"I'm home," I called, slamming the car door shut. The French doors were all open. The afternoon breeze fluttered the voile curtains and sucked them from the safety of the windows into the fresh air outside, like a bride's veil swept up in an unexpected gale. I breathed in, filling my lungs and waited for my welcome committee. My heart did that thing it did every time I came home, where it grew and expanded until it felt like it was going to explode out of my chest cavity. Then I heard it, a screech of a call followed by the patter of four paws.
A bolt of dark hair barrelled its way into my chest and I wound my arms tight around slender shoulders and stooped so I could plant a kiss on silky strands of hair. Four paws padded up my trousers, smattering my chinos in dust and dried mud, and I stroked the golden fur. "How're my boys?" I asked.
"Did you meet him, did you meet him, did you meet him?" Sammy asked, the little guy's eyes crinkled in the afternoon sun making his freckles illuminate like paint-splattered milk chocolate droplets. I could have eaten them all up like chocolate buttons. My heart gave a little squeeze.
Holding in a groan I shuddered at the memory of the icy glare and the idiot who owned it. "Mm." I couldn't lie to a six-year-old, it's just not a done thing. "I met him." It’s all I can manage. My teeth clamp together with a snap just thinking about my day.
"What did he say, what did he say, what did he say?"
I don't know if it's a little guy thing or a six-year-old thing to repeat everything three times. I also don't know if it's cute, or a phase that I hope he grows out of sooner rather than later. Ruffling my fingers through his wavy hair, I chuckled. "He didn't get to talk. I made him run too much." Sammy laughed and then I laughed like I'd caught an infectious disease, the day forgot in an instant. That icy stare couldn't reach me here; nothing could reach me here in my little slice of unexpected heaven. "How was school?" I asked.
The little guy sighed, his freckles scrunching again. "PE sucked."
"It sucked?"
Jasper bounded at our heels like a retriever on ecstasy.
"It was Kwick Cricket." He rolled his eyes. "I told the coach that you'd come and teach them the real thing."
I chuckled again and pulled him tight to my side for a squeeze. "Now you know, not everyone likes to be beaten by a girl." I flashed back to the icy glare and the snarl from the throat of the Lancashire Lion but then blanked it from my mind. Just like the click of my fingers I could shut him and his truckloads of angry out.
Sammy nodded. "They'd all like to be beaten by you," he said, his face staring up at mine.
"Sure thing." I made a mental note to approach the school about doing an afternoon practice or the like. Sammy would love it. "Now, my little friend, have you got homework?"
Sammy shook his head, although I knew I’d need to check the recesses of his school bag. It's amazing the paperwork that could get mislaid down in the dark, crumb-filled, corners of a six-year-old’s magical vortex of a school backpack.
"Okay?" I left a questioning lilt in my voice so if he felt the need to correct the statement about homework the option was there to utilise—nine times out of ten he did. "How about after dinner we have a game of catch?"
"Yes, yes, yes." Sammy bounded in the air.
"But only a quick one before bed."
Little guy groaned. "It's hours till bedtime."
I gave my head a firm parental nod, and it felt comfortingly natural. "Not on a school night it's not." I hated being the grown up. If it was me I’d be on the trampoline until midnight, but it wasn’t the done thing, apparently, as I’d found out last year when Sammy’s teachers had talked to me about him being too tired in class. How was I supposed to know? He didn’t come with a user manual.
Sammy groaned and ran ahead, Jasper chasing in his wake and I laughed knowing full well he would reappear with a scrunched sheet of A4 in his palm in five minutes time.
Turning, I took in the shape of the house, a solid detached affair, with patio doors opening from every downstairs room. It was part mine, part inheritance. I loved the Britishness of it, with its landscaped gardens and light, airy spaces. Being here made me feel this alien tightness in my chest that I didn't think I would ever fully understand.
In the kitchen, I found Maria stirring a sauce on the cooker. She flashed me a warm smile and waved the spoon at me. Maria was my saving grace, and I didn't know how I got through one day before she appeared like an unexpected fairy godmother. She cooked, cleaned and turned my former solitary existence for one, into a semblance of a family life.
"What's cooking?" I peered over her shoulder, giving her plump shoulders a squeeze and peeked at the perfect smelling Bolognese. I breathed in the herb and wine scent and my stomach growled loudly. "That smells divine." I almost drooled into the pot but managed to catch it back in time.
"Pasta. Are you carbing it tonight?" she asked. “Or do I need to shred my fingers through the spiraliser?”
I thought of all those laps around the field. "Hell, yes." I grabbed a teaspoon and dipped it in the sauce. "Was Sammy okay at pick up?"
"Fine, although he was moaning about PE." She grinned at me and I rolled my eyes. The little guy always moaned about PE.
"Oh I know, he's already told me all about it." Maria laughed and placed the spoon down. "You okay if I head off now, or do you need me for a bit longer?"
