Work Text:
Keeley had assumed she wouldn’t be welcome at team outings anymore, now that she doesn’t work for Richmond directly. But she got the group text about going to the club tonight, just like always, and when she tried to ignore it and work late, she got a series of texts from all the lads and Roy as well, asking if she was caught in traffic and if they should come get her. So here she is, still in her I Am An Independent, Professional Woman clothes and not-nearly-sexy-enough heels, at the club with the team, insisting she is only going to have one drink.
Her third drink is already in her hand. These boys always get around her best intentions.
She takes a slow sip and shimmies with the beat of the music, glancing around the room. Most of the players are on the dance floor, burning off more of their apparently endless energy. Roy and Ted and Beard are at the other end of the bar, having a discussion that’s either about tactics or scotch. Isaac and Colin are the only two lingering with Keeley in comfortable quiet, nursing their own drinks and alternating between watching the dance floor and looking at their phones.
Keeley squints into the shadows kitty-corner from the bar, where a few tables are lined up against the wall. “Who’s that with Jamie?”
Even in the dim light, she can tell that the woman is tall and willowy and icy-blonde, like some kind of snow witch from a fantasy movie. She’s talking animatedly, her hands flitting around in the air between them, and Jamie is looking at her with a little smile that makes Keeley’s heart twist in her chest. Jamie had never looked at her like that when they were dating. He sometimes looks at her like that now, after his year of growth and development or becoming a better version of himself or… or whatever it was.
Isaac’s voice startles her back to herself. “That’s Celia.”
“His new girlfriend,” Colin adds.
“She’s beautiful.” Keeley brings her drink to her mouth again and takes a maybe too-large sip. “Fuck that, she’s gorgeous.” Isaac grunts, and Keeley’s been with Roy long enough to translate it as a not entirely positive sound. “What? She is. That’s just… objective fact.”
Colin and Isaac look at each other, and for a moment there’s some kind of silent conversation going on quite literally over Keeley’s head. “We don’t like her,” Colin says finally.
“What?” Keeley frowns up at them. “Why not?”
Isaac shrugs, his eyes fixed on Jamie and Celia’s table. “She hits when she gets angry.”
Keeley’s stomach clenches and does an odd little flip. “She what? He told you that?”
Isaac shrugs again, still not looking at her. “No, of course he didn’t.”
“We bloody figured it out ourselves,” Colin adds. “Came in with a black eye and said he ran into a door.”
“Came in with bruises and scratches and said they were from sex.” Isaac lifts an eyebrow. “Never seen sex marks look like that.”
Colin shakes his head. “So we were wondering, like. And then one day the lads are all talking about their girls, and he tells a story about Celia’s temper, and we all just looked at each other and it went click.”
“We kept keeping an eye out and it kept not adding up to anything else.” Isaac puts his empty glass down on the bar and signals for another drink. “He won’t say anything, of course. And he wouldn’t want us telling you. But you’re the only one who has a chance of getting through to him, you know, Keeley? So Colin and me, we thought maybe…”
Fucking hell. “I appreciate it, but the ex-girlfriend criticizing the new girlfriend is hardly going to get through, is it?”
“Shit,” Collin mutters. “There is that.”
Isaac takes his new drink from the bartender and downs half of it in a long swallow. “Right, then. We’ll keep looking out for him.”
“I know you will. You’re good lads.” She puts her own drink down so she can grab their free hands and squeeze gently. “I’ll talk to him if I can.”
**
If Jamie wouldn’t want her to know, he would rather hurl himself off a cliff than have Roy know. She’ll need to poke around the matter delicately.
“Babe?” she asks when they get home that night, while he’s ready for bed and she’s still midway through taking her makeup off. “Got a minute for a question?”
“Always.” He stops in the washroom doorway and looks at her. “Everything all right?”
“Mm. I’m fine.” She dabs at her eyes with a cotton ball, wishing that fucking false lashes came off on purpose as easily as they fell off in the middle of a fucking CEO presentation. “Just wondering if you noticed anything off about Jamie lately?”
Roy frowns and leans on the doorframe, crossing his arms over his chest, and as always she loses the plot for a moment, distracted by looking at him. “Jamie? He’s always a bit off, isn’t he?”
“Moreso than usual, I mean, Mr. Smartarse.” There, left eye done. On to the right. “I didn’t get a chance to talk to him tonight, but some of the boys mentioned he hasn’t quite been himself.”
“They were probably grateful.” He holds up a hand before she can glare at him. “Let me think… well, there might be a carbon monoxide leak in his house, because he’s fucking clumsy lately. Gave himself a black eye one day, and another he had bruised ribs all the way up and down from falling out of bed.”
It’s Keeley’s turn to frown. “Falling out of bed?”
“That’s what he said, he fell out of bed in the middle of the night. I said that only happens to children and maybe he should get a fucking bed with sides like a toddler.”
Boys are so fucking crude. “What did he say to that?”
Roy thinks for another moment, and what she thinks of as Frown Level Three settles on his face. That one has a deep line down his forehead, and the corners of his mouth sort of tuck in. It’s a more serious frown than the first two levels. “Actually he didn’t say anything. Didn’t mouth off at me, just ran back to start the drill over. Ted let him go early because he was all stiff and looked like shit through training, and he didn’t mouth off about that, either. Just went.”
Keeley reaches for her undereye serum with less enthusiasm than the expensive bottle deserves. “That doesn’t sound like him, does it?”
“It doesn’t. You’re right.” Roy unfolds his arms and walks back over to her, wrapping his arms around her and pressing a gentle kiss to her hair. “I’ll keep an eye on him. Promise.”
“Thank you.” She wants to tell him what Isaac and Colin said, what the other boys have put together since they’re properly in the room with Jamie, while Roy is removed by a level now, off somewhere else with the coaches. But Jamie wouldn’t want her to. She can’t justify it the way Isaac and Colin did; Roy won’t be discreet if he knows. He’ll go barging off and shout in Jamie’s face and turn everything into a scene. That’s not the right approach here.
Unfortunately, she doesn’t have any brilliant ideas for what is.
**
Another week goes by, and she keeps worrying. She doesn’t hear anything from Isaac or Colin, and Roy doesn’t mention anything either, but she can’t stop thinking about it. Her distraction makes her make mistakes at work. It makes her burn Roy’s toast one morning and forget the cream in her own coffee. She can’t go on like this.
So she texts Jamie and asks if he’d like to meet up for coffee and a chat. Just catch up. Like friends do, and they’re friends, aren’t they? Middle of the day, busy coffee shop, nothing untoward.
It takes her four tries to type a message she doesn’t have to delete before sending for sounding completely and utterly mental. This shouldn’t be so difficult.
When she does finally send one, Jamie replies faster than she expected. He’d love to meet up, with three smiley emojis and a coffee cup one. He suggests a place near his house that she’d always quite liked. She sends back a date and time, he gives a thumbs-up. All very easy, compared to her dithering beforehand. Maybe she had been overthinking this.
Roy gets home from training in a foul mood the day before the coffee date. “This is an important match coming up and Jamie’s all over the fucking place. We need him to be in top form and instead he’s off on Mars or something. Distracted. I asked him what was going on in his fucking head and he just looked at me. Couldn’t even explain himself.”
Keeley looks at him over the edge of her laptop, and when that doesn’t seem to set off any lightbulbs for him, she closes the screen and looks at him more intently.
“What?” he asks. “What’s that look for?”
“Wouldn’t this fit into the category of things you’re supposed to be keeping an eye out for, regarding Jamie? Like we talked about? Because something might be wrong?”
“Oh. Shit.” Roy stares off into space for a moment. “Right. Well, in that case, I shouldn’t have said what I said after that. That was a bit overly harsh.”
Keeley sighs and puts her head down on her laptop. “I understand that football is its own little world but I do think you might consider trying to make it not-okay to talk to each other like that ever—”
“I know, I know. Ted’s on me about it, too.” Roy sighs. “Fuck.”
She can’t bring herself to lift her head up. Not yet. Not while she has tears in her eyes. “Do better, babe. Please?”
“I’m trying. I swear I am.” His hand settles carefully on her shoulder, and she covers it with her own, because she does love him, and she does know he’s trying, and it’s hard to change a hundred years of behavior all by himself on one team, even if it is under Ted Lasso’s management.
“I love you,” she says, and he kisses her hair again, and she’s glad the laptop is already closed because it makes it easier to push it aside and go upstairs with him for something a lot closer to lovemaking than their usual romps before they have to think about getting dinner.
**
Jamie is waiting at the coffee shop when she gets there, a plain blue cap pulled down over his eyebrows instead of the ICON one. His clothes are plain, too, quiet rather than the attention-getters he usually favors. He shrugs at her questioning look and gesture up and down his body.
“Didn’t want to have people fussing around us while we’re trying to catch up.” He smiles and it’s the same kind of sweet one she’d noticed at the club, the new one that she likes so much. “I don’t look ugly, do I?”
“You know you never do and never could.” She hooks her elbow with his and marches him up to the counter. “Is it a cheat day? Can you have something ridiculous and sugary with whipped cream?”
“Saved the day just for that. You want your usual?” At her nod he gently untangles his arm from hers. “Go grab us a table, then. I’ll get these.”
“Big spender.” She finds a table tucked away in a corner, where Jamie can sit with his back to the room. He joins her with a mug in each hand and a biscuit apiece, little plates balanced on top of the mugs with surprising deftness.
“Cheers.” He takes a sip of his sugary thing and wiggles in pleasure. “Fuck, that’s good.”
“Glad I could give you an excuse to indulge.” She smiles at him, curling both hands around her own drink to keep from reaching across the table and wiping a bit of whipped cream off his lip. “So, how are you? How are things?”
“Great. Good. You know, busy. Got some big matches coming up. I’ve been missing a step the last few days, got to get meself back on form.” He makes a face and takes another drink. “I’m sure Roy’s talked your ear off about that.”
“He mentioned that the next few matches are important.” She tilts her head and studies his face for a moment. He’s got circles under his eyes, and he missed a spot shaving, up on the curve of his jaw. “Why do you think you’re off a step? You sleeping all right?”
He shrugs and starts breaking his biscuit into little pieces. “Well enough, I guess. Maybe it’s the weather.”
The weather has been perfectly normal. “Maybe Mercury’s in retrograde.”
That gets her a brow-furrow, like she knew it would. “What’s in what now?”
“Just astrology. Blame the planets for your problems.”
“Oh. Well, yeah, in that case. All Mercury’s fault.” He picks up one of the biscuit-pieces and eats it slowly. “I like that idea, blaming the planets.”
“I’ll do your chart sometime.” She lets quiet settle for a few minutes, both of them eating and drinking. She can’t stop looking at that bit of stubble on his jaw. Not like him to miss a spot. “So I didn’t get a chance to say hello the last time the team went out, but I saw the girl you were with. She’s lovely.”
“Oh.” Jamie blinks a few times. “Yeah, Celia. She’s… she’s pretty amazing.”
Keeley smiles, or maybe bares her teeth. “What does she do? Model? Actress?”
“She’s in real estate, actually.” Jamie’s cheeks have gone all red. “My agent introduced us. They’re friends.”
“Oh, wow.” Celia was absolutely a model before she was in fucking real estate. Keeley has a sense for these things. “She must be brilliant.”
“Smarter than me, that’s for sure. Not that that’s saying much.” He rests his chin in his hand. “She’s like you, you know?”
Keeley takes a careful sip so she won’t say something she shouldn’t. Fuck, she’s almost out of coffee. “Is she?”
“She wants to help me be better. Show me how. No excuses, you know? She’s going to…” He gestures vaguely. “I dunno. Fix me. She says I could be perfect if I tried.”
“You’re perfect the way you are.”
He laughs softly. “That’s sweet, Keeley, but you know it’s not true.”
“You’ve done so much work. You’ve grown so much. It’s wonderful.”
“Yeah, but I’m far from perfect. You know. I still piss people off like it’s my second job. I’ve got a temper. I’m fucking… shallow. And thick-headed. I don’t read books or…” He trails off and sighs, shrugging again. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’d still rather be Jamie Tartt than anyone else. I’m brilliant at football and that’s still the most important thing. But I could be a lot better, as a person. Celia’s pushing me on it.”
Keeley can’t help but reach across the table now, carefully touching the back of his wrist. “I don’t like hearing you say things like that about yourself.”
This is another new Jamie-smile, a sad one, and she doesn’t like it one bit. “Sorry.”
She can feel how fragile the moment is, how easily it could tip toward Jamie trusting her or pushing her away and locking himself up in his head. Best to not scare him or make him feel cornered. “As long as she’s good to you, yeah?”
“She’s great.” He flushes again, all the way to the tips of his ears. “A gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell, though.”
She makes herself laugh and pat his hand again. “Since when has that stopped you?”
“I’m trying to be good, here, Keeley!” At least this is a proper smile. “Thanks for asking after me. ‘s nice of you.”
“We’re friends, Jamie. I want to be friends.”
“I know. I won’t mess it up again.” His phone buzzes in his pocket, and he takes his hand away from hers to check it. “Fucking… hell. I’ve got to take this, Keeley, I’m sorry.”
“It’s all right. You’re a busy man.” And she’s done as much as she can in one conversation. “Go ahead, I’m about done anyway. See you soon?”
“Absolutely.” He gets up, phone already to his ear. “Bye, Keels. Hey, yes, sorry, I was just having coffee...”
She sits there for a while after he’s gone, looking into her empty mug and trying to gather her composure. Things aren’t right; she can feel it all the way through her heart. But she doesn’t know what the fuck to do about it.
**
Roy finds her crying in her dressing room before they leave for the match. “Keeley? What’s wrong?”
She sniffles and wipes at her eyes, dully aware that she’s going to have to do her mascara and falsies all over again. “If I say nothing, will you believe me?”
“No.” He takes her free hand carefully in both of his. “It’s something you don’t want to tell me, though?”
“You’re getting so much better about feelings, babe.” She manages a watery smile. “And actually I would like to tell you very much, but I can’t. It’s not my thing to talk about.”
He nods slowly. “Something’s wrong with a friend, and it’s making you sad?”
She wipes at her eyes again. Fuck, they must be a mess. “Exactly that. Yeah.”
He pulls her into a hug and she clings to him, silently grateful that he’s so warm and solid and strong. Holding on to him makes it all feel just a little more bearable.
“Tell me if there’s anything I can do to help?” he murmurs in her ear. She nods and holds on tighter, until he gives a little grunt of pain.
“Sorry.” She lets go and steps back, blinking away the last tears and feeling her left eyelashes flop down onto her cheek. “Fuck.”
He glances at the clock on her dressing table. “Do you still want to come? If you want to stay home and rest I understand.”
“No, I’m coming.” She works the other lashes off and throws them on the table. “I just might have to be bare-faced and scary.”
“You’re perfect bare-faced.”
“I’m blotchy.” The image of Jamie across the cafe table putting himself down flashes in her mind, and she stops herself from saying more. “Thank you, though, babe. I appreciate it.”
“Any time.” He glances at the clock again, an agonized look in his eyes. “But if you are coming then we sort of need to—”
“Right, right.” She pulls out the pack of makeup wipes she keeps for times like these, when she can’t do the whole proper routine. “I’m on it.”
**
Rebecca is understandably concerned to see her bare-faced and upset, and Keeley has to repeat the whole routine with Roy, about how one of her friends is in a bad way that she can’t talk about in specifics. Rebecca’s hugs are very nearly as good as Roy’s.
“Let me know if there’s anything I can do at all,” she says, and Keeley nods, because maybe at some point there will be. Banning the woman from the grounds, or something. Ruining a real estate deal? She doesn’t know enough about how that world works to plan it.
Just before the players take the pitch, Keeley realizes that the woman in question is there, sitting in the seats reserved for players’ guests. She’s wearing a gorgeous, teal green wool coat instead of a Richmond windbreaker, and her hair’s done up in an artful pile of curls that the sun and wind are going to take to pieces in no time at all. Keeley lets herself enjoy the thought for a moment before she nudges Rebecca and nods toward Celia.
“That’s Jamie’s new girl. In the coat.”
Rebecca’s eyebrows dart upward. “Well. They must set a record for hair products when they go out.”
“Rebecca!” Keeley swats her arm and laughs. “Isn’t she pretty?”
“She is. She looks familiar, a bit.” Rebecca frowns. “I can’t quite place her.”
“Her name’s Celia. She’s in real estate, if that helps?”
“Oh! Oh, that… yes.” Rebecca huffs, her eyes narrowing. “She helped Rupert sell a flat.”
Well, shit. “Just sell a flat?” Keeley asks as delicately as she can. “Or… that and more?”
