by Kelly, A. S.
“Observant of you.”
“And you’ll probably never accept this whole thing…”
“What thing, boy?”
“Me and Casey.”
“If you want me to treat you like a man, then start acting like one when you say her name. Or start running. Fast.”
I gather the last scraps of my courage and take a deep breath. “I’m in love with your daughter,” I say quickly.
“Mmm.”
“And, I have no idea why, but she loves me, too.”
“I have no idea why, either.” Don Madigan crosses his arms and studies me intently.
“I know that I’m not good enough for her, but I love her, coach. She’s the most important person in my life and I promise that I’ll do everything I can do make her happy.”
“So no more bullshit?”
“No, sir.”
“I never liked you, O’Connor.”
“I know that, sir.”
“And I don’t think I ever will.”
“I can accept that.”
“But you’re better than that surgeon. I couldn’t deal with him. He didn’t even like sport.”
I smile, despite myself.
“But I’m warning you: I’ll be keeping an eye on you. A close eye. And if you make her sad, or she even thinks about crying…”
“You’ll shoot me up the arse with your rifle.”
“No. I’ll kill you with my bare hands. I already have a place picked out in the garden, under that tree over there. See?” he says, pointing to it. “I could dig you a nice, deep hole, where all the pieces of your body will fit nicely after I’ve torn you apart.”
I swallow, nervous.
“Are we clear, boy?”
“Crystal clear.”
Suddenly his face loses its certainty, concern etching itself into his expression.
“She’s all I have, Nick.” For the first time in my life, the coach calls me by my name. “Casey’s my whole life.”
“I know, sir. But she’s my whole life, too.”
He nods, serious. “Well. I guess we have something in common, then.”
Suddenly, I hear the door to her apartment shutting, and turn to see her approaching us. She’s wearing a green dress and flat shoes, with her hair pulled back and a smile that melts the world around us.
“Something unique, sir.”
“Hey, you two.” Casey joins us. “What are you talking about?” she asks, looking between us.
“Everything,” I respond, sliding my hands around her waist. “Shall we go?”
“Sure, I’m ready.”
I turn to the coach. “Don’t wait up for me to bring her home,” I say, a challenge.
“Don’t wait for me to find out where you live and slice your balls off in your sleep.”
“I’ll bear that in mind.”
Casey pulls away from me to give her dad a kiss on the cheek. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
He nods, hardly overjoyed, but doesn’t say anything else. I grab Casey’s hand and lead her to my car. We climb inside and I start the engine as she clicks her seatbelt into place.
“Ready for an O’Connor evening?”
She turns to me, her eyes glowing, happiness seeping out of every pore. “I can’t wait.”
* * *
As soon as we get to The Bridge, I head straight for the table, where my brothers and Jamie are sitting. Tonight, everyone from the centre is here. They start their training again in a week, and the guys on the team wanted to organise a party to mark the start of the new season. I have nothing to do with it, obviously – I’m not on the team, and I’m not part of the centre – but I’m Nick, right? I’m always invited.
“Hey, mate!” Jamie says, getting to his feet. “Well, look who you’ve brought along…”
“Shut up,” I say, stopping him.
“Hey, Casey. I’m Jamie, the captain.”
“I know exactly who you are, Jamie Murray,” Casey says, accepting his outstretched hand. “My dad worships you.”
Jamie laughs, satisfied. “He’s not the only one.”
“Jesus, Casey! Don’t inflate his ego even more,” Ryan complains.
“Where are Riley and Chris?” I ask, sitting down.
“Dancing,” Ian responds, sipping his beer.
“Then why are you two over here?”
“Because they didn’t want us there.”
Casey bursts out laughing. Then she touches me arm lightly and whispers: “Do you mind if I go and join them?”
“Absolutely not. But please, stay away from those two,” I say, pointing to Scott and Jake, in the middle of the dance floor. “They sometimes let their hands wander, and I really don’t feel like beating anyone up tonight.”
“Don’t worry, I can defend myself.”
“I know that. But I’m not sure I could keep my fists to myself if they tried anything.”
Casey shakes her head, gives me a kiss, then heads towards the dance floor.
“Fuck, man,” Jamie says, right away. “She’s…”
“What?” I say, snapping around to face him.
Jamie’s expression sweetens. “She’s worth the risk.”
I exhale deeply, before responding. “She’s worth everything.”
* * *
As soon as Jamie and I are alone at the table, I gather my courage and bring up the one subject I’ve been avoiding.
“I’ve thought about it.”
“About what?”
“About what you said.”
“Mate, you’ll have to be more specific. I say a lot of things.”
“Too many,” I say, taking a sip of my beer.
“What are you talking about?”
“Your idea. Your job offer. Is it still open, by any chance?”
“Have you decided you want to be a babysitter?”
“Fuck off.”
“Jesus, you O’Connors are so easy to wind up.”
“I’m trying to be serious here, and you’re taking the piss.”
