“So, here’s whatisgoing to happen. One of you two, either you or Aiden, will be captain on your own, and the other will be vice.”
My brain is in catch-up mode. I have no words to respond with. I open my mouth, but only air escapes. On the stage, someone wheels Snatch’s pole into position, and the pyrotechnic guys I hired are setting up around the front.
I watch them, dumbfounded. Coach Eksteen stares at me, waiting for a reply, but I still can’t form one. All of this feels like it was for nothing. I pushed Pi so far out of his comfort zone for nothing.
We cannot be co-captains together.
“But . . .” I say weakly, finally looking at Eksteen.
“And the other catch is . . .” he adds, before I can question him. He swishes his wine around in his glass and then throws it back. “I wantyouto choose who the new skipper will be.”
Half Time
Chapter 9
Aiden
19 months ago
Friday 31st October 2025
Owen Bosley’s pub is freaking adorable, but it’s packed. It’s Halloween and everyone’s turned out for the party in costume. Some are less practical than others and take up more space than is necessary for a building with such a microscopic floor plan. The air is dense with other people’s breath, and I’m finding it hard to remain enthusiastic and social.
The Little Thatch is a stereotypical English cottage slash inn in the middle of woop woop, in the middle of England, and it’s almost the middle of the night. Okay, it’s only just past nine, but I’ve had to come outside again to get some fresh air.
Luckily, it’s not too cold. Or it is cold, but I’ve been sweating so much inside the pub that it’s taking my body a while to realise the existence of the coldness.
Or maybe I’ve simply lived in the UK for so long now that I’ve become fully acclimatised to their horrifico weather systems. Eight months of bitter, bleak winter, three months of sodden spring, two and a half days of summer if we’re lucky, and exactly ten days of crisp, sunny afternoons and pretty leaves falling before the cycle repeats itself.
But as refreshing as the nearly November temperatures are to my overheated, overcostumed body, I can’t stay outside for much longer. It’s already my third trip to come and stand beside the bushes, and I’m not even a smoker. People are starting to comment.
Or they probably are. I don’t know. It’s too fucking sweaty inside to hear anything being said. That makes no sense, but it totally makes sense. It’s too hot to pay attention.
My best friend Abs has only recently arrived, and I haven’t had a chance to say hello yet, but he seems very preoccupied with his . . . boyfriend, not-quite boyfriend. Not sure what label to attach to their situationship. I only know that Abs is in way over his head this time.
This Lando kid is all Harry ever talks about. I know more about Orlando Reginald Oakham-Goodwin than I know about my own father. I know that he lost his mum at a young age. I know that his dad is a multimillionaire and also a “piece of work.” I know he lives in a mansion just down the road from this very pub, that he only ever wears black, that he’s severely lactose intolerant, and that he’s been stringing Abs along for months now, though this is the part Harry won’t comment on. Won’t tell me why they’re not officially dating.
Even so, it’s not difficult for anyone with eyeballs to clock how wildly into each other they are, and as happy as I am for my best mate, I can’t help but feel a little . . .when will it happen to me?
I’ve had plenty of girlfriends before, both in England and Australia, and technically,technicallyI have a girlfriend at the moment, so I’m not a stranger to finding a romantic partner, but the way these two flaunt their adoration makes me wonder if . . . I’m looking in the wrong place.
I’ve had suspicions for a while that I might not be straight. I’m not gay—women are far too sexy for that—so perhaps I’m somewhere in the middle. Though bisexual feels wrong too. Phoney. I just . . . don’t feel queer enough for that.
Like I don’t qualify for that label. That I don’t meet the right specs.
Or it could just be that Abs and Orlando have a kind of love that’s rarely replicated. Even if neither of them ever realise it, they have something a lot of people never will. I’ve probably had too much to drink, but now I’m thinking it would be a good idea for me to make them aware of this and caution Orlando, because I cannot let Abs’s heart get broken by this modelesque libertine.
Shit, maybe I am jealous.
My dirty pint glass rests on the soil in a nearby planter. I pick it up, collect another empty that someone else has left on the patio,and suck in the last few lungfuls of fresh countryside air before heading back into the sauna.
Owen and Gadget have hosted karaoke nights here before, and quiz nights, and the atmosphere has always been on the slightly too warm side of things, but those times I hadn’t been wearing a three-foot-long purple wig. I consider ditching the thing behind the bar, but then I’ll just be some guy in micro hot pants, fishnets, and massive balloon tits. My fit only makes sense with the hair.
I’m Rumi fromKPop Demon Hunters. Eggo’s suggestion. He had originally told me he was going to dress as the main Saja Boy from the same movie because that’s who his six-year-old kid, Logan, had wanted him to be, and that we could make it a couple’s costume.
When Eggo arrived wearing nothing but a pair of brown jocks and an upside down brown bucket helmet with cartoon-like eyes and a bulbous pink nose stuck to the front, I knew I’d been conned.
“Why aren’t you dressed as Jinu? I thought we were going to coordinate? Now we don’t stand a chance of winning the couple’s competition,”I’d said to him when I’d finally deciphered who the massive hairy chest and belly belonged to.
