Page 6 of Falling for You
I look down at my notebook. I have Tell’s number, I know I could just call her and ask if I could come round. But I’ve already done that, haven’t I? She made it pretty clear to me in New York that she didn’t want to hear from me, for some unknown reason, even though she was happy to have Stevie stay with her when he was at dance school. Not that Stevie relays it in the same way on the rare occasion that you can get him to talk about it using more words than ‘She’s a dick.’ So I need a new plan of attack.
‘Excuse me?’ I catch the eye of the bartender. ‘Can I have another one?’
He is a portly man, wearing the same blue football shirt as the rest of the crowd, with large, bushy eyebrows which he raises at me, expertly.
‘Sure,’ he says, picking up my glass. ‘Same again?’
I narrow my eyes at the range of ales, each named more whimsically than the last. So far I’ve tried the Hoptimus Prime (surprisingly average), Fursty Ferret (quite nice) and Golden Champion (not for me). Each pump has an eccentric character on the front, and I fixate on a cartoon rabbit wearing boxing gloves, eyeballing me. This needs to be my last pint; my head is feeling a little fuzzy.
‘Hopping Hare, please,’ I say, and the bartender nods and plucks a clean glass from under the sink.
I look around as a wave of ‘go on’s starts up around me, and each person lurches out of their seat like pieces of popcorn. One of the players is racing down the pitch with the ball, and despite myself I suck in a breath. The bartender is frozen mid-pour. The player is flanked by two men from the opposite team as he gets closer to the goal, jabbing their feet around him to try and get the ball. Effortlessly, the player spins the ball away from them and before I can blink, he curves his foot round the ball and launches it into the air.
My heart is racing as I watch, and I suddenly feel as sucked into the TV screen as the rest of the pub. His teammate sees the ball, jumps into the air and knocks his head against the ball. It bounces off his hand and smacks the back of the net, flying past the goalkeeper’s outstretched hands and scoring into the goal.
Before I can stop myself, I throw myself off my chair andcheer, punching the air. My ears are ringing and I feel so alive that it takes me a moment to notice that nobody else is cheering. Actually, everyone else looks pretty furious.
‘It’s a handball, mate. It doesn’t count.’
I turn around to see an older man next to me. He’s probably in his late fifties, wearing a flat cap, and is smiling at me kindly.
I quickly sit back down and take my pint off the bartender, trying to control the embarrassment rippling up my body.
‘Ah, right,’ I say, laughing, ‘because he hit it with his hand, I guess?’
The man nods. ‘That’s right.’
I take a sip of my new beer. This one is biscuity and slightly foamy. It’s the nicest one so far.
‘Well, that makes sense,’ I mumble into my pint. ‘It is called football, after all.’
‘That it is.’
I glance around to check the rest of the pub aren’t pointing and cruelly laughing at me, like my imagination would have them, but they’re back to being fully absorbed in the game. Thank God.
‘You’re new to football, then?’ the man asks.
I look back at him and nod. ‘Guilty as charged.’
‘Sounds like you might know more about American football?’
I shrug. ‘I don’t know much about that either, to be honest.’
‘Baseball?’
‘No.’
‘Basketball?’
‘Nope.’
‘Ice hockey?’
I shake my head and the man tries and fails to hide a smile. ‘I’m not really that into sports,’ I admit. ‘I thought I’d try and get into football. Be a good way to really experience British culture.’
He cocks his head. ‘It is a big part of us,’ he agrees.
I take another sip of my pint. At least that’s one thing I’ve gotten right.
