Chapter 20

20

HAYDEN

I don’t know what I expect him to say. I don’t hang around to find out. I grab his portfolio from his shoulder and march with it towards the car park until he shouts, “That’s really why you avoid your family?”

I halt as abruptly as I set off.

“What?”

He catches up with me, flushed like when we last shared a pillow, which was only hours ago. He’s still as gorgeous. Still as full of questions. Still wanting to know everything about me.

“I asked if that’s why you don’t see your family? Your mum said you were avoiding them.” Fuck knows what he sees flicker across my face. “Sorry,” he says quickly. “Your stepmum, I mean. Kirsty?”

I nod, unable to voice how him calling her Mum isn’t why I’ve faltered, or how I’ve actually stayed away from home for a whole other reason. One that didn’t matter between me and him as long as this was short term. What stops me dead is how, after weeks of me translating for him, he’s now trying to translate me as if he has every intention of staying around for longer, all while a horn beeps and he should hurry.

He doesn’t.

He also doesn’t phrase this as a question. “You’re not a user.”

I shake my head. I’m not.

“But you were and that’s why you missed your shot. Not because of a concussion.” He squints. “Is a test you failed ten years ago really why you keep your distance from them?”

No.

That isn’t my reason, but he asks another question which is easier to answer. “What did you use?”

“Tramadol.”

“Anything else?”

I shake my head, but then I have to nod. “Yeah. I took something else. Once.”

“When?”

“Right before my big chance. Second biggest regret of my life.”

He swallows. “Where did you get it?” He comes to his own quick conclusion. “At the academy. The one that scouted you? Fuckers.”

After the talk I just witnessed, I didn’t expect this reaction. I don’t expect his hand to reach out for mine, either. I’m too slow to dodge it. Too slow as well to look away from what crosses his face.

Protectiveness.

It’s such a familiar expression. One I’ve seen recently.

In all those drawings Sol showed me.

Of me.

Him wearing the same now feels like another mirror held up right where I can’t avoid it. I just wish that fucking horn would stop its beeping so I could tell him I’m no hero or anyone’s giant.

Right now?

I’ve never felt smaller.

I can’t help meeting eyes that lock with mine as easily now as before I told him what ended my first shot for me. Now Rae’s tone lowers the same way as when he consoled Noah or supported Teo. “Hayden, exactly how much of my talk did you hear?”

I blink.

“How much of it?” More than enough to hear him say no future , and to guess that my bright idea of meds to make his life easier might be the opposite of what he’d ever choose to swallow. I only skimmed a few websites but I’m pretty sure the amphetamines they mentioned are longhand for speed like his mother needed bumps of. And that she sent him out to score for her.

Suggest using anything like that to him?

I’d be as bad as a team doctor for only focussing on the end result instead of on the player’s welfare, so I settle for telling him this. “I heard your recap.” Which is why hustling him towards his ride is a better option than him taking advice from someone who didn’t even know he was addicted until his own supply stopped.

Rae digs his heels in like he isn’t done asking questions until another volley of honks rings out. Then he does let me hustle him, but he doesn’t release my hand while we hurry.

He holds fast all the way through the woods and past the chapel, his grip tightening the minute we get to the car park where a minibus waits. Sol is behind the steering wheel and he looks apologetic, but I get it. What I don’t expect is for Rae to bellow, “Give me one more minute,” before yanking me through another willow curtain.

This one offers little camouflage now that most of its leaves have fallen. Anyone walking past would see him finally let go of my hand to clasp my face. They would also witness him pull me closer. Our foreheads connect like we’ve got all the time in the world for explanations.

We don’t.

He must know so. He sidesteps so the tree trunk blocks any view of us, and his kiss is the same surprise as the first time we ever did this. That was on the eve of a wedding. Now he makes a vow I’m certain he’ll break the minute he has time to think.

“We aren’t done talking. You didn’t hear my whole story.”

“I heard plenty.” My reminder is so, so gritty. “And we already said goodbye.”

Drawing a line here is for the best.

I know it.

I still make myself a liar by reaching for his face with fingers affected by emotion. “I told you I wasn’t a long-term prospect.”

This should be a full stop.

All I know is that Rae studies my face, and fuck knows what he sees. His eyes don’t dance as he repeats, “I’ve still got more to tell you.” He follows it with a quieter order, “Go the fuck home, Hayden. They really miss you.” He can’t know he next echoes Dad when he was too sick to come to matches. A chart used to spell this out for me. Now it’s Rae who says, “If you do go, let me know you got there safely, yeah?”