“I’ve no idea. Could be either.” Rebecca shakes her head. “I don’t think I’ll go introduce myself, though.”
“No, of course not.” That’s the last thing Keeley wants to do. “We’re all just here to watch the match, that’s fine.”
Rebecca’s still staring at Celia, though. “Rupert gave her the card of his preferred plastic surgeon, anyway. He gives all of them the same look around the eyes.”
“I don’t believe in being mean to girls over getting work done,” Keeley says, a little regretfully, because having another reason to be mean to Celia would be lovely.
“Oh, neither do I. Just wish she’d gotten it done by someone better than that hack.” She sighs and leans a little against Keeley’s shoulder. “We should go get some Botox done. Make it a spa day?”
“Absolutely.” They’ve done that before, massage and mud wraps and Botox. A nice girls’ outing, even if Roy got weird about the Botox. “Just pick the day.”
“Pick one two months out if we both want to fit it on our calendars.”
“Ha. That’s the bloody truth… referee!” Keeley wails as the other team romps through Richmond with elbows flying.
Richmond is awarded a penalty shot, which Jamie puts in beautifully. Celia stands up and claps and cheers, which shouldn’t be annoying, because most of the stadium is doing the same, but Keeley still glares at the back of her head. At least her curls are indeed wilting.
“Chin up, Keeley.” Rebecca squeezes her hand. “It’s a beautiful day, the boys are playing well, and we’re just three weeks out from the charity gala, where we can both get absolutely plastered on champagne and enjoy ourselves. I don’t think there’s any way that Jamie’s girlfriend can spoil that.”
**
Rebecca’s words turn out to be a prophecy, unfortunately.
A week before the gala, the boys have another club night. “We have to blow off steam before the party, so we can behave properly there,” is how Isaac explains it, which makes perfect sense to Keeley but leaves Roy rolling his eyes. Keeley makes sure she had a change of clothes and shoes with her this time, and gets there just as most of the team does, rolling up to the doors with big smiles and a general air of being important men in the world.
Keeley manages to attach herself to Jan’s elbow so she can be swept in with the lot of them instead of waiting in line. “Hello,” she says breathlessly. “Thanks for letting me borrow your height.”
“No problem, Miss Keeley.” Jan gives her a regal nod. “Would you like to be dropped off at the bar?”
“Please.” He moves through the crowd like a ship, and she can hurry along in his wake. It works out nicely.
“May I buy you a drink?” he asks politely, and she smiles, because even if she is a happily partnered woman now, it’s still very nice to have fit young men buying her drinks.
“Absolutely. Whatever you’re having.”
He throws his head back and laughs. “A brave woman!” He moves off to order and she turns to face the dancefloor, looking around to do a habitual headcount of the lads.
“Keeley!”
She turns again, practically spinning, and finds herself eyes to neckline with Celia. Jamie, the one who said her name, is standing there looking both happy and anxious, glancing back and forth between the two of them.
“You said we missed each other last time,” he says. “So I wanted to introduce you to Celia properly tonight.”
“Oh! Yes. Celia.” Keeley offers her hand and puts on her most blinding, camera-ready smile. “Keeley Jones.”
“The lion girl from the adverts.” Celia returns a matching smile and a brief handshake. “Those were adorable. I’m Celia Creslington.”
Of course she fucking is. “Jamie said you met through his agent?”
“Yes, that’s right. We’re old friends.”
“How nice.” Keeley is utterly at a loss. Luckily Jan appears at her shoulder with a glass of something or other. Presumably something Dutch.
“Here you are, Miss Keeley.” He sips his own drink and offers Jamie a fist-bump. “I wasn’t sure if you would make it, Tartt, you looked so tired after training.”
“I’m fine. I’m here.” Jamie touches Celia’s shoulder. “I’ll get us some drinks. Vodka tonic?”
“Absolutely.” Celia watches him go, then does a little shiver that Keeley recognizes as trying to keep some uncomfortable undergarments in place. “Well. I wasn’t sure if I’d meet you or not, Keeley. Always awkward, the ex and the new girl, isn’t it?”
“It doesn’t have to be.” Keeley takes a drink and finds that it’s actually quite nice. She should have more trust in Jan Maas. “Jamie and I are just friends now.”
“How nice. I always find it so difficult to be friends with exes. You just know them too well.”
“Knowing your friends well seems quite normal to me,” Jan says cheerfully. Keeley silently promises to make sure he gets a very nice endorsement deal very soon.
Celia gives him a thin-lipped smile. “I suppose.”
Jan isn’t done, though, and Keeley mentally increases the value of that endorsement deal. “Make sure you get Jamie home at a decent hour tonight! He’s been very tired and lethargic and it’s very bad for his football.”
Celia’s smile gets wider and more vicious. “Oh dear, am I keeping him too busy in bed to sleep?”
“I don’t think that’s the problem, no.” Jan finishes his drink and sets the glass on the bar. “Sex only fuels his powers, usually. Well, excuse me, I’m off to dance.”
Celia stares after him. “What the fuck is his problem?”
“He’s Dutch,” Keeley murmurs. “They’re very blunt people. Excuse me as well, Roy just came in.”
She tucks herself in under Roy’s arm and greets him with a kiss. “Who’s that you were talking to?” he asks, settling his hand happily on her hip.
“That’s Celia. Jamie’s new girlfriend.” She smiles up at him in case Celia is watching. “She’s awful.”
“Well, I’m sure Jamie isn’t dating her for her personality.”
“I hope not.” She steers Roy to the bar and firmly keeps her back to where Jamie and Celia are standing. She doesn’t want to spoil her night worrying about them. She can’t do anything tonight, so she might as well enjoy herself. Maybe she can even get Roy on the dancefloor.
She does manage it, though only for one song. They head home shortly after that, because why not have sex properly instead of simulating it to French electronica or whatever the genre is called these days. She doesn’t check her phone until much later, when Roy is asleep and she’s headed in that direction as well, squinting at the screen for a final look and finding a text from Colin among the social media notifs.
Celia got in a snit before she and Jamie left. Fingers crossed for how he shows up tomorrow. With a little prayer-hands emoji.
Well. That’s not going to do anything good for her dreams.
**
There isn’t training the next day, just film review, which is why they made the team night out when they did. Keeley works from home, curled up on the sofa with her laptop and a hot toddy because apparently she’s becoming too old to run round in clubs even if she does leave early. Or maybe the weather’s just a bit damp. She likes that explanation better.
Roy gets home with lunch for both of them and an odd look on his face. “Thanks, babe,” she says, setting her laptop aside. “What’s wrong?”
“Not sure if it’s something wrong or not. I might be overthinking it.” He rubs the back of his neck and puts the takeaway bag down next to her. “We need plates.”
She tries to wait patiently while he gets them, and then goes back for drinks, and then for absolutely nothing that she can tell, he just bolts back to the kitchen. “Roy!” she calls. “Get out here and eat.”
He shuffles obediently back and sits down next to her. “You know how we agreed I’d keep an eye on Jamie.”
“Yes.” Her stomach twists up unhappily. “Something was wrong with him today?”
“Like I said, I might be overthinking it.” He pushes his plate away untouched and looks at her. “Have you got a pair of your shoes around? The fancy ones, with the really long heels.”
“Stilettos?” She stares blankly at him. “Um, yeah, last night I took them off before we went upstairs, I think, they should be right over there.”
He gets up and goes to fetch one, then stands in front of the sofa gently testing the heft of it in his hand. “So Jamie came in with a bandage on his face here.” He touches his forehead up above his eyebrow, near the hairline. “And a bruise here.” Below his eye, along the cheekbone. “And the lads all started asking him what he did, you know, and he said he and Celia were playing around before they went to bed and she tossed one of her shoes at him, just silly, and he didn’t dodge right and it hit him in the face.”
He hefts the shoe again. “And I’m not an expert or anything, but these fucking shoes barely weigh anything at all. I feel like if you just tossed one, being silly—” He tosses it toward the sofa, where he was sitting before, and they both watch it gently tumble against the cushions. “Yeah. Like that.” He looks at her, one eyebrow lifting. “Keeley, how hard would someone have to throw one of these shoes to split skin and leave a bruise?”
She swallows. “Pretty fucking hard, I would think.”
“Yeah.” He picks up the shoe and takes it back to the foot of the stairs. “I’ve got no idea what to do with this idea that’s in my head now.”
She closes her eyes for a moment. “Jamie’s the friend I’ve been worrying about. Because of this. Isaac and Colin, they told me they had suspicions, and I talked to him, and I—”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It wasn’t mine to tell, Roy.”
“Yeah, but Keeley—” He stares up at the ceiling, his eyes suspiciously bright, and she looks at him in puzzlement. He likes Jamie more than he used to, moved quite a few levels up from thoroughly hating him, but that doesn’t explain this kind of reaction, where he looks like he might either cry or be sick.
“You weren’t around when Phoebe’s dad still was,” he says, and her stomach drops through the floor. Oh.
“He put my sister through absolute hell,” Roy says, his voice carefully controlled in a way she knows is costing him. “And obviously it’s not the same, exactly, Jamie’s not family and the… the dynamic is different and…”
“Babe, I’m so sorry.” She scrambles off the sofa and to his side, grabbing his hands and trying to get him to look at her. “I didn’t think of it that way, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have let you stumble over it without any warning, I’m so sorry.”
“Not your fault.” Roy takes a breath and puts his arms around her. It’s not a proper hug, it’s stiff and awkward, but it’s a signal that she can hold him, too, trying to offer all the comfort she can.
“I’ll take him to coffee again,” she says against Roy’s chest. “Talk to him. See if I can get through at all.”
“It can take a long time for people to be ready to walk away from it.” He sounds exhausted, and she starts backing toward the sofa again, tugging him along. “Don’t feel bad if he brushes you off.”
“I know.” She’s had plenty of friends deal with this sort of shit, even if nobody as close to her as a sister. “Maybe next time we’re all out you can distract Jamie and I can see how she likes being hit with a stiletto.”
Roy laughs a little bit, just a rumble in his chest but it’s something. “Don’t dirty your shoes, love.”
“Wouldn’t mind.” She gets him sitting down and curls up in his lap, pressing careful kisses to his face. “I love you. Thank you for being you.”
“I love you too. And I don’t know how to be anyone else.”
“I’m glad.” She rests her head on his shoulder and breathes in the smell of him, the one that makes her feel warm and safe and home.
**
Getting Jamie to sit down for coffee again ends up being more difficult than she expected. He’s evasive when she texts him, and finally she has to doll herself up and drop by Nelson Road for a visit to all of her old friends, with cornering him in a hallway as a side benefit.
“Get your phone out,” she says, putting her hands on her hips and raising an eyebrow at him in her best stern-schoolteacher pose. “We’re going to schedule this right now.”
“Aw, Keeley.” He has the good grace to look embarrassed, at least. “I’ve just been busy.”
“Mm-hmm. Don’t want to hear it. C’mon. Pick a time and place.”
He looks at his calendar and makes a face. “I can either do right now, or… next Thursday.”
“Right! Now it is.” She claps her hands. “Where would you like to go? Figure that out while I say goodbye to Roy and Rebecca. And don’t try to escape!”
“I’ll wait right here.” He’s smiling as she hurries off, and it’s a proper smile, too, despite the cut and bruise still clear on his face.
Rebecca tries to get her to stay longer, and Keeley has to get out her own phone and book their spa day right on the spot to get permission to leave. Roy just gives her a kiss and murmurs, “Don’t push.” She makes a mental note to wear the nightie he likes best tonight—less comfortable than her pajamas, but he’s been so amazing he deserves a thrill.
She finds Jamie right where she left him, as advertised, worrying his lower lip between his teeth and typing something on his phone. “Ready,” she chirps, hooking her arm through his. “Where are we going?”
“Is the one near yours okay? I can drive, and drop you off after.” He tucks his phone in his pocket and lets her steer him toward the doors.
“Yeah, of course. Thanks.” She wishes she could take it as just a nice thought and not wonder if it’s that he’s trying to avoid his own neighborhood, or the one around Nelson Road, since those are both places Celia knows to look for him. Keeley doesn’t like being suspicious and worried. It gives her headaches and probably wrinkles.
But both of those are better than a fucking shoe to the face, aren’t they.
She doesn’t bring it up until they’re seated, coffees in hand. Then she reaches across the table and carefully brushes her fingertips over the bruised cheekbone. “Gotta be careful with your face, eh? It’s too pretty for all this.”
He laughs a little and looks down at the table. “Just a silly accident.”
“Yeah, Roy told me. Sexy accident.” She takes a sip and waits for him to look up. “You’ve had a lot of accidents lately, it sounds like. Everything all right?”
“Think maybe Roy’s right about a carbon monoxide leak in the house. I’ll have to have an inspector come round.” He sighs and rests his head on his hand. “I dunno. Just in a slump, I guess. At football and just at life.”
“C’mon. Talk to Dr. Keeley about it.” She wishes she was a proper doctor, like Dr. Fieldstone, who would know what to do here for real. Not making it up as she went along.
He hesitates, staring into his drink. “I told you, right, that Celia’s kind of like you? She wants to make me better.”
“You did, yeah.” She won’t offer her opinion on that, just yet.
“She’s just… she’s got a lot of ideas and she wants me to do all of them at once and it’s just, it’s… I didn’t think I was quite that awful, you know? I thought I was doing all right.”
“You’re not awful, Jamie. You’ve done tons of work already and you should be proud of that.”
“I thought so.” He glances at her, his eyes bewildered, then looks back down. “But it’s even stuff I thought I was all right at. Like, she wants to change out all my clothes. She got me a proper suit for the gala, right, and I remembered when you tried to get me to wear one the last time and I said no and did what I wanted, and I feel so bad about that, now, I should’ve listened to you, you were just trying to be good to me. To help me be better.”
“Jamie. Jamie.” She puts her hands over his, trying to steady him when the frantic flow of words stops. “That wasn’t a problem at all, you wanted to be yourself and that’s fine. You’re allowed to be yourself.”
“It don’t feel like it anymore.” He shakes his head. “Doesn’t. Doesn’t feel like it.”
Her annoyance slips through despite herself. “Oh, speech lessons too?”
“Fuck.” He slumps back in his chair, tilting his head back to the ceiling. “I’m fucking tired, Keeley. You know how sometimes you just get… really fucking tired?”
“Yeah. I do. That’s when you need to be able to lean on your people and let them help you.”
“I’m trying. I’m trying to let her help me.”
“No, no.” She reaches for his hands again, but he pulls them away, dropping them to his lap. “Your other friends. She’s pushing too hard, all right? You can tell her it’s too much, that you need her to back off a little.”
He shakes his head. “I can’t tell her that.”
“You can. It’s your life.”
That gets a shaky exhale, and his chin drops to his chest. “Can I ask you for a terrible favor?”
“Of course.” She sits up straight. “Anything.”
“Could I come back to your flat and just… just take a nap on the sofa? I won’t do anything weird or improper. I’m just. I’m so fucking tired, and if I go home there’s a million things I ought to do, and I always napped well on that sofa. I know it’s not right and I shouldn’t ask, but…”
“Of course you can.” She stands up and gathers their half-finished coffees. “C’mon. We’ll go right now. I’ll loan you an eye mask. I’ve got a few things to do for work, so I can sit at the table and do that and you can rest.”
“Should you check with Roy first? I don’t want…”
She raises an eyebrow at that. “I don’t need Roy’s permission to have a friend over.”
His face goes all terribly red. “Right, I know. Just.”
All right, she can take pity on him. “He won’t mind a bit, I’m sure. If he comes in, he’ll see me at the table working and you asleep on the sofa, nothing untoward about that.”
“Everyone fully dressed.” There, that’s a smile. “I’ll even keep me shoes on.”
“You will not. Not on my sofa.” She shoos him out the door and back toward the car. “I’ll let you use the purple blanket, how’s that?”
“The special occasions only blanket? Keeley!”
“Yeah, well.” Sounding careless and breezy about it is hard, but she can manage. “You’re a special boy.”
**
Because her Roy is lovely, when he comes in to find her at the table and Jamie on the sofa under the purple blanket, the only thing he comments on is the blanket. “Special occasion?”
“Yes. We’re celebrating him getting some proper fucking sleep.” She closes her laptop and greets him with a kiss. “He’s been out for almost three hours.”
“Should we wake him up, then? REM cycles and all that?”
She huffs a little. “I don’t want to.”
“Well, leave him a bit longer.” He goes to the kitchen to put the kettle on, and she starts cleaning up her papers and work things so they’ll be able to use the table.
