Mr. Match: The Boxed Set

by Delancey Stewart

  “We’d better go,” I told Magalie, worried now.

  With that, we left LePoivre’s winery and headed out to our chauffeur. “As fast as you can,” I told him, feeling myself turning greener by the second. I wanted to be well away from LePoivre’s place before the cheese came back to haunt me in a spectacular fashion. But it was definitely coming back, I could feel it.

  “Oh no,” Magalie said, scooting away from me in the back seat. “Open your window. Fresh air will help.”

  Fresh air did not help.

  By the time we got back to our hotel, I’d painted the side of the car we were riding in, a fact I attempted to make up for by handing the driver more bills than I thought made sense for a tip, and stumbling as far away from the car as possible to eject the next load of pig cheese.

  I spent the remainder of the night in our room, miserable and green.

  “I knew I hated pigs,” I moaned later, when my intestines had calmed their revolt. “Damn them and their stupid cheese. And damn LePoivre.”

  Magalie had a wet washcloth on my forehead. “Will you be able to play tomorrow?” She frowned down at me, her pretty face worried.

  “Of course,” I said, though my stomach twisted as I said it. “I can’t let that turd win.”

  Chapter 158

  LePoivre the Pooper

  Trace

  The day of the match dawned beautiful and clear, and I dressed and went to meet the other Sharks for team breakfast after assuring Magalie I was fine.

  In reality, I was tired and sore, and felt like I’d already played a couple matches and been roundly beaten.

  “Dude,” Fuerte said as soon as he laid eyes on me. “We said no ridiculous drinking. What the hell did you guys do last night?”

  “It wasn’t alcohol,” I assured him. “It was cheese.”

  He raised an eyebrow and Hamish planted himself in front of me.

  “Cheese,” Hamish repeated, having heard my last word. “Explain.”

  Now most of the team was eyeing me and shaking their heads.

  “It was LePoivre!” I told them. “I couldn’t let that douchebag and his stupid pig cheese win.” I explained about the wine tasting gone wrong, and how I’d beaten the guy at his own game.

  “Yeah, you really look like you won,” Erick Evans, said, clapping me on the back.

  “You gonna be okay in the goal?” Coach asked, keeping his voice low in my ear. “I can play Salzetti.”

  I glared across the room at Salzetti, who was cheerfully sipping coffee and looking like he was just a little too eager to take my place in the box. “I’ll be fine.”

  Coach raised an eyebrow at me, and then said, “We’ll see how it goes.”

  “Stupid pigs,” I muttered, sinking into a chair with a piece of dry toast and some water. “Stupid cheese.”

  The bus ride turned my stomach inside out again, and by the time we’d arrived at Marseilles stadium, I was ready to puke. “Play Salzetti,” I managed to say to Coach before retiring to the bathroom for a bit.

  I stayed in there longer than I needed to, imagining the pleasure on LePoivre’s ugly mug as he realized I wasn’t in the goal. Anger fired in my blood and I decided I hated him, hated cheese, and hated pigs especially. My anger was expanding to all of France by the time I finally made myself go out to join my team on the bench.

  The French had already scored on Salzetti once, and I cringed at my own stupidity. If I’d just stayed at the hotel. Or if I hadn’t let myself get angry at LePoivre’s dumb face. Then we might not be about to lose this pride match.

  I watched as the French forward drove another ball straight into our box, my stomach turning for completely different reasons now, and a second later, I was on my feet, begging Coach to pull Salzetti and put me in.

  He gave the other goalie the full half, and by then we were down two. I knew Max and Fuerte could pull it out if I could seal up the leak in our box. They’d gotten close a few times, and by the time the second half began, they were both boiling mad. That was usually a good thing when it came to scoring points.

  Before I’d even had time to take a breath, LePoivre came steaming down the pitch, his teammates passing him the ball as he neared my territory. Anger and pig cheese combined in me to send adrenaline spiking in my blood, and I flew with superhuman strength to block his shot, sending the ball immediately back down the field to Max.

