Page 25 of Contested

The room was large and neat. His king-size bed rested against the far wall, one side sitting beneath the large window that took up almost the entire wall. The city spread below it, bright and distant, roads closing in thin lines of headlights between buildings. His sheets were pulled tight across the mattress, and all twelve of the pillows his grandparents insisted he needed were propped up.

In front of him, the bookshelf took up most of the opposite wall.

Awards filled the upper shelves, lined up in the order he’d earned them. Juniors first, then club trophies, and best and fairest plaques. Accompanying them were framed photos. One from draft night and another from his first game with the Rams. In both, his smile was too sharp and too practised. The last photo was after the siren, grass on his knees, mouth open in a smile that looked better from a distance.

A smaller shelf sat over his bed with the photos he actually looked at. His grandparents standing beside him after a match, his grandmother’s hand wrapped around his forearm because she’d always held on to people that way when she was proud. His grandfather stood on the other side, chin lifted, shoulders squared, wearing the cap Sebastian had given him even though it didn’t suit him. There was one of his sister, too, her arm slung around his shoulders, both of them younger. Back when things had been easier between them.

Sebastian stared at the shelf until the ache in his chest shifted.

Everything on display felt like another version of himself. A person he had built piece by piece and placed where people could see him.

Sebastian Nguyen.

Crafted for the cameras and the club rooms and, at some point, for the people he was closest to. When being himself started to cost too much.

All he wanted to do was wipe everything off the shelves. To bring it all down.

He didn’t.

Instead, he stepped further into the room, his legs carrying him to the end of the bed. His shins hit the frame with a dull thud, and he let his body drop onto the mattress face first.

He didn’t shower. He didn’t change out of his clothes or take his glasses off. He felt them press against his face and dig into his skin, bending slightly under his weight, but he left them there. His shirt twisted beneath him, sitting uncomfortably, the dried blood pulling at the bandage as pressure spread over the cut.

Pain stung through his chest. It sat in his jaw and settled under his eye.

He stayed there anyway, wishing he had someone he could call.

|| Chapter Six ||

Sebastian – “What the fuck did you say?”

EARLY FEBRUARY

“Seb! Seb!”

“Here!”

“I’m open!”

Voices overlapped across the field, breaking through the wind that whipped around the oval and carried half the calls sideways before they reached him properly.

The ball was warm in Sebastian’s hands as he took a few steps back from the mark and scanned the ground ahead of him. He had just marked from a kick deep in their fifty, the ball hitting his palms cleanly enough that for half a second everything narrowed to the feel of leather and the familiar pressure of needing to move it before the field changed.

It was midday on Thursday, and the Mustangs were running a mock game with the reserve team. Everything was in full swing as they prepared for the start of the season. More bodies. More voices. More senior players setting standards without needing to explain what they were doing. More eyes on every mistake.

It had been a week since the incident with Marcos, and so far, everything was normal.

Well, with everyone else on the team.

From what Sebastian could gather, they didn’t know anything, which meant Marcos hadn’t said anything. No one had looked at Sebastian differently in the locker room. No one had gone quiet when he walked in. No one had made a joke that landed too close to the truth and waited to see how he reacted.

Marcos himself, though, was the issue.

He’d barely said a word to Sebastian or even looked his way unless it was necessary. If there was any chance that Sebastian and Marcos would be alone together, Marcos made sure to leave or bring someone else along, too. At training, he called for the ball when he had to. In drills, he did what the play required. Outside of that, he gave Sebastian nothing.

It was not subtle, and the team had noticed the tension. Thankfully, they seemed to think it was the normal kind dialled up a little higher. For now, that was keeping Sebastian’s head level, but not by much. Anger sat underneath his skin with every breath he took, and the more he tried to keep it pushed down, the more he felt it shoving back.

Sebastian took a sharp breath in and forced his attention downfield.