Jamie wakes up while they’re chopping vegetables together, Roy humming something off-key and Keeley feeling terribly domestic about it all. He shuffles from the sofa to where he can see them and blinks like a groggy baby owl. “Time’s it?”
“Later than you think.” Roy nods at the clock over the stove; Jamie squints at it and curses. “You staying for dinner?”
“I can’t. Got a million things I was supposed to get done.” Jamie runs his hand through his hair. “Shit.”
“Is Celia waiting on you?” Keeley asks, as delicately as she can.
“No, she’s at a work dinner… thing… I don’t know where exactly. Might be Edinburgh? But she asked me to do some things while she was gone and I haven’t.” He sighs and looks around for his trainers. “Thanks for letting me sleep on your sofa, Keeley. Talk soon?”
“We’ll see you at the gala,” she says, pointing to where she put the shoes. “Can’t wait to see Celia’s dress. Do you know what she’s wearing?”
“Gucci,” Jamie mutters, looking for his jacket now. “It’s red, it’s Gucci… my suit is Gucci, too. Not red though. I think she knows someone who works for them here in London… What are you wearing?”
“Molly Goddard,” she says. “It’s fantastic. Can’t wait for everyone to see.”
Roy looks longsuffering. “I’m just wearing a fucking suit.”
“It’s Corneliani and you know it.” Keeley swats gently at him.
“I did not know that, actually. Don’t know that I care for that name, either.”
“You’ll look fit in that,” Jamie says, finally getting himself pulled together enough to take his keys from the table. “Right, I’ll see you at training tomorrow, then, Roy, and Keeley, I’ll see you at the gala, knocking everyone dead in Goddard. G’night.”
He shows himself out and Keeley blinks at the cutting board for a moment, trying to remember what she was doing with all these vegetables.
“Just rough-cut those last ones there,” Roy says, pressing a kiss to her temple. “It’ll be all right.”
“I feel like I’m handling this all wrong.”
“You’re not. You’re reminding him he has people. She’s not got him isolated.” He kisses her again. “Do you need to go shopping tomorrow and get a red Gucci dress?”
She has to laugh, a watery little sound but real. “No, babe. You don’t want to invite direct comparisons, ever. My dress is a perfect contrast, people will look at her and look at me and say they like how I look better, even though they can’t put their finger on why.”
“It’s all a fucking mystery to me.” He pats her gently on the bum. “Why don’t you go put your feet up and I’ll get this in the oven.”
“You’re a prince, Roy Kent.” She leans against him for a moment. “I’m going to do unspeakable things to you when we go upstairs.”
“You know we’re allowed to have sex downstairs, too. Or anywhere we like. Maybe not the garden, people could see.”
“That makes it more exciting.” She lets him take the vegetables and makes her way to the sofa, where she flops down and rolls herself up in the purple blanket. It smells like Jamie, his cologne and the coffee from earlier and a little bit of sweat, with just the smell of his body under it. She shouldn’t let herself recognize that at all, much less like it. She is handling this all wrong, and if she isn’t careful, she’ll blow her whole life up in her face. Wouldn’t that be just like her. Keeley fucking Jones, burning things down just as they get nice.
She takes a breath and shakes herself. No point getting mopey, that doesn’t help anything. She sits up a bit, wrapping the blanket around herself so it doesn’t come up by her face. There. Boundaries and all.
Roy comes out to join her a minute later, wiping his hands on his joggers. “You look cozy,” he says, settling in at her side. He must be able to smell Jamie on the blanket, too, but he doesn’t say anything, just takes her in his arms and shifts her around so she can cuddle up against his chest.
“Better with you here,” she says, and it’s the truth, always, forever.
**
The night of the gala arrives in a whirlwind of things to get done, as always. Keeley does her own makeup, but she has a hair appointment and she and Rebecca are meeting up to get their nails done. Then home to do her face and get into the dress, shimmery blue with tiers of fringe and a series of ribbons down the back. She splurged on the shoes to match, and when she does a turn in front of the mirror she’s happy to confirm that she looks fucking fantastic.
Roy wanders into the dressing room, doing up his tie. “Fuck me. You are a vision.”
She beams at him, swishing the skirt back and forth. “So are you. Look like a fairy tale prince.” The suit is dark blue, three-piece, and the waistcoat has designs picked out on it in silver and black thread. “If we weren’t already together, I would seduce you in the washrooms tonight.”
“No reason we can’t do that anyway.” He waits while she does a final mist of setting spray over her face, then offers his arm. “Let’s go. Rebecca’s going to want you to do shots with her before people start arriving.”
The venue is beautiful, of course; the decorations are flawless and the champagne a waiter hands them is top-notch. Keeley takes a minute to enjoy it all before she’s whisked away to Rebecca’s side, and then the energy of the night starts ramping up and there’s no time to think about anything.
She does glimpse Celia and Jamie across the room—the Gucci dress is red as advertised, bright crimson, neckline low and thigh-slit high, and Celia looks divine in it. Jamie’s suit is dove-grey, double-breasted, and makes him look a little bit like a teenager playing dress-up as a banker for unknown reasons.
“He should never wear double-breasted suits,” she tells Isaac at the bar, while leaning on his shoulder maybe a bit heavily. “Makes him look boxy.”
“Aren’t men supposed to look boxy?” Isaac is clearly highly amused by her, and the champagne, and the whole night.
She shakes her head. “No, no. Men with really broad shoulders can pull it off, but someone with Jamie’s shape needs more of a waist. He’s got it, he should flaunt it, you know?”
“Got what, exactly, Keeley?”
She gestures in the air, sketching what’s maybe the shape of Jamie or maybe nothing at all. “A really fit body.”
Isaac laughs out loud and turns to the bartender. “Could she have a water, mate? Just needs a little hydration break before she gets back at it.”
Keeley sighs dramatically. “You’re not wrong.”
The bartender brings her a glass of ice water and she sips slowly, leaning on the bar. Isaac studies her carefully. “You still fancy Jamie a bit, Keeley?”
She shrugs, like that isn’t a question that’s been eating at her. “I’m worried about him.”
“He looks happy tonight.” Isaac looks off across the room, probably at the man in question. Keeley doesn’t follow his gaze. “I still don’t like her but maybe it’s one of those things where it’s different for the people involved.”
Keeley shakes her head. “It’s not. Or if it is, it’s not good for him. I’m worried.”
Isaac sighs and downs the rest of his drink. “Yeah, me too. Just hoped I was wrong, that’s all.”
“I know.” She pats at his hand and looks around for Roy, or Rebecca, or someone else who can distract her from getting maudlin. Ted, even, would be a good distraction.
Sam passes by, and Keeley yelps his name, pushing the glass away and hurrying to his side. “Sam, Sam, thank god. Let’s dance, all right? I need to not get moody standing around.”
He laughs and lets her lead him to the dance floor, and the music switches to something uptempo, and it’s lovely, because Sam knows how to move his body and she’s not quite drunk enough to make a fool of herself but enough to be carefree. The floor clears around them for a bit, letting them show off until they’re both breathless and giggling and drift off to the side of the room again.
Sam is telling her about how his restaurant is doing, and even though she’s not supposed to give away work for free, she would never hold out on Sam, so she’s handing out advice. Jamie and Colin drift over to chat, their ties loosened and jackets off, folded over their arms. It’s that time of the night, when everyone is soft-edged and happy, the obligations over and the booze easy in their veins and the DJ has turned on the fun side of the playlist. Roy and Ted join them next, Roy’s arm warm around Keeley’s waist and Ted overflowing with love for them all, and everything is shiny and brilliant.
And then it all gets ruined.
Celia comes over to their little group, her face flushed and her walk a little unsteady in her heels. “There you are,” she says, tugging at Jamie’s arm. “I couldn’t find you.”
“Oh! Sorry, love.” He smiles at her, all soft eyes. “Was just talking to me mates here.”
She frowns, pushing an errant strand of hair back from her face and tugging him a few steps away from the group. “Put your jacket back on. And fix your tie. You look messy.”
“Celia—”
“Don’t argue with me.” She takes hold of his tie and tightens the knot back up again, snug to his throat. “We’ve talked about this.”
“Okay, okay. Sorry.” He slips his jacket back on and does up the buttons. “Better?”
“Well, it’s wrinkled now.” She sighs and runs her hand down his chest, brushing away some fuzz or something, Keeley can’t make anything out from where she’s standing. “I don’t know why you can’t stay dressed for a few hours, like a grown adult.”
“Was just relaxing a bit.”
“It’s a formal event. There are still people here you could be networking with.” She exhales sharply and shakes her head. “I don’t know why I bother. You don’t listen.”
“I do listen, I know that you want me to be—”
“You don’t listen. You faff around doing whatever you want, making a fool of yourself, acting like a child.” Her face is getting more red. “And now you’re embarrassing me in public. Making me yell at you in public.”
“Celia, love, just calm down, all right? Let me get you some water, or a coffee, yeah?”
“Do not fucking tell me to calm down, Jamie!” The sharp crack of skin on skin startles Keeley so much it takes her a minute to realize what it was. Celia had hit him. Slapped Jamie right across the face, sending him half-falling sideways and catching himself on a chair.
Jamie straightens up slowly, working his jaw back and forth. “I think maybe we should go home, all right? You’re… you’re a bit too drunk. You won’t like that you acted like this in the morning.”
“Stop arguing with me!” She swings her purse at him this time, in the same arc against his face, and this time Jamie loses his footing, crashing down to the floor. “Get up, for fuck’s sake, Jamie, stop making a scene!”
Keeley realizes that she’s just standing there, doing nothing, just watching this, but her body won’t obey her even when she tries to move. Thank god, Roy and Ted break their paralysis at least, rushing forward to get between Jamie and Celia, while Colin takes off toward the lobby, where the security guards are hopefully still about.
“All right now, that’s enough,” Ted says, keeping his body right in front of Celia’s so she can’t move any closer to where Roy’s helping Jamie up off the floor. “Now I know you’ve had a few drinks, ma’am, and sometimes we all get a little too loosey-goosey at these things, but that kind of behavior is not acceptable.”
Keeley sees Celia’s eyes well up with tears and can guess what kind of performance this is going to turn into next, but then Roy has Jamie on his feet, one hand over his face with blood running between his fingers. She forgets all about Celia in favor of getting to Jamie’s side and taking him by the arm that Roy isn’t holding.
“Let’s get you to the washroom,” she says, starting them all carefully across the floor, and not incidentally away from Celia. With any luck Ted and the lads can keep her exactly where she is. “C’mon, Jamie, this way.”
“Shit,” he’s muttering, rubbing his hand against his face, and she realizes he’s trying to keep the blood from dripping down on his suit jacket. A lost cause, probably, but she snatches a napkin off a table as they pass and offers him that to hold in place instead. “Fuck, fuck.”
She guides them to the ladies’ washroom, which makes Roy and Jamie both hesitate. “I can’t go in there,” Jamie protests, and Roy opens his mouth to say something else before Keeley cuts them both off.
“We’ll clear the room, and Roy, you guard the door and tell anyone who comes over that it’s out of service for a few minutes. There’s another ladies’ room over there, they just have to walk a little further. C’mon, babe, this way.”
Thankfully, she only has to shoo one woman out of the room, and then can wet a towel and start dabbing at Jamie’s face. It’s a shallow cut along his cheekbone, layered right over top of the half-faded bruise. “The clasp on the purse?” she guesses, and Jamie nods, his eyes firmly closed.
“Sorry,” he mutters.
“Hush.” She presses carefully, hoping it will start to clot.
“You shouldn’t have had to see all that. ‘s embarrassing.”
“She ought to be sorry. And embarrassed. And fucking… watching her back, because I just might…” She stops herself and lifts the towel; the cut’s still seeping, but much less. Pressure back on. “Jamie, she shouldn’t treat you like that.”
“She’s trying to make me better.” It’s a recitation, no feeling behind it. “And she’s right, I don’t listen, I don’t try, I embarrass her.”
“That doesn’t mean she has a right to hurt you.” Keeley takes a deep breath and cups her free hand under his chin, lifting it until they’re looking into each other’s eyes. “I know you’re going to tell me that you’re a big strong footballer and she’s a girl, so it doesn’t count, but… Jamie, it does. She shouldn’t hurt you, and she shouldn’t talk to you like that, it’s not right. You deserve better than this.”
His mouth falls open a little, his eyes fixed on hers like that’s all that’s holding him together. “Are you sure?”
His voice is so small it makes her heart ache. “I’ve never lied to you, have I, love?”
“I… I guess not.” He closes his eyes again, lashes wet against his cheeks, and she carefully lifts the towel away again so she can get a clean one to dab at his tears. “Fuck, Keeley. I don’t know what to do.”
“Well, one step at a time. Getting you cleaned up, and then I’ll have Roy take you home, and you can get some rest.”
“She’s staying at mine. She’s moving in, next month when her lease is up.” He takes a shuddery breath. “I don’t know what—”
“It’s not a problem,” she says quickly, firmly, and she squeezes his hand for good measure. “Roy can take you back to our place. Purple blanket’s all yours, but you’re not sleeping on the sofa, you get a proper bed. And a nice hot shower. Warm drink before bed. All of that, all right?”
“Keeley, I don’t know—”
“Please let me take care of you,” she says, and while her voice doesn’t break, it definitely wobbles. That seems to cut through to Jamie in some way; he looks at her, his brow furrowing, then nods.
“Yeah. Okay. Could use that tonight, I guess. If you’re sure it’s all right.”
“I’m sure.” She takes another towel from the basket by the sink and hands it to him. “Keep this in case it opens up again. Let me talk to Roy quick.”
Roy is still at the door, like she knew he would be, redirecting anyone who approaches the washroom. “Babe,” she says, and he pulls her into a tight hug, her head fitting in neatly under his chin like she’s all wrapped up and protected.
“She’s been escorted out and put in a car home,” he says, his chest a warm rumble against her. “Rebecca’s going to raise all kinds of hell, but in that scary quiet posh way.”
Keeley has to laugh at that. “I love her.”
“How is he?”
She shrugs, leaning into him again. “Wobbly, I think? I told him you would take him back to ours, is that all right? I think it’s safer.”
“Of course. Are you not coming with us?”
“Not right away.” She takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders. Strong, independent Keeley Jones. Taking care of business. “Got to make sure everything’s taken care of here. Check with Rebecca. I’ll get an Uber and be along as quick as I can, all right?”
He kisses the top of her head, then catches her chin, tilts it up, and kisses her mouth. “You’re amazing, Keeley.”
She laughs a little. “I feel like I’m losing my fucking mind.”
“When you get home you can fall apart as hard as you need. I’ll be there for you.” He hugs her one more time, then stands her up on her feet, giving the gentlest little squeeze at her shoulders. “Get Jamie for me and take care of your things. I’ll see you soon.”
Handing Jamie over to Roy feels entirely too much like passing a parcel, but Jamie has gone quiet and exhausted and doesn’t object to being steered around wherever he’s told. She whirls through the rest of the things she needs to do, all of it a blur in her head except the pauses where Rebecca and Ted and what seems like half the lads hug her. She doesn’t properly come back to herself until she’s sliding into the Uber and waving goodbye to Isaac, who walked her out to the curb.
She checks her mobile while the driver eases into traffic. There are a series of texts from Roy, spaced out at about ten minute intervals.
We’re back at the house
Can you find somewhere open on your way home and get some jammie dodgers
I gave him your bathrobe hope that’s all right
She sends back a series of hearts and leans forward to direct the driver to the first Tesco they pass on the way. She’ll buy him a snack, too, while she’s in there, and tip him in cash as well as through the fucking app. It feels terribly important to do a kind thing or two tonight, maybe just to balance out the burning desire in her heart to find Celia and give her a taste of what happens when you fuck with an Essex girl’s friends.
Back at the house, she looks through the front window while she tries to balance her shopping bag and purse and mobile to punch the key code in. She can see Jamie sitting on the sofa, wearing her pink fuzzy robe—it’s ridiculously oversized on her, which leaves it a bit short on him—and looking at Roy with a kind of dazed expression. The cut on his cheek has a neat little series of butterfly bandages on it, something Roy must have produced from somewhere since she’s certainly never bought them. Roy is sitting in front of him on one of her kitchen chairs, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, saying something that’s making Jamie look like that.
She lets herself in and they both immediately stand up. “Don’t move, it’s fine,” she says, but Roy is rushing to her side and sweeping her into his arms, and Jamie’s taking her bags and carrying them to the table.
“We were getting worried,” Roy says quietly in her ear.
“About what?”
“Well, we weren’t sure, exactly, were we, but maybe something awful had happened. It hasn’t exactly been a relaxing night.”
