This is the most appalling thing I will ever do.
But my legs kept on walking.
The players on the pitch closest to me were warming up. A referee jogged towards the centre with a whistle in his mouth. Everything moved slowly, like an old VHS tape starting to jam. The air smelled of greasy rubber and exhaust fumes.
My legs kept on walking.
‘Turn round and run,’ I instructed myself in a loud whisper. ‘Turn round and run, and we’ll forget this ever happened.’
My legs kept on walking.
It was at that moment I realized that, apart from the PAGLIERO man, there were no other players in the Old Robsonians’ red-and-white strip. There was a team in blue and a team in orange on the pitch nearest me, and on the other one, black-and-white versus green .
PAGLIERO was putting his shin pads back in his bag. After a moment he straightened up, noticing me.
‘Are you an Old Robsonian?’ I asked him.
‘I am. A very late one. Are you looking for someone?’
‘Well, all of them, I guess.’
PAGLIERO had the mischievous smile of a boy. ‘The game got moved to seven p.m. I forgot. They’ve already played.’
‘Oh.’
He picked up his satchel. ‘But they’ll be over there now, having some post-match beers. Would you like to join us?’ He gestured over to what looked like a shipping container.
I peered at it. It was a shipping container. How typically London. A craft ale taproom, probably, in a bloody windowless container. ‘Please do come and join us,’ he repeated. ‘We like visitors.’
PAGLIERO looked too disorganized to be a rapist or a murderer, so I fell into stride beside him, making small talk I couldn’t even hear. I wasn’t in charge of my own mind anymore, so this was all fine.
‘Here you go,’ PAGLIERO said, holding open a door carved into the side of the container.
I was staring at the naked backside of an adult male for quite some time before I realized what was happening. Before I realized that I was staring at the naked backside of an adult male, with a towel round his neck and his back to the door, singing something with great enthusiasm and minimal musicianship. Other men, more fully clothed than this one, were sitting on benches, arguing about the match. Around them, a jungle of discarded football shirts read, ‘SAUNDERS’, ‘VAUGHAN’,‘WOODHOUSE’,‘MORLEY-SMITH’,‘ADAMS’, ‘HUNTER’.
Over by the door to what I realized now must be the showers, the naked adult male pulled on some boxer shorts .
‘Oh no,’ something deep inside me said, but it didn’t make its way to my mouth. Behind me, in the direction of PAGLIERO, I heard a man laugh.
‘Pags!’ someone said. ‘You’re an hour late.’ Then: ‘Oh. Hello.’
I came back to life. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I whispered, turning to leave. PAGLIERO, laughing, moved to one side to let me out.
‘Welcome!’ someone else said, close behind me. I staggered outside, wondering how I would ever get over this. I had just walked into a changing room full of barely clothed men.
‘Hello?’ The man had followed me out. He, at least, was fully clothed.
He put on a pair of glasses, and from inside the container I heard the stunned silence lapse into laughter that I thought would never stop.
He shook his head in the direction of the door, as if to say, Ignore them.
‘I’m Martin. Team captain and manager. You’ve just walked into our changing room, and while it’s an unorthodox move, I sense that you might need some help.’
‘I do,’ I whispered, clutching my handbag to me. This must be the Martin who’d written on Eddie’s Facebook page. ‘I need quite a lot of help, I think, but I’m not sure you can offer it.’
‘It could happen to anyone,’ Martin said kindly.
‘It could not.’
He thought about it. ‘No, I suppose you’re right. We’ve never had a woman walk into our changing room, not in twenty years. But Old Robsonians is a modern team, embracing innovation and change. Showering after every match is one of our oldest principles, but there’s no reason why we can’t build new features into the practice – guests, maybe a live band, that sort of thing.’
From inside the container drifted great shouts of laughter and male conversation. A ribbon of shower steam uncurled slowly into the evening air. Martin the team captain was laughing at me, although he did so with kindness.
I took a deep breath.
‘It was a terrible, terrible mistake,’ I said. ‘I was looking for—’ I stopped suddenly. In my horror, I had completely forgotten why I was there in the first place.
Dear Christ. I had walked into a changing room in the hope of seeing Eddie David.
I folded my arms tightly across my chest, as if trying to hold the shattered pieces of myself together. What would I have said? What would I actually have done? He could be in there, right now, towelling down after a shower, listening with the growing shock of realization as his teammates told him about the tall girl with the suntan who’d just marched into the changing room.
Sickness moved in my stomach. Something is wrong with me , I realized. Something is actually wrong with me. People don’t do this.
‘Looking for who? Someone in Old Robsonians? Or another team?’
‘Old Robsonians, she said just now,’ PAGLIERO told him, stepping outside. Then: ‘Sorry, by the way. That was very bad of me. Although you made the boys’ night. One of our founder members is visiting from Cincinnati – he thinks we hired you especially to welcome him back.’
I stared at the ground. ‘It was a great joke,’ I whispered. ‘No need to apologize. And I got it wrong. I wasn’t looking for anyone from Old Robsonians, I was . . .’
‘Looking for someone from Old Robsonians,’ Martin said. ‘ Who? Everyone’s married! Well, apart from Wally, but he—’ He stopped and stared sharply at me, and before he even said it, I knew what was coming. ‘Are you Sarah?’ he asked quietly.
‘Er . . . No?’
Two other men came out. ‘Is it true that—’ one began, and then saw me. ‘Oh. It is.’
‘These gentlemen are Edwards and Fung-On,’ Martin said, although his eyes didn’t leave my face. ‘I’m deciding which of them I think should be Player of the Night.’ Then: ‘I’ll help you get back to the road,’ he said suddenly, marching me off towards the entrance lane.
‘Bye!’ called PAGLIERO, and Edwards and Fung-On, one of whom would be Player of the Night, gave a salute. I could hear their laughter as they went back into the container.
When they were gone, Martin stopped and faced me. ‘He’s not here tonight,’ he said eventually. ‘He doesn’t play for us every week. He’s in the West Country most of the time.’
‘Who? Sorry, I . . .’
Martin looked sympathetic, but I could see he knew exactly who I was. And that he knew exactly why Eddie hadn’t called.
‘Is he in Gloucestershire, then?’ I blurted. Hot tears of humiliation built in my eyes.
Martin nodded. ‘He—’ He stopped abruptly, as if remembering his responsibility to his teammate. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t talk about Eddie.’
‘It’s OK.’ I stood there, slumped with shame. I wanted to leave, but self-loathing and shock had immobilized my legs.
‘Look, it’s none of my business,’ he said slowly, running a hand over his face. ‘But Eddie’s been a friend for years, and he . . . Stop trying to find him, OK? I’m sure you’re very nice, and if it helps, I don’t think you’re mad, and neither does he, but . . . stop, ’
‘He said that? He doesn’t think I’m mad? What else did he say about me?’ Tears rolled down my face and fell to the cooling concrete below. It defied belief that I was in this situation. Here, with this man. This total stranger, begging for scraps.
‘You don’t want to find him,’ Martin said eventually. ‘Please trust me. You do not want to find Eddie David.’
And he turned round and walked back to the container, calling over his shoulder that it was nice to have met me, and he hoped what I’d seen in there hadn’t scarred me for life.