“Okay,” he says, raising his hands in surrender. “I’ll try to be serious.”
“I just want to know if the offer’s still open.”
“Maybe…”
“Jamie.”
“You’re lucky. I have friends in high places.”
I shake my head, exasperated.
“I guess I could put in a good word for you. They’ve already done a few interviews, but they haven’t hired anyone yet. They’re still deciding – but, you know, the season starts next week and time’s running out. You need to act now.”
“Do you reckon I can do it?”
Jamie smiles at me. “You can do anything, Nick. But only if you really want it.”
I consider this for a few moments.
“Do you want it?”
“I’m starting to think it might be the right solution.”
“Not just because you have nothing else lined up at the moment?”
“No, that’s not why. I’ve thought about it, and I don’t think I’d mind it. Besides, I miss rugby. I was never able to be the player I wanted to be, but maybe I could become someone else instead,” I say, turning my gaze back to Casey, who’s coming back towards our table.
Jamie leans closer. “You may not have become the player you wanted to be, Nick, but you’ve become the man that everyone knew you were.”
Jamie gets to his feet, leaving me alone with Casey, who’s just reached the table.
“Don’t you want to dance?” she asks me, her head tilted quizzically.
“I’m here for you,” I say, pulling myself to my feet. “Do whatever you want with me.”
She laughs, shaking her head. “Oh, I will, O’Connor. You can be sure of that.”
She leads me over to the dance floor and I pull her close to me. She lifts her gaze to meet mine, and I can feel her soul pulling me in – it’s so beautiful, so light. So pure. It’s like I could reach out and touch it, trace its edges with one finger; it’s like I can feel
it taking me by the hand and guiding me out of the darkness, saving me from the raging inferno and up into paradise. I can feel its grip now – so determined that it projects its strength, its love, into me. She’s giving me everything I could never have on my own. And I know that I could only ever have it next to her.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she asks, pulling me out of my trance.
“I like your dress.”
She smiles. “I knew green was someone’s favourite colour.”
I bend down to her, brushing my lips against hers. “Thank you, Casey.”
“For what? It’s just a dress.”
“For helping me realise that, without us, I was nothing.”
“Oh…I…”
“It’s as if you’re an angel sent to save me from my personal hell, to help me find the way.”
“The way to heaven?” she asks, raising an eyebrow in amusement.
“The way home.”
She bites down on her lip, trying to hold back her emotions.
“I could never thank you enough for that. You…you brought me back, showed me the light. You believed in me, you loved me, and I… I finally feel like me: like Nick, with all his mistakes and all his bullshit. But it’s all real. I just feel like…myself.”
“And I love you, just as you are.”
And I love her. I love the way she makes me feel about myself, the way I feel when I’m with her.
I love who we are together.
A safety net. A home.
A family.
Everyone deserves a family, I once said to someone, years ago.
Now I finally feel like I might deserve one, too.
Epilogue
Nick
“You’re not nervous, are you?”
“What the fuck are you on about?”
“I don’t know, you seem nervous. You’re as white as a sheet, and you look like you’re about to heave up everything you’ve eaten.”
“Who the fuck let you in, anyway?” I ask Ryan, losing my patience.
“Stupid question. Him,” Ian says, nodding towards Jamie, who’s winding up the kids.
“Jesus, this is never-ending. It’s like a vicious cycle.”
“Do to others as you want done to yourself,” Ryan says, obviously asking for a fist through his face.
“Couldn’t you have gone and sat in the stands like normal people?”
“We’re not normal. We’re O’Connors,” Ian says proudly.
“So, guys. We ready?” Jamie says, poking his head between Ian and Ryan and throwing his arms around their shoulders. “How are you feeling, Nick?”
“Like someone who’s about to tell you to fuck off.”
“Same as always, then.”
“Can you guys leave now? We have a match to play.”
“Sure, coach. No problem,” Ryan says, sniggering.
“I swear I’ll tell Mum.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Try me. I’m the son who makes her proud now. You guys aren’t in fashion anymore.”
“Until you fuck everything up again,” Ian warns.
“I’m sure the next person to fuck anything up will be Ryan.”
“Why do you guys always have to get me involved?”
“You’re the one who always gets yourself involved in–”
“Coach? It’s time to go.”
I turn to see one of my kids. “What are you waiting for, then? Come on, let’s go!”
So, here I am. Nick O’Connor, rugby coach. Don’t laugh, please. Don’t be like my brothers: take pity on me. I fucking deserve it.
I never thought I’d go down this route – I was too busy making mistakes, too angry with myself to ever admit what I really wanted – but I really missed sport. The adrenaline, the motivation, the hard work, the fear of failure: all emotions that keep you alive, burn you up inside. Emotions I should never have given up.
And now it’s my turn. It won’t be like it was for my brothers: this is really important to me. It’s something I’ve chosen, a decision that has been growing inside me ever since that stupid summer camp with Jamie. That’s when I realised that setting foot on the pitch doesn’t necessarily mean playing.
