Page 46 of After the Siren

Chapter Twenty-Three

‘Who’s it even for?’ Tenders grumbled. ‘No offence,’ he said to Gabby.

It’s for me , Jake wanted to say, like he’d wanted to say a thousand times before. O r at least, for the kid I was when I was thirteen.

‘Come on, Tenders,’ Yelks said. ‘We want to make sure everyone knows they’re welcome.’

Both Falcons teams were gathered in the locker room, ready for open training.

Jake had exited concussion protocols just in time to take part.

He was, in theory, absolutely in favour of Pride open training.

He was particularly in favour of the bet he had with Dex about who’d get the most shots on goal.

But it got tiring, wondering which teammates had a problem with it.

Wondering whether someone would actually come out and say something.

Paddy was sporting rainbow nails. He’d probably made Xen do them, because they were too neat for a DIY.

Jake was going to stick with a rainbow armband and some rainbow socks.

Stavs was kneeling down to put rainbow laces into his boots, but he was looking at them as though they might come to life and strangle him.

Yelks ran a tight ship when it came to inclusion. The only time Jake had ever seen him really lose it was when Collins had gone on a homophobic spray about an umpire. He’d been traded away soon after.

Nobody would be stupid enough to say anything shitty where Yelks might detect it.

Or Raze. Once Raze had rainbow tape around one of his massive biceps, nobody was going to fuck around.

Except sometimes Jake thought he’d rather hear it.

At least when people said it out loud, you knew who thought that kind of shit.

He hated not knowing who was thinking it and just not saying it.

‘Yeah, but they obviously are, right?’ Tenders jerked his head in a way that might have been intended to capture the AFLW team. ‘The girls are playing, and some of them are, you know.’ He shrugged, apparently unwilling to say queer . ‘We can train together without all this rainbow PC shit.’

Jake saw Gabby’s mouth tighten, saw her shaping a sensible, conciliatory answer.

‘It’s for me.’ Jake heard the words as though somebody else was speaking. He felt like they’d just forced their way out of his mouth. He swallowed. ‘I care about it. And other, uh, other queer people care about it.’

Gabby shifted, stepping in to flank him. She didn’t say anything. Stavs was staring at him, still kneeling, his face unreadable, and oh fuck , they really should have talked about this first. But it was too late.

‘I’m ... I’m gay.’ His voice sounded steady, which was weird, because he was pretty sure his heart was in the back of his throat.

Was it possible to vomit up your own heart?

‘It’s ... it’s fucking sucked, sometimes.

There was nothing like this when I was a kid.

I guess I knew even then that I could either be out or I could play footy.

I chose footy. But maybe when we do stuff like this, kids coming through now won’t have to choose.

And that matters. It fucking matters, okay?

’ He was getting choked up. He realised he was looking at Yelks.

Looking for something. But Yelks didn’t say anything.

He was staring at Jake like he’d never seen him before.

‘It’s for me, too.’

For a second, Jake thought it must have been Stavs speaking, even though it didn’t sound like him at all. But it was Raze who was stepping forward, wearing only his shorts, a rainbow armband around one bicep. ‘I’m bi,’ he said, in his soft, even voice.

‘You’re fucking kidding,’ Tenders said. He was staring at them both.

‘Yeah,’ Raze said, voice flat. ‘This is my idea of a joke.’

Tenders blinked.

‘Do either of them look like they’re fucking kidding?’ Paddy asked. He stepped forward and wrapped one arm around Raze’s shoulders, the other around Jake’s. He was looking at Tenders like he’d throw down if he said something that pissed Paddy off even a little bit.

‘I just —’ Tenders started.

Raze held up a hand, and thank God, he was going to talk. Jake didn’t want to do any more talking.

‘I’ve never said anything because I didn’t want anyone to look at me differently,’ Raze said.

‘I’m with Jake – it would have meant a lot to me to see rainbow tape and rainbow jumpers when I was growing up.

And it’s always meant something to me as a player.

Made me feel more welcome, and safer, even though I wasn’t out.

’ His voice got firmer as he spoke. ‘If you don’t get it, maybe you’ve never known what it’s like not to know if you’re welcome somewhere.

And I like doing this stuff, but it stresses me out, too.

That it hasn’t occurred to everyone that there could be someone queer in the room.

Someone standing right next to them. That there’s probably someone on every team – more than one person – who chose footy over being out.

