Playing for Keeps (Glasgow Lads Book 2) (21 page)

This was the first they’d been alone together all week. When John had been able to escape his parents to see Fergus in the evening, it was always with his teammates. There was much to prepare for Monday’s charity-match announcement: rush-ordering merchandise, updating the Warriors’ website and social-media profiles—and especially orchestrating the promo video that would hopefully gain them the attention they deserved.

Fergus had plenty to be tense about, between Colin’s injury, his lingering fears about being in the spotlight, and bringing John home to meet his family. Still, John couldn’t shake the sense that there was something more going on. His worst fear, of course, the one that stole his sleep and often his appetite, was that Fergus was close to discovering John’s own shameful Orange secret.

Fergus lowered the radio volume. “Can I show you something disturbing?”

John glanced at the upcoming exit sign. “In Cumbernauld? Where would you even start?”

“Here.” Fergus picked up his phone and thumbed the screen, eyes darting between it and the lane ahead of them. “There’s only two messages in the thread because I got a new phone a couple months ago.” He added under his breath, “Much-needed retail therapy.”

John took the phone and saw,
Please consider going to hell instead. You’ll fit right in there.
Then he scrolled up to—

I miss you. Considering coming home.

From Evan Fucking Hollister. Six days ago.

John’s pulse surged with fear and rage. He suddenly understood how his dad had felt when his own heart turned against him inside his chest.

He pressed the phone face down on his knee and tried to breathe. “Bastard. I’ll kill him.”

“Yes, he is. And no, you won’t. I doubt he’ll come back to Scotland.”

“How do you know? Did you talk to him?”

“This was our only communication, I swear to you.” Fergus glanced at him. “You believe me, right?”

“Yes.” John said it before he meant it, but he did mean it. If Fergus were secretly reuniting with his ex, why would he show John the message at all?

“Do you wish I’d not told you?”

“I knew something was wrong.” John squeezed the phone, wanting to roll down the window and hurl it out.

“Nothing is wrong,” Fergus said. “As you can see, I told him to go to hell. Believe me, that was polite compared to what I felt like saying.”

“How can you be so calm? You loved him. I don’t know why, but you did. He turned your life upside down and now he wants back in it.”

“He won’t get what he wants.” Fergus’s voice was soft and calm, accentuating the turbulence inside John. “Aren’t you curious why I loved him?”

“No!” John scoffed. “Why would I want a list of your ex-boyfriend’s outstanding qualities?”

“That’s not what I mean. You need to understand that I loved Evan because of who I was when I was with him. I’m not that person anymore.”

John shook his head hard. “How could you change so much so quickly? How can you just stop loving a person?”

“When it’s the wrong person, love is poison. Best to be shot of it.”

Am I the wrong person too?
John wondered. “I wouldn’t know.”

“You’ve never been in love?”

John fidgeted with the window controls, flicking the child safety lock off and on.
Aye, I’ve been in love, since…just now? Since the day we met? Somewhere in between?
Trying to pin down the moment he’d fallen for Fergus was like trying to remember learning to walk.

“Look at me.” Fergus tapped John’s arm. “Look at me.”

John snapped his head to the right. “What is it?”

“I want you to know two things.” Fergus counted off on his thumb, then forefinger. “One: I’m with you. Two: I’m happy. Wait—three things.” He added his middle finger. “Thing Three is that Thing One and Thing Two are directly related.” He danced his thumb back and forth around his forefinger. “Clear?” He waggled his hand in John’s face. “Clear?”

“Aye, clear! Now get your fuckin’ fingers out of my nose.” With a nervous laugh, John grabbed Fergus’s hand and held onto it.

A new song came on the radio, one they’d danced to at the club with Colin and Liam. John turned up the volume, then sat back, hanging on to Fergus’s hand for grim death.

This is real
, he told himself.
So please, please, please, gonnae no fuck this up.

= = =

The rain eased, but the sky remained cloudy as they gained altitude and latitude. John felt his eyes bulge watching the fog and mist roll through the valleys and wrap around the peaks of the hills. He’d been to the Highlands before, to areas far more rugged than this. But here was a place where a person he knew had lived, which somehow made it both more real
and
surreal.

They fetched Fergus’s brother, Malcolm, and his sister-in-law, Lainie, from the train station in Pitlochry, an eerily pretty Victorian town. John imagined it as a setting for the sort of fairy tale where treacherous fae are disguised as friendly barmen and winsome tea-shop proprietors.

