Chapter 1: The Spilled Tea Incident
The stadium cafeteria smelled of old grease and boiled vegetables. Roz MacLeod clutched her portfolio to her chest like a shield, following the click-clack of Jenni from PR’s heels across the linoleum. The noise was a physical thing—a wall of clattering trays, shouted jokes, and the deep, rumbling laughter of very large men.
“Through here,” Jenni said, holding open a heavy door marked ‘Staff Only’. “Panel’s this way. You get a great view of the training pitch.”
Roz stepped through and the world opened up. Behind a wall of glass, a dozen men in mud-spattered training kits were running through drills, their breath pluming in the cold air. The thud of boots and the sharp calls of coaches were muffled by the glass. It was like watching a violent, beautiful ballet.
“The lads,” Jenni said, smiling. She had a practised, polished ease. “Any cheek, just give it back. They’re puppies, really.” She glanced at her watch, a sharp, impatient gesture. “Come on, they’re finished in five. They’re all nice. Some will chat, some won’t. You’ll see them around obviously.”
She led Roz back into the cacophony of the cafeteria, just as a wave of players began to spill in from the pitch, bringing with them a blast of cold air and the scent of sweat and grass. Roz felt herself shrink, trying to make her five-foot-two frame disappear against a pillar.
“I tell you, Cal,” Jenni was saying, lowering her voice confidentially as she nodded toward two players peeling off from the group. “That tall, blonde one and Ally, the dark one. Well, you probably know who they are. They’re nice. The posh boys, the articulate ones. I use them a lot for media. They’ll tell the others to lay off. Well-mannered. They do that with me.”
Jenni’s phone buzzed violently in her hand. She looked at the screen, her smile tightening. “Shoot. I have to take this. Just… mingle. You’re fine.”
And then she was gone, weaving through the tables, phone already pressed to her ear, leaving Roz utterly alone in the middle of the roaring room.
Roz stood frozen, her portfolio now feeling absurd. She was an art graduate, here on a tentative commission to paint a mural for the players’ lounge—a fact that seemed more ridiculous by the second. She took a hesitant step toward an empty table, her eyes on the floor.
“Who’s the lost kitten?”
The voice, deep and laced with amusement, came from a table to her right. She didn’t look up.
“Dunno. New physio?”
“Too pretty for a physio. And too scared.”
Roz’s cheeks burned. She reached the table and slid onto a bench, placing her portfolio beside her. She focused on unzipping it, her hands trembling slightly.
“Hey. You with Jenni?”
This time the voice was closer. She had to look up. Two players stood by her table, towels around their necks. One was huge, with a broken nose and a friendly, vacant smile. The other was leaner, sharper, his eyes doing a quick, appraising sweep of her.
“Y-yes,” Roz managed, the word catching in her throat.
The leaner one’s eyebrow twitched. “You cold or something?”
The bigger one grinned. “Maybe she’s from somewhere fancy. Sounds a bit… posh. Or is it a stutter?”
They weren’t being cruel, not exactly. It was a bored, observational curiosity, the kind reserved for a strange insect that had landed on their bench. But the heat in Roz’s face intensified, spreading down her neck.
“D-definitely n-not p-posh,” she said, forcing the words out, each one a small battle.
The lean player, Cal, laughed. “Okay, okay. Don’t blow a fuse.” He nudged his friend. “Stammer or sexy accent? Place your bets.”
“Stammer,” the big one said, still grinning. “My cousin’s got one. Sounds just like that when he’s nervous.”
“Nah, it’s an accent. Russian or something. Eastern European. Very chic.”
They were debating her as if she weren’t there. Roz’s vision blurred slightly at the edges. She looked down at her hands, knuckles white where they gripped the edge of the table. The noise of the cafeteria seemed to recede, replaced by a high-pitched hum in her ears. She saw a half-finished mug of tea on the table, left by its previous occupant, steam still faintly rising.
“It’s called having a fucking standard, lads.”
The new voice cut through the air, clear and sharp as a slap. It wasn’t Eilidh. It was a man’s voice, laced with a cold, dismissive authority.
Roz’s head snapped up. The two players who had been debating her—the blonde one and the dark one Jenni had pointed out—were standing a few feet away. The dark one, Ally, was holding two coffee cups. He wasn’t looking at Roz. He was staring at Cal and his friend, his expression utterly flat, but his eyes were like flint.
“Give it a rest,” the blonde one said, his tone milder but with a finality that brooked no argument. He offered a small, apologetic glance toward Roz.
Cal held his hands up in mock surrender, a smirk still playing on his lips. “Just chatting, mate. No harm.”
“Chat to someone who can answer back,” Ally said, his voice low. He finally looked at Roz. The intensity in his gaze shifted, softened by a fraction. “You alright?”
The kindness, the sheer unexpectedness of it after the public dissection, was what did it. A choked, hysterical laugh burst from Roz’s throat. It was a strangled, desperate sound. At the same time, her arm jerked involuntarily, knocking the abandoned mug of tea.
The brown liquid arced through the air, a perfect spray, and landed with a soggy splat across the open pages of a glossy playbook on the next table. The playbook had ‘A. McTavish’ scrawled on the cover in sharpie.
Silence fell at their immediate cluster of tables. All Roz could hear was the drip-drip of tea off the plastic tabletop onto the floo