Page 116 of Good Losers (Lochkelvin Academy)

“I mean, protestin’ at the opera?” Finlay mutters in a tone of incredulity, like it must have been a pitiful display indeed. “Whit are we, French? It’s only gonnae piss aff the rich, and the rich famously dinnae approve o’ the status quo bein’ challenged. Naw, this’ll backfire. Dinnae worry about it, sassenach.”

The rest of the evening is spent in domestic bliss. It feels like we’re trying it on, to see what it’s like, to see what the future may resemble, slipping on roles of domesticity like a costume, as intricate and as much an act as the opera had been.

Danny resets the chessboard and offers me a game, expressing his disappointment after losing seven times in a row to Luke. I play stuntedly, sacrificing most of my pieces before Danny even touches the queen, and end up tuning in and out of Luke and Finlay’s political bickering on the sofa.

The TV is resolutely switched off — and, as far as I can make out, not even plugged in. Some kind of angry compromise must have been reached between the two of them tonight, because Finlay’s tablet doesn’t leave his side all evening.

“How was it, anyway?” Danny asks as his queen demolishes the scant remainder of my army. I don’t even have the energy to scowl at the board, though I’m happy enough to lose so dismally if it gives Danny a small boost of self-belief that he’s not the worst chess player here. “The opera? I’ve never been to one.”

“Loud,” I answer automatically, though my thoughts drift instead to Rory with his hand lodged inside me, his other palm tight against my mouth, suffocating my cries as I shuddered out my orgasm into the theater. Delicately, I cross my legs beneath the table. “I don’t know. I didn’t really understand it. Rory liked it, though.”

“Yer leadership conditionin’ has been extended, by the way,” Finlay points out, as though the mention of Rory has made him suddenly remember. “Rory’s asked me tae create a schedule o’ cultural awareness for ye tae broaden yer mind, so every night until the end o’ the festival, ye’ll be seein’ a wide range o’ theater, including the entirety o’ the Shakespeare canon, plus whitever the National Opera deems fit to perform, if it ever manages tae finish a full show again.”

“Are you joking?” I snap. “‘Broaden my mind’? I don’t even want to be a leader! Rory’s being ridiculous.” I harrumph at the table with all the grace of a tantrum-throwing six-year-old, but then Rory’s words from the restaurant weave through my mind. About being raised to be his equal, about being taught the things he knows. About me being good enough to match him.

To marry him.

I screw my eyes shut. Danny looks back at me in concern. “Instead of tea, perhaps something stronger?” he asks kindly, as though my sudden distress is over the prospect of being force-fed Shakespeare for the rest of summer. “The Munro cellars are stocked for the apocalypse, I swear. They wouldn’t notice one missing bottle.”

I agree, if only so Danny will stop examining my expression and trying to fix me. He means well — he meanssowell, with his good, well-intentioned heart — but right now I’m filled to the brim with every emotion going, and adding alcohol to the mix sounds like a smart idea to combine all those prickly emotions into one messy swirl.

“I’m not doing it,” I tell Finlay as soon as Danny leaves the room. “He can’t make me. And… I can’t do it. I can’t do this. Tonight… the part with the opera, it wasso boring. I sat there waiting for something to happen, and it was terrible, it was so bad, I can’t even explain…”

I feel like I’m being a tad harsh onTosca, whose intense, intricate music I ended up weeping over when it all connected like a solved equation, when its harmonies penetrated the glowing aura of my orgasming body. But I have to press the point. I can’t do what Rory expects of me. Night after night, being brainwashed with the type of old-fashioned, miserable high art that Rory considers culture.

I can’t do it.

“Too bad, sassenach,” Finlay says cheerfully, as though my protests are somewhat adorable, “I’ve already booked tickets forCoriolanustomorrow.”

I thunk my head against the table, narrowly missing the sharp edge of the chessboard. As though I’ve wished him into existence, Danny appears with dazzlingly clean glasses and a large, chunky bottle of alcohol — I don’t know what it is, but it doesn’t matter. All bottled alcohol tastes the same, and if anyone says otherwise, they’re lying.

And with that thought, I have the sudden flash of fear that Rory will smuggle me into a wine-tasting session, in an attempt to groom me into having the expert, discerning tongue that he probably has.

Thinking of Rory’s tongue leads me down a dangerous path, so I deliberately clear my mind before tossing a glass of strong, sparkly, sneeze-inducing alcohol down my throat.

“Bless you,” Finlay says to me, looking amused as the bubbles tickle my nose.

Luke accepts the glass of whatever-it-is from Danny, with a warmly intoned, “Thanks, Danny.”

Finlay doesn’t miss a beat. “Thanks, Danny,” he repeats, like the words are inherently funny, as he takes his own glass. “Danny, Danny, Daaaaaaannyyyyyyyyyy… I love ye so much, Danny.”

Danny’s freckled cheeks quickly tinge with red. Luke ignores Finlay but I narrow my eyes.

“Stop being such a dick.”

“My God, sassenach,” Finlay declares, with so much melodrama he may as well have placed a hand of dismay across his forehead. “It’s been sickenin’ tae be around these two while ye’ve been gone. Their constant, hardcore, homoerotic games o’ chess. I swear, ye’d be reachin’ for the brain-bleach, too, if ye heard another shy compliment about each other’s openings.”

I snort with laughter, but neither Luke nor Danny seem at all amused.

“Remind me to say the same about you when Rory’s back in the room,” Luke says coolly, and he takes a sip of alcohol that seems somehow victorious.

Finlay glares at him. “It isnae the same. No’ in a thousand years.” His addition of a timescale speaks volumes, as though his all-consuming obsession with Rory spans the vastness of time and space, of the sky and all its stars, eclipsing like a blanket and smothering all other, weaker kinds of love that dare to exist in the world when Rory Munro is right there to be adored.

I imagine it seems somehow offensive, to Finlay, that the rest of the world does not worship Rory with the same passionate intensity he does.

And I feel the same way. I feel it straight to my heart like a masterfully aimed arrow.

“Danny’s nice to me,” Luke says, although he doesn’t have to explain anything. “Unlike certain people. Unlike most of the world right now.”

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