Malcolm was as tall as Fergus, so John offered him the passenger seat and climbed into the back with Lainie, sitting beside Fergus’s niece, Isobel.

“We call her Izzy,” Lainie told John, “but she’s pure crabbit most of the time, so the fun nickname doesn’t suit her.”

“We’ll see about that.” John gave the baby an appraising look. She stared back with solemn, dark blue eyes as she sucked her rubber dummy. Then he leaned back so that the side of Izzy’s car seat blocked her view of him. She tilted her head, trying to keep him in sight. Then John shot forward, popping his eyes and mouth as wide as they could go.

Izzy spit out her dummy and gave a toothless, drooling grin.

Lainie let out a squeal. “That’s the first she’s smiled all day. Malcolm, John made Izzy smile!”

“It was probably indigestion,” John said. “I have that effect on people.” He met Fergus’s amused glance in the rearview mirror.

“Have you got nieces or nephews?” Lainie asked John as he slipped Izzy’s dummy back into her mouth. “You seem such a natural with weans.”

“I’ve a nephew, Harry. He’s five and plans to be an aeroplane when he grows up.”

“Ah, so it’ll be like having a Transformer in the family.”

“Yes, we’re all very proud.”

“Who else is coming today?” Fergus asked his brother. “I’ve been so busy I’ve missed Ma’s latest status reports.”

Malcolm recited an enormous list of aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends that made John’s jaw drop.

“Relax,” Lainie whispered across the back seat. “The family’s harmless enough. They’re the sort of ultra-civil middle-class folk you can talk to for an hour without learning a single fucking thing about them, if you ken what I mean.”

He chuckled. “Good to know. Thanks.”

“Fergus’s last boyfriend fitted in well with that crowd. But I’m glad he’s found someone a bit livelier. You’ll do all right.” Lainie fidgeted with one of her long blond curls, some of which were tinged with pink near the ends. “Just don’t play poker with the Derry contingent.”

“D-Derry?” John stammered. “Northern Ireland Derry?” It felt strange to call the famously contentious area by its “Irish” name, rather than its official “British” name, Londonderry.

“Aye, that Derry,” Lainie said. “Those cousins of Ma’s are the most entertaining of the lot. You should hear them rant about the state of things in their country, once they’ve had a few drams. It’s ‘Hun’ this and ‘Proddy’ that. You’d think the Troubles were still on.”

John swallowed hard. A whole weekend surrounded by Catholics, including Northern Irish cousins who’d be looking to sniff out the Orangeman in him.

Maybe it was a mistake coming here. Maybe he and Fergus were a mistake to begin with.

He leaned his head against the smooth, cool window and steadied his breath. One more week, and it would all be sorted. Just one. More. Week.

= = =

The view grew no less breathtaking or intimidating to John as they turned up Fergus’s driveway. On the left side of the long, curved, chipped-gravel lane, sheep grazed on a lush green field, ears and tails flicking. The right side was flanked by a low stone wall and beyond it, a neatly landscaped lawn, the flat part of which had been set up for croquet. John looked back through the rear window to see rolling green hills dotted with more sheep, and farther away, a row of tree-topped mountains, dark against the high, light-gray clouds.

“You should see it when the sun’s out,” Lainie told John.

“I think that would kill me.”

The driveway ended in front of three stone buildings. Fergus parked beside the middle-sized one, which itself was as large as John’s entire house (had his house been laid on its side and placed in the middle of paradise).

To stop himself gawking like an eejit, he helped Lainie unbuckle the car seat. Isobel stretched her arms toward him, then let out a squeal of protest when her mother tried to pick her up.

Lainie sighed. “Kitten, please be cheery today, for Gran’s sake.” Isobel answered with a wail.

“I can take her.” John needed a distraction from his nerves. “If it’s all right.”

“Be our guest,” Malcolm said, “if you think your eardrums can handle it.”

John put his hands beneath the child’s armpits and drew her to his chest. “Am I doing it right?”

“Hand under the bum,” Lainie instructed.

“Always good advice,” Fergus added.

She batted the back of Fergus’s head. “Cheeky.”

“Exactly,” Malcolm said.

Lainie grimaced at John. “These brothers turn into twelve-year-olds when they’re together. Now curl your arm around like this and let her rest on it. Perfect.”

