“Relax, I’m not into dudes. Or girls for that matter,” Molly says, but I don’t think any of them are even slightly bothered she’s in there. She draws in closeso she, Mathias, and I are in a huddle. “Somebody has posted pictures of you two online.”
“What? What do you mean? What kind of pictures?” Mathias grabs Molly’s phone before she can hand it over. His mouth drops open as he stares down. “Oh . . . fuck.” He pivots the screen so I can see.
It’s an Instagram carousel . . . I think that’s the right word. The top photo shows Mathias and me in the pub. We’re standing in front of the bar, our backs facing the camera. My arm is looped around Mathias’s waist and my hand rests on his hip. No, not rests, squeezes. I’m squeezing his flesh. He’s looking away, but I’m staring at him and there is nothing but unadulterated love in my eyes.
My first thought is,“Okay, now I don’t need to tell Mathias how much I love him. He can see it for himself.”My second thought is,“Holy crap, everyone else knows too.”
The caption below the photo reads:Find someone who looks at you the way Owen Bosley looks at Mathias Jones.
The rest of the pictures have been snapped from the same angle and feature some of me smiling, and there’s one of Mathias’s hand cupping my jaw. I don’t recognise the account name.
“Who posted them?” I ask Molly.
She shrugs. “Some tourists, I think.” She takes her phone back and opens a different thread. “There’s more.”
It’s a single photo, thankfully not an entire ream of them, and shows the interior hallways of Bath’s stadium. At first glance, it looks as though Mathias and I are chatting, but someone has very helpfully applied this little zoomy magnifying glass thing over our hands and you can see our fingers are threaded together. I feel my blood pressure rising because okay, we could have been a lot more careful, but this is from the staff only area of the building.
“And then there’s this one,” she says, bringing up something else.
Not a photo, but a TikTok video. A bold-lettered caption reads:#Bones! New evidence Bosley and Jones are a couple.
A young man with bleached white hair is superimposed over a picture of Mathias and me. It’s the same one from the Bath grounds. He raises aneyebrow while the cutout of him sort of floats about on the screen. Then the background changes to the photo in the pub with Mathias’s hand on my face, and the guyhmms.Then it transitions to a new picture and the annoying fucker gasps and slaps a palm over his mouth.
It shows us in the carpark of the club grounds, and had to have been taken this morning because Mathias has his Picnic Eggs shorts balled up in one fist.
“Tom’s livid,”Mathias had said, holding up the offending item.“It literally says picnic eggs right over our asses.”
“Okay, but why are your picnic eggs the most adorable thing ever?”I’d replied. We were alone, or at least I’d thought we were alone. It was even before the mobile bleacher guy had turned up.
“I’d love to put my picnic eggs in your mouth,”Mathias said, or tried to say, but he’d been laughing too much to get the words out.
It was in that moment I’d grabbed him by the collar, pulled him towards me, and kissed him. And it also seemed to be that moment someone hiding in the locker room snapped a photo of us.
“Fuck,” I say.
I don’t want anything to jeopardize the fundraiser game, everyone’s spent so long organising it and people have come from far and wide to watch, but right now all I care about is Mathias.
He’s quiet. It’s not unusual for him, but this feels like a bad quiet. Ominous. A zoning out because his emotions are overwhelming him kind of quiet.
Eventually he lifts his head and looks at me.
“I’m sorry,” I say, though I know it’s neither of our faults. I’m more worried about Mathias than the situation. He hates not being in control of the narrative, and this is one of the worst what-ifs to have happened.
During his endless hours of risk assessment, I wonder if this scenario ever presented itself.
“Owen?” Mathias side-eyes Molly, like he wants to say something but doesn’t want to say it in front of her.
“Molly, could you give us a minute?” I ask.
I have no idea what to do—how to proceed, or smooth this out, or even what to say next—but I need a few moments alone with Mathias. I need to feel the solid warmth of his body under my palms. Remind myself he’s real. This is real. It’s not some sweaty, cheese-induced fever dream.
And I need to hold onto him because . . . I’m terrified he might run.
“Sure.” Molly turns to leave.
“No, wait, Molly,” Mathias says, and she stops in her tracks.
Mathias looks at me. His expression is unreadable, or at least it would be to an outsider, but I know him well enough to place the panic, and sadness, and sheer desperation in those impassive brown eyes.
