“Oh, Daze.” I hold my arms open, and she slots herself between them. “We’ll figure this out, I promise.”
26
Thursday 17th April 2025
Mathias
“When it’s Father’s Day, in June, you need to make your dad breakfast,” I tell Daisy after training. I’m sitting on one of the squishy leather bar stools, cradling the dregs of my cider.
It’s just gone six, and Owen is rushing around the pub like a fly trapped in a window, collecting glasses and taking food orders. Daisy stands behind the bar. Her hair is down today, and she’s wearing a tiny black vest top and an even tinier black skirt.
“What? Why? That’s such a weird thing to say.” She looks at me like I’ve grown anextra head.
“Because he’s your dad, and you love him, and this morning when I made him breakfast he almost cried. He said nobody’s made him breakfast in five years.”
She opens her mouth, no doubt ready with a snappy retort, but slams it shut again. “Oh. Okay, I can do that.” She busies herself behind the bar for a few moments, cutting limes and scooping and unscooping ice. I don’t think she even realises what she’s doing. “Another cider?”
“Sure,” I say. “Catesby, please. It’s the only thing in this pub that doesn’t taste like windscreen wash.”
Daisy laughs. A minute later, she plonks down a glass of golden liquid. “It’s not on the house, though. I know last time it was, but we can’t afford to feed and water a man your size any more.”
That’s not what Owen told me earlier via text, but I choose not to point it out.We. She said we.Wecan’t afford to feed you. Like it’s her pub as well as her dad’s, or that his financial problems are hers to bear too.
“So, you admit that Dad stayed the night with you? Since you made him breakfast. What happened? It’ll be less gross coming from you.”
I don’t answer her question. “Why are you all dressed up, anyway? Are you going out with Lando?”
“No, Lando’s coming here tonight. He says he wants to do the pub quiz, but I’m pretty sure he just wants to ogle the hottest new gay in town. And I’m going out. I have a date with this criminally hot top.”
“Congratulations,” I say.
She beams at me. “Do I look cute?”
“You look like Wednesday Addams in her slut phase.”
Daisy pokes her tongue out and flips her hair over her shoulder. “Nailed it, then. Do you have training tomorrow?”
I swallow down my mouthful of cider and shake my head. “Bank holiday, and thankfully we don’t have a match on Sunday like a lot of teams. But I am driving to Wales in the morning for the weekend, so probably best if I don’t drink too much.”
Our next game isn’t until the twenty-sixth. I’ll be playing in the number ten shirt, or so Coach Eksteen tells me. Bad luck, Harry. Though it’s a little difficult to feel sorry for a guy who projects his own poor performance onto other people. Honestly, not my fault he can’t kick for shit.
“Aw cute. To see the fam?” Why does it sound so patronising when she says it like that?
“Yep. Mama Jones, Papa Jones, Nan, Gramps, my sister, aunts, uncles. And I get to see my dog.”
“Brian!” she says.
“Close. Brain. How do you know about my dog?”
“I’m a super sleuth,” she says, offers no further explanation. “What the fuck kind of dog name is Brain?”
“You know, like Brain fromInspector Gadget? That’s the name of Inspector Gadget’s dog,” I say.
Daisy frowns at me, and at the same time somehow lifts a single brow. In all honesty,Inspector Gadgetis even before my time, so it’s no wonder the eighteen-year-old hasn’t heard of the show.
I miss Brain, so much. He’s ten years old and is the stupidest, dopiest, most idiotic dog to have ever graced the planet. He still lives with my parents because as soon as I went pro, I started travelling too often, and was out of the house for hours and hours at a time. It wasn’t fair on the poor butthead. And now, of course, Mam has grown too fond of him to let him move to Wiltshire with me, and I’m pretty sure Brain would put up a fight if I forced him to leave the T-bones Mam cooks, or the custard creams Dad sneaks him under the table.
But I don’t want to talk about my dog. I hadn’t planned on unpacking any of those feelings today, so I keep them locked up.