Then he’s gone.

Sol hits the horn again as the minibus leaves, this time tooting goodbye. I hear Sol’s final volley in time with what he told me.

Miles don’t have to matter.

Right now, with the minibus only halfway down the driveway, I already hate this distance.

Maybe that’s why I cut another distance in half later in my Land Rover. Then I slice it into quarters by battling Friday traffic. Fraction by fraction, I leave Cornwall behind and close in on another confession I’ll have to make when I reach my destination.

I can’t keep hiding from Kirsty.

I do stop on the way for diesel, where I catch myself scanning pasties in a service station chiller. Every single one of them is wrapped in plastic, and I’ve never been more tempted to get in my vehicle to head back to Marc and Stefan’s. I could be at their kitchen table right now eating the real deal while they take the piss out of me.

Not for eating my body weight in home baking.

For falling so hard for Rae that I can’t stop wanting to be the giant he drew so often. A king. His hero.

Only Stefan and Marc wouldn’t take the piss if they knew that. They’d set up an arch for me in celebration. Prick their fingers on gorse blossom and be so happy for me if I told them.

Instead, I get back in my vehicle with a coffee and send a text to our group chat.

Hayden: Definitely can’t work this weekend .

I sit in the service station and swallow bitter caffeine as traffic roars past, and I calculate how long it’s been since I started making excuses not to make this journey.

Nearly a year.

Fuck, that’s almost a twelfth of the girls’ lives.

The months have slipped by so fast while I’ve been locked in a whole other landslide. One of Rae’s questions is another boulder I can’t hold back for any longer.

Is a test you failed ten years ago really why you keep your distance from them?

No.

No, it isn’t.

My phone pings, my drink tasting less bitter as I read replies reminding me of a mentor’s advice.

Marc: Good.

Stefan: Because you can’t keep drawing water from an empty well, mate.

Marc: Take off as much time as you need to refill it with your family.

Family is what I need now. I still hesitate when I pull up outside a bright pink front door.

The engine ticks as I hesitate some more while imagining Rae beside me. He’d already be at the door if he were here instead of London. He’d ring that bell first before thinking about the consequences of waking up a trio who need sleep more than they need to see their big brother with the jitters.

That’s what strikes as soon as I get out of the Land Rover to face music I can’t put off any longer.

I hesitate again, a trembling finger raised for the bell because there will be no going back if I show Kirsty why working until I’ve got no fuel left in my tank has seemed my only option. And why short-term distractions are all I’ve let myself have or had the spare headspace to offer to another person.

Until Rae.

A light clicks on inside, glowing like a hot coal of distress does inside my chest—distress that must be a beacon for this woman who wiped my teenage tears and told me we’d survive even if Dad didn’t. That we’d go on as a family unit, no need for blood between us. It didn’t matter if she wasn’t my mother by birth. She’d promised to always be a shoulder to lean on, for better or for worse, and yeah, I’ve always called my stepmum Kirsty.

I can’t tonight.

“Mum?”

I hold out both hands and don’t try to hide their shaking.

There’s no point.

We’ve walked a journey that started with these symptoms once already.

Shaking hands are no excuse for almost falling over in the hallway. I trip over suitcases no doubt holding clothes I could have built a wardrobe for already if I hadn’t wanted to stave off this moment.

For her.

I can’t now, or five minutes later in the kitchen when I take the mug she offers across a table cluttered with proof that a flock of Swifties lives here. She moves a pink boa out of the way, feathers shifting in the breeze as she also moves paperwork out of my way—forms I recognise from years of her filling out the same applications for me.

“You’re signing the girls up for soccer camp?”

“Only Isla,” she says. She also immediately cuts off my usual worry. “And don’t you go thinking that’s because I can’t afford to pay for three sets of subs or for three new kits. I keep telling you there’s no need. I just mean that she’s the only one who inherited that gene from your father.” She quickly adds, “For football.”

This comes out so fast it’s an unexpected reminder of Rae, but then she always was a mile-a-minute, like him. She is again now.

“And stop trying to change the subject.” Her hand shakes almost as badly as mine now that I’ve given up hiding them in my pocket or from her. “Hayden, how long have you been worried about PSP?”