“Do you need me to need you a bit longer?” I laughed at my backwards question. Maria’s daughter Scarlett was sixteen and turning into a handful. I think Maria liked the quiet solitude she found at our house. It made me wonder where I would be able to go and hide when Sammy was a teenager. Although, while I didn’t know much about boys, I did seem to remember the teenage ones at school just cocooned themselves in their smelly rooms and masturbated a lot. Shit, I’d definitely need to hide if that was going on.
Shaking my head from a future I couldn’t quite comprehend, I focused on Maria.
“No it’s okay, I think the Princess has plans,” she said.
"Well, off with you then, enjoy the peace. I am more than capable of boiling pasta."
She laughed again and shook her head with slightly more intensity than I thought she needed, motioning to a saucepan on the back burner, lifting the lid and revealing buttery strands of spaghetti nestled inside. "Oh I know, but I've done it for you." I nearly fell at her feet in gratitude. Last week I burnt rice to the bottom of a pan so bad we'd had to throw it away. Not the rice, that was a given in the circumstances, but the pan itself. "You are good at many things, Lyssa, but cooking is not one of your skills."
I grabbed another huge dollop and jammed the spoon into my mouth. "I run, you cook," I said around the silverware jammed between my lips.
Maria patted her curved hips. "You do not get handles like this from participating in running."
Grinning, I clapped her on the back. "I'll see you in the morning, enjoy your night. Oh and tell Ricky that I haven't forgotten about his autographs."
When the Red Cats had their first game, I'd wangled Maria and her husband some tickets, but I'd promised that in the meantime I'd get some scrawls from the top players to tide her cricket-loving husband over. I repressed a shudder when I thought of asking Mr. Icy Stare for an autograph. I'd rather shove the pen up his arse.
"Everything okay?" Maria hesitated, as she grabbed her purse and searched for her keys.
I offered her a well-practiced shoulder lift. "Everything's dandy."
Her eyes narrowed and then she turned for the door. "Ciao, Lyssa," she sing-songed from the kitchen door.
“Ciao, Maria." I sang back but not quite as tunefully. Singing not being my thing.
Shovelling pasta was my thing. I ate two helpings without it touching the sides. That run had been hard, and it had taken all my willpower not to let the pain show. I already knew I'd be strapping my knees tonight and praying to the gods of cartilage that I hadn't inflicted any more damage. And if I could walk downstairs tomorrow I would accept that as a bonus.
"So what was it like?" Sammy asked, his head resting on his hand. I knew if my mum was there she'd be telling him not to put his elbows on the table, but I couldn't quite make myself partake in grown up things like that. Hell, I liked to put my elbows on the table, especially when I was knackered. If he hadn't been there slurping pasta right next to me along the high gloss, white, breakfast bar in the kitchen, I would have had my head on it.
"It was okay. You know, different." I trailed off a little.
"Did you miss it?"
"Miss what?"
"Playing?"
I chewed my food for longer than I needed and glanced at Sammy’s dark eyes. The little guy was so perceptive and that little mind of his was a mystery to me. "Nah, and no one was playing anyway. I was making them run like crazies."
Little guy offered me a weak smile, and I rolled my eyes at his face. Yeah I know, it wasn’t very grown up. "What? Spit it out, or you're going to choke on your pasta."
His cheeks flushed absorbing his dotted freckles like a sponge. "Is it my fault that you don't play anymore?" I think he wanted to sound braver than he did, but his little voice lifted as his words died in the air between us.
I swivelled on my stool to face him, lowering myself a few inches so I could look in his eyes. "No, who said that?"
The little guy shook his head. "No one, it's just you used to be a captain, and now you don't even play."
Placing my hand on his shoulder I gave a squeeze, feeling the skin and bone under my touch, all the things that made him real. "I gave up playing because my knee wanted to make me walk like a granny and I decided I didn't need to go through the rest of my life looking like I'd wet my pants."
Sammy's lips curved a notch, but his eyes were still scrunched in concentration. "Truth?" he held out his pinkie finger. Oh god no! Not the pinkie promise.
I wrapped my little finger around his, but as I did I amended my words. "I didn't want to walk like I peed myself, but I also wanted to spend time with you."
His steady dark gaze held mine, and for the millionth time I wondered what he remembered and felt inside that little head of his. "Why?"
"Because you are super cool and I'm hoping to learn some skills from you." I released his finger and pushed my bowl away. "Have you finished?"
He nodded, and I flashed him a grin. "Good, last one to the green is a stinky bum."
"Cheeeeaaaaat," he screeched after me as Jasper ran, barking at our heels.
