Page 73 of We Were Never Lovers
“You said you wanna keep playing,” Jack went on. “And you deserve to have the same protection as the rest of us. I’m not going to argue about this.”
Sean could only blink up at him for a moment. They’d resumed their usual positions—Jack was standing up, Sean was sitting on the couch—and Jack once again looked unsure, but he was putting a good face on it with his posturing. Sean squeezed his eyes closed.
“I totalled the car,” he said. “If you got money for it, great, but I reckon I’m either gonna have to buy you a new one or you’re gonna have to use that cash to get yourself a new one.”
“You didn’t do anything,” Jack snapped. Sean’s eyes opened, widened.
“That fucking lunatic truck driver was amped up on dexies and lost control. He’s lucky all he got was a fucking suspended sentence,” Jack said angrily. “And the only reason I haven’t fucking sued him is ‘cos he’s got no money.”
Sean knew about the conviction. He didn’t know Jack had been thinking about suing him. It was the guy’s fault, sure, but the poor old bloke was under a lot of pressure; truckies had impossible deadlines, crossing from one side of the country to the other to meet them on no sleep, of course they took amphetamines. He said as much to Jack.
“You almost fucking died!” Jack exploded in response.
Sean’s mouth fell open. In all the years Sean had known Jack, the angriest he’d ever seen him was when he’d had him pinned against the lockers after the preliminary final. Aside from that, he’d taken Sean’s wrath with slumped shoulders, downcast eyes, and long-suffering sighing, with the exception of his few outbursts since they’d been living together. But nothing like this. Now he looked like he was about to punch the wall, chest heaving, eyes wild, his face red and furious.
Sean watched him take a deep breath. “I was going to,” Jack said quieter now. “I hired a lawyer, but she said I’d be spending a lot of money to get nothing in return. I could take on the company the guy worked for, but she said it’d be a long shot because they deferred all liability to the driver. It was a criminal case, they’d been absolved or some shit.”
“You did fuckin’ what now?” Sean asked, too disbelieving to muster up anger.
“I didn’t end up doing anything,” Jack replied, defeated.
“But you were going to, Jesus,” Sean said and rubbed his forehead. Jack was a lunatic. And this was a lot of commitment for fuck buddies.
“Of course I was, if I could’ve,” Jack replied softly. He sat down next to Sean, gripped his knee. “Just, promise me something.”
Sean looked at him. Jack was looking at his hand on Sean’s knee. Up close, Sean could smell the soap and shampoo of the training facility on his skin, the hint of deodorant he wore; it wasn’t the sport kind most of the guys wore, it was sharper and softer all at once. It smelled expensive and Jack always wore it lightly so you could still smell the hint of his sweat.
“I can’t promise anythin’ until I know what it is,” Sean said, because he wasn’t going to get trapped by some demented demand to drag the league through the courts—he wouldn’t put it past Jack based on this latest revelation.
Jack nodded, blonde hair falling in his face, his stubble glinting in the sunshine as he clenched his jaw.
“Promise you won’t just shoot through without talking to me if,” he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing, the stretch of his throat prickly-looking with the hair coming through. “If they don’t let you play.”
“I reckon I’d need to pack up my shit, so it’s not like I could leave without you noticing,” Sean said.
“Don’t joke about it,” Jack squeezed his knee.
Sean placed his palm over Jack’s, slid their fingers together. “Alright,” he said, eyes on their hands. “Reckon I couldn’t just leave Lola like that anyway.”
Jack laughed, a brittle sound, and when Sean looked up, Jack was already watching him, a fond yet apologetic smile on his face. “She’d go with you.”
Sean frowned. “I’m not takin’ your dog.”
Jack tilted his head to the side, smile turning more fond, his eyes boring into Sean’s.
“She’s my dog,” Sean said.
“Yeah, Sean,” Jack said, his smile soft. “She’s yours.”
“Then why did you…”
“I dunno why I made you believe a lotta shit,” he replied and took his hand back as he stood. “I guess I didn’t want to see your face when you didn’t believe me. It’s a weak excuse,” he turned back and smiled apologetically, “but it’s all I got.”
Sean nodded, head brimming with questions, but not a single one vied for position more strongly than the obvious: are we together? And now he was scared of the answer too. Because if Jack didn’t want to tell him then that meant Jack didn’t think Sean would believe him. And maybe he wouldn’t have when he woke up, but now he would. And if anything could make Sean stay, it would be that. Jack must know that. So why wouldn’t he say it?
26
It’d been Sean who’dstarted texting Jack again. Another fact of their past Jack hadn’t told him. It was the week after they’d lost the preliminary final, the end of their first season as teammates, though Jack had felt less animosity from their opposition than his supposed teammate. Jack had posted a workout video on his socials—he wasn’t Finn, he didn’t know how to give the camera the shy yet knowing smiles, the look from under his lashes, the thirst traps that meant Finn’s social media numbers weren’t just down to his ridiculous abs. But Jack did try and put some helpful content out there for fellow footy players and younger guys. And women; he had a lot of female followers—there were as many good female athletes out there as men—he followed a lot of them himself, knew a lot of them. He usually posted training tips, nutrition tips. It’d only been up for an hour or so when his phone buzzed.