Isobel’s cries faded as she reached up and grasped a handful of John’s hair.

“Ow.” Somehow he managed to get out of the car without dropping the baby or hitting his own head.

“Happy Birthday, Ma!” Fergus called out.

“There you are!” A spritely ginger woman in a green dress rushed across the driveway, making a beeline for John.

He froze. He’d never met a boyfriend’s mum before, and here one was swooping down on him like a falcon on a rabbit.

“Mrs.—” In his panic, John forgot Fergus’s last name.

“How’s my wee lassie?” She grabbed Izzy, pulling her close to kiss her nose. “Look at you in this adorable frock! I could eat you up.”

Fergus stepped forward. “Ma, I’d like you to meet the nice man whose arms you just ripped this child from.”

“Ah, you must be John!” she said.

“Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Taylor.” He felt proud to get the words out in the correct order.

“Sorry for ignoring you,” she said. “I’m blind to everything in this world but my granddaughter.”

“Hi, Ma, we’re here too.” Malcolm put his arm around her shoulders. “The people who gave you that granddaughter? Remember us?”

There were hugs and kisses all round, then Fergus’s mum pointed to the building they’d parked beside. “You five will stay in the cottage. The main house’ll be full of old people who might want to sleep tonight.”

“Yes!” Malcolm fist-bumped Fergus. “Party central!”

“Dibs on that bedroom.” Fergus pointed to the left side of the top floor. “Better view,” he told John. “Also it’s six square inches bigger.”

They entered the cottage and climbed a spiral wooden staircase. The bedroom’s ceiling was slanted, with a skylight in the center, plus another small window overlooking the valley they’d driven through.

Izzy started to cry in Mrs. Taylor’s arms. “You need a wee nap, don’t you? Everyone will be arriving in an hour.”

“Can I help with anything?” John asked her.

“Oh, you’re sweet. No, the caterers and my brother and sister have everything under control. Besides, Fergus is bursting to take you on a tour, and he’ll wear that hungry-puppy look until he gets what he wants.”

I know that look
, John nearly said aloud but was glad he didn’t.

The ground floor of the cottage had a living room with an open fireplace and a bookshelf stuffed with what looked like photo albums. On the other side was a dining room with a log burner, as well as a kitchen the size of the one in John’s own house.

When his mum was out of earshot, Fergus said, “The decor’s a bit ‘old Scottish lady’ for my tastes, but it’s livable for a weekend, I suppose.”

I could live here forever
, John thought. None of the paint was flaking, none of the carpets was tattered. Aside from the gratuitous distribution of potpourri, it was perfect.

Then he turned to see a three-foot-tall wooden crucifix dominating the dining room wall. “Oh.” The painstakingly carved Jesus had its eyes closed, yet John’s skin prickled as if the figure were staring at him. “That’s…imposing.”

“Isn’t it just? It was a gift from an artist friend of Dad’s. Rather grim for an dining area, if you ask me.” Fergus took his hand. “Come, I’ll show you the studio.”

“Wait.” John closed his mouth, then opened it again, trying to work out how to ask this question. “Are you still—I mean, given the Catholic Church’s stance on gays, do you still, you know…”

“Believe? Aye, I do, though sometimes I wish I didn’t. It seems so illogical to be part of something that opposes what I am.”

“You could leave, right? Join a more tolerant church?”

“I wish it were that simple, like switching political parties.” Fergus sighed in the direction of the crucifix. “But this is who I am. I can’t be an ex-Catholic any more than I can be an ex-ginger.” He held up a hand. “And don’t say
that’s
just a matter of hair dye.”

John smiled, despite his disappointment. “I know it’s not. Every inch of you is ginger.” He kissed his favorite freckle, the one atop Fergus’s lip. “Every. Glorious. Inch.”

As Fergus led him from the cottage, John tried to understand what he’d just been told. Though the Orange Order had been a part of his life since birth—and possibly had saved his life as a teenager—it wasn’t who he was. Leaving it wouldn’t feel like some sort of spiritual amputation.

“This used to be a bothy,” Fergus said of the cottage’s smaller adjacent building, whose facade consisted of tall, thin windows alternating with the wood itself, “but when my parents moved here, my da turned it into a studio and office for his architectural firm. Which consisted of him and the superhero who managed the business—my mother, of course.” He opened the front door. “And now it’s mine.”