Playing Offside by Jax Calder
Aiden
Training camp was always difficult, but this year it was a special type of torture.
On paper, I’m sure it made sense to management. Put the new rookie in with a veteran player. Match the hotheaded, talented up-and-coming player with a calm and collected old-timer.
Only it turned out I wasn’t so calm when it came to Tyler Bannings.
I had no idea what it was about the guy that screwed with my head so much.
At training, I couldn’t avoid him. He was constantly there, a smirk on his face, joke falling from his lips as he lifted weights, ran drills, and practiced set pieces.
The fact he was hanging out with Graham and his special band of idiots should have meant absolutely nothing to me. But I couldn’t help watching with concern as Tyler pushed himself hard in every drill, trying to prove he could keep up with the men.
At least it did seem like he was taking my advice and not doing any obvious dumb shit.
At the end of the second session, when my twenty-eight-year-old body was reminding me exactly why training camp sucked, we had a snippet of free time. I just wanted to chill out in my room and read, forgetting about how sore I was.
Instead, Tyler bounced into our room and stared at me like I was his home entertainment center.
“What are you reading?” he asked.
I lowered my book reluctantly. “A World War Two biography.”
“It looks thrilling,” he mocked.
“I like history.”
“It figures.”
I narrowed my eyes. “What figures?”
A grin lit up his face. “Old person liking old stuff.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, can you change the record?”
“Record? You know the music industries moved on from records, right?” His smile grew even larger.
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, I’ve tried some of those newfangled cassette things. I’m not sure if they’re going to catch on, though.”
His eyes widened. “Did you just make a joke?”
“No. I don’t joke.”
“I’m pretty sure that was a joke.”
“You imagined it.”
But I knew my lips were quirking up in the direction of a smile as he continued to grin at me. Tyler pulled off his T-shirt in one quick motion, balling it up and throwing it in the corner. He stood there, the sculpted muscles under that golden, glowing skin. A flush of lust shot through my body.
Fuck. I had to stop ogling the kid, the straight kid who was out to get my starting spot. It was high up there on the list of masochistic behavior. Probably deserved the top spot.
I glanced away, schooling my face back into neutral territory.
“And there it is,” Tyler said.
“There what is?”
“There’s the Aiden Jones freeze-over. There’s always this moment where you shut down your whole face like you’re going out of business.”
I swallowed. The fact that the kid already had me pegged so well unsettled me.
“If only I could turn off my ears so I didn’t have to listen to you.” My voice came out harsher than I anticipated. Tyler flinched.
I almost flinched too at the look on his face.
He stared at me for a few beats of silence before speaking again. “You don’t like me very much, do you?” His voice was quieter than normal.
I shrugged. “What’s not to like?”
He gave me a flat stare at my non-answer.
“I don’t have any emotions toward you, Bannings, positive or negative.”
How I wished my words were true. I wished I didn’t have any emotions toward the guy. Instead of the swirling mess of feelings that I could never pin down.
He continued to look at me before turning away to grab another T-shirt. He pulled it on with jerky movements. “I’m bailing,” he said.
“Fine by me.”
Watching Tyler walk to the door, the slight slump in his shoulders, caused something uneasy to stir inside me.
Fuck. Had I been too hard on the kid? Was I punishing him because of my attraction to him? He came across all cocky arrogance, but I was fairly sure I’d just glimpsed something softer underneath.
He closed the door behind him with a sharp click.
I tried to get back into my book, but stories of the Allied campaign in Egypt couldn’t hold my attention, and Tyler crept back into my mind.
To distract myself from thoughts of the rookie, I put down my book and called my mother. I tried to ring her once a week, and it was a guaranteed mood killer. So, I might as well do it when I was already in a bad mood.
“Hi, Mum.”
“Hi, honey.”
“How are you?” I asked the same question I always asked, although I could answer it myself.
“Fine.”
She was lying. My mother was not fine. She hadn’t been fine for eighteen years. My father’s death had devastated my mother to the point where she was a husk of the person she used to be. A withered husk, so desiccated that it was hard to believe it had ever been something alive and vibrant.
“So, it’s the New Zealand training camp this week,” I said.
“Oh, that’s right. How’s it going?” I could hear the effort it required for her to summon the words, to pretend to be interested.
“Good. Same old, same old. It’s a good group of guys this year. Zach’s here, and we’ve been trying some new set moves…” I rattled on.
“That’s nice.” Her voice was listless.
“So, what about you? Have you been up to anything interesting?”
“Not really.”
“How’s the garden going?”
“Okay. Some of the bulbs are starting to emerge.”
“Well, that’s something to look forward to.”
“Yes.”
Silence.
“I better get going,” I said eventually.
“Okay, dear.”
I hung up, staring blankly at the wall of the hotel room. It was a vase of flowers, one of those terrible bland painting that hotels seem to specialize in, designed not to elicit any emotion.
But talking to my mother had cracked open the box inside my mind, and memories crept out. Dad’s funeral. I’d spent most of the afternoon freaked out about how everyone I knew had become these stiff and solemn versions of themselves, like they were weird mutant zombies, without the killing or brain-eating.
That day, it felt like I’d had my lifetime’s quota of hugs. After everyone left, Mum and I were left staring at the remains of club sandwiches that were curling at the edges, and that’s when the tears that had been threatening me all day finally started to leak out. I’d expected my mother’s warm embrace, the smell of her vanilla perfume to engulf me.
But my mother had stepped back, avoiding touching me. “Now, now, enough of that.”
It wasn’t her words that froze my tears. It was the look on her face. Fear.
She was scared of my grief.
And so I’d choked it down. I’d learned to curb my emotion so nothing showed on my face. I never wanted to see that look on my mother’s face again.
Only one parent was in the ground, but it felt like I’d lost two parents the day of the accident.
The only good thing was I was now a master at controlling my emotions. And I was going to have to use that skill to get me through the next few days of training camp. Get me through dealing with having Tyler in such close proximity. My best tactic would be to avoid him as much as possible.