“So, you can work off some of that stress.” He scruffs his hand through my hair.
I force a laugh, shoving him off me as our meals are delivered, and the spotlight shifts away from me to our game tomorrow. BHU has a new goalkeeper who is supposed to be unbelievable, but with the way we’ve been playing, I’m not worried.
After we eat, we take the internal exit from the café into the warehouse and find ourselves in the entrance to the smashroom. Apparently, the entire warehouse has been sectioned off into different rooms that you can rent out.
“You realise Coach Johnson’s going to string us up by our balls if we hurt ourselves,” I mutter to Everett as we watch the safety video.
He just grins.
I hate to admit it, and I’ll vehemently deny it until my dying breath rather than give my smartarse housemate the satisfaction, but I have a good time. There’s something almost therapeutic about smashing the ever-loving shit out of things that don’t belong to you.
Of course, the four of us are competitive, so it doesn’t take long for it to turn into an unspoken, testosterone-fuelled contest. There are no rules, but we don’t need them. The goal is to destroy in the most impressive way.
Ritter picks up a ceramic plate and tosses it in the air.
Everett swings his bat and connects, grinning like a buffoon when it shatters.
“Home run, baby!” he whoops, pumping a fist.
Zac snorts from behind his face shield. “That’s child’s play.”
He lines up a microwave that’s seen better days—its door already half hanging off—tilting his head as if he’s calculating the best angle. Just as he’s about to swing his crowbar, Ritter beats him to it, roaring as he brings his sledgehammer down, twisting the metal frame.
“I was lining that up, arsehole,” Zac snaps.
Ritter shrugs, not caring in the slightest. “You snooze, you lose.”
I laugh, the sound surprising me as much as it doesEverett, who shoots me a look like he’s just spotted a unicorn shitting rainbows.
“Did we break Blake?” he says. “Is he”—he exaggerates a gasp—“having fun?”
“Shut up,” I say, hefting my bat and swinging it at a television screen. The resulting crack is satisfying as the glass spiderwebs. The vibration of the hit travels straight up my arms, a feeling of exhilaration blooming in my chest.
Oh, yeah.
I get the appeal now.
“Holy shit,” I mutter, resetting my stance. This time, I swing harder, and the screen caves in with a crunch.
“Look out, boys,” Zac taunts with a smirk. “He’s come out to play.”
Everett grins. “About bloody time. Dude’s been walking around like a wound-up grandfather clock for months.”
I narrow my eyes at the familiar crack about my age. “Keep talking, Mathers,” I warn, though there’s no heat in my words. “I’ll be imaging your head for the next one.”
His grin only widens. “Promises, promises.”
The rest of the session is chaos. Beautiful, cathartic chaos.
Tension bleeds out of my shoulders with every smash and shatter. My muscles ache. Not in a bad way, but I will need a date with my foam roller later. I egg the guys on, taunting and joking around with my mates for the first time in months as a cacophony of noise fills the space—glass breaking, metal buckling, our laughter echoing off the walls.
“Feel better?” Zac asks, nudging me with his shoulderas we watch Ritter and Everett go to town on an old office printer like it’s personally offended them.
“Yeah,” I say without thinking, and to my surprise, it’s true. I do feel better.
This was exactly what I needed. Four idiots wrecking junk and laughing like hyenas.
A total reset.