I take a sip, surprised by the sweetness of this hot chocolate instead of the tea or coffee I’d expected. It’s a reminder of gulping down similar sugar-filled fuel on wintry touchlines. Of her breath clouding around the words, “Have fun!” before I ran onto the pitches back when football was fun for me. Maybe that’s why this slips out, although this confession doesn’t relate to any of my tremors. “I wanted to tell you. About the Tramadol.”

Her hand finds mine across the table, and that’s a second time today when someone hasn’t backed away from what got this whole shame-filled ball rolling for me. “You need to talk about that first?”

I shake my head. Then I nod.

She takes a sip of her own drink. There are more laugh lines around her eyes these days. Fuck knows how. They crinkle even deeper as she says, “Just as long as you know we are talking about this.” Her hold tightens, squeezing until my hand stills, and that’s better. I can keep going just as long as she doesn’t let go, like Rae didn’t let go of me either under a willow almost stripped bare of its leaves.

This leaves me bare too. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. I don’t know why.” I focus on the table between us. It’s scored with marks. With evidence of years of us sharing it as a team of three before a trio of baby Novacs joined us. “I’m sorry for not explaining.”

“You didn’t have to.” She sets down her mug to free up a second hand for me. “Neither apologise nor explain, Hayden. None of it was down to you. If I’d been more on the ball, I would have been there for you so much sooner.”

She’s told me that before, and I know it. I do. It’s why I’ve been able to take a second shot at building a life. How I learned to hold my head up despite everything.

Until lately.

“I meant I’m sorry for not explaining why I kept putting off coming home. Wouldn’t surprise me if you thought I was using something again and trying to hide it from you. I’m not. I wouldn’t.”

“Of course you wouldn’t. Because your Tramadol use was only ever situational, wasn’t it?”

I nod. I know that as well. Have known it for years and put it all behind me to work on building a future for all five of us. Now that I sit here in the house that was only ever meant to be temporary, missing a second shot to do so is a reminder. Perhaps it’s why feelings I’ve sidelined for ten years keep bubbling up so often lately. “If I do have PSP?—”

“You don’t.” Her hold could give Rae’s a run for its tight money. She’s as emphatic now as he was about us not being done talking. She isn’t done yet either. “You absolutely don’t, Hayden. Neither do the girls. None of you share those genetic markers.” She squeezes again until I look up. “Spit it out.”

“What if they were wrong?”

My throat is full of brambles. I swallow, but they still snag on this.

“Those tests, I mean. What if they were all wrong, or I got someone else’s results? It could be an admin mix-up. And what if the science has moved on? Or what if I’ve got something like it, because this came out of nowhere, Mum, and it can’t have, can it? People don’t shake for no reason.”

Her hand clenches around mine. “First thing tomorrow, I’ll dig out all the test results.” This bulldozer wrapped in a feather boa keeps going. “And then I’ll get back in touch with your dad’s team.” She means the medics who ran batteries of tests on me and the girls when I was a teen and they were babies. The squad who did their best to play defence for him until they couldn’t, which is an odd time to picture Mitch and Justin.

It’s also a reminder of what else I’ve brought with me.

I itch to fetch that scrapbook full of photos of the man she next mentions.

“Dad’s experts will explain until you believe them, Hayden. Or we’ll get them to repeat the testing if that’s what you need. And then we’ll get any other tests you need to get to the bottom of whatever this is.”

If her hold gets any tighter, I’ll lose all the feeling in my fingers.

Right now, I hope she never stops, even when she couples it with a question I’ve been fending off for almost a year now. She touches one of the miniature sunflowers I sent her. “What did Dad always say about these?”

My throat is too thick to answer.

She does it for me. “They search for the sun, then face it. And if a cloud covers the sun and they can’t find it?”

I croak this. “They turn to each other.” Like they did in that picture Rae drew of our old garden.

My voice takes a turn at shaking, and I don’t try to hide it. “Mum, let me go grab something quickly?”

I head outside. It is colder this far upcountry. My breath clouds when I’m back in the Land Rover where I can grab a scrapbook I didn’t know existed and now feels like a gift. Yes, there’s pain between these pages. There’s also love—so much of it, and for a first time, I’m glad of the reminder that real teams always pull together.

My breath also clouds my phone screen.

I type regardless and hope Rae gets this message.

Hayden: I did go home.

I follow it with another message.

Hayden: Made it here safe and sound.

A third message is harder to type. Not for trembling reasons, but because of how true this feels .

Hayden: Wish you were here with me.

And if my hands quit shaking anytime soon?

I might even find the guts to send it.