  The Sharks worked it like a choreographed dance then, passing and driving until Fuerte made a shot like a speed train in the corner of their goal, and we had our first point.

  I caught LePoivre’s eye and grinned, giving him a little wave as he returned to midfield.

  It occurred to me that pig cheese might be a secret strength elixir. Maybe you had to suffer through the negative effects to enjoy the power that came on the other side. I was definitely feeling strong now.

  Which is how I blocked the next four attempts on our goal. The Sharks scored again, tying it up.

  There were only two minutes left on the clock as LePoivre came at me again, a maniacal and desperate grin on his ugly mug.

  But he was no match for the power of pig cheese, and I met his shot easily, punting the ball so far down the pitch I nearly scored myself. Evans was waiting to pass it to Fuerte, who sent it across the box to Winchell. And it was like the most glorious ballet ever danced in France when Winchell sent that little ball right through the posts, delivering the Sharks a win just as the timer blared the end of the game.

  LePoivre was still standing near my box, so I sauntered over to him. “Hey,” I said. “I meant to thank you for the cheese.”

  He turned a sneer my way. “I happen to know you were puking your guts out all night. I have friends in that hotel.”

  I grinned. “Maybe, but after the storm comes the calm.”

  He shook his head, pretending not to know what I meant.

  “I just played the best game of my life. Thanks to your cheese,” I told him. “So thanks for sharing it with me.”

  His mouth opened, but he clearly didn’t know how to respond. I left him standing there, and joined my teammates in their celebration at mid-field.

  * * *

  The rest of our time in France was perfect. We did some more wine tasting and touring, but instead of running into people eager to deride American soccer and say awful things to us, we met people who congratulated us on the win and welcomed us. It was a short trip, only three more days after the match, but Magalie gave me a congratulatory gift that made everything perfect.

  “Amazing,” I said, stretching in the hotel room bed and pulling her close to me. I loved the way she fit me, I loved the way she smelled, I loved the way she smiled at me. I loved everything about her.

  “That was not your gift,” she said, smiling and then dropping a kiss on my chest.

  “What? You said ‘I have a gift for you,’ and the next thing I knew, you’d seduced me into bed.”

  She sat up, her hair perfectly wild around her head. “Actually, I told you I had a gift, and then you picked me up and tossed me on the bed like a Neanderthal and told me you were going to find it.”

  “I did find it,” I pointed out.

  “That wasn’t your gift.” She pouted and slid off the bed.

  “There’s more?” I sat up, feeling like my life could honestly not get better.

  Magalie dug around in her bag for a minute, returning to bed with a plastic wrapped package, which she handed to me.

  I let my mouth drop open and feigned surprise. “For me?”

  “Open it, Trace.” She scooted in close to me to watch me unwrap my present.

  A little wad of guilt came from nowhere and plopped into my gut. “But I didn’t get you anything.”

  Magalie bumped my shoulder with her own, pushing her hair from her face. “Just open it please.”

  I sighed and opened the package. And there inside, looking extremely French and totally perfect, was a brand new black beret. I put it on, turning to Magalie with a grin. “Ho
w do I look?”

  “Ridiculous,” she said, smiling.

  “It’s perfect,” I told her. “Thank you.” I pulled her into my arms and kept her there, thanking her not just for the beret, but for turning my life inside out, for fixing things I didn’t know were broken, and for making me happier than I ever thought I could be.

  SCORING A PRINCE

  BONUS EPILOGUE

  Chapter 159

  A Smear, Sir?

  Hamish

  Two years later

  The phone call wasn’t completely unexpected when it came.

  Uncle Vlad hadn’t been doing well. He’d taken a turn for the worse soon after our wedding, and Da had been beside himself. Charlie had kept us updated on the King’s condition, but the cancer struck him quick and hard, and his oldest son, Gavin, was being prepped to ascend.

