‘You’ll lose interest once the novelty wears off.’
‘I don’t think I will,’ I say. ‘I’ve been watching AFL games all season. I’m eighth in my work footy-tipping comp.’
‘So what? You want a medal? Anyone can do footy tipping. Even kids.’
My chest deflates; my shoulders hunch.
‘Is this because of that guy you were seeing?’ Sabrina asks.
‘He co-founded the footy club,’ I admit. Sabrina frowns, but she holds her tongue. ‘It’s good exercise,’ I add to my parents. ‘Will help me lose some weight. Thought you’d be glad I started playing sports finally.’
‘Too little, too late,’ Dad sighs. ‘This mattered at primary school. Would’ve made you more popular then. Nobody cares if you play football now.’
My mother clicks her tongue. ‘I think you should stop being silly. You’re sensitive and you’ll get injured. You’re good with books. Sports isn’t you.’
I see Sabrina glance at my mother, and with horror, realise they finally have one thing in common. That may be even worse than them being at loggerheads.
I’m saved from the footy talk by my mother grilling me about finding a job, so I redirect the conversation with lies about how great things are at the call centre.
Which is ironic, because I would get ten out of ten for this visit if Carol had recorded it as a work phone call. I never let my frustrations show, I de-escalated conflict by evading it, and my customers were kept happy at all times. I handled myself magnificently.
When my parents leave, I mumble about needing to go to the shops so I can leave at the same time and avoid being alone with Sabrina.
‘Zeke, we are overdue for a chat about – that stuff,’ Sabrina says vaguely, noticing my mother peering at us like a hawk. ‘Can we chat about that … soon?’
A skilled Soviet spy she isn’t.
‘Yeah, definitely,’ I concur, then scramble out of the house with my parents as my human shield.
Dad shakes my hand and heads for the driver’s door, but my mother’s onto it.
‘What was that about?’ she launches as soon as we’re in the driveway. ‘What was Sabrina trying to say that she didn’t want me to know?’
I think on my feet. ‘She doesn’t want me to move out into your investment property,’ I suggest. ‘I think she’ll miss me.’
Not bad. That might give me an excuse to not move into my parents’ new place.
My mothers grins. ‘Aw, darling. That’s easily solved: you can ask her to move into our place with you! Best of both worlds.’
I give a higher-pitched laugh than usual to pass off her suggestion as the best, instead of the worst, of both worlds.
When I park outside Curtis’s house, I get a text message from Robbie:Dad reckons you tried to play footy? Send videos mate, that’ll be the funniest shit I’ve ever seen.
That night is my third training session with Perth Centurions. Before we start, Jack confirms the details for our upcoming footytrip to Lancelin. It’s a team-building trip where we’ll do our usual training but also bond as a club. Jack confirms a big holiday house is booked and he and Brick will sort food. It will cost about two hundred bucks each. Although I’m unemployed and homeless and can’t afford it, I say yes. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.
We get into training. Brick shows me how to form a love-heart shape with my hands over the footy and how to step into the kick so I put more power in my kicking leg. Jack shows me how to mark in front of my chest, instead of my current haphazard grabs into space over my head. Fergus tells me to stop saying ‘Sorry’ every time I do a shit kick. He says everyone shanks kicks and saying sorry every time makes me a whiny sook.
My first kick after that is terrible, dribbling along the ground. It’s a massive effort to not say sorry, but I ride out the awkwardness. Nothing bad happens. Fergus scrambles, picks the footy up, kicks it to Rogan, and the drill goes on. Nobody cares. Shit happens.
At the end of the goal-kicking drill, I take a few steps, the way Brick taught me, throw the power of my leg into the kick and drop the footy onto my boot.
I kick a goal.
Sure, it’s from a plastic cone fifteen metres directly in front of the posts. But it’s the first time I’ve ever done it, and the elation is next level. I pump my fist and Brick calls out, ‘Good improvement, Zeke! You’re getting it.’
When I get home from training, Ahmed’s cooking something that smells incredible.
‘Take your dirty footy boots off!’ he squawks. ‘Don’t track mud all over my floorboards or you can mop it up yourself!’