“I’m fine,” she assures him, kissing his forehead. “But I’ve got to go get out of this dress.” Roy is in joggers and a t-shirt and Jamie, as best she can tell, is naked under her robe. “I’m overdressed for the room.”
Roy doesn’t want to let go of her, she can tell, but after a moment he does. He looks over at Jamie, who’s holding up the contents of the shopping bag, and gives a sharp, barking laugh. “Jammie dodgers and wagon wheels. Spoiling us.”
“I wanted chocolate.” She hurries up the stairs and strips down faster than the dress deserves. Poor thing, it’s a bit ruined for her now. She finds a t-shirt and yoga pants, drags her fingers through her hair and puts it back up in a rough ponytail, and does a first swipe at taking off her makeup. Good enough.
Roy and Jamie are sitting on the sofa together with cups of tea and a plate with the contents of both packages of treats spread out on it. A third cup is waiting for her on the side table. She takes a wagon wheel and sits down on the floor, facing them, waiting for any indication that someone’s going to talk any time soon.
Jamie is mechanically making his way through the jammie dodgers, only interrupting his chewing to take careful sips of tea. His eyes are unfocused, fixed somewhere in the middle distance. Keeley glances at Roy, trying to ask with her eyes what the fuck is going on.
Roy finally clears his throat. “Jamie, mate, you’re scaring Keeley.”
“What?” That gets his eyes back in focus at least. He blinks at Keeley and reddens. “Oh. Sorry. ‘m okay. Just… tired, I guess.” He takes a careful sip of tea and stares at the smear of jam on his fingers. “Thank you for the biscuits.”
“It’s no problem. Was there a particular reason for them?”
Jamie’s eyes track left to Roy, who swallows his mouthful of wagon wheel and mumbles, “Comfort food.”
“They were my favorites when I was a kid.” Jamie sighs and puts his mug down. “Fuck, I’m acting like a child again. Celia doesn’t half miss, does she.”
“She certainly didn’t miss when she hit you in the face.”
“Roy!” Keeley doesn’t understand the first fucking thing about these men.
“It’s all right, babe.” Roy’s face is inscrutable, but she bites her tongue and does her best to trust him. “We’re trying out not lying to ourselves or each other, right, Jamie?”
“Trying it,” Jamie echoes dully. “It’s awful.”
“That it is.” Roy picks up another biscuit and takes a bite.
She’s fucking lost at sea with these two. “You’re staying the night, Jamie.”
“Yeah. Thank you for that, too.” He rubs at his eyes. “She probably went back to hers, but I’m too knackered to change all the codes and that tonight.”
“You haven’t even decided if you’re going to change the codes,” Roy mutters, his mouth full. “You might be taking her back, still.”
“It’s not taking her back, we haven’t actually broke up.”
“She got removed from a building for belting you round the head. I’m pretty sure that’s fucking broken up.”
Jamie looks at him with uncertainty. “You think we should be broken up.”
“Mm-hmm. Said it three different ways now.” Roy’s saying cold things, but his tone isn’t mean. Keeley gets the sense he’s trying to gently coax a nervous animal down a path it’s not sure about. Can’t act different from normal, but also can’t slip up and be scary. Got to keep everyone’s nerves in check. She’s never seen him do this before.
Jamie looks into his tea mug, finds it empty, and puts it on the floor. “I think I need to sleep on it.”
“That’s fine.” Roy scoops up the empty mug and gets to his feet. “Getting a refill. Either of you want one?”
Keeley and Jamie both nod, and Roy sweeps out of the room, leaving them alone. Jamie’s back to staring into space, this time at the dark, silent telly.
“How do you manage to look fit in that robe?” Keeley asks finally.
Jamie gives her a startled look, then starts giggling. “Just natural talent, I guess.”
“I’m not sure why he didn’t loan you his robe.”
“His isn’t fuzzy. It’s that… waffle-weave stuff. He asked if I wanted fuzzy and I said yes. Didn’t realize that meant I’d get yours.”
“It’s fine.” She’s giggling too, now, and maybe it’s got a little bit of hysteria in it but Jamie doesn’t seem to mind. “It’s a nice snuggly robe. Comforting.”
“Yeah. He said I needed something soft, and tea, and comfort food. Bossing me around and being nice to me at the same time, it’s very weird.”
“He’s just good.” She shrugs. “That’s all there is to it.”
No argument, not even rolling his eyes. That’s a million miles different than how it would have been before. She scoots closer, reaching out to rest her hand on Jamie’s knee. “For the record, I think you and Celia should be broken up, too.”
“I know you do.” He rubs at his eyes again, which just draws her attention to the way they’re suspiciously bright. “I need to think.”
“That’s fine. I know all of this is… it’s hard, and it’s shit, and I wish I could fix it for you.”
“The fact that you haven’t tossed me in the fucking bin helps.” He looks up as Roy comes back in, carefully balancing all three mugs. “Thanks, mate.”
“Mm.” Roy hands the drinks around and sits down with a pained grunt. “Keels, by any chance can you come up here and join us so I can lean on you?”
She scrambles up to position herself next to him, and Jamie watches with interest. “How does that help your knee?” he asks.
“It doesn’t,” Roy mutters, resting his head against Keeley’s. “But she’s soft and she smells good and it just feels better in general with her here.”
Jamie squirms in his seat. “Are you just rubbing it in my fucking face, then, having a nice girlfriend, or what?”
“I’m being fucking honest with myself and you.” Roy nudges Jamie with his foot. “Maybe rubbing it in your face just a little bit, but not on the bruised side.”
“Oh, well, thanks for that.” They’re all quiet for a while, no one moving much or speaking until Jamie finishes his tea and says, “Think I’ll head up to bed.”
“You might as well wait half an hour,” Keeley points out. “You just drank two full mugs of tea, you’re going to have to piss.”
Jamie stares at her for a moment, or possibly at Roy, or both of them, then starts giggling. He giggles so hard he loses his balance and has to clutch at the chair Roy left facing the sofa. He giggles so hard he has to put his head down in his hands.
“’s better than crying, isn’t it?” Roy murmurs in Keeley’s ear. She nods, still watching Jamie carefully as he gasps for breath. He’s definitely having hysterics as much as anything, but maybe it’ll help him vent some of the mess in his head.
“I do appreciate you two,” Jamie says finally, wiping at his eyes with the sleeve of Keeley’s robe. “I do. I feel like absolute shit but like Coach Lasso says, better to feel like shit with people than alone, or whatever it was.”
“That was the plan.” Keeley reaches out and pats his arm. “Sit down with us for a bit longer, and then we’ll all go up to bed together, all right? Tomorrow’s likely to be shit as well, so we need to be well-rested.”
Jamie doesn’t argue, just sits down on Roy’s other side and tilts his head back against the cushions, and they’re all quiet together for a while longer.
**
The next day is, of course, just as shit as predicted, though at least there’s no training and Keeley had planned not to do any work, not even checking in on things. It was supposed to be because of her hangover, not the possibly-traumatized footballer in the room down the hall, but life is just like that sometimes.
Roy is up first, as usual, and Jamie presumably drags himself out of bed sometime after that, because they’re both downstairs drinking coffee and staring at the telly when Keeley finally makes it down to join them. They’re watching one of Roy’s ridiculous satellite packages he insists on, the one that brings in football matches from places like the Croatian league, which appears to be what they’re watching right now.
“That defender is shit,” Jamie says, and Roy grunts in agreement. “Goalkeeper’s not half bad, though. He’ll get picked up somewhere.”
“He’ll make the national team.” Roy meets Keeley’s eyes and jerks his head toward the kitchen, which she interprets as meaning that there’s coffee left for her.
When she’s doctored it up strongly enough to face the day, she joins them on the sofa. They’ve moved on to ruthlessly criticizing the midfielders.
“My mother told me to date salesmen and accountants,” she says after a few minutes of that. “I thought it was a boring idea at the time but now I’m seeing the appeal.”
They both look at her blankly for a moment, then swing their attention back to the screen. All right. It’s that kind of morning, then.
They watch the rest of the game together, and when it’s over Roy heaves a sigh and turns the telly off. “All right. What’s next?”
“Lunch?” Jamie asks hopefully. “It’s after noon already.”
“Lunch,” Keeley agrees, “and then we’ll go by your place so you can get some things and change your lock code. I know you haven’t decided if you’re broken up yet, but changing it is safer while you sort things out, and you can always give her the new code if you decide you want to.”
Jamie blinks at her. “Why do I need to get some things?”
“You should stay here with us for a few more days.” She shrugs at his puzzled look. “Just to be safe.”
Roy’s look is a lot more knowing than Jamie’s; he can tell exactly what’s going on with her, that she isn’t ready for Jamie to be alone yet, or out of her sight in general. He’s apparently not going to object to it, though, or insist on the full honesty thing again.
Jamie’s expression wars back and forth for a moment, but in the end he gives in, like she knew he would. Jamie hates to be alone in the first place. “I... I suppose. If you’re sure you don’t mind. And you, Roy.”
“Fine with me,” Roy says briefly. “I’ll loan you something decent to wear and we’re going out for lunch. I need fish and chips swimming in grease and I’m not taking any arguments on the subject.”
“I need a mimosa,” Keeley mutters, following him up the stairs to get dressed. “Maybe more than one.”
Roy gently tugs her into the corner of the room and then into his arms. “Doing all right?”
She nods, resting against his chest. “Am I that transparent?”
“You are, but he’s off on fucking Mars again so he won’t notice. Just me.”
“Do I have to tell him? With the whole being honest thing?”
“Not yet. It would send him into a fucking fit and nobody needs that right now. Eventually you’ll have to, though.” He kisses her soft and slow. “Definitely not until after lunch.”
“Thank god.” She pulls away reluctantly and goes to find a jumper and yoga pants that will make it clear she’s hungover and her hair and face are not to be judged. Roy tugs on a clean version of his joggers and t-shirt and takes another set down to Jamie, and like that, they’re ready to go.
Lunch is quiet, and they’ve all perked up considerably afterward. Keeley actually feels calm when they pull up to Jamie’s place—picking up some clothes and toiletries, changing the lock code, those aren’t so hard, and then they’ll go home and collapse on the sofa again, this time with something other than football on the telly.
Jamie punches in the current code and opens the door, then freezes, making a hurt sound. Keeley peers around him and sees that there’s a cardboard box sitting there in the entryway, with some clothes she recognizes as Jamie’s spilling out of it.
“Things I left at her place,” he says, nudging the box with his foot. “I guess she beat us back over here. And I think she’s officially broken up with me.”
Roy takes hold of Jamie’s arm and steers him toward the nearest surface he can sit down on. Keeley picks up the box, not knowing what else to do with it, and follows.
“All right,” Roy’s saying in a low voice when she joins them. “We’ll pack up her things and return them, too. But first things first, change the code. Can you do it from your phone?”
“Yeah,” Jamie mumbles. He’s gone all pale again, his skin almost grayish, and his eyes aren’t focusing right. “There’s an app.”
“Good lad. Walk me through it.” Between the two of them they get the app up and find the code change screen. “What’s it currently? Your birthday?”
Jamie shakes his head. “My number.”
Roy looks at him. “Your number is a single digit and this is a six-digit code.” Jamie nods. “It’s just nine nine nine, nine nine nine? How have you not been robbed fucking blind already?” That gets a feeble shrug, and Roy sighs. “Well, what should we change it to? What’s something you can remember?”
“Can I use my birthday?”
“No.” Roy frowns at the phone. “But your mum’s birthday might be okay. Let’s use that.”
The code box at the door chirps when they put the new code through, and Keeley sighs with relief. When she eventually has to let Jamie out of her sight, at least he hopefully won’t get murdered in his sleep. She looks in the cardboard box, poking through familiar things—the same kind of things Jamie would leave at her place when they were together. Clothes, toothbrush, hair products, a... men’s grooming accessory. She picks that up and squints at it.
“What do you need this for?” she asks. “You get it all waxed.”
“Needs a trim sometimes in-between,” he says. “C’mon, Keeley, give that here.”
“Just dump it all out there.” Roy gives Jamie a gentle push to get him on his feet. “We’ll use the same box to pack her things up. After we get your bag packed. C’mon. Bedroom.”
Thank god Roy is here to come up with sensible instructions. Keeley and Jamie would have dithered around in circles for an hour.
She drifts around the kitchen and the dining nook while she waits, picking things up and putting them down. The dining table is a state—piles of adverts that must be all Jamie gets in the mail these days, a few PR kits, some kitchen towels the housecleaners hadn’t put away for some reason, and a stack of books and thick folders with a sticky note on top saying This week’s reading! XX Celia.
Keeley frowns at that and pokes through the stack. The folders are the kind of info packets stocked in offices to help people decide about a product or procedure or something; the top one is from a dentist, then one from a plastic surgeon, then one from a dermatologist. The books are called The Vegan Athlete and The Vegan Athlete 2.
She drags her thumb along the edge of the dentistry folder, staring down at the rest of it and wondering what the fuck is going on, until Jamie and Roy emerge from the bedroom again. Jamie has a bag over his shoulder and Roy’s carrying that fucking box.
“Jamie,” Keeley asks as calmly as she can manage, “what’s all this?”
Jamie squints and then frowns, his face reddening. “Oh. Some things Celia wanted me to look at.”
“Why?” She waves the dentistry folder at him. “You got your teeth done when you got your first real contract, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, of course.” Roy nods in agreement, and Keeley would, too, if she hadn’t talked about this with Jamie years ago. They had all got their teeth done as soon as they had the money for it. “Second thing I did with it.”
“What was the first one?” Roy asks.
“Got my mum a proper flat.” That gets another nod from Roy, this one in approval. Whether they took care of their parents first was one of the metrics Keeley had used for screening her footballers over the years. “Flat, then teeth, then I don’t really remember what all, but I did buy my dad a car.”
Roy wrinkles his nose. “Why?”
“He wouldn’t leave me alone until I did.” Jamie shakes his head. “He either wrecked it or sold it, I don’t know, but he doesn’t have it anymore.”
If they get sidetracked onto the topic of Jamie’s shit dad, they’ll be here all day. “Right, well,” Keeley says, “if you already had them fixed, why did she want you to get them done again?”
“This is for veneers.” He takes the folder and flips it open to show her the papers inside. “The big shiny white ones. She said I’d be more marketable.”
Roy’s nose is still scrunched. “Getting your teeth done the first time fucking hurts. Not worth doing it again just to be marketable.”
“Well, this isn’t moving them around like that. They sort of... they grind them down til they’re smaller? Then glue the veneers to them. I think.” He frowns at the pages. “Something like that.”
“That sounds fucking awful, Jamie.”
“Yeah, well.” He shrugs and puts the folder down on the table. “Don’t know what to tell you.”
Keeley holds up the second folder. “Plastic surgery?”
Jamie points at the outer corner of his eye. “Apparently I’ve got lines and crows-feet and all.”
“Of course you do.” Roy sounds positively disgusted. “You’re a fucking footballer. You spend all day squinting against the sun down the fucking pitch.”
“Yeah, I know! But she thought I should get them fixed.” He shrugs again.
Third folder. “And the dermatologist?”
He squints at it for a moment. “Oh! That was for laser hair removal, so I don’t have to do the waxings so often. That one I do want to read, because waxing is fucking awful.”
“You’d get your whole body lasered?” Roy asks.
“Yeah.” Jamie opens that folder and points at one of the pictures on the top page. “See, Keeley, they can make it so you never have to do your bikini line again.”
She has to admit that would be nice. “And she also thought you should go vegan?”
“Said it would be good for my skin and also very marketable.”
Roy heaves a sigh. “For fuck’s sake.”
“Jamie,” Keeley says carefully. “Do you want to do any of these things? Because they would all be fine if you want to. But not just because she told you to.”
Jamie’s shoulders hunch defensively. “Well, she couldn’t make me. She just wanted me to read on all of them.”
Keeley and Roy share a look of mutual understanding that Celia did not just want Jamie to read about them. “Well, you don’t have to do any of it if you don’t want to. We can bin these right now.”
He’s quiet for a minute, then picked up one of the folders and the two books. “I’m still thinking about the laser thing. And it would be a waste to throw out the books.”
Roy bins the other folders with excessive force. “For the record, if you do the laser thing, Keeley is going with you, not me. The staff would take one look at me and have collective orgasms at the thought of the commission rate.”
Jamie laughs a little. “I would be going by meself, wouldn’t I? Keeley doesn’t have to come to my fucking appointments anymore. Got better things to do. Gotta scope out nursing homes for you, doesn’t she?” There’s no bite behind the old joke; it sounds more like Jamie’s saying it from a script than like he means it.