  “You’ll come back for the funeral and the ceremony?” Charlie sounded tired, and I knew he’d been the rock Da and my mother had leaned on as they’d suffered through the loss of Dad’s brother the king.

  “Of course we will.” I glanced at Sophie, standing to one side of me holding our son, the king’s namesake in her arms. “Soph and little Vlad and I will come as quick as we can.” A small part of me dreaded the twelve-hour flight with a six-month-old baby, but there was nothing to be done for it. We’d survive. “I’ll send you an email with our arrangements.”

  Charlie and I said goodbye and I hung up, turning to face Sophie. “The king is gone.”

  She let out a breath and closed her eyes, tucking her chin into little Vlad’s mop of red curls. After a moment, she looked up at me with shining bright eyes. “I’m so sorry, Hamish.”

  I stepped close and put my arms around my wife and son, drawing solace from our little family, from their warmth and solidity inside the circle of my arms.

  “I’ll make arrangements,” Sophie said, kissing Vlad and handing him to me, and then heading for the office to book our flights home to Durnland.

  ***

  If you’ve never changed a diaper in an airplane bathroom, you’re missing out. Missing out on the sheer absurdity of how impossible this task is. There are no changing tables, no way to hang the diaper bag in a convenient spot where you can easily reach your supplies, and no way to keep the entire endeavor civilized and sanitary.

  “I’ve got it,” I assured my exhausted wife seconds after we heard Vlad’s trademark splooch just moments after the seatbelt sign had gone off.

  Sophie smiled at me, and I picked up the baby and the bag, having no idea what was in store for me at the end of the airplane corridor.

  Once I’d wedged Vlad and myself inside the tiny space, I turned, looking for the hook on the door. No such luck.

  “That’s all right,” I assured Vlad. I was a grown man. I could handle this.

  I sat the baby on the closed toilet seat, holding him there with one hand, and then reached into the bag for the diaper pad. I lifted Vlad up again, got that set up under him, and attempted to squat down to open up the onesie and pants he wore and assess the situation. Only there wasn’t enough room to squat, which put me leaning over instead. Not the most comfortable situation.

  “We’ve got it,” I assured him. “Not a wee bit of worry.”

  I pulled off his tiny pants. And that was the first indication that this was not going to be an easy fix.

  “Holy mother of sheep,” I breathed. Poop coated my son’s legs and oozed from beneath his diaper out the leg holes. “For fuck’s sake, lad, what has she been feeding you?”

  I tried to wad up the soiled pants, attempting to keep my mind off the smell, and the fact that the whole plane would be enjoying the smell if I didn’t find a way to contain it. The onesie and diaper itself cannot be mentioned or discussed in polite company. And my inability to easily access the wet wipes in my confined situation did not help matters.

  “Holy cripes…” I muttered, along with some other obscenities I immediately felt guilty about speaking near my son’s innocent ears. But for heaven’s sake, he was the responsible party here. He might as well see the fallout from such an exuberantly loaded diaper.

  I managed to strip the boy, dispose of all of his clothes and the diaper in a plastic bag that I then shoved into the tiny bathroom trash receptacle. Then I washed him down with some wet paper towels, something he did not particularly appreciate. The shrieks echoed off the bathroom walls like angry daggers assailing my eardrums.

  “I’ve got you, boy,” I assured him. “Almost done here. Just a little—” I was beginning to believe there was a light at the end of this poop-filled tunnel as I banged every joint I had against a wall or door in this tiny cubicle trying to clean up the baby, when he let loose with a stream of urine aimed directly at my face. It went absolutely everywhere. And the paper towel clean up began anew, this time including the floor and walls, my own beard and the front of my shirt.

  I finally managed to wrangle the boy into a new diaper—in the nick of time. He immediately splooched again, and I repeated the entire soul-shattering process.

  “For the love of God, Vlad.”

  He gave me a smile that led me to believe he was toying with me.

