Page 61 of Just for Me
“Yeh,” she said. “He’s seven. He wanted to know if gay people can play rugby, and I could say, ‘Well, of course they can. There’s our skipper doing it. That’s why you’re asking, isn’t it?’ And he said, ‘I guess so.’ That’s going to mean a lot to kids. Especially teenagers.”
“I see that,” Hayden said. “Not sure Luke ever wanted to be a poster boy for anything, though. He hasn’t been enjoying this.”
“Somebody had to be first, I guess,” Madelyn said. “Sorry if it’s been dread. It’ll be worse tonight, fair warning.”
“What do you mean?” Hayden asked.
“Watch,” she said, “and you’ll see. Never mind. He’s tough, and they’re all used to copping it over something, especially when Scotland plays the Auld Enemy. He can take it.”
Easy for you to say,Hayden thought and didn’t say.We’re tired of taking it. And why should we have to?
* * *
Luke had runout of a thousand tunnels in his career. He’d run out at the head of his team dozens of times, too. He knew about hostile crowds and hostile stadiums.
It had never been like this.
They ran out to a rousing hail of boos, as full-throated as 67,000 voices could manage. Which wasn’t unheard-of, but this was worse. He could hear, somehow, some individual words in the midst of that yelling, or he thought he could. He did his best to ignore all of it and lined up facing the stands for the anthem. At the end of the row, because he was the skipper, with Henry’s arm around his shoulders and his arm around Henry’s waist, since Henry was the next-most-senior player on the squad. If Henry wasn’t comfortable with it, he didn’t say anything.
The crowd did. “God Save the King” began to play, and the boos increased, drowning out the music. And then came the hail of drink cups. Murrayfield was a dry stadium, so beer wasn’t the reason. It was Luke.
All you had at the end of the day, though, was your refusal to be cowed. If he hadn’t backed down when he was nine and some twelve-year-old was beating him in the toilets, when his nose was bloody and he’d been kicked in the head, he wasn’t backing down now. He didn’t think,I’m putting the team under the pump,because there was no point. The anthems ended, and he jogged to his spot and braced for the kickoff. England were receiving, and that was all that mattered right now.
The ball was in the air, spinning high under the lights. Trevor Martin, the lock, who hadn’t looked Luke in the eye all week, was backpedaling, then backpedaling some more, and Luke was running with him, behind him.
The ball was coming down. Too high, still, even as Trevor ran backward to get it. Misjudged. Luke saw his moment, reached for Trevor’s waist, and lifted him overhead.
He felt Trevor overbalancing, reaching too far, then going arse-over-teakettle, headfirst and backward toward the ground, and Luke stiffened every muscle and held on.
It barely took a second, and he felt every fraction of it. When Trevor’s feet were in the air, and when Luke started pulling him in the other direction. When Luke’s arms came back to vertical and he could see Trevor’s feet again. When he was planting his feet and bringing the big lock’s 105 kG down slowly. Slowly. Not letting him fall.
Trevor’s feet on the ground, the ball in his arms. Trevor hitting the line, and Luke right behind him, adding his weight. The crowd singingFlower of Scotland,willing their team on. Trying to get under Luke’s skin, but he didn’t need to let them.
The earth had shifted on its axis, and he was in the right place again. Doing his role. Anchoring his team. Pressing on.
No moment but this one. No purpose but domination.
He was here, and he was strong. That was enough.
* * *
Hayden was havinga hard time breathing. They weren’t even three minutes into the game, and England was driving, the backs with the ball now, handing it off. Down the field, playing like men possessed. Like it wasn’t the beginning, but the end. Like they had something to prove.
The big screen overhead was showing it, of course. And then switching off to show that lift. How Luke had, somehow, held somebody up whose entire body weight was pulling him backward, and then lifted him overhead again and set him down.
How?
How?
Beside him, Madelyn was saying, “How did he do that? How ever did he do that?”
Hayden finally came up with the answer. “Because he had to.”
Around him, the noise swelled. The crowd was on its feet, the Scots singing and the English singing back.Swing Low, Sweet Chariotbeing drowned out, then rising again.
Scotland finally getting it together, stiffening their line. Repelling the backs, and then repelling them again, until it was the forwards taking their turn, the same way he’d seen it happen before, bashing into the opposition like the most brutal game of Red Rover ever.
Hayden had been rubbish at Red Rover. On purpose. In his opinion, if other kids wanted to brutalize him, he wasn’t going to line up for the chance, and he wasn’t going to dislocate his arms trying to stop them, either.