Still, if his plan was to put walls back up between them, cutting off the closeness Keeley’s felt forming over the last day... well, it’s successful at that. Roy turns on his heel and goes out to the car without another word.
Jamie stares after him, then shakes his head and puts the books and folder into the box of Celia’s things. “So much for me doing better, right, Keeley?”
“Don’t do that, Jamie.” Her chest hurts. “Don’t tear everything down because you feel bad. Please? I’m asking you. Please don’t do that.”
He takes an unsteady breath. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t understand why you and him are being nice to me. Just because you felt sorry for me getting hit in the face? I don’t want pity.”
“I don’t feel sorry for you. I hurt for you, because you’re my friend.” She wants to grab him by the shoulders and shake him, but that’s the whole problem, isn’t it? Jamie presses buttons until people focus on him entirely, but the buttons he chooses tend to be connected to anger, and he goes looking for people who will follow anger with striking out. She knows where it all comes from, even, but it doesn’t make it any easier to navigate. “If any of my friends got hurt and got dumped and had someone playing fucking mind games with them, tearing out their confidence, I would be nice to them.”
“My confidence is fine.” If it is, none of it’s showing in his voice. “I’m Jamie fucking Tartt, aren’t I?”
“How many times have you got to say that in front of the mirror before you go out on the pitch these days?” She sees him flinch back at that, and she’s sorry, but honesty is the only thing she’s got here. “It’s not your fault. She was cutting it out of you on purpose so you’d listen to her and let her make you over how she wanted you.”
“What if how she wanted me is better? Smarter and better manners and... more marketable and not acting like a child.”
Keeley takes the box out of his hands and puts it on the table, then cups his chin so he can’t look away from her. “That’s up to you, not anyone else. You learned to be more accountable and more kind because you decided you wanted to. Yeah, me and Ted and other people suggested it to you, but you were the one who decided maybe things would be nicer if you did it, right?”
He nods a little. “When my agent said nobody wanted me anymore, the way I was. Couldn’t forget that. It echoed in me head, you know? Nobody wants you.” His face twists a little. “It’s fucking lonely, knowing that.”
“So you decided to do better.” She rubs her thumbs gently over his face. “And you’ve done well. You’ve got to keep it up, it’s not a thing you can stop and coast on. We all have to keep trying to do better. But there’s a difference between trying to be better by being kind and thoughtful and not hurting people, or trying to be better by being more handsome and making more money. D’you see what I mean?”
“I... I think so?” He looks exhausted again. “It’s a lot at once.”
“Well, let me just put it this way.” She rests her forehead against his. “Roy and I are asking you to stay with us, aren’t we? Doesn’t that mean we want you there? Can’t think nobody wants you when we’re telling you we do, can you?”
He shakes, just for a minute but he does. “Fuck, Keeley. I don’t... I mean, Roy might’ve changed his mind now.”
“I doubt it.” She steps back and picks up the box. “But you could go apologize to him and find out for sure. I’ve got this, go on.”
She dallies a bit before she goes out to the car—not too long, because that would just give them the chance to start picking at each other again, but a few minutes. When she gets there they’re both sitting quietly and looking relieved, which is good enough for her.
“Everything good, boys?” At their nods she claps her hands. “Brilliant. Now. What’s Celia’s address, Jamie, we need to drop this off.”
The address isn’t too far away, a ritzy building with abstract statues out front. Keeley goes to open the car door and Roy stops her, frowning. “You want me to handle it?”
She blinks at him. “I’ve got it.”
“Keeley.” He gives her one of those looks with extra eyebrows. “Just leave it with the front desk. Do not offer to take it up to her door.”
“Roy!” She starts taking her earrings off. “I have no idea what you mean.”
Jamie leans forward, poking his head between the front seats. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know what it’s like in Manchester,” Roy says, “but I remember the kinds of fights that went down between girls where I grew up, and I can’t imagine they were any less terrifying in Essex.”
Jamie whistles softly, and Keeley sniffs and tosses her head. “You have no idea.”
“Yeah, that’s what scares me. Just leave the box at the desk.”
“Don’t let me have any fun at all,” she mutters, but she does the sensible thing, so they can finally go home.
**
Not that having Jamie stay with them is easy. He swings around between his normal self, a quiet and withdrawn version that stares at nothing, and a particular kind of prickly nastiness that Keeley can only assume is some attempt to get the violence he’s expecting to hurry up and arrive, especially since he tends to direct it at Roy.
Telling him not to use them for that works, but it’s fucking fraught every time. When he’s himself, he swears that he’s trying not to do it, and that actually he’s doing it a lot less than he has the impulse to, which… well. Small favors.
But the biggest problem turns out to be at night. The first few, he slept like the dead, stumbling downstairs in the morning still clumsy and groggy. But once the worst depths of exhaustion were purged, he went back to what was making him so tired in the first place—not sleeping through the fucking night.
His time is around three AM, and Keeley tends to start awake at either his footsteps on the stairs or the sound of things being moved around in the kitchen. He’s not doing it on purpose, he’s trying to be quiet, but she’s a light sleeper when it comes to the sound of someone moving around her house.
The first time she raced downstairs in a panic, to find him sitting at the table with a cup of tea, a bowl of cereal, and his The Vegan Athlete book, making his way through a chapter with a deeply furrowed brow. She ended up with her own tea and a stupid matching game on her phone, keeping him company until he finally closed the book and said he was going to go back upstairs.
After that they agreed she didn’t have to get up with him, but her sleep was light and muddled after the start awake, always taking a long while before she could drift off again, even with the rhythm of Roy’s breathing pressed up against her side.
Worse was one night when what woke her was the front door opening and closing. Scared the shit out of her so badly she woke Roy up, too, and they both sat downstairs on the sofa waiting for Jamie to come back, Roy coming up with increasingly alarming threats. The specifics fortunately fell by the wayside when Jamie let himself back in, dripping sweat and red in the face from a fucking-middle-of-the-fucking-night fifteen kilometer run, which was not part of his fucking training plan, was it?
Which brings them to tonight, when the door once again opened and closed but this time Jamie’s car started, too, and headed off down the road, leaving Keeley and Roy at the kitchen table with cups of coffee because there was absolutely no way they are going to make it back to sleep after this.
“I’m not going to kill him,” Roy says after a while, “but I might make him wish he was dead.”
Keeley can’t even argue with that. She stares at her Instagram feed, scrolling slowly past evidence that Isaac and Thierry had a very nice night out—nothing embarrassing, thank God—and that Colin still needs help from a stylist.
Roy’s mobile goes off, and she promptly drops hers, jerking back from the table. Roy gives the phone a murderous look, then picks it up, holding a short conversation mainly in grunts and a brief “thank you” before hanging up.
“You want to witness the murder or stay here?” he asks, getting up and shuffling toward where he’d left his shoes the evening before.
“Oh, I’m coming.” She scrambles to her feet. “That wasn’t the police, was it?”
“No. Security at Nelson Road.” He exhales very slowly through clenched teeth. “Our wayward Tartt is out on the pitch putting himself through drills at three-thirty fucking AM and Geoffrey wasn’t sure if he should let that continue or do something about it.”
“What could he do about it?”
“Geoffrey was a boxer in a former life.” Roy holds the door open for her and they make their way to the car. “I seriously considered telling him to go ahead and fight the little prick, but I’m going soft in my old age.”
“Not noticeably,” she reassures him. He finds her hand in the dark and they hold on to each other through the drive to Nelson Road.
**
Geoffrey is waiting for them at the practice pitch, calmly watching Jamie sprint up and down with one of quite a few footballs scattered around.
“Mr. Kent,” Geoffrey says. “You got it from here or should I go out there with you? Hello, Miss Jones.”
“Hello.” Keeley nudges Roy with her elbow. “Let me go talk to him first. Screaming at him isn’t going to help and making threats will make it worse.”
“I have other responses besides screaming and threats.”
“Not with Jamie, you don’t.” Which is something that really needs to change, but she can’t have that particular heart-to-heart right now. She has to go out there and calm down the panicking creature bolting around the pitch. Jamie Tartt as frightened horse.
Geoffrey clears his throat. “I’ll get back to my rounds, then. Call if you need anything.”
“Thank you, Geoffrey,” Roy says, real gratitude in his gruff voice. “I appreciate it.”
“We’ll have Rebecca give you a bonus,” Keeley tosses over her shoulder before she starts out on the pitch. She picks her way carefully out to where she can put herself in Jamie’s line of sight and waves her arms at him. “Jamie! Jamie.”
Thank god, he skids to a halt and stands there staring at her. “Keeley? What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same thing.”
He’s dripping sweat, his shirt soaked through. “I have to fix it.”
“Fix what, love?” She takes another step closer. “Tell me what’s going on in that pretty head, please?”
He closes his eyes tightly. “I’m still shit. It’s been… however long it’s been and I’m still shit, I can’t score and I can’t… I can’t do anything, Keeley, I can’t feel the game at all. I can’t find it, that thing where everything fits together and you don’t have to think, you just do it, you know, we talked about it before, that thing?”
“Flow state,” she says, nodding gently. She read the book ages ago, and yeah, she and Jamie had talked about it. He got all excited about the idea, that what he experienced on the pitch was real and something other people knew, too. “You can’t find it?”
He shakes his head. “It’s gone.” His voice is shaking. “I have to find it or I’m going to get fucking cut from the team and then what’m I going to do, I’ve got nothing if I don’t have football. That’s all I am.”
“That’s not true.” She’s close enough to touch him now, but he flinches back from her hand on his shoulder. “Jamie, you can’t find it because you’re too deep in your head. Your brain’s getting in the way of what your body knows how to do. You need to calm down.”
He laughs miserably. “How’m I to do that?”
“First of all,” Roy’s voice comes from behind her, “you need to breathe. Slow, deep breaths. I’ll count you off. In for three, out for three, got it?”
It takes a few tries for Jamie to match Roy’s count, but once he does, it seems to help. At least he stops shaking. Roy keeps him just at breathing until his shoulders drop, too, then clears his throat. “Now, what’s going on in your head? What’s getting in the way of just seeing the pitch?”
“Everything. All of it.” Jamie tilts his head back and gulps at the clear night air. “I’m shit, I can’t do anything right, and I knew that but now it’s football, too, not just… life. I’m a shit person but now I’m a shit footballer, too, and that’s all I have left and I don’t know how to fix it.”
“You’re not a shit footballer.” Roy’s voice brooks no argument. “You’re not at your best lately, but you’re still head and shoulders above most. We’ll get you through this. You’ve got the fucking yips, that’s all.”
Jamie shakes his head. “It doesn’t feel like the yips. It feels like there’s a fucking wall between me and seeing the game.”
“The wall’s just in your head, Tartt.”
“I know that. But my head’s so fucking loud, and such a fucking mess, I…” Jamie sags down to the turf and drops his head between his knees. "Keeley, I can't remember the fucking difference between you and Ted wanting me to be better and Celia wanting it. Tell me again, why did the one feel hard and embarrassing but the other feels like I'm fucking dying?"
Roy answers before Keeley can, his voice harsh in the silence of the early morning, but that makes the truth in it clear. "Because Keeley and Ted just wanted you to be a fucking decent human being and not insult everyone around you. Celia wanted to make you more presentable as her arm candy for posh company."
Jamie lifts his head a little to blink at him, and Roy goes on.
"The thing is you can do the first while still talking Manchester and wearing loud clothes and having lines around your eyes, but the second has tighter rules, doesn't it? Ted and Keeley wanted you to behave different. Celia wanted you to be different." Roy shrugs. "One is work. The other fucking hurts."
Jamie's mouth hangs open a bit. "Oh."
"Yeah." Roy offers his hand. "Get up, Jamie. You need to act like a decent person, but you can look and talk however you want. If you want to change that shit for yourself, that's fine. But someone else making you do it because otherwise you're not good enough for them, that's shit. All right?"
Jamie takes his hand and pulls himself to his feet. "All right."
“Good lad.” Roy holds his hand a bit longer. "Can we fucking go home or do you still need to work at this?"
A miserable shake of his head. "I can't find the flow, Roy. I can’t just stop when it’s all fucked up like this."
Roy sighs. "All right. Round up the balls and line them up there. I'll pass to you. Don't think. Just move."
Ten balls lined up. Roy studying them, dark-eyed and intense. He takes the step and launches the first one shallow and left, and Jamie sprints for it.
"Two defenders coming at you," Roy calls dispassionately. "Fucking turn it."
Jamie dribbles and spins and takes the ball toward the goal. Keeley can see the minute when his brain interferes: he misses a step, flubs the next contact with the ball, sends it spinning off uselessly. He comes to a halt, hands on his hips, body heaving with breath.
"Oi!" Roy roars, and Jamie turns just as Roy launches the next ball, sending it hurtling deep. Jamie takes off again and Roy calls some sequence after him that makes no sense to Keeley at all, but seems to mean something to Jamie.
The final kick to the goal goes wide, though.
"Fucking hell," Roy mutters, then bellows "Three!" and sends the next one off.
Jamie runs like his hair is on fire, like he wants to make his heart explode, but every time the line of muscle memory and instinct gets broken up by his whirring brain, and even Keeley can see it. They're going to be out here all bloody night.
On the sixth ball, though. Something happens.
Jamie plants himself in front of Roy, knees relaxed, arms loose at his sides. His eyes are wide, jaw slack. And when Roy kicks the ball, Jamie is moving before the contact is properly made. This time he's not sprinting, he's flying.
He catches it on his foot, dances around invisible opponents, turns it across the pitch and then turns it again. When he faces the goal this time, there's no hesitation, no hitch, he sends it flying like he's just told it to go home, to the back corner of the net, and it does.
"There we are," Roy murmurs with deep satisfaction.
Jamie drops to the turf again, staring into the net, then hauls himself up and shouts to the sky, throwing his arms wide and spinning in place.
"Feel it that time?" Roy calls, and Jamie nods, grinning at them from halfway down the pitch.
"Perfect," he calls back. "Just fucking perfect."
"That's wonderful. Now gather up these fucking balls, you fucking muppet, we're going home." Roy turns away from him and bends forward, hands on his knees. “Jesus fucking Christ on a donkey.”
“Are you all right?” Keeley hurries to his side. “Your knee?”
“No, my fucking… soul, I think.” He straightens again and does the same slow, balanced breathing he’d made Jamie do. “Never had to handle a meltdown like that myself before.”
“Have you had the meltdown yourself?” She hooks her elbow with his, steadying him.
“Oh, yeah. Half a dozen times. Coaches usually smacked my head to snap me out of it, but that would’ve made it worse for him.” He looks over his shoulder, watching Jamie round up the footballs. “I should make him do a proper cooldown but I want to get him back to the house.”
“He’s going to get sweat all over your car.”
“I’ve got a blanket in the back. He’ll need it anyway, chill’s going to set in when he stops moving.” Roy rubs the back of his neck with his free hand and she can see him mentally ticking through all the things that need to be done to care for his player, the consummate coach. She pushes back the whisper in the back of her head that wants Roy to see Jamie as something other than his player—it isn’t the time for that, or the place.
The drive home is quiet. Jamie’s in the back seat, huddled up in the Richmond logo blanket Roy had produced from apparently nowhere. Nobody speaks until they park at the house and Roy twists around to look at him.
“Shower. Full set of stretches. I’ll leave a water bottle in your room and you need to drink all of it before you go to bed. If you can’t sleep, lie still with your eyes closed and let your body rest. You’re off training tomorrow, but I want you to stay here at the house with Keeley. You’re on supervision until we can talk about this shit. Understood?”
Jamie nods, looking like some kind of medieval nun with the blanket pulled all the way up over his head. “Yes.”
“Good. Get inside.”
Jamie goes, and Keeley sits still for a moment, taking deep careful breaths, until she feels Roy’s hand take hers. “Keeley, love?”
“I’m all right. Tired.”
“Sorry for saddling you with him, but I knew you were working from home and I need to go in today if at all possible.”
“It’s fine.” She squeezes his hand carefully and leans into him, trying to soak up as much of his warmth as she can. “I love you.”
“I love you too. I hope I’m not getting all of this wrong.”
“We’re all just doing the best we can.” She makes herself sit up and wipe her eyes. “I’m going to go in and lie down, try to rest for a few hours like you told him.”
“You want to be alone? I can come hold you.”
“Please hold me.” If she’s alone right now she’ll shake apart. There’s too much in her head, and she’s too exhausted to sort it out. So much for the independent woman, part of her sneers, but the rest is so glad to have Roy here, backing her up, being what she needs.
**
She’s more herself by the afternoon, which is when Jamie comes downstairs. She’s at the table with her laptop, filling out a spreadsheet—absolutely her least favorite part of this job—and looks up to catch him shuffling into the kitchen.
