Page 1 of Poke the Bear

Chapter 1

Freya

“You look amazing, Freya,” my bestie, Jack, said as she stood before me. Her hands started to flutter and her eyes got a little misty as my eyes narrowed.

I loved her. She was the best person in the world, but I didn’t feel amazing.

“I look…”

Different, that was what my family would always say when they saw my artwork. It was the word they used when they didn’t know what to say or do and couldn’t think of a polite way of saying it. But it was true, I did look different. Somehow Jack had bullied me into accompanying me to the televised Magarey Medal awards night. It marked the end of the South Australian Football League’s season and the best and fairest player would be decided, winning the coveted medal.

I theory.

In practice, all of the best South Australian Aussie Rules footballers got super drunk as they waited to find out which one of them won.

“You look beautiful,” Jack said, and she was talking fast, like she did when she was dealing with difficult clients. Don’t let them get a word in edgewise, that was her motto. “I always said you’d look fab in this dress, but look at you.”

She spun me around by the shoulders, making me stare back into the mirror at my reflection. She’d worked hard to find a dress that looked good on me, something I seriously appreciated but…

She wanted me to be happy, I knew that. She wanted me to be proud and feel beautiful, so I smiled for her. But I wasn’t a WAG (wives and girlfriends of players) and I wasn’t even in PR, like Jack. I was a waitress most of the time and sometimes an artist, selling my work at a market stall one weekend out of four, so why was I here?

“Thanks for agreeing to come,” she said and that’s when my hand covered hers. She frowned now, hard, trying to stop the tears from coming. “When Laila broke up with me…”

Ah, that’s why.

I turned around, glad to not be staring at myself now and focused back on her.

Jack and I had been friends since school, and we’d talked about life, boys, our futures, until she finally confessed that she liked girls, not guys. There’d been a string of girlfriends since then and each time it didn’t work out, it got messy.I’d held her hair back over the toilet as she heaved her guts out, sat and held her hand as she fucking wept, wondering if she’d ever find Miss Right. I mouthed what I hoped were helpful platitudes, because… She was my best friend and I would’ve done anything to help her find a partner who would treat Jack the way she deserved, even if I had no idea how to.

“Laila was an idiot,” I told Jack, tilting her head up and smoothing away the small smears of mascara. Waterproof, my arse. “If she didn’t see what an amazing person you are and marry you off, then she doesn’t deserve you.”

She smiled then, through the tears and then wrapped her arms around me.

“Thanks… Just thanks. I know you don’t want to do this. That hanging out with a bunch of footy players is your idea of hell. That being on television is even worse.”

My grip on her tightened.

“I won’t be on TV though, right, Jack? Jack?”

She pulled back and grinned down on me, even through the tears.

“There’ll be too many other people hanging around to worry about that,” she said. “We’ll kick back in the background, make sure the boys don’t get too messy. It’ll be just like when we used to do bar work.”

I groaned then. The two of us had worked behind the bar at a local university pub and it had not been fun. Australian boys and alcohol were not a good combination. Like there was this thing for a while, amongst the engineers, which were weirdly the worst. They called the game pelican. You got as drunk as possible, then tried to spew in your mate’s mouth. Weird times. The pub owner had gotten so pissed off about the whole thing, he said anyone who ‘pelican-ed’ in his pub would get a lifetime ban, which stopped it.

“Just as long as no one’s playing pelican tonight,” I replied. Jack just smiled. “Jack? Jack! Tell me no one is playing pelican. Jack!”

She pulled me out of the hotel suite we were sharing tonight, then down the hall and I thanked fuck that I hadn’t worn the heels she’d given me. I’d swapped them out for a pair of my custom-painted Chuck Taylor’s, the long sweep of the satin dress I was wearing able to hide them. But Jack moved like a fucking steam train, stalking down the hall on perilously high heels, walking us towards the lift when her phone rang.

“Jaclyn Maynard speaking,” she said, sounding completely professional now. She winked at me as we got in the lift. “Yep, we’re heading down now. Got it, sir. Watch the players, make sure none of the contenders get too drunk and rowdy. Definitely no sex in the toilets. We won’t have a Sonny Bill Williams situation tonight. Understood. I’ll see you down there when you arrive.”

“The owner of the team,” she told me when the call ended. “You don’t have to do anything tonight, because you’re my plus one, though if you bring me gin and tonics when our guys start running amok, I’ll love you forever.”

“You already love me forever,” I shot back with a grin, then lifted my leg, shifting the mass of satin. “And I must love you, wearing a damn dress.”

She sniffed at that.

“Women do it all the time. Anyway, you could’ve worn a suit, you’d have looked sharp in it.”

---