“It’s utter fucking chaos in there. No one told me a wedding involvedthat!” He gestured to the house. “We need to escape. Somewhere.”
He looked at my feet and back up again. “Are those your sweats?”
“Possibly not. These yours, Shay?” I looked over at Shay.
“They look like mine.” He squinted, no glasses on yet and hopefully not wearing his contacts.
“They’re a bit tight actually. Round the thigh and groin area.” I looked at Shay and got ready to dodge anything he might throw.
“I must’ve shrunk them in the wash then.”
Max shook his head. “You should both still be in nursery school.”
I leaned against the wall – no way was I sitting next to Shay while he was wrapped in just a blanket that would now need decontaminating – and looked at my brother. He was stressed, worried and not in control, three things that could lead to an automatic blow up of epic proportions.
“What do you want to do this morning? Because at some point you’re going to need to get ready and all that shit. Sort your pocket hanky out and cummerbund, whatever it is.” I knew we had to keep him sober, just allow maybe two fingers of whisky for his nerves before he went into the church, and we also needed to keep him active, else he’d start to stress.
“Something where I can lose a few pounds of Christmas dinner.”
I looked at Shay. Shay squinted back, then nodded.
Forty minutes later we had everyone rounded up at the indoor rugby pitch we’d used a few days ago, two text messages from Shay knocking the deal out of the park. Somehow, we’d managed to get all of us together. One of Mum’s friends from the village, who I remembered babysitting me when I was about five, had turned up to help with Teddy and Eliza and give Katie a lift with her three. We also rounded up a school friend of Jackson’s. This meant we had a full complement of brothers, cousin and future in-laws for a game of five-a-side, as-little-contact-as-possible rugby as we were released on pain of death of getting any marks, bruises or cuts that would be seen in photographs.
It was pretty inevitable that someone was going to get a shiner, we just needed to make sure it wasn’t Max.
“How are we doing this?” Max looked round at our group.
“Warm up – properly because I don’t fancy accident and emergency – then I vote we split off in age: wisdom versus stupidity.” Killian rubbed his hands together.
I smothered my groan and looked at Shay; he was wearing the same sort of misery I was. When we trained, it was either Killian or Eli who coached. Eli was more technical, Killian was a barbarian, mainly because he’d been in the marines with Nick, and they’d turned him into a machine.
His fitness sessions were the worst idea of a PE lesson: shuttle runs, burpees, fast circuits that didn’t give you time to breathe with intermittent sets of press ups. It was a form of torture. Shay had only been at one, but I could tell he was already envisaging the vomit that he’d be yakking up.
“We’ll start with butt kicks.”
I caught Shay’s look of pain.
Max, however, looked far more relaxed than I’d seen him since he’d crashed the cabin early this morning, so I decided it was going to be worth it. And I might even find a second ab under the mince pies.
Forty minutes later, I figured we’d walked into the ninth circle of hell and the devil was named Killian O’Hara.
“How the fuck does he do all this and talk?” I was doubled over, trying to get some blood back into my head and clutching my shins for stability.
Owen laughed. He wasn’t struggling at all.
“Have you been doing extra training or something?”
“A bit more fitness and less weights. That’s why you’re struggling. You’ve put muscle on and weight, but you haven’t added to your cardio so your endurance is shit.” He clapped me on the back. “You going to survive the game?”
I managed to lift my head. “I’m sure Victoria won’t miss me if I die before the wedding.”
He clapped my back a bit harder. “We’ll make sure you get a good send off.”
We were divided into age: me, Shay, Owen, Callum and Jackson – a bit of a spread of ages – versus Nick, Max, Kilian, Eli and Tommy - Jackson’s friend from school, who was just a few days older than Jacks. While my team should’ve had the advantage of youth, I already knew there was no way we’d beat any side with Killian and Nick on it. Eli was faster than any of us and the two O’Hara brothers were just too quick and read what we were about to do far too well.
We got hammered. Jackson was not happy.
“Who’s hitting the weight room?” Killian’s voice rang out like a sadistic PE teacher.
