how I felt. Exercise makes me happy. Seeing that I’ve taken control of the one thing I could makes me happy. Eventually the braces came off and the acne faded. But I had still taken action to make myself feel better. And in doing that, I happened to make friends with some of the rugby lads who used the school gym at lunchtime. By the time I was sixteen I had finally found my tribe. And I was getting attention off the girls.”

“So…you’re not offering because you think I’m fucking puny?” I asked, finally feeling my cheeks pull up a little bit as I spoke.

“I’m offering because I think exercise gives people happiness, and you could do with a little bit of happiness. And a bit of muscle never hurt anyone…‘til it punched them in the face.”

“Fine then,” I said, holding out my hand to him with more confidence than I felt. “So long as you’re not expecting me to join the rugby team.”

“And in return, you cover for me if anyone thinks I’ve gone all straight and narrow.” Finn reached forwardly and gently clasped my hand in his much bigger one. “Fake boyfriends,” he said with a smile.

“Fake boyfriends,” I agreed. “Less straight, if you make me less narrow.”

Finn laughed quietly and then looked down at his hands. Now we’d negotiated, things felt awkward.

“So where did you go to school?” I asked when a second had gone without him speaking.

“Pont High, you?”

“Pont.”

“I don’t recognise you…” he said. “Are the glasses new?” I pointed up at the picture on the wall above him and he craned his neck to see. “Oh, P’raps not.”

The picture in question was me at seventeen years old, in the second year of sixth form with my high school diploma and my big tortoiseshell glasses.

“Oh, I remember you now,” said Finn. “A year below me, right? You were cute as hell.”

“Thanks, but I wasnot,’ I said. I had begged Mum at the time not to buy the picture but she refused. “If you’d told me I looked cute back then, I’d have thrown myself at you.”

He pulled out his phone and showed me a picture. “Believe me, I was not about to ask you out in school. There’s me in school, sixth form rugby championship.”

“You arejoking!” I said. With a wispy moustache and terrible mullet, the Finn of a decade ago, pictured running across the rugby field, somehow looked older than the man before me. “Who de-aged you?”

Finn picked up a TARDIS I’d been about to pack. “If I had one of these, I’d travel back in time and tell myself that the mullet was a fucking mistake. I looked like if David Hasselhoff and Hulk Hogan had a baby.”

“Weirdly specific reference,” I said, grabbing the TARDIS and stuffing it in the package with the cuddly Doctor Who monster toys. “Though this is my favourite show.”

“Always been more of aThrones of Bloodman myself,” said Finn. “They’re the only books I’ve ever read.”

“Really?”

“Never thought I was any good at school, but I picked upThrones of Bloodat some hookup’s house when he was asleep and I couldn’t find a key to get out…I was hooked man.”

“Ever watched the TV show?” I asked slyly, pulling my phone from my pocket and prepared to blow his mind.

“Are you joking? I once faked an injury in a Cardiff game to watch the finale,” he said. “That Daniel Ellison couldget it.”

“Well he’s very loved up with his partner,” I said. I found the photo of me, Danny and all my other friends from Hiraeth on my phone and showed it to him. “Jealous?”

“Fuck off, you have not met Daniel Ellison.” Finn took the phone from my hand and zoomed in. “It’s not a cardboard cut-out? He really is that good looking in person?”

“Yes, and a good friend of mine too.”

“You’re kidding. Keep this up and I just might have to make you my real boyfriend,” Finn said.

I laughed, only because it was said in such earnest. It was easy to get along with Finn, despite my initial fear. He really was a puppy of a man in a Great Dane’s body.

“Right, I need to get these orders packed. So if you’re not going to help, you better shove off,” I I said.

Finn smiled. “I’m off to work, anyway. Got to get my first day’s prep done before training starts for the season next week.” He fiddled with his phone for a second. “There we go, I’ve AirDropped you my contact details.” My phone buzzed in my pocket. “I’ll send you over details when I’m ready for your first training session.”

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