We’re still jogging. I bounce the footy, wait for it to spring back up at me predictably, which it does, then palm it off to Sniper. ‘Isn’t it a bit late, now?’ I ask. ‘Water under the bridge?’
‘The water hasn’t even started flowing yet,’ Sniper says, thumping the footy back. ‘Club’s announcing a Pride Guernsey next week. We all gotta wear it. You gotta let ’em know in case someone makes a stink out of your comment, you know?’
I fumble the footy; it spikes off my fingertips and rolls uselessly into the grass. ‘A fucken Pride Guernsey?’ I spit. ‘What, so we all have to wear iton our bodies? That fugly-arse rainbow flag and shit? Are they fucken serious? Forcing us to accept this and put it on ourselves? Is this still men’s footy anymore or not?’
Sniper retrieves the footy. When he draws level with me, he raises an eyebrow like he’s sorta got my back. ‘Look, Hammer, I’ll be honest with ya. For real, I don’t hate anyone,’ he says. ‘I got a gay cousin. I like him. There’s lesbians working in there.’ He jabs his thumb at the clubrooms. ‘I like them. I get the principle of inclusion, making sure footy is for everyone. I also dunno why we need to make a big song and dance about it. I don’t particularly care about the Pride Round or the Guernsey, to be honest. I just wanna play footy.’
‘Then say something!’ I blurt out. ‘We could all band together, and—’
Sniper holds his hand up to interrupt me. He pinches the fabric of his guernsey over his pec, where the Hungry Jack’s logo is. ‘I also prefer Maccas burgers to Hungry Jack’s,’ he goes on, before pinching the ECU logo on the other side, ‘and I’m doing my accounting degree at Curtin, not ECU.’ He gives me a serious look. ‘We’re players. We wear what the club makes us wear. We have the sponsors on our guernsey whether we like them or not. Same as this. Doesn’t mean you agree. Just do what’s right by the club. Be a team player.’
I stare at the Hungry Jack’s logo in horror, imagining it turning into a rainbow burger. ‘Burger preference isn’t the same as sexual preference, though,’ I say. ‘We shouldn’t have this rammed down our throats.’
‘I agree,’ Sniper says. ‘But it’s not my job to fight it. I gotta lead you boys into a game. Winning should be our focus. Having a hissy fit about what we wear is … sorta gay itself, right?’
He says it casually, like I’m meant to laugh with him, but my mind darts to the DM again. It was him, wasn’t it? He’s stirring me up.
Sniper handballs the footy into the air. ‘So you’ll report yourself to the club?’
I shrug. ‘Yeah,’ I say. I’m excellent at lying to myself, so lying to him is a piece of piss. ‘I’ll take care of it.’
After the captain’s run, I drive south to see my brother at his workshop in Canning Vale.
Doug was always a classic car loser. Once he moved to Perth to become a mechanic, he made ‘revhead’ his whole identity. He runs his own business – Hammersmith Automotive Performance Centre – specialising in car mods to make souped-up V8s go even faster and louder. Doug’s found a client base of cashed-up bogans, so he’s broken even as a business, bought a house in Thornlie, and hits the speedway every other weekend to race his Clubsport. When we were teenagers, I used to call him Pizza Face, cos of his acne. The acne went away but left his face scarred and dented, so I don’t insult him anymore. Feels too mean.
Something made me gravitate to him today. I need to vent about the Pride shit. Even if Doug doesn’t have a lot to say, he’ll tinker with a car and listen to me talk.
When I rock up, the front desk chick – a tough old bird named Raelene – congratulates me on a cracking season and takes a selfie with me (her fourth). She’s an Eagles fan. Being famous gets irritating sometimes – like at the pub when some turbo wants to kick off to prove he’s tougher than an AFL player – but meeting fans isn’t usually too hard on the old ego.
When I get into the workshop, Doug’s on his back on the oil-stained concrete, head underneath the engine of a shiny red Falcon with the custom number plate S3ND1T.
‘Yeah, some idiot’s used the wrong glue putting the headers back on,’ Doug’s voice wafts up to his other mechanic, a skinny bloke with a goatee named Mick, who nods at me.
‘You got a visitor, Dougie,’ Mick says.
‘Just me little brother Kade, he can fucken wait,’ Doug replies.
Mick sticks his tongue out at me. I hate being called Kade and Doug knows it.
‘How’d you know it was me?’ I blurt out.
‘Recognised the tune of your engine when you drove in,’ Doug mutters, tinkering with a pipe I can’t see.
‘Shit, impressive,’ I say.
‘I can see your shoes, dipshit,’ Doug adds.
He rolls himself out from under the Falcon, issues instructions to Mick and wipes his hand on a rag so black it makes his fingers dirtier. ‘No footy today, bruz?’
‘Game’s tomorrow,’ I say. I wanna add,As if you don’t already know.
Doug pretends to not follow my career even though he’s an Eagles supporter. Not everyone has a brother who’s an AFL star. Most guys would be stoked, wouldn’t they? Cheering their brother on, coming to games, asking for tickets? Doug only comes to a game twice a season, and always bails early. Bit shit that your brother becomes a big deal and you don’t get around him. Reckon he’s just jealous I got more famous than he’ll ever be.
Doug leads me into the break room and rummages in a drawer for a lighter. Doug’s break room is as festy as herpes. The faded posters of Peter Brock and Daniel Ricciardo are ripped. The sink is always dripping onto a saturated sponge that gets more brown every time I visit. Dog-eared copies ofJust CarsandStreet Machinemagazines are strewn everywhere. The cheap microwaveis splattered with dried curry sauce. The only scungier things in the workshop are the dunnies, and Doug himself.
I dunno what went wrong with my older brother. He’s like the sacrificial sausage you chuck on a barbecue to soak up the grease before the grill is ready for the prime cuts of meat. Or the first pancake of a batch that doesn’t turn out fully cooked. Scars aside, Doug’s face is munted, like his eyes are too far apart and there’s something not fully sharp about him. I’ve never seen him with a chick. I don’t think he’s into dudes, either. He refers to utes as sexy so often I wonder if he cracks a fat looking at cars. If I ever walk in here and he’s humping a Commodore via the exhaust pipe I deadset wouldn’t even be shocked.
Doug finds his lighter. We head out the back to stand in the sun while he smokes. Doug starts our catch-up the same way he always does. ‘How’s tricks, cob?’
