Page 17 of After the Siren
Theo’s hands were a little clammy. He thought about sayingAbout what?
‘Why?’ he asked instead.
For a moment, something like annoyance contracted the corners of Cunningham’s eyes. Something sharper than annoyance, maybe.
‘Because whatever you might think, Bestavros, I’m not that much of an asshole.’
‘I didn’t —’ Theo started. Except he had said several things that pretty much meant ‘asshole’, and Cunningham must have heard some of them. ‘Thanks,’ he finished.
Cunningham shrugged. ‘Sure.’ He stood. ‘Listen, I gotta make that call.’ He looked pointedly towards the door.
‘Uh, yeah, of course. Sure.’ Theo was going to leave as soon as his brain unfroze and gave him back control of his feet.
Cunningham turned away and walked around the corner of the balcony, out of sight. Theo retreated, and heard Jake say, ‘Hey, Mum, how’d it go?’ before he closed the door.
Theo wasn’t surprised when his phone started buzzing as he headed back towards his room. He thought about ignoring it, but then Priya wouldknowsomething was wrong.
‘Hey, Priy.’
‘Are you good?’ she asked, cutting to the chase. ‘You were cagey.’
‘Yeah,’ he said, stopping to lean against the trunk of one of the jacarandas. ‘No. I just accidentally outed myself to Cunningham.’
‘What?’
Theo explained.
Priya made a thoughtful noise. ‘That sucks, but it sounds like he won’t tell anyone. I know you don’t like him, with good reason. But outing you – that would be extreme.’
Theo had sent Priya theFull Forwardepisode after she’d made some gentle noises about the possibility of moving on and mending fences. It had put an end to those suggestions, and also to the jokes about Jake.
‘If he overheard that then he overheard what I said about him.’ Theo cringed internally. Calling him a flog had been pretty harsh. He’d been exaggerating a bit, maybe, for the benefit of the group, but Cunningham didn’t know that.
‘Yeesh.’ There were a few moments of silence. But Priya had never been one to beat around the bush. ‘Are you worried he’ll out you out of spite?’
‘Yes.’ Theo hesitated. ‘No. I don’t know. Like you said, it’d be pretty extreme. And Kat, the one I was telling you about – she’s queer. I think she’d come down pretty hard on anyone who did something like that. He is a star, though, so who knows. Nothing I can do about it now.’
‘Should you apologise?’
‘That might just make it worse. I mean, he hasn’t apologised for the skit. So maybe we can just pretend it never happened. An eye for an eye.’
‘How’s everything else?’ Priya asked. He appreciated the question, because he knew she wanted to tell him that he should take the initiative and apologise, and it was probably physically paining her not to give him that good advice.
‘It’s —’ He stopped.
‘Theo.’ Her voice was a little wry and very warm, and Theo suddenly missed her so much it actually hurt.
‘It’s just ... hard. I want —’ He stopped again. Priya stayed quiet.
‘I want to make this work,’ he admitted. ‘To fit in here. But it’s like I’ve forgotten how to do that. It seems like a good group, and there’s a lot of social stuff, but I just ...’ He shook his head, as though she could see. ‘I can’t seem to do it. And I’m not playing well. Better, I guess, but not well enough.’
‘You were really excited when you got drafted to the Sharks,’ she said. It was a mark of how seriously she was taking this that she didn’t even pretend she’d forgotten the name of his first team.
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘I was.’
Shame pulsed up from his stomach, tightening his throat. He’d been naive. Hopeful.Stupid.
‘You know,’ Priya said, choosing her words carefully, ‘the fact you were excited about that and it didn’t work out doesn’t mean you can’t be excited about this.’