’ He looked around, his eyes catching and lingering on Yelks. ‘So, yeah. It’s for me, too.’

Jake swallowed hard. Raze was looking at him like it was Jake’s turn to say something. Someone definitely had to say something. Stavs had come to his feet. He took a step back and sat down, hard, still looking at Jake.

‘I love this team,’ Jake managed. ‘I love this game. I figured it’d be worth staying kinda closeted in order to play it.

’ He crossed his arms over his chest. ‘And now I reckon I’ve proved I can play footy.

Maybe someone here needs to hear that I’m queer, and it makes me feel shitty to think my teammates won’t even put on some rainbow fucking socks. ’

He didn’t know who to look at. Not Stavs – he didn’t think he could do that. Raze stepped forward and pulled him into a hug before he had to decide. Someone whistled, and then several people started to clap. Jake let himself slump a bit into Raze’s arms. Wished they were Stavs’ arms.

‘Thanks,’ he said, softly enough that only Raze would be able to hear it.

‘Thank you. ’ Raze’s arms squeezed him tighter for a moment.

‘Give him to me,’ someone said, and then Jake was being hugged by Drips and Dex at the same time. That gave him the courage to look up, to see what was happening.

The noise gradually settled. Tenders was staring at both Jake and Raze.

He looked ... not horrified. Just stunned.

‘Is there a fucking problem?’ Paddy asked.

Maybe it was the whipcord tension between Tenders and Paddy that snapped Yelks out of his surprise. ‘Right,’ he said, in the kind of tone that made everyone stand up a little straighter. He looked shook . Jake didn’t blame him. Jake was shook.

‘Jaze, Raze. Thank you for telling us. It was brave of you. I’m sorry you didn’t feel like you could say something to the team until now.

Or that ...’ He paused, and for a second he just looked sad .

‘That you felt like you couldn’t say anything to me.

’ He looked around the room, his gaze intent.

‘That’s on me, and that’s on us – the men’s team.

We talk about being family, being brothers, but what’s the point of family if you can’t be yourself?

So we’re going to go out there and we’re going to show that this is a club for everyone, and we’ve got even more reason to do that now than we did ten minutes ago. ’

Yelks paused, and Gabby stepped forward. ‘And in case it doesn’t go without saying,’ she said, ‘nobody says anything to anyone about this unless the boys say it’s alright.’

‘Too right,’ Yelks said. ‘Now, let’s play some fucking footy.’ Gabby whooped, and the room broke out into shouts again.

Jake exhaled fully for the first time in what felt like hours. Yelks might have dropped the bundle for a minute or so, but he was a good captain. He cared , and that was enough for Jake.

Dex came over and elbowed Jake in the ribs. ‘Always need the limelight,’ they teased.

‘Yeah, I was worried you might show me up on the field. Had to get in first.’

Jake looked around for Stavs, but he was nowhere to be found.

Maybe he’d already run out with Xen and Paddy.

‘You good?’ Dex asked. They were almost the last people still in the rooms.

‘Yeah,’ he said, although something felt wrong in his chest. ‘Yeah, let’s go.’

Theo was sure he’d felt worse at some point in his life.

He just couldn’t remember when. He wasn’t sure how he’d made it through open training, how he’d smiled for selfies and signed posters and run drills like nothing was wrong, like he wasn’t choking on nausea and listening to the thud of his own heart.

Like he wasn’t hearing coward, coward, coward with every step he took.

He’d avoided Jake, which he’d known was a shitty thing to do – an awful thing to do – but he’d also known that if he’d spoken to Jake, touched Jake, he wouldn’t have been able to keep it together.

Xen had said, ‘You good?’ and Theo had said, ‘No,’ because lying was too hard. And maybe Xen had understood, because after that he’d run interference, sticking close to Theo and keeping them both away from Paddy and Jake.

Theo had known, even as he grabbed his stuff and bolted once training was finished, that he was being a dick, that Jake would want to talk to him, that he needed to talk to Jake .

But he’d felt the panic creeping up from the tips of his fingers and he’d run, got himself into the car and driven home even as he struggled to breathe, knowing he should pull over.

Not pulling over. He’d managed to park the car and get inside and into his bedroom before he lost his breath completely, before he had to sit on the floor and put his head between his knees.

The one thing he could have done. The moment when he could have been brave. When Jake was waiting for him to be brave. Had needed him.