  Once the little lad was diapered up again and wrapped in a cloth I found inside the bag that I put around him like a tiny little Kilt, I lifted him to my shoulder. “A proper Durnishman ye are there, lad,” I told him, and he grinned at me some more.

  I managed a final wipe down of the surfaces I could reach, and we exited the bathroom, effectively bursting out the door. The flight attendants were gathered there, staring at me in surprise.

  “Very hard to change a babe in there,” I pointed out, glancing back to ensure I hadn’t left any substances smeared where I hadn’t seen them.

  They all nodded their agreement, staring at me with wide eyes and probably a bit of star recognition, and Vlad and I made our way back down the aisle. Sophie glanced up and frowned at Vlad’s attire.

  “His clothes?”

  “Ruined. Nothing to be done for it.”

  “And yours?” She grimaced at me.

  “Just water. I’m fine.”

  “That isn’t water, Hamish,” Sophie took the baby in one arm and pointed with her free hand at a smear across my chest I hadn’t noticed before. Perhaps the flight attendants hadn’t been overwhelmed by recognition so much as by shock at the smear of feces on my shirt.

  Oh sweet baby Vlad.

  I didn’t even have time to think. I whipped the shirt off, made it into a ball and shoved it into one of the diaper disposal bags, all while standing in the aisle.

  “You have another shirt with you?” She asked.

  “Ah … no.”

  “Well at least I have a change for Vlad.” She shook her pretty head.

  And that was how I ended up making the full transit to Durnland bare-chested, wearing an airline blanket like a toga across my middle as we exited the plane.

  Vlad managed to soil himself another four times during the journey, and for some reason Sophie wouldn’t let me handle any of the diaper changes after that first one.

  I was beginning to learn that doing something in exactly the wrong way could mean never having to do it again. I filed that lesson away for later use.

  Chapter 160

  He Who Smelt It…

  Sophie

  We hadn’t been back to Durnland since the wedding, and it was bittersweet returning now under these circumstances. It was wonderful showing little Vlad his homeland, bringing him to meet the family who hadn’t been able to travel for his birth. But it was awfully sad knowing we were here because King Vlad had died. Even the baby seemed to pick up on the somber mood as we sat around the living room in Hamish’s parents’ home, and he smiled gently and babbled quietly as he was passed from uncle to aunt to grandparent.

  “He’s a perfect little love!” Marigold exclaimed, holding him close to her chest.

  “Sure, for you,” Hamish muttered, having pulled a new shirt from his luggage when th
e suitcase arrived in baggage claim so that most of his family hadn’t witnessed him wearing the airline blanket. “Watch out though, that adorable baby produces substances previously encountered only in toxic waste dumps and zoos.”

  “Hamish,” Mam said, looking appalled her son could say such things about a tiny baby.

  As if on cue, Vlad let out a long rumble of a fart from where he sat in Charlie’s lap, and then smiled up at him as if the noise (and smell) had come from somewhere else altogether. The entire room erupted into laughter.

  A little while later, after everyone had eaten and the ale and wine was flowing, James and Dane found their way across the room, a strange look of intent on each of their faces.

  “Oh now, what’s this?” Hamish asked as they approached.

  “How’s it work then?” Dane said, sitting down next to me and giving me a wide-eyed look.

  ‘What’s that?”

  “Mr. Match. We want to try it,” James said, nodding.

  “I thought it was just in the states,” Hamish said, turning to me with an eyebrow raised. Max hadn’t said anything about going international, but then again, Max didn’t say much about the business since Talullah had taken over.

  “It is,” Dane confirmed. “We’ll move.”

  I exchanged a look with Hamish.

  “Well, the thing is, lads, I never really put myself in. Someone else did that for me.”

  “That’s why we asked Sophie,” James pointed out, dropping his chin into one hand and giving me a look that said he was ready to listen.

  “Well,” I said. “It’s a little complicated, I guess. There’s a long questionnaire, if I recall. A few questions about pineapple and rodents that made little sense to me at all …”