Page 14 of After the Siren
Xen bounced the ball off Jake’s forehead.
‘Ow, that fucking hurt.’
‘It was meant to.’
Jake retaliated by throwing a sock at Xen’s head. Xen was obviously wiped out too, because he caught the sock but didn’t return fire.
Jake flicked the fidget ring again. Maybe he should have apologised. But suddenly they were two days into the camp and he hadn’t brought it up, and he wasn’t quite surehowto bring it up. It seemed safer to just leave it. Bestavros hadn’t brought it up either. Then again, he hadn’t said a word to Jake except in response to direct questions.
Paddy emerged from the bathroom wearing only a low-slung towel. ‘What’s up?’
‘Bestavros hates me,’ Jake told him.
Paddy grabbed a second towel from the foot of his bed and flicked it over his head to dry his hair. ‘Maybe he hates everyone. That guy isintense,’ he said, slightly muffled. He surfaced from the towel a moment later.
Paddy wasn’t wrong. Bestavros wasn’t unfriendly, exactly, but he kept to himself. Jake’s mum would have called him ‘reserved’.Bestavros’ game was like that, too. He worked hard, hitting drills with a focused intensity, but he wasn’t playingwell.Not like he used to. Jake had spent some time looking at old footage of Bestavros playing in NSW, from back before he got drafted. He’d wanted to see what Kat had seen – and it was there in spades. Bestavros had the type of raw athleticism that Jake hadalways envied. He only had a couple of inches on Jake, but he played much taller, and he’d mastered a fearless, aerial game that complemented his accuracy in front of goal.
Or it had.
‘I like him,’ Xen said. ‘He works hard, seems nice. We’ve chatted a bit.’
Of course they had. Xen could talk to anyone. He wasn’tchatty, but he put people at ease.
‘I don’tdislikehim,’ Paddy said, turning away from them both and pulling underwear out of his suitcase. He dropped the towel and Jake choked.
‘What the fuck is that?’
Paddy looked over his shoulder. ‘My ass?’
‘On your ass, dickhead.’ Paddy definitely didn’t have a tattoo on his ass last time Jake had seen it. But there was one there now: a large blackwork piece spreading from Paddy’s lower back over his ass and down to the backs of his thighs. It looked almost like an explosion of abstract flowers, the lines bold enough to show clearly on Paddy’s dark skin.
Paddy pulled on his briefs. ‘Keep looking and I’ll start charging.’ Jake flipped him off and threw a sock at him. It bounced off the ass in question. Paddy grabbed it and tossed it back towards Jake, who lobbed it at Xen. Xen threw the ball at Paddy and the sock at Jake.
‘No,’ Xen said, as Jake reached for one of Xen’s discarded footy boots. ‘Don’t even think about it.’
Jake raised his hands in surrender. ‘Think about what?’
Xen turned back to Paddy. ‘Do people get tattoos on their asses if theydon’twant people to look?’
Paddy wiggled his ass and pulled on some shorts.
‘Back to Stavs,’ Xen said. ‘Being on a new team is tough. Takes time to adjust.’
‘We’re great, though,’ Paddy said, dropping back onto his own bed, still shirtless. ‘Shouldn’t he be happy to be here? Bet he didn’t think he’d play another game after that shitshow last year.’
‘I wasn’t talking about whether or not he’s happy to be here,’ Jake said. ‘I was talking about the fact that he hatesme.’
‘Of course, sorry to make it not about you.’ Paddy folded his arms behind his head.
‘Just apologise,’ Xen told Jake.
‘For what?’ Paddy asked. ‘You weren’t in that stupid skit.’
Which, to be honest, was how Jake felt about it. Xen made a noise that meant he disagreed but wasn’t going to say anything about it.
‘Question,’ Paddy continued, rolling over and propping himself up on one elbow to look down at Jake on the floor. ‘Why do youcare? Got a crush?’
Jake rolled his eyes. ‘Yeah, sure.’