“There you are,” she says softly. “Was going to come upstairs and check on you soon.”
“Can’t believe I slept so late.” He rubs his face and peers into the refrigerator, finally choosing the bottle of orange juice. “Don’t let me interrupt your work.”
“Could use a break.” She watches him fill a glass, put the juice away, take a drink. “Can we talk?”
The look on his face is mildly to moderately terrified. “I can pack up in... fifteen minutes. Get out of your way.”
“That’s not what I want.” She gestures toward the other room. “Let’s sit down together. A little less of a confrontation vibe.”
He follows her to the sofa, sitting down with his glass in one hand and the other clamped between his knees. “Can I say something first?”
She nods, hugging her knees to her chest. “Yeah, go ahead.”
“I am... very sorry.” He doesn’t look at her, staring ahead and down at the floor. “Both for constantly waking you up, and for... for treating you and Roy badly. You’ve both been so... generous, and nice, letting me stay here, and feeding me, and listening to my stupid fucking tantrums, and I’ve been awful, and I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.” She blinks away fresh tears. “That... look at you, you know what you’re apologizing for this time.”
“Fuck.” He laughs breathlessly. “Everything?”
“I accept your apology. And I forgive you.” She scoots one foot forward, nudging his thigh with her toes. “You’ll have to repeat it for Roy when he gets here, but you and I, we’re square.”
“You’re much better than I deserve, Keeley.” He sighs and sets the glass down on the floor, turning a little to face her. “All right. Your turn.”
“I...” She wipes at her eyes. “Shit. Jamie. I’m so scared right now.”
His brow furrows. “Scared?”
“Scared. Exhausted. Worried.” Losing her bloody mind. “I want you to stay here, I want you to be close, the idea of you going back to that house makes me sick, but... but you can’t keep going out in the middle of the night.”
His eyes have gone wide. “There’s... a few things there I... Can I start at the end? It scares you when I go out?”
“At that hour of the night, yes.” Her whole chest aches with having to hold herself together and speak calmly. “I lived alone as a woman in London for years, and that means when I hear someone moving around my house at three AM, I wake up thinking I might be about to be raped and murdered. That scares me, for one thing. But then when I hear you leave, I get scared that you’re going to get hurt, that something will happen, that I won’t be able to...”
“Keeley, Keeley.” He moves down the sofa toward her, his hands settling carefully on her shoulders. “That’s not your job. You don’t have to watch out for me.”
“I know it’s not my job. I don’t feel it because it’s my job.” She’s crying now, fully crying. “I don’t worry because I’m your keeper or your owner or something, I worry because I care about you.”
“Oh.” He pulls her into his arms, as gently as if she’s made of glass, and she sags against his chest, all of her hard-won control falling away from her. She cries and cries, soaking his shirt, and he holds her, his hands rubbing careful circles on her back. “It’s all right,” he whispers against her hair. “It’s all right, Keeley. I’ll… I’ll do better, I won’t scare you anymore.”
She sniffles, leaning harder against him for a moment before pulling back. “Thank you.”
“Here, let me…” He stands and hurries to the kitchen, coming back with a towel for her. “Clean up your face, yeah?”
She does her best, though she can feel how swollen her eyes are. “Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize.” He puts his hand on her knee for a moment, then pulls it away. “You said you want me here still? Close?”
She nods, dabbing at her nose. “I do, yes.”
“That’s…” He breathes out slowly. “I don’t know how to tell you how much that means.”
“You’re wanted, Jamie. You are.” She wipes her face again, just as the alarm on her laptop goes off. “Shit. That’s… ten minutes until my next call. Shit.”
“Go splash some water on your face. I’ll get you a cup of tea.” He stands and offers his hands to help her up. “Tell them your camera’s acting up and you need to just do audio.”
“Oh, god, I look that bad?”
He winces. “It’s not a ten-minute fix.”
“Fuck.” She hurries off to the washroom, her head aching at the stress of switching from whatever that was back into work mode. This is her last call of the day. If she can get through it, she can collapse on the floor and not move until Roy gets home.
When she gets off her call, Jamie is still on the sofa, frowning at his phone in a serious way. He looks up and brightens, holding it so she can see the screen, though she has no idea what she’s meant to be looking at.
“I had an idea, yeah? I thought maybe I can get one of those little electric kettles, just enough for two cups or so, and keep that in my room, so if I wake up in the middle of the night and want a tea I don’t have to come downstairs. And maybe a yoga mat or something, and Roy could show me a bit of how to do it, and so if I feel like I need to move around I could do that instead of going out. And that way I won’t scare you.”
He looks so hopeful and proud of himself, she can’t help but take his face in her hands and smile at him. “That’s brilliant. Thank you, Jamie.”
This smile is one she doesn’t think he ever shows in public—too wide, too much, his eyes crinkled up and shining. “I’ll order them right now, have them delivered round.”
“I could text Roy and have him pick them up on his way home.” She squints at his phone again and sees the name of the shop. “Yeah, he goes right by there. Order it for pick-up and I’ll have him do it.”
She realizes that she’s still holding his face, and he’s not pulling away, just gazing up at her like she’s the center of his universe. She pulls back slowly, letting her hands drop to her sides, immediately hating herself for it when fear and disappointment flicker in his eyes.
“I’ll text him now,” she says, her voice thick. “Do you want some more tea?”
“Yeah. That’d be fine.” His face is red, he’s looking down at his lap, she’s fucking this up. “Thanks.”
“Jamie?” He looks up, and she hopes it’s showing in her face, how much she means it. “I want you here. I know it gets… a little funny, and awkward, but I do want you here. We’ll get it figured out. Please don’t pull a runner on me?”
“It’s not just you, though, is it? It’s Roy, too.”
She nods, wrapping her arms around herself. “I’m going to talk to him. About all of it. Make sure we’re on the same page.”
“Could you maybe let me know what that page is? At some point?” He tries for a smile. “I’m not sure I’m even reading the same book.”
“I will absolutely let you know. Swear it.”
That seems to settle him a little. Thank god he trusts her, even if it’s a scary responsibility, too. “Text him about picking up my things, then. I can get the tea.”
“No, you stay here.” She retreats to the kitchen, messaging Roy while the kettle heats. He sends back some question marks, she promises to explain later, hesitates over saying more, then puts the phone down on the counter. If they’re going to talk about it they need to talk about it, in person. She just has to be brave enough to insist on it when a chance comes around.
**
Jamie’s new setup works a treat—Keeley sleeps through the whole night, and wakes up feeling human and able to think for the first time in ages. Roy is pleased, too, humming to himself as he trims his beard and brushes his teeth. She hasn’t heard him do that in a while.
The mood is good enough that she takes it as her chance and leans in the washroom doorway. “Babe?”
“Yeah?” He spits and makes a face at himself in the mirror. “Do you think I need to start trimming my ear hair?”
“Only if you want to.” She comes into the room and boosts herself up on the counter. “Think we could go out to dinner tonight?”
“Any time you like. Any time you’ll be free from work.” He glances at her and picks up the floss. “Just the two of us?”
“Yeah. We should talk, shouldn’t we? It’s been a bit.”
“I’d like that.” He turns back to the mirror to floss, and she waits, kicking her feet in slow arcs until he spits again and tosses the floss in the bin.
“Well?” she asks finally.
“What?”
“You’re not going to ask if I’m breaking up with you, and tease me for reassurance, and then take me back to bed for a bit?”
“I trust you, and I don’t need reassurance, and I would love to take you back to bed but if I do that you’re going to be late and your secretary will be upset.”
“Executive assistant. We don’t say secretary.”
“Whatever.” He catches her chin and kisses her slowly. “I trust you. I love you. I have things I want to talk about one on one, too.”
“You’re not going to break up with me, are you?”
“Jesus.” He tilts his head back and looks at the ceiling. “All right. A quickie to end all quickies. Get your panties off.”
She is late to the office, and Caprice is upset, but it’s worth it, because she and Roy are okay, and they’re going to talk like proper adults who understand each other, and also he’s promised reservations at her very favorite place.
Mid-afternoon she realizes she ought to give Jamie a heads-up that he’ll be on his own for dinner and have the house to himself. She opens her messages only to find one from him waiting for her.
Won’t be home til late tonight. Lads are demanding my presence at team bonding. Apparently it’s not a proper party without me! with a string of emojis.
Keeley hadn’t realized that there were new depths of tension in her chest until they eased at that. Oh, good. He’ll be busy, he’ll be with his friends, she won’t have to worry. The lads will take care of him, they’re all wonderful, she should see if she can send round a sponsored lunch or something to the clubhouse soon. Not just for this, obviously, but just for being wonderful in general, and—
“Keeley!” Caprice is in her office doorway again, eyes wide in the exaggerated way that means she’s held off the wolves for as long as she can. “Zoom waiting, it’s the rep from that start-up.”
“Which one?”
“Er.” Caprice glances back over her shoulder to her desk, then brightens. “The one we code orange in emails.”
“Got it.” She slips her headset on, finds her smile, and accepts the call. “Steven! Sorry for the wait, it’s madness around here today, how are you?”
**
The call goes well; she finally locks Steven into the project he’s been dithering about, with the up-front portion of the payment promised tomorrow. Caprice only has a few things for her to sign off on after, and then she can go to the washroom, freshen up her makeup and fuss with her hair, and head out to the restaurant to meet Roy.
He must have gone home before here, because he’s wearing a proper shirt and jacket instead of his coaching clothes. He’s still already seated, a nice private booth in the back and a glass in front of him, but he smiles without a hint of impatience when he sees her.
“I thought I was getting out early and you still beat me.” She kisses him before sliding into her side of the booth and reaching for the drinks menu. “He’s here, he’s there…”
“My schedule is a little more flexible than yours. Ted and Beard wanted to do some extra film review and I just said fuck no and left.” He stretches his legs out under the table, catching one of her feet between his. “How was your day?”
“Good! Very good. Booked a new client.” He nods in approval and she beams at him. “One more at this rate and I’m going ahead and booking a month off solid in advance so we can go away properly this year.”
That nod is more of an I’ll believe it when I see it, but she can’t blame him for that, can she?
“Should we eat first and then talk, or both at once?” he asks. “If it affects your decision, they do have duck tonight.”
“Oh!” That does change things. “Eat first and just tell each other how great we are, then the serious talk over dessert and coffee?”
“Brilliant.” He glances up and nods to the waiter. “The duck for both of us, and the lady’s choice of appetizers and wine.”
Cozy talk, the duck, and the wine have her properly relaxed by the time the dessert cart comes round and it’s time to talk about the fit, pouty elephant in the metaphorical room. Roy takes a sip of his coffee and rubs at his forehead before plunging them right in. “So. Jamie.”
Keeley nods. “Jamie.”
“You have feelings for him again.”
She takes a breath, trying to stay balanced against the immediate rush of shame in her stomach. “I think these are new feelings. Ones I didn’t actually have for him when we dated. We really weren’t very nice to each other at all then, in a lot of ways.”
“He wasn’t really very nice to anyone.” Roy wraps his hands around his coffee cup, looking down into it. “I feel differently about him than I did then, too.”
“I thought you might.” She tries for a smile. “You’re almost proper friends now, aren’t you?”
“I think…” This is hard for him, she knows it is. Talking about his feelings is like excavating rocks from deep in his chest and hauling them up to the surface. “I think it goes a bit further than that, actually.”
Her mouth falls open. She sits there gawking at him like a fish, until he reaches across the table, gently puts two fingers under her chin, and pushes it closed again.
“I didn’t know,” she says.
“I didn’t know either.” He shrugs, and she realizes he’s blushing, too, the color rising up above the line of his beard. “It’s… new. Weird. A little alarming, because it’s him, but…”
She grabs for his hand and he lets her, both of them holding on tight. “Do you think… I mean, people do, don’t they?”
“Quietly. Discreetly.” He shrugs again. “And the third person has to be interested, which I sort of doubt he is.”
“Why do you think that?”
“He’s Jamie Tartt, Keeley. Playboy extraordinaire. He doesn’t want commitment, and he certainly doesn’t want it with a man.”
“Are you thinking of the Jamie you know from football and advertising and Lust Conquers All, or the Jamie who we both got out of bed for at three AM and who has learned to make your rather exacting morning coffee?”
“Fuck.” He doesn’t let go of her hand, but his free hand smacks down helplessly on the table. “I don’t know.”
She tilts her head, watching him for a moment. “You’re afraid he doesn’t want you?”
“I wouldn’t say afraid.” She waits for another one of those rocks to be dragged up out of him and exposed to the air. “Maybe a little afraid.”
“If we asked him? And he did?”
“That’s like saying ‘if I woke up tomorrow with wings, and could just fly over to work so there’s no commute.’”
She knows him by now, knows how to read hope under the gruffness and bluster and fear. “If he did, though?”
He cups his hand over his mouth, his gaze going somewhere either deep inside or very far away. “Well, that would be… that would be something, wouldn’t it?”
**
The lads drop Jamie off at the front door with lots of whooping and hollering at around midnight, which is going to get her some stiff calls from the neighbors. He shouts back at them and lets himself inside, smiling as wide as she’s seen in a while, dancing a little in the entryway as he kicks off his shoes.
“Had fun?” she asks from her spot on the sofa, curled up with the remote and a program that Roy’s got no interest in. He’s upstairs, already in bed, giving her solo time.
“Yeah. It was great.” He comes into the room and grins at her, and she squeaks in surprise. His hair has been cut back—not cropped short again like it was, but the long bit is just at the top front now, and the rest is shaved in a series of patterns and fades.
“Where’d you get that done?” she asks, sitting up straighter. “It looks incredible.”
“Isaac did it.” He grins and turns in a circle so she can see it all the way around. “The lads grabbed me after practice and said I was being given a once in a lifetime special bonus haircut before we went out, shaving off the past so I could start brand new. Couldn’t say no to that, eh?”
“Course not.” She holds her hand out to him, snapping her fingers. “Give me your phone, I was just on Instagram so I know you haven’t posted pictures yet. This needs to be documented for the people.”
He preens and poses, letting her get a whole series of shots, and then sits down with her to go through them and decide what to post. They blur out the backgrounds so no one speculates about where he is, and he posts a set of three with a caption about fresh starts and shout-out to his dear mate who did the work, but he won’t tag without permission in case he wants to save his skills for special people.
“Don’t need half of London banging on Isaac’s door demanding the magic.” He tosses his phone down and grins at her, relaxed and happy and himself in a way she hasn’t seen in too long. “What did you and Roy do tonight?”
“We went out to dinner. Le Brillant had duck.”
“Oh shit.” He groans happily. “Sorry I missed out on that.”
“No, you’re not, you had too much fun with the lads to be sorry.”
“True.” He wiggles a little in his seat. “I’m glad you two had a chance to go out, too. I’ve been a bit in your way, haven’t I?”
“No,” she says, maybe too quickly by the startled look he gives her. “You’ve been lovely.”
“You’re sure?”
“Absolutely. And so is Roy. We talked about it at dinner.” She grabs his hand and squeezes it firmly. “We’re both very happy having you here.”
“So… that’s the page, then?” He looks a little bit hopeful, and like he’s trying to hold it back, which makes her want to spill everything right now, right up to the parts that are making Roy skittish. But she can’t do that without him, and if they wake him up to talk about his feelings he will walk out into the garden and refuse to come back.
“That’s the page,” she says instead, pressing a kiss to the back of his hand. “It’s got just one sentence on it, that says Jamie, please stay as long as you like..”
He grins again, wide and tender. “That’s clear enough even for me, I guess.”
“I’ll print one at work tomorrow for real, if you like. We can put it on the wall.”
“You don’t have to do that.” He looks at their intertwined fingers. “But thank you for telling me.”
**
Waiting for an opportunity to all talk about it together is nearly as stressful as waiting to talk to Roy had been. Something keeps getting in the way, every time they almost get there.
Richmond has a midweek game, which keeps the boys distracted and useless in the run-up and then sullen and grumpy after it’s a loss. Then Keeley loses a client—not due to her work, they go out of business, which, thanks a fucking lot for that—and has a rough go of it herself.
Finally, Jamie has another bad day where he picks a fight with Roy and says terrible things and all that has to be defused.
They’re collapsed around the table, poking at their fresh emotional bruises, when Roy takes a breath and says, “I think we maybe need some reinforcements here.”
Jamie gives him a wary look. He’s still red-faced and quietly roiling, Keeley can tell, but when he speaks his voice is subdued. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, Keeley and I aren’t… professionals, or even really amateurs, at helping people deal with shit. Neither one of us knows what the fuck we’re doing.” He shrugs and folds his arms across his chest. “Maybe we should get back in touch with Dr. Sharon and see if she can recommend you someone to talk to. Confidential and all that, so you can complain about us, too, if you need to.”
