Page 9 of After the Siren
He shouldn’t apologise.
Cunningham hadn’t apologised. Theo had been willing to give Cunningham a chance – only one chance, because the arrogant shit didn’t deserve more than one – and Cunningham had blown it. He’d said ‘hey’ to Theo as though he hadn’t sat his smug ass down in front of a camera six months ago and laughingly critiqued Theo’s probably career-ending performance for the benefit of thirty thousandFull Forwardsubscribers.
The great mystery was why everyone acted as though the sun shone out of Cunningham’s ass. He wasn’t eventhatgood-looking. He had the generic surfer charm that Aussie boys who grew up near the beach all seemed to have in spades; it soaked in with the sunscreen. Theo would have bet every cent in hisbank account that Cunningham had spent most of the summer paddling around in the surf with a couple of other identical guys (maybe one brunette for variety). He probably had an equally boring, generically pretty girlfriend. He wasn’t special.
What he was, though, was fucking irritating.
Cunningham had been the last to arrive for the bus, rumpled in a way that had to be deliberate. Nobody who wasn’t trying could have picked board shorts and a singlet that clashed like that. He’d been late, but that obviously hadn’t deterred him from stopping for coffee. And he’d brought a surfboard. To development camp.
Instead of shamefacedly retiring to the back of the bus and shutting the fuck up like a normal person, he seemed determined to remain the absolute centre of attention. He was in perpetual motion up and down the aisle, exchanging jokes and ridiculous handshakes with his teammates, constantly intruding into Theo’s peripheral vision. Impossible to ignore. The sunlight sparked off the gold of a fidget ring on his left index finger as he gesticulated.
He hung on to the luggage rack as he chatted to various players, his singlet riding up to expose part of a tattoo on his hip. It hadn’t been visible in the Naked sneaker ads – it must have been under a layer of mud. Theo couldn’t quite work out what it was, which was even more irritating because then he was just staring at Cunningham’s exposed hip.
He texted Priya to let her know they’d clearly touched up Cunningham’s abs in the advertisements.
Priya
How have you seen his abs already?
Theo
His shirt rode up
Priya
Were you making out in the bathroom of the bus at the time?
Theo
This fantasy of yours is not the hill you should die on
Cunningham subsided into a seat every time the bus driver growled at him, but never for long. It was like being locked in a room with a very energetic puppy, except that Theo liked puppies.
The only saving grace of the bus ride was Morgan Reyes, who’d glanced around the bus and then dropped into the seat next to Theo. He was almost comically different to how he was on the field. Theo had only played against him once, but his abiding memory of that game was of Reyes, with his sharp undercut and sleeve tattoos, flattening Sharks midfielders like they were made of papier-mâché. Off the field he turned out to be softly spoken, with a ready smile and a laugh that crinkled the corners of his eyes. It was his third year with the Falcons, and he’d given Theo a quick rundown on what to expect.
Johnny Xenos had also given Theo a fist bump on the way past. Theo remembered Xenos – vividly – because it had been Xenos’s broad chest that he’d hammered the ball into at the end of that last, awful game for the Sharks. He’d wondered if he’d be ribbed about it, wondered how he was going to pretendthose barbs weren’t hitting raw skin, but Xenos just gave him a friendly smile and said, ‘Good to have you on board,’ as though he really meant it. Maybe he did.
Cunningham was obviously tight with Xenos and Riley. The three of them were tactile in a so-homo-there’s-no-homo way. At one point Riley had literally shoved his hand up Cunningham’s singlet.
By the time the players had unloaded their luggage in front of the Torquay Athletics Centre, Theo had decided that this was basically school camp. Weird bus trip where no one knew who to sit with: check. At least two or three people who were way too excited: check. At least one person arriving with triple the amount of luggage reasonably required: check. At least one person arriving with significantly less than the amount of luggage reasonably required: check.
He’d never been quite this anxious about school camp, though. The medication helped, but it didn’t tamp down the thrumming current ofdon’t fuck this up, don’t fuck this up, punctuated by the occasional viciousyou’re going to fuck this up.
Kat clambered onto a bench to direct operations. She had a clipboard in one hand and a whistle around her neck. Apparently, players were going to be sharing rooms. Theo assumed the rationale was that it would help them all bond, because the club could definitely afford to give them their own rooms.
Kat’s voice cut through the babble of conversation. ‘Bestavros and Cunningham, room seven. Bestavros, Cunningham knows where to go.’
Ohhellno.
Theo looked across at Cunningham. The smile slipped off Cunningham’s face for a moment, replaced by an almost cartoonish look of dismay.
Nice.Feeling’s mutual, dickhead.
‘Riley and Xenos, room eight.’ The two exchanged a fist bump.
Theo grabbed his bag and approached Cunningham. He caught the tail end of the conversation between Cunningham, Riley and Xenos.
‘Cold, bro,’ Cunningham was saying.
