Page 79 of One Last Try

“What if we took a bet on it?” Daisy says.

“What? No, I don’t bet. Ever. Unless I know I’m right. And that’s not much of a gamble, is it?” I reply.

“Aw, come on. It’ll be fun. We can just pluck a random, completely arbitrary wager amount from thin air. Say thirty-five thousand pounds.” She winces and bites her thumbnail.

“The thatch cost?”

“It’s been playing on my mind recently,” she says.

I want to help so I say, “I’ve been doing some research, and I don’t think it would be impossible if we had some kind of fete, fair thing, with a big charity-type rugby match.”

“He’ll never go for it if you pitch it as charity,” Daisy argues. “You know, when we moved to the cottage across the road, this pub was a wreck. It was horrible. Smelled like piss and stale cigarette smoke and it was falling apart. Dad gutted it and renovated the whole thing himself. He wouldn’t let anyone else help him—not financially, or physically. Well, except Viv, in the end.” She goes quiet for a moment, caught up in a memory perhaps. “He barely let Molly and me help paint the walls. He doesn’t like the feeling of owing people.”

I twirl my glass on the bar top while I speed-think up a solution. I come up empty-handed, though I’m not bothered. It only means more research, and I’ll never complain when research is on the cards.

“My other idea,” I say, not taking my eyes away from the pint. “Is to get some of the Cents lads involved.”

“Yeah, no, I don’t think Dad would go for that either,” she says.

“What won’t I go for?” Owen appears beside me. He has a tray balanced on one hand, stacked with empty glasses from the beer garden.

It’s been boiling today, and despite the tone deaf warbling inside the pub, the outside seating areas have been rammed. Owen, Daisy, and the two Saturday bar girls have been rushed off their feet.

“Why do you keep doing that?” Daisy whines.

“Doing what?” Owen snakes his free hand over my shoulder and brushes my nape. I had a haircut on Wednesday and the hair at the back of my head is baby soft.

“Sneaking around. Creeping up on us while we’re having a private conversation.”

“Daze, it’s my pub. I don’t sneak, I strut.”

“Ha ha ha,” Daisy says without any trace of humour.

Owen boops her on the nose. “Okay, but why are there private conversations happening between my daughter and my boyf—” He cuts himself off, but my heart is already in my throat.

Daisy’s hand is covering her open mouth, her eyes wide. Owen knows he’s fucked up. His eyes are as wide as Daisy’s, but they look worried. Panicked even.

“Oh, fuck, I’m . . . It slipped out. It doesn’t mean anything,” Owen says. He holds onto my arm like if he lets go, we both might drown.

Suddenly Lando is beside us. “Shit, did you just say Mathias and you are boyfriends?”

Owen’s shaking his head, silently pleading with his surrogate son to shut the fuck up.

Lando twigs. “Nooo . . .actually you definitely didn’t. I must have heard something else. Boyf . . .” He laughs, but his lips are pulled down into a Wallace-like grimace. “That’s just Gen Z slang for dude, right?”

Daisy simply slaps herself in the face.

“Mate.” Owen puts his tray on the bar and turns to me. “It wasn’t . . . Literally doesn’t mean anything.”

“Okay,” I say, but suddenly the room feels very small. The walls are too close. It’s too hot and humid. Who’s idea was it to cram five hundred rugby players into a building with a maximum occupancy of negative one? “I need air.”

I don’t know how I get outside. All I know is that one second I’m sitting in that stuffy, cramped pub, and the next I’m standing at the edge of the field beside a style. It’s overgrown with weeds. Dandelions and nettles crowd up around the posts, making it impossible to climb without getting your ankles attacked. Someone has carvedD+Linto the old splintered wood. Daisy and Lando maybe?

It’s times like this I wish I smoked. I’d at least have a neurotypical-friendly reason to leave. Something they can understand. Not“Sorry, I’m having real trouble regulating my emotions right now.”

It’s dark out, and I can’t make out the RFC club building, except for a tiny blinking red light, which I assume is the security alarm. Between the trees, the goal posts cast enormous H silhouettes against the sky.

Behind me, a twig snaps. There’s rustling and the soft padding of cautious steps slowly growing closer. I know without turning that the tread of those footsteps belongs to a pair of black New Balance trainers. Have I spent so long with Owen that I’ve memorised the sound of his gait? Or . . . is it something else?

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