Jamie narrows his eyes a little, and Keeley braces herself for sharp-edged questions about if the two of them complain about him to each other, and if so how much, but they don’t come. “That might be good,” Jamie says instead. “Whenever I tried to get her to fight with me she would just look at me and be all patient and tell me not to speak to her like that so I felt like a right arsehole.”
Keeley sags a little in relief. “It’s a good idea, yeah, Roy. She gave her number to everyone in case they needed a referral or things, right?”
“Oh, she gave me referrals before she left.” Jamie is poking through his mobile already. “Three or four names, I don’t remember exactly. She said they were all very good and did things in a way that would mesh with me.” He looks up after a moment, maybe feeling that Roy and Keeley are both staring at him. “What?”
“She gave you referrals months ago and you didn’t use them?” Credit to Roy, he doesn’t curse at all, much less hit a full roar.
“Well, of course not. We had the break and then I was dating Celia and I didn’t think I needed a fucking therapist, did I?” He shakes his head and scrolls some more. “Yeah, here it is. Four names. I’ll try calling tomorrow and see if any of them are taking new people?”
“That would be great,” Keeley says firmly, before Roy can say anything else. “Thank you. I think that will help a lot, don’t you?”
“Yeah.” Jamie nods, glancing back and forth between them. “Progress?”
“Progress.” Roy exhales slowly and rubs at his eyes. “On my side, too, I think, since I thought of that instead of trying to throw you across the room.”
“You couldn’t if you tried, old man.” It’s teasing, not trying to start another fight, but Keeley puts her hands up to stop it anyway.
“Popcorn,” she says, pointing at Jamie. “Telly.” Pointing at Roy. “Wine.” Pointing at herself. “Let’s quit while we’re ahead.”
The truce holds the rest of the night, thank god, and the next evening Jamie pokes his head in while she and Roy are making dinner to tell them he has an appointment scheduled, with the person Dr. Sharon had recommended most strongly. “He came up through the football academies and all that,” Jamie says, leaning in the doorway. “He didn’t go pro but he knows the, like, environment and all. She thought that would give us common ground to start from.”
“Sounds good.” Roy gives an approving nod. “This should be ready in an hour or so.”
“D’you want me to help?” Jamie leans in closer, sniffing at the cooking smells without actually crossing into the kitchen. “I could help more.”
“Could you clear and set the table?”
“That is the job for the youngest, isn’t it?” Jamie laughs and moves away, and Keeley bumps Roy’s hip with hers.
“Progress,” she says, scraping her cutting board of vegetables into the pan he’s working on.
“Progress.” He glances toward the dining room, where they can hear Jamie shuffling things around as he clears the table, then touches her shoulder gently. “We’ve got Saturday off this week. Could you see if he’d be willing to stay home Saturday night and the three of us can have that talk?”
Keeley promptly drops the cutting board. “Shit. Sorry. Of course. But why can’t you ask him?”
“Because I’m having a fucking heart attack just thinking about it and it would go poorly.”
“Fair.” She boosts herself on tiptoe to kiss his nose. “I’ll take care of it.”
She’s not nervous about it, she just knows how to pick a moment, so she taps on Jamie’s door after Roy’s gone to bed and she’s finished her nighttime routine. “Jamie? Got a minute?”
“Sure.” She opens the door to find him stretched out in bed, The Vegan Athlete 2 open on his chest.
“How’s the reading?” she asks, stepping inside and half-closing the door behind her.
“It’s interesting.” He taps at the open page. “Don’t think I’ll go full vegan, but I’m going to ask the nutritionist if we can incorporate some of this into my plan. More plant proteins and all that. It doesn’t have to be all one thing or another, right? You can put different pieces together and find what works.”
“Yeah, definitely.” She doesn’t know where to stand. Close to the door seems like she’s ready to bolt, close to the bed feels like she’s trying to force intimacy or something. Instead she’s awkwardly in the middle, wringing her hands, and Jamie’s looking at her warily.
“What’s wrong?” he asks. “I swear, Dr. Dhanial is going to get the worst of me now, not you two anymore.”
“I’m so proud of you for that.” She compromises with one step closer to the bed. “Really, it’s great, Jamie.”
He shrugs, blushing a little. “I should’ve thought of it sooner. Was just so stuck in feeling bad I couldn’t think of any ways to get out, except leaning on you and Roy.”
“We don’t mind leaning. Just need a little extra help, is all.”
“No, I know. I’ll do better.” He sighs. “I’ve said that so much, don’t blame you for not believing me anymore.”
“I do believe you.” She reaches out and touches his arm. “Look, do you have plans for Saturday night? I know you’ve got the day off.”
“Plans,” he echoes. “Well, the lads don’t usually decide if we’re going out or not until the last minute, so nothing yet, I guess.”
“Do you think maybe you could skip if they do go out? I was hoping we could order something nice and spend the evening the three of us.”
She expects more suspicion at that, but instead Jamie lights up. “Oh! Yeah, that would be great.”
She pets his arm again, smiling, and after a minute it clicks—if she and Roy want to have an evening with the three of them together, they really aren’t mad at him or planning to kick him out. Lucky she phrased it the way she did instead of saying the three of us should talk, that probably would’ve sent him straight up to the ceiling.
“Brilliant,” she says, and forces herself to take her hand back. “I’ll plan on it.”
“Doesn’t have to be a whole big party, Keeley.” That smile’s still in place, her new favorite one. “Not a PR thing, just three people lying around the house.”
“My parties are incredible and you know it.”
“Obviously. But what are three people going to do with fire-eaters and a baby elephant and a chocolate fountain…” He collapses giggling against the pillows and she rolls her eyes at him.
“There has never been a baby elephant, but I’m going to keep that in mind now, if I can find one. Goodnight, Jamie.”
“Night.” He stretches slowly, and she can’t help it, she reaches out to touch him again. “See you tomorrow.”
**
Keeley really does try not to get carried away, but she likes nice things, and she likes doing nice things for people, and anyway by Saturday evening she’s accepting deliveries from a fancy wine store, a bakery, and several very nice restaurants.
Jamie and Roy have both been out all day, Roy with Phoebe, Jamie on a very intense sunglasses-shopping expedition with Moe and Isaac. Keeley texts them both to make sure they’re on their way back, then takes her shower and gets dressed in clothes comfortable enough for a night at home but still attractive enough for where this will hopefully end up.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself, Keeley,” she mutters at her reflection, carefully applying her most neutral lipstick. “This could all still go horribly wrong, you know.”
She’s an optimist, though. Always has been.
Her phone informs her that Roy is on his way and Jamie just pulled in, timestamped ten minutes ago. She hurries downstairs to find him standing in the entryway, looking wide-eyed at the bottles of champagne and stacks of delivery boxes. “What’s all this?” he asks, then actually looks at her and his eyes go wide. “Wow.”
“This is our party.” She grabs the champagne bottles and goes to the kitchen to get ice ready. “All of our favorites.”
“You’re so done up. Should I go put something nicer on?”
“You’re wearing at least a few thousand pounds worth of outfit, aren’t you?”
He looks down at himself. “Well. Yeah. But I’ve got nicer.”
“Put on something comfortable. Doesn’t have to be fancy.” She doesn’t have an ice bucket. How does she not have an ice bucket? Well, she’ll fill the sink with ice and stick the bottles in there.
Jamie heads off upstairs and Keeley circles the downstairs a few times, adjusting cushions and tossing blankets here and there. The special-occasion purple blanket has been living on the sofa ever since Jamie started staying here; either every day is a special occasion now, or it’s just his.
Roy lets himself in and does a similar round of stopping and staring, first at the deliveries and then at her. “Fuck me.”
“Hi.” She comes over for a kiss. “How’s Phoebe?”
“She’s good. Diabolical. Smarter than me.”
“Situation normal, then.” She tugs at his t-shirt, guiding him over to the food. “Let’s set the table and start serving this out.”
“What is all of it?”
“All of our favorites. Yours, mine, Jamie’s. And our favorite desserts, too, but I could get all those from one bakery, so that was a little more efficient.”
“You’re incredible.” He kisses her again and goes to get dishes. “What’s Jamie doing?”
“Getting changed.”
“Do I need to get changed?”
“Only if you want to.” Fancy kebabs, fancy barbecue, fancy ramen. God, it all smells so good. “Champagne flutes, too, please.”
“Why don’t we just drink the champagne out of water glasses? Or mugs.”
She sighs. These men. “We’re adults having a party, Roy, not freshers at uni.”
“Freshers don’t drink Armand de Brignac.”
Jamie whistles as he comes down the stairs. “Fuck, Keeley. You went all out.”
“Of course I did. We’re celebrating.”
“What are we celebrating?” He looks at Roy. “Do you know?”
“I never fucking know anything.” Roy shrugs and goes to get the champagne flutes. “Call it celebrating Keeley.”
“Oh, all right.” Jamie nods and follows Roy to the kitchen. “Toss me the silverware, I’ll put that out.”
It’s nice, the three of them navigating around each other to get the table ready and the ridiculous spread of food dished out. It’s nice to be sitting together eating and sipping champagne and hearing about Jamie and the lads’ adventures in looking for the perfect sunglasses. It’s nice to get buzzy, and laugh a lot, and not be on edge or worried or scared.
It’s nice to see Roy and Jamie both smiling, at the same time.
“I don’t think I can do the dessert yet,” Jamie says, slumping in his chair. “That was so good, fuck.”
“Wouldn’t have thought noodles with barbecue sauce on top would work, but here we are.” Roy drags his finger through a last bit of sauce on his plate and sucks it clean. “Brilliant work as usual, Keeley.”
“Thank you.” She tilts her champagne flute toward each of them in turn. “Should we have a toast?”
Jamie tops off his and Roy’s glasses. “To what?”
She puts on her best smile. “To us.”
Silence settles for a moment. Jamie’s blinking rapidly, Roy’s fighting a smile, and Keeley can’t tell if her wild shot is heading for the net or the sidelines.
Roy steps in to save her, because he’s a perfect teammate. “To us, yeah. In fact, let’s do this different, though.” He stands up and gestures at them. “Both of you, come here.”
Jamie looks like a cat who’s been cornered, his eyes wide. He goes to Roy, though, and lets Roy guide him by the shoulders to stand where he wants him. Roy puts Keeley next to Jamie, so he’s facing them both, studying them with the expression Keeley had thought was unreadable for a long time, though she now considers it a Frown Level One, hardly worth thinking about.
“All right,” Roy says, nodding a bit. “Good. Here we are.”
“Here we are,” Jamie agrees, his voice unsteady. “What are we doing?”
“Trying something.” Roy reaches out and cups Jamie’s jaw in his hand. “Don’t panic, now.” And he leans in and kisses him.
Keeley’s heart misses a beat, racing in her chest. She squeezes her hands together behind her back, silently asking any guardian angels who might be passing by to let this go all right, to not let Jamie be scared, to keep the warm glow over dinner lasting for just a little bit more.
Roy breaks the kiss gently and hums to himself. “Lovely.” In a smooth movement he turns to Keeley, catches her chin in his other hand, and kisses her the same way, his other hand still on Jamie. Jamie isn’t bolting, Keeley notes with the part of her brain not lost in the taste of Roy’s mouth on hers. Jamie isn’t even pulling away. He’s watching them.
Roy pulls back again with a deeply satisfied smirk. “And now you two. Go on.”
Keeley is the one to move, because Jamie is still wide-eyed and frozen, probably utterly overwhelmed. Roy’s hand drops from Jamie’s jaw to his shoulder, so Keeley can cup Jamie’s face in her hands and kiss him, worry flickering in her heart for just a moment until he sighs against her mouth and kisses her back.
Kissing Jamie is familiar, is settling back into something easy and good, a place where she knows where everything belongs. He makes a rough little noise, almost frantic, and she gently pulls back, still holding him. “All right?”
“Are we… are you…” He glances at Roy, then back to her. “I mean. I think this seems pretty clear, but I know I’m a bit thick sometimes…”
“You’re doing just fine this time,” Roy says. “Can we take you upstairs?”
Keeley expects more uncertainty, maybe a bit of lashing out in the pattern that’s settled in so much, but instead Jamie smiles, bright and wide like sunshine. “Fuck, yes, of course. Jesus. You think I’m going to say no to that? I’m in my right mind, aren’t I?”
Roy shakes his head and laughs out loud. “Still Jamie fucking Tartt.”
“Obviously.” Jamie starts for the stairs, not even looking back to see if they’re following. They are, but Keeley pauses for a moment to grab Roy’s hands and kiss him before they go up.
“So far so good,” she whispers, and Roy nods, his hand settling at the small of her back to guide her along ahead of him.
Jamie’s wiggling out of his trackies when they get to the bedroom, his shirt already discarded on the floor. “I’m trying very hard to be cool here but I want you to know I don’t feel at all cool about this, I’m very excited.”
It takes Keeley a moment to parse that, and in the meantime Roy catches Jamie by the arms and makes him look at him.
“You set the pace here, all right?” he says, giving Jamie a gentle shake. “You need to stop or slow down or you have questions or any of that shit, you say so and we’ll sort it out.”
Jamie nods, licking his lips. “I’m all right, really. Actually.”
“Just like that?” Keeley can’t blame Roy for sounding a little skeptical. “Would think it would be kind of an unexpected twist in things.”
“Oh, yeah.” Jamie shrugs, swaying a little toward Roy, held steady by his hands. “But the thing is, if you’d just brought me over to fuck me and then throw me out, you would’ve done it well before now, yeah? When I was being awful. If you’re just getting round to it now, you probably don’t want to just throw me out, because you’ve put up with all the shit. It’s like a… a sunken cost now, right, Keeley? You invested in me.”
She presses her hand over her mouth to hold back a laugh. “You’ve been listening to my business podcasts, haven’t you?”
“They synched to my phone, I don’t even know how that happened. The BlueTooth or something.” He strains toward Roy. “Kiss me again, c’mon.”
Roy does, deep and slow, then pulls back with another stern look. “You’re not an investment, or a sunken anything. You’re Jamie Tartt. All right?”
“Yeah. Yes.” Jamie nods a little desperately. “Really need you both to be more naked than this.”
Keeley strips down, giving her tits a little extra jiggle as she tugs her top off, because they’re good boys and they deserve a nice view. When she looks at them again, Jamie’s lying back on the bed, propped up on his elbows, while Roy is still in the midst of undressing. From the wet, puffy cast of Jamie’s mouth, they spent most of the time she was undressing still kissing.
Keeley crawls up the mattress, bracing herself over Jamie and leaning down to breathe against his mouth. “Any requests?”
“Want to touch you.” He wraps her hands gently around her wrists, rubbing his thumbs over the lines of her tendons. “Can I?”
“Anywhere you want.” She can guess where he’ll go first—she knows his approach in bed, after all—and sure enough, his hands move to her sides, ghost down along them to her hips, and then dip between her thighs to tease her there.
She loses track of everything for a few minutes, between kissing him and his fingers moving expertly against her and then inside her, getting her properly slick and open. “Condom?” he mumbles against her mouth, and she nods, fumbling toward the bedside table only to have one pressed into her open hand. Roy, everywhere he’s needed, as ever.
Jamie gets the condom on and she moves to line herself up, letting him steady her hips until he pushes inside, and then sliding down on him with a rough moan. Fuck, it’s been a long time, but Keeley still recognizes every bit of this, every throb of her pulse and his.
She rocks her hips slowly, taking a moment just to revel in how good he feels inside her. Their bodies know each other, old friends, and she tightens her muscles around him, listening for the little gasp that’s her cue to relax again.
"Keeley..." His fingers tighten on her hips. "Fuck, missed you."
"I've got you." She lifts up a little and sinks back down, giving a gasp of her own when Roy's hands settle over her breasts. "And there you are." She turns her head to kiss him, and for a minute they linger in that, Jamie waiting patiently beneath her.
Roy slides his hand down her back and between her legs, finding where Jamie's body meets hers. She can feel his hand moving more, but whatever his fingers are doing it’s to Jamie, not her, and it’s making him shake.
"Fucking beautiful," Roy murmurs, and Jamie arches up, turning his head to the side. His mouth falls open, pretty and red and vulnerable. Keeley remembers other things that used to make him shake like that, and she brings her hands up to his chest, setting her nails against his skin and dragging them lightly down.
Instead of the pretty shudder she expects, Jamie tenses under her, his eyes squeezing shut, and the voice that comes out of him barely sounds like him at all. "I don't like that."
