“Maybe you need to work on a bit of fitness rather than just lifting weights.” I offered a hand to help him up. He had really bulked up recently, obsessively training sometimes twice a day.
“Fuck you,” he said, brushing himself down. “But you might be right. I’m not as quick as I used to be but I swear I didn’t see you fucking coming till the last second then. You been taking stealth pills or something?”
There was a certain irony to the question. “Lots of practice over the years. I’d get yourself doing some boxing. Not the MMA stuff Max does, some pad work. It’ll get you sharper.”
He nodded, walking to the side of the pitch we hired some Saturdays to practise. There had been a big function on Thursday which meant our usual practice had been postponed, with just a few of the men who made up our rugby team meeting up to use the gym instead.
“Let’s try something different,” Rhys Thomas, who was our captain and also a barrister who Max used, shouted out. “Owen, can you come in from the left instead? Jackson, you need to watch your arm when you do that.” He went through a list of pointers and rearranged a play we were going to try on Sunday and then we started again, only this time I wasn’t trying to floor Seph.”
“Killian!” I shouted for the ball, running down the flank, Max about three paces behind, and I knew he would struggle to keep up as long as the pass was clean. It was and I upped my pace, diving on the line before Callum could cut in to score a try.
“Someone’s had their porridge this morning,” Max said, looking pissed off. He hated the fact he had no chance of catching me, needing to be competitive in every single thing to the extent where he could be completely fucking irritating.
I gave him a wide, shit-eating smile.
“Fucker,” was his response. He folded his arms and stared at me, practice effectively over. I had about an hour and a half to get home, get showered so I didn’t smell of sweat and dirt and other things girls found gross, and meet Ava.
“You look different.” He eyed me suspiciously.
“Why the fuck would you say I looked different? Has Vic taken your man card and given you a vagina instead?”
He shook his head. “You look better. When you were with the happy sucker from Leeds, you had this pained, shackled look.” He tipped his head to one side, a gesture I knew was a Callaghan trait. “You’re getting laid. Maya?”
I shook my head. “Nope. We had our last date yesterday. Not been there and not going there either.”
We started to walk off the field, the clubhouse bar and a beer calling after I’d rid myself of the sweat.
“Why’s that? I thought she was okay.”
I shrugged and shook my head. “Really, really nice girl but all we had in common was that we’re both lawyers and live in London.”
“But you don’t have to talk all the time and she was hardly ugly,” Max said.
“There was no spark. And yeah, we could’ve gone there but it would’ve been shit.”
“You’re not still pining after your ex, are you?” Max looked half concerned and I did think that if I said yes, he’d probably start trying to set me up with someone from the university where he lectured.
“Fuck no.” It was the truth. I was pining after his youngest sister. “She’s well off the scene. I haven’t even thought about her for a couple of weeks maybe.” Which was the truth. Not having to text or phone Andrea or arrange weekend plans around her had been a relief and I’d wondered why I hadn’t ended it myself sooner.
“Fair enough,” Max said. “So what are you up to tonight? Rhys is coming round to ours with Jacks so we can assess his poker skills.”
“I’m seeing a friend this afternoon and I think we’ll make a night of it,” I said, starting to pull off my top which was wringing wet with sweat. Seph had come in with Callum and a couple of the other lads and was talking manically about some gig he was going to and how the singer had passed him a load of tickets. I caught Max’s eye, knowing how irritated he could get with Seph. “Leave him be. He’s doing no harm.”
Max shook his head. “He lives with me. You know what a cock block that it? Me and Vic could’ve christened every room of our house ten times over by now, but we can’t because shit-for-brains decided to move in because he hates living on his own. And when I mention about shifting him onto Callum or Jackson, Vic goes all soft because she actuallylikeshim. I don’t get it.”
I snorted back a laugh. “Don’t you like him?”
Max shook his head. “He’s my little brother. I cleaned his backside when he was a baby so of course I like him. I don’t have any fucking choice. But given that I work with him, I don’t want to live with him too.”
“At least he’s out tonight,” I said, chucking the rest of my clothes in a washbag. “And because it’s Seph you won’t see him till the game tomorrow.”
Max shook his head. “He’ll be home. All this wittering about the singer – when we’ve got a game, he doesn’t drink and I’m pretty sure he enforces a sex ban on himself. Fuck knows why because it won’t improve his game any.” Which was unfair, as Seph was a pretty decent player.
There was a loud cheer from Killian and his brother, Nick, followed by a few swear words from Jackson and the changing rooms and showers grew loud and raucous. I kept quiet, wanting to make sure attention stayed away from me and what I was doing next. Bar crawls weren’t unusual after practice, but they weren’t on my list for the day. Ava was. And I wanted to make the most of her before she decided to move on to the next fun thing.
The priory looked a lot different already from the last time I’d seen it. It had only been Ava’s for a fortnight, but she’d thrown everything she could into it while at the same time managing her her other projects. Scaffolding was up all across the front and one side of the house; the garden had been deforested, not with any style or precision but so the house was visible.
“It looks better already.” Ava’s voice was low and quiet, as if she didn’t want to disturb the peace in this part of London. “There’s even a wall at the back of the house now. The guys have done well. Another month or so and I’ll be able to move in here.”