We played for an hour in the end, until the shadows were lengthening along the lawn, stealing the daylight, and Jasper had given up trying to grab a dropped catch and was on the bench chewing a nylon bone. When it was way passed a suitable bedtime for a six-year-old, I called it a day and carried him over my shoulder up to the bathroom, ignoring the call of the trampoline. "These nails are disgusting,” I told him, as I scrubbed him down with a nailbrush and a flannel. "You know, your catching has come on hugely. I think you will be a captain one day." Lifting him out of the bath I wrapped him in a fluffy blue towel.
"Like my daddy?" he asked.
A sizeable obstruction filled my throat. "Sure thing; just like your daddy." I held him tight in my arms as we made our way to his bright green room. From the walls, the face of the Lancashire Lion grinned at me, although his eyes weren't quite as icy as they'd been in person. I held myself back from sticking my tongue out at the posters. Hopefully, Sammy would have a new cricket crush this year. Maybe I'd introduce him to Bailey, he seemed decent enough and didn't have an attitude that could do with being flushed down the toilet to the sewer of douchebags.
Once he was tucked up, and I'd read twenty pages of The Greatest Cricket Slides Ever to a pair of drooping eyes, I headed back downstairs.
The depths of the evening were the very worst part of the day for me. I called it empty house syndrome. Pressing the music system and filling the air with some chilled Ibiza tunes through the speakers, I changed into my yoga kit. I'd need to do some serious stretching if I wanted to be able to walk the following day. An hour later I'd made the little guy’s packed lunch and was tucked up in bed.
At nine o’clock.
I couldn't even bring myself to contemplate how incredibly pathetic going to bed at that time was, so I grabbed the phone, and dialled Betsy. I knew she'd be waiting to talk to me. I'd never been one to sit and watch telly, it just seemed like a waste of time to me, yet even I had to admit that going to bed at nine at the age of twenty-five, was pathetic on many levels. It was different when I'd been training and playing the game myself—sleep was an essential part of the day—but there was no excuse for me now. Now, I was just a sad fuck and I had to accept it for what it was.
She answered on the first ring. "Hooooow was it?"
I settled back against the pillows and stretched my legs, pointing my toes as far as they would go. Damn that felt good. “It was..." I struggled to think of something positive to say before settling on, "different."
"Ha, he hated you didn't he?"
I glared at the ceiling visualising the smug face I'd wanted to punch. "Believe me, the feeling is mutual."
"Still hate him then?"
"With more passion than I can express."
"You know what they say about hate, right?" Betsy giggled, and I held the phone away from my ear. "It's a fine line between hate and fucking."
I spluttered and sat up, my feet hooking in the duvet. "Betsy, where do you come up with this crap? No one says that at all."
"Well, I do." Her laughter died, and she dropped her voice. "Do you think he remembered you?"
I snorted. "No, that would involve him, the glorious Lancashire Lion, firstly realising I was there, secondly acknowledging that I was there, and thirdly, not being a complete twat."
It's Betsy turn to snort. "I miss you."
"I miss you too." I sighed and frowned at the ceiling. God, I missed her. She was crazy, unpredictable and had been my sidekick for so long now that work without her felt very much like work and not the play that it used to be.
"Team sucks without you; Annabelle is a total fucking bitch." It's fair to say that Betsy, the England women's offside spinner, was not a fan of the new captain.
"She'll be fine, she's just settling in. You know she's got some big shoes to fill." I laughed a little, but it only made the ache inside of me more intense. It was like a bowling ball had been let loose around my rib cage and was using my bones as skittles. God, I missed it: the girls, the laughter, the outright bitchiness on the pitch. I missed it all. And all so I could be glared at by that knob...
No. I had to remind myself that I had more important reasons for giving up.
"What are you doing now?" she asked when silence extended between us.
"Uh, I'm, I'm."
"You're in bed aren't you?"
"Kiss my arse." I snuggled further under my blanket.
"I would, but you are too far away."
"Ooh, don't be gross." I chuckled. Betsy had never hidden her sexuality, and in all honesty, it scared the shit out of the girls on opposing teams so it'd always been a positive aspect of our friendship. She said she was in her ideal job where she got to look at other women hot and sweaty all day. Once, when a fielder from Sussex Women's First called her a carpet muncher, Betsy had just turned around and fired back right in front of the crowd, "Bring that pussy here and I'll eat it for breakfast."
We'd won that game and Betsy had been fined for inappropriate behaviour, but she honestly didn't give a shit.
A dark head popped up next to the bed causing me to shriek. "Shit, oh I mean, sugar."
Sammy was rubbing his eyes. “I can't sleep," he sleep-slurred. "Can I get in with you?"
"Gotta go," I told Betsy, before hanging up the phone and hiding it under my pillow.
"Come on, little guy." I pulled back the cover, and he slid in. Jasper was ten seconds behind him, and I moved so the great big Golden Retriever could lay next to his favourite. I snuggled Sammy under my arm, smelling the fresh zing of his apple shampoo. "Night, little guy."
'Night, Aunty Lyssi.”