Keeley quickly moves her hands, bringing them down to rest flat on his torso, just above his hips. "Sorry, babe, sorry. Won't do it again."
His eyes open and he looks up at her, his face tight and confused. "All I have to say is I don't like it and you'll stop?"
Keeley feels like the air has been knocked out of her. Thank god Roy is here, leaning around her and down to put his hand over Jamie's and speak low and close to him.
"Yeah, mate. That's all you have to do. All right? You need Keeley to get down so you can breathe a minute?"
Jamie takes a careful breath, eyes darting back and forth. “I don’t want to stop stop, but could I watch you two for a bit?”
“Course.” Roy sits up and fits his hands to Keeley’s waist, easily lifting her up and off Jamie’s cock and gently tumbling her onto her back on the bed. He covers her with his body, kissing her deeply while he slips two fingers inside her, teasing over the sensitive nerves and coaxing them back into play.
Keeley turns her head when Roy breaks the kiss and finds Jamie looking at her, lying on his side with one hand splayed on the mattress between their bodies. “Feels good?” he asks softly. “What he’s doing?”
She nods, grabbing his hand as Roy thrusts his fingers deeper. “So good. God. Can’t wait to watch him touch you, too.”
“Been thinking about this.” His voice is barely above a whisper. “Knew I shouldn’t, felt bad about it, but I couldn’t help it.”
“It’s okay. Don’t feel bad anymore.” Keeley gasps as Roy curls his fingers inside her, finding just the right spot. “Oh, god, god. Roy!”
“There you are.” Roy sounds distinctly pleased with himself. “Hides from me sometimes.”
Keeley laughs breathlessly. “Not fucking often… oh, oh.”
Jamie leans in and kisses her, then turns his head to kiss Roy. “Can I taste?”
Roy pulls his hand back slowly, leaving Keeley twisting on the sheets at the sudden emptiness, but watching Jamie close his eyes and suck Roy’s fingers clean makes heat pulse between her legs.
“You want?” Roy asks, and Jamie nods, reaching across the bed for another condom. It takes Keeley a moment to catch up, that Roy is moving away from her and Jamie is taking his place, bracing himself over her body and raising his eyebrow at her questioningly.
She nods, opening her legs wider so he can move in and guide himself into her again. Roy is stroking her thigh gently, his hand heavy and warm, and she sinks her fingers into the blankets as Jamie starts to thrust.
Roy keeps up a low commentary, which Keeley barely hears, because Jamie apparently remembers every single thing he ever learned about her body. He doesn’t have Roy’s trick of making it feel curved, but he has his own repertoire, and she has no complaints, none at all, except that she’s possibly going to die.
Jamie thrusts hard and shudders, coming inside her, and Keeley closes her eyes tightly, wishing she could feel it properly. She’s so frustratingly close to her own orgasm, too, but not quite able to fall, just wait for the tension to fade.
Then Jamie is easing away, out of her, murmuring something to Roy that she can’t make out. She reaches down to try to give herself some relief, only for one of them to catch her wrist and pin her hand gently to the bed.
“As if we wouldn’t take care of you,” Roy says, kissing her and moving back between her thighs again, nudging them apart and bumping his cock against her pussy, waiting for her frantic nod before he pushes inside.
She is absolutely going to die, and her tombstone will say Keeley Jones, killed by being fucked too well by extremely fit men who are competitive in everything they do. She’s well aware that there are words for a woman who lets two men take turns with her like this, but she doesn’t give a fuck, and neither do they, because she’s vaguely aware of Jamie offering commentary now, and just like when it was Roy talking, everything he’s saying is nice.
She’s right on the edge, gasping roughly and angling her hips under Roy to find where she needs it, and god bless him and his ability to keep up a rhythm without faltering for as long as she needs it. Pulsing heat moves through her and she wails, clutching at the blankets again.
“Fucking beautiful,” Jamie whispers. She turns her head toward him, boneless and easy for his kisses while Roy picks up his pace again, groaning softly and dripping sweat on her torso until he’s come, too.
None of them move for a bit, just lying there in a sticky tangle of limbs. Keeley finally pats Roy on the shoulder, cuing him to ease out so she can shuffle to the washroom and clean herself up. She splashes some water on her face and looks at herself in the mirror. She looks a right mess but she feels like some kind of fucking ancient goddess, one who could create the world with her body and some assistance from, well. Extremely fit, competitive men.
They’re not being competitive when she comes back out to the bed, though; they’re curled up like a pair of sleepy kittens, apparently quite content even in the messy wreckage of the bedding. “Anyone need anything?” she asks, standing at the foot of the bed. “Washcloth? Water? Tea? Champagne?”
Roy snorts. “Come to bed, Keeley.”
“I do need some water, actually.” She tickles the sole of his foot, making him kick and squeak.
Jamie lifts his head. “Didn’t know you could make that sound, mate.”
“Don’t get any ideas.” Roy sits up slowly. “I’ll grab the water and make sure everything’s locked up.”
“I can do it,” she protests, but he shakes his head, waving her off as he heads for the door.
“Need to move around a bit,” he says. “Knee and all. Jamie, you want water, too?”
“Yeah, thanks.” Jamie’s sitting up now, rubbing absently at his chest. “Should I go back to my room, then, or…”
“Don’t be silly.” She flops down on the bed and tugs at him until she can rest her head on his thigh. “You’re staying in here tonight.”
His fingers comb feather-light through her hair. “What about my kettle and yoga mat?”
“You can go get those, but you’ve got to come right back.” She presses a kiss to his hip. “Need to talk about anything?”
“No. My head’s actually quiet right now.” He laughs softly. “Fucking nice, actually.”
“Good.” She smiles up at him, hoping he can hear everything in her heart. “That’s good.”
**
It’s not all suddenly easy, of course.
Dr. Awan Dhanial is very good and he and Jamie get along well, but he makes Jamie work, and that means that sometimes after his sessions Jamie comes home exhausted and on an emotional hair-trigger. They come up with a routine for those nights—a few quiet hours in his room, until he’s ready to eat and watch telly with them, all conversations about anything more difficult than what to watch and the next day’s schedule resolutely tabled—but it’s still hard.
Dr. Dhanial gives him a book called The Body Keeps The Score, and recommends that Keeley and Roy read it, too, so Jamie can reference things from it if he needs to. They’ve got their own little book club of misery for a bit, but it is helpful. The fact that he suggested it at all means that he’s respecting whatever it is that the three of them have, too; Jamie hadn’t wanted to tell him about it, but Roy pointed out that he couldn’t leave out such a big part of his life, and if Dr. Dhanial didn’t approve of it then it would just mean he wasn’t the right doctor for Jamie, wouldn’t it?
The doctor apparently had an entire series of thoughts about what it meant that Jamie was establishing a support structure outside of traditional relationship patterns, but they were generally approving, according to Jamie. “He thinks you two sound great,” he says after one of his lighter sessions, when he comes home tired but calm. “Sometimes you encourage me to be a little too codependent, but that’s something we can all work on, he’s not concerned.”
Roy looks mutinous at that, but Keeley can’t really argue. They are codependent sometimes. Going to work every day means she’s carved out more space for herself, but they all need things outside of the little nested-off world they’re building, too.
So Jamie makes a point of going out with the lads more, and Roy keeps up his yoga and Phoebe time, and Keeley drinks wine with Rebecca and joins an actual book club, one focused on trashy beach reads rather than trauma. They’re all doing their best, and nine days out of ten, it works.
And on the tenth, they try for progress.
**
Another club night with the lads, this time after a win so everyone is flying high. Jamie and Thierry have even dragged Ted out on the dance floor, trying to teach him the newest thing. It’s not going very well, but they all seem to be having a good time.
Keeley is half-curled in one of the VIP booths, nursing a cosmopolitan and enjoying watching instead of being in the middle of things. She’s had a long week at work, thought about not coming out tonight at all, but in the end it’s turned out to be worth it. She feels lighter just from being in the room.
“Keeley?”
She looks up to find Isaac, Colin, and Sam standing by her table, drinks in hand, including a new one for her. “Mind if we sit a moment?” Sam asks.
“Of course.” She makes room, smiling at them. “Everything all right? You look awfully serious for a night out.”
“We just wanted to let you know,” Colin starts, then stops and looks at Isaac. “You tell it.”
“Why do I have to tell it? It’s not something awful.”
Sam rolls his eyes. “We wanted to let you know that Jamie told us, today. About him and you and Roy.”
“Oh.” Keeley’s stomach flips a bit. She’d known Jamie was going to tell a few of the lads—he wouldn’t do that without letting her and Roy know first—but she hadn’t expected to have it loop back around to her like this. She thought it would be more like… everyone pretending not to know around each other, keeping it quietly in the background like a family secret.
Which was rather the point, wasn’t it; Jamie didn’t want to be a dirty secret, actually couldn’t stand the idea, and Dr. Dhanial agreed that it was better if he had people he could talk to about his relationship who weren’t either a trained professional who kept turning his questions back to him or the people also involved in the relationship itself. Jamie deserved to be able to talk to his friends.
He had a few childhood mates back in Manchester, whom he texted with and saw when he was home now and then; neither Keeley nor Roy gave a toss about them knowing. That was fine. But the idea of the players Roy coached knowing sent him into a state for days. He wasn’t vetoing, he was processing, but it was still three days of him barely talking to either of them, Jamie sleeping alone in his room with the door closed, and Keeley walking in on Jamie in her dressing room having an emergency phone session with Dr. Dhanial on the topic of if he even had a right to ask either of them for anything ever.
Fucking miserable few days. But Roy had finally agreed, and Jamie had promised to keep it to a small group who could be trusted to be discreet, and then they hadn’t talked about it again.
“Keeley?” Sam says gently, snapping her back into the moment. “Are you all right?”
“Yes! Yes.” She nods firmly. “Just didn’t realize he’d spoken to you already. The three of you?”
Isaac nods. “Said he trusted us. Which, you know. Considering everything. That was kind of touching.”
“We just wanted you to know that we’ll be careful,” Colin says earnestly. “We know it’s sensitive and all. And Roy isn’t out. And all that.”
“We would be telling Roy this, too,” Sam adds, “but he would hate it, so we’ll let you pass the message along.”
“Yeah, that’s probably best.” If they cornered Roy in a club and told him they supported him, he would probably have a cardiac event. “Thank you. I appreciate it so much.”
They all beam at her. “We thought maybe we were supposed to give you the talk,” Colin says, “you know, that if you and Roy hurt his feelings we’ll throw you in the river, but… I mean. We won’t. So.”
“And you’ll do your best not to hurt his feelings. Since he does have them, apparently.” Isaac shrugs. “Anyway. This is getting weird, so we’re going to go bother the DJ. Cheers, Keeley.”
“Cheers.” She watches them go and finishes her drink, then puts her head down on the table for a moment. Sometimes she doesn’t know what to do with all the love in her heart for these ridiculous men.
“Are you that pissed already?” Roy slides into the booth next to her and puts his arm around her waist. “I leave you for ten minutes.”
“I’m fine.” She sits up and leans on him instead. “Just a bit tipsy and it’s making me soppy.”
He kisses the top of her head. “You want to go home?”
“Yeah.” She tucks her face against his neck and breathes him in. “Send Jamie a text that we’re going? We’ll keep the bed warm for him.”
**
Jamie asks her out for coffee one afternoon, which would worry her except he’s cheerful about it, teasing about clearing his calendar for the occasion and hoping she can do the same. They go to a new one that just opened near her office, a clean slate with no memories in it, and he buys his cheat-day fancy thing for both of them.
“Wanted to talk to you about something,” he says, watching her take a bite of her scone. She has to chew and swallow before she can reply, but he doesn’t seem to mind waiting.
“Not something bad, is it?”
“I hope not? I mean. It might upset you a little bit, but I think it’s important to say it up front instead of tripping over it in the middle of things.”
She rolls that around in her head a bit. “It’s a sex thing?”
“Yeah.” He squirms in his seat. “Embarrassing, I guess. But it’s really not bad! Just stupid.”
“All right.” She sits up straighter and folds her hand on the table. “Tell me.”
“When we were together before, you remember, you’d wake me up with sex sometimes?”
Keeley nods; that had always been fun, when she woke up first, slipping under the blankets and teasing him with her hand or her mouth until he woke up hard and they could have a round or two before the day even properly started.
“I don’t.” He closes his mouth tight, then sighs. “I don’t like that, anymore. Being surprised like that. I thought it was better to tell you instead of you trying it one day and me getting upset and you feeling bad.”
Keeley’s stomach clenches up. “Of course, Jamie. I won’t do that, then. I’m glad you told me, thank you.”
“It’s really not as bad as you’re thinking,” he says, sounding a little desperate, which leaves her absolutely sure that it is exactly as bad as she’s thinking. “Just… stupid.”
“It’s not stupid. If you don’t like it, you don’t like it, and that’s that.” She reaches across the table and covers his hand with hers. “It’s all right.”
He nods, stiff and jerky. “Okay. Good.”
“Do you want me to let Roy know?”
“Oh. Um.” Red climbs all the way to the tips of his ears. “I sort of talked to him already. We talk about… stuff, sometimes. I asked him if I should tell you and he said yes.”
“That’s good. That you two talk.” She’s worried about that, sometimes. It still feels a little strange to know they’re talking without her, but it’s the right thing, and she’ll settle herself with it later, on her own time. “We’re all very functional, look at us.”
“It’s mad. I didn’t know it could work like this.” He wrinkles his nose at her. “I don’t think I’ve ever known… anyone who had a relationship where people talk about shit like this. It’s weird.”
“It’s working pretty well, isn’t it?” It’s the only possible way this can work. If Jamie and Roy gave in to their natural instincts toward bottling up and seething they would kill each other inside a week, or else she would hop a flight to Australia.
“Yes. Absolutely.” He squeezes her hand. “Let’s never stop.”
**
Roy and Keeley are deep into some documentary about the American Civil War and also a bottle of wine. Roy is cursing out both sides of the conflict for being stupid fucking Yanks, and Keeley is actually more looking at Instagram than the screen, but it’s extremely cozy couple time on a night when it’s just the two of them. Jamie’s off at a party thrown by his agent, which he considers marginally less boring than watching documentaries, so it all works out.
Her phone lights up with a message from him, like he knew she was thinking of him. She smiles until she actually reads it. Celia’s here.
“Fuck.” She shows Roy the message. “What should we do?”
“Ask him if he needs us to come get him.” He wraps his arm around her waist, steadying her while she types. “Let him decide.”
It takes a minute for Jamie to reply, one where her heart pounds frantically, but Roy was right, apparently. Think I’ll stay through the cocktails and mingling bit and then get an Uber. Skip dinner and all. Wait up for me?
Of course, she sends back, and flops against Roy’s shoulder. “I still want to murder her.”
“Well, we can’t, so let’s just be ready when he gets here.” Roy picks up his own phone and squints at it. “Which fucking app do I use to make someone go to Tesco for us and get biscuits?”
She walks him through that and they wait, missing what are probably fairly important pieces of the war in their distraction. Jamie texts again when he gets in the Uber, and Roy gets up to turn the lights on out front and put the kettle on.
Jamie lets himself in just after their Tesco delivery arrives. “Hey,” he says softly, blinking at them where they’re standing in the kitchen.
Keeley hurries over. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah, actually. She didn’t try to talk to me or anything. Stayed on the opposite side of the room.” He leans down and kisses her. “Thanks for waiting up. Nice to come back to lights on and you two here, instead of all dark and by meself.”
Roy hands him a cup of tea over Keeley’s head. “Biscuits on the counter there.”
“Ooh.” Jamie shuffles over to them without dislodging Keeley’s hold on him. “I actually don’t feel completely terrible. Can I still have these?”
Roy shrugs and stuffs a wagon wheel in his mouth. “Won’t tell if you don’t.”
“I suppose I could still end up feeling terrible in the morning. Eating these now is being pro-emptive, right? Or pre-active. All that.” Jamie carefully takes two jammie dodgers from their wrapping and lets Keeley steer him to the sofa. “Movie night? What’d I miss?”
“The American Civil War.” Keeley pulls the purple blanket over them both, holding up one side of it until Roy can join them and tuck in, too.
“We can change it for something else,” Roy says, grabbing the remote. “I’ll watch this another time.”
Jamie just shrugs, which is the first sign since he came in that he isn’t actually entirely fine. “I don’t mind. Long as we can all be together.”
“Absolutely.” Roy reaches over Keeley and takes Jamie’s hand. Keeley tucks her feet under Roy and rests her head on Jamie’s shoulder.
They’ve got each other. They’ve got this. It’s going to be all right.