Page 16 of Contested

Parker laughed and elbowed Marcos. “Maybe.”

“If it will get you to shut up, I’ll fucking do it.”

That earned Marcos an even sharper elbow. “Thanks, but you can save that for someone else.”

Marcos groaned, dropping his shoulders. His gaze found Sebastian, who was a few metres ahead, speaking to Phetmany with his head slightly turned. Marcos couldn’t hear what he was saying, but Phetmany laughed once, quick and surprised, and Sebastian’s mouth pulled at the corner before he glanced back.

Their eyes met across the small gap between players, and Sebastian’s expression tightened. Marcos lifted two fingers in a lazy wave.

Sebastian rolled his eyes and faced forward, and Marcos smiled despite himself. He should probably stop poking at him.

Probably.

But then what would he do?

|| Chapter Four ||

Marcos – “Dude, what the fuck?”

LATE JANUARY

Marcos’ shoes hit the footpath in time with the music.

He kept his breathing steady, shoulders loose, arms swinging without too much effort. The night had held onto the heat of the day. The sun had gone down, the sky darkened, and the air still sat warm against his skin. Sweat had soaked through the back of his singlet and gathered along his chest, making the fabric cling each time he turned a corner.

He’d started from home nearly forty minutes ago, cutting through the inner streets on a route he knew well enough that he didn’t need to think too hard about it. His family lived close enough to the city that a proper run could drag him toward the CBD if he let it, and Marcos usually did. He liked the distance. He liked knowing he could keep going long after the streets changed around him. Houses gave way to apartment blocks, old shopfronts, narrower footpaths, brighter corners, and people spilling out of late dinners with their phones in their hands.

Close to midnight on a Tuesday, though, there weren’t too many people out.

A couple stepped aside when they saw him coming, and a delivery rider shot past him in the bike lane, shoulders hunched forward, reflective strips catching the streetlight as he shot through an intersection without slowing.

Training had been sitting in his body all day.

The full squad was back now. No more half-empty oval and no more pretending the season still sat somewhere safely in the distance. They were back in it. Gym blocks, match simulation, stoppage work, repeat efforts, recovery, meetings, and whatever else Jacob decided they needed before the pre-season games started.

The Mustangs had come back from the Christmas break in good shape. Better than good, maybe. There was proper movement in the team now, more voices, more pressure, more older players setting the standard.

Jacob still never seemed satisfied.

Marcos had learned quickly that the man could watch a clean passage of play, nod once, and then spend three minutes explaining why it wasn’t good enough. A few of the newer players had been pulled into line by the end of the first week back. The ones who’d thought fitness would carry them through had learned that fitness wasn’t the same as discipline.

The tension between Marcos and Sebastian had changed, too.

It hadn’t disappeared. It sat there every session, close to the surface, waiting for someone to come in too hard or hold contact too long. There were still moments when they forgot they wore the same colours. A contested ball would hit the ground between them, and both of them would go at it with a fraction too much force. A ruck drill would turn sharp, or a block would become a shove. Then a shove would nearly become something that had Jacob’s voice cutting across the field before either of them could decide their next move.

But it happened less now.

Not because Sebastian had warmed to him, though.

In fact, Sebastian had stopped engaging.

Marcos wiped sweat from his brow with the back of his wrist and turned down a side street that ran between a row of apartment buildings and a small strip of stores with their shutters pulled down. His music kept going, bass thudding low through his headphones, but his mind stayed on Sebastian.

At training, Sebastian still called for the ball when he had to. He still used Marcos’ name when the play required it. He still stepped into space and demanded the pass with the same sharp confidence he had always carried. But outside the work, he had shut every door.

Marcos had tried casual conversation in the gym.

Nothing.