Maybe Jamie really does have a sixth sense. Maybe he really can see and understand everything before you’ve even got there yourself. Or maybe he’s just a lucky bastard who can’t keep his nose out of other people’s lives.
I sit down on the bench as the senior coach leads the warm-up. I check their formations, as nervous as they are for them all to be out on the field.
“Hey, coach.” Someone pokes me on the back. “Nervous?”
“No fucking way.”
“He’s about to shit himself!” Ryan’s loveable voice comes floating over from the stands.
I turn towards the bleachers. “Really? Front row?”
“Obviously.”
The problem with training the youth team is that all the matches take place on the small pitch – the one in Donnybrook – which means that the seating area is practically on top of the benches. Which means I’m surrounded constantly by loud, cheerful people who think they’re at the bloody Olympics, not at a Sunday morning rugby match for the youth championship. And the biggest problem is that my family have decided to come and ‘cheer me on’ at my first match.
There are those two arseholes, Evan, Riley, Chris, Jamie, Casey and her dad, and… Wait a minute. What the fuck is Dr Dickhead doing here?
“Why are you here?” I ask him, when I notice his presence.
“I came to help out.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t want to miss this.”
“But you don’t even like rugby!”
“I think I might be starting to like it,” Martin says, a cheeky smile on his face.
“Forget about them,” Casey says to me, bringing me back into the present. “Just think about winning.”
“I’m thinking about getting home later.”
There’s a sudden cough from behind me. Coach Madigan nods surreptitiously towards my crotch, reminding me what I have to lose.
“I like your T-shirt,” I say to Casey, going back to more important topics of conversation.
I love the coach, it reads, with a huge heart in the middle.
“I think I’ll like it even more on my bedroom floor.”
“Can we please get back to the match?” the senior coach calls me.
Well, what did you expect? The fact that I’ve decided to stop living a lie, to follow a career as a kids’ rugby coach, doesn’t mean that I’ve given up my day job: being a dick. Some things never change, even though life forces you to make a decision. Just like the way you feel about people never changes, either.
I can never stop loving my brothers, despite all their fuck-ups. I can never stop worrying about my family.
I can never stop loving her, dreaming of our future together.
Maybe I won’t be able to give her everything she deserves. Maybe it’ll always just be the two of us; maybe that’ll be enough, and maybe it won’t, but I can’t spend the rest of my life asking myself that question. All I can do is live my life, build a new world that’s all our own, where she can feel loved, and I can try to make her happy, giving her everything I have.
And I can’t wait another day. I can’t even wait another minute.
I want a family with her.
And I want it for the rest of my life.
* * *
CASEY
“They’re going to lose.”
“Dad, stop being so negative.”
“I’m just being honest.”
“This is only their first match. Have a little faith in him.”
“I’ve already got a little too much faith in him.”
“I think they’re going to lose, too,” Martin interjects.
“Did you guys just come here to jinx it?”
“There’s no jinxing involved,” Jamie says, dropping himself down onto the step behind us
. “They’re just being realistic. The boys aren’t a proper team yet, their formation is all wrong. Nick has no fucking clue what he’s doing, and the senior coach looks like he’s on the brink of a nervous breakdown.”
“But it’s just a kids’ match,” Martin comments.
Jamie turns to him. “Dr Dickhead, I imagine.”
“The famous rugby champ.”
“So, tell me, dear doctor. What sports experience is it that you have, exactly?”
“What has experience got to do with it? We’re talking about kids, a friendly match.”
Jamie bursts into laughter behind me, shortly joined by my dad. “There’s no such thing as a friendly rugby match.”
“Oh, really?” Martin crosses his arms, one eyebrow arched.
“You wouldn’t get it. You don’t know what I’m talking about.”
“Maybe you could try explaining it to me, instead of pissing around.”
“Maybe you should go back to your crisp, white shirt. Oh, and don’t forget the hand sanitiser!”
“Oh, come on! Cut it out!” Dad cries. “I’m trying to watch the game.”
Jamie sits back down, as Martin fixes his gaze in front of him, his face red with rage.
I shake my head and turn my eyes back to the field, hoping that I can watch the rest of the game in peace. I really hope that they win: I’m not sure how Nick would take a loss.
Nick doesn’t like to lose.
It’s nice to see him so involved in something that he really believes in, to see him love what he does. Nick loves rugby, and these past few years must’ve been hard, sitting there watching his brothers’ sporting successes. He lost his confidence. He didn’t believe he had a chance; he never stopped to look around at what he had, to find something that made him feel alive again. Something that could take up an important space in his heart.
Nick’s a teddy bear, hiding behind his arrogance and his quick wit. He tries to be tough, even when he’s not: but that’s exactly why I love him.
I love that vulnerable side to him. It makes him real, and I adore the real Nick. The one who has no filter when he speaks, who’s always ready to risk everything for love.
The only thing that matters to me is who we are together.
