Glory Of The Football Manager System

[Beckenham. 12:46 BST.]

The phones went off.

Jessica rang first. Five minutes after the draw. She had the list of broadcaster requests already coming in and a recommended list of which to say yes to. I said yes to Garth Crooks at the BBC because it was Garth Crooks and Garth Crooks deserved fifteen minutes of anybody’s time, and no to all the rest. Jessica did not argue. She wrote it down. She hung up.

Steve Parish came down at one. Suit jacket off. Sleeves rolled to his elbows.

”Daniel.”

”Steve.”

”Did you see the Telegraph?”

”No.”

”Henry Winter has written eight hundred words on you. Manager of the season regardless of what happens between now and the twentieth of May. The most efficient use of a hundred million pounds in the history of modern English football, except Henry does his homework and Henry noticed the number is fifty, not a hundred.”

”All right.”

”The board met this morning at nine. They had not been planning to meet. They met because seven of them had read the papers and felt the need to be in a room together for an hour.

They authorised me to extend your contract for four years on terms that take the wages from where they are to a number I will not say in this room because there is a Netflix lad with a camera somewhere on this floor and he might be on the other side of that door. I am in your office Tuesday morning at nine with Jessica Finch and the papers.”

”All right.”

”And one more thing.”

”Yeah.”

”Manchester United rang the chairman’s office three times this morning. They want a meeting next week about Konaté. I have told them no. They will ring again on Monday because they are Manchester United and they have a hundred and ninety-six million pounds of recent spending that does not appear to have bought them anybody who can defend at a corner.”

”They are not getting Konaté.”

”I know they are not getting Konaté. I am telling you that they are ringing. They will ring you next. They will go round me. Be ready.”

”All right.”

He went out.

I sat at the desk for a long time.

Then I got up and walked across to the analyst room and asked Marcus Reid for everything he had on Bruno Fernandes.

[Beckenham. 17:14 BST.]

The afternoon went on the analysis. Bruno Fernandes. Bas Dost. Gelson Martins. Sporting’s away record. Sporting’s record in the cups. Sporting against English opposition (none since 2005). The two videos of Sporting against Atlético in the second leg of the quarter-final that Marcus had cut into a thirty-minute reel for me at three o’clock.

I came out at quarter past five.

Drove home through Friday traffic. Got in at twenty past six.

The flat was quiet.

She was not on the sofa. She was not in the kitchen. The Friday papers were still in a neat stack on the kitchen table next to a single wine glass that had been emptied and rinsed and put face-down on the drainer. There was a candle lit on the kitchen counter that had not been there this morning. The candle was new. The candle smelled of fig.

I knew where she was.

I dropped the keys in the bowl by the door. Took my jacket off. Took my shoes off. Walked across the kitchen and up the stairs.

The bedroom door was open.

She was on the bed.

She was on her side on top of the duvet, head propped on one hand, the other hand resting on her thigh. She had her hair down, properly down, the way she only wore it down when she had spent forty minutes on it with a brush and a hairdryer and a thought of who she had been doing it for.

The lamp on her side of the bed was on and the lamp on my side was off and the room was lit from the one corner. She had got into the bedroom early enough to draw the curtains against the April evening and to put the heating on so that the bedroom was the temperature of a bedroom you would want to be undressed in.

She was wearing black.

Black lace bra with the cups demi-cut so the tops of her breasts were where the lace ended and her skin began. Black thong, lace at the front, two strings at the sides.

Black stockings to the top of her thighs with the bands wide and lacy at the top where they ended on her bare leg, no garter belt because she did not need a garter belt because the stockings stayed up on their own and she had wanted no extra strap across her hip. She was not wearing anything else.

She had bought it on Lordship Lane this morning with Caitlin, between the lunch and the column. Caitlin had picked it up off the rail and said this one and Emma had bought it without trying it on because Emma was twenty-seven years old and knew her body well enough to look at lingerie on a hanger and know whether it would fit her or not. Emma’s body fit it.

She did not say anything when I came through the door.

She just looked at me.

I closed the door behind me.

”Em.”

”Walsh.”

”You went to Lordship Lane.”

”I went to Lordship Lane.”

”With Caitlin.”

”With Caitlin. Caitlin picked it. Caitlin said it was time.”

”Caitlin was right.”

”Caitlin is usually right.”

I crossed the room. Did not say anything else. She did not move from where she was lying. I sat down on the edge of the bed next to her hip and put a hand flat on the curve of her at the back of the thigh above where the stocking ended, and she made a sound against the pillow that was the sound she made when she did not have to ask for what she wanted because the man on the bed already knew.

I ran the hand up from her thigh over the curve of her, the full curve of her, the curve of her that she had been working on for two years at the Dulwich gym with Caitlin twice a week and that the thong was not really covering, and held her there with my whole palm flat against her skin.

She turned onto her back. Looked up at me.

”You took your time, Walsh.”

”I took my time.”

”How was your day?”

”I do not want to talk about my day.”

”Good. I do not want to hear about your day.”

She put both her hands on the front of my shirt and pulled the bottom of it out of my trousers and ran both of her hands up under it, flat against my chest, palms on my skin, and pulled me down to her.

I kissed her. She kissed me back. Then she kissed me again the way she had decided she was going to kiss me from quarter past four when Caitlin had dropped her at the gate.

My hands were where they had been on her at the bottom of the stairs in October, when she had first taken me to bed in this flat, when she had decided that I was the man and the night was the night and there were no more nights left to wait for, and the lingerie she had bought today and the candle in the kitchen and the stockings she had bought for the second time in her life were her telling me that we had been together for fifteen months and she was not done telling me she had picked me.

What happened after is between her and me.

After.

She was lying with her head on my chest and her hair across my collarbone. The duvet was on the floor on her side. The lamp was still on. The candle in the kitchen was still going. The window was open a crack and the Friday-night quiet of Dulwich was coming through it.

The stockings were on the floor somewhere I could not see them. The thong had ended up at the corner of the bed and one of the strings was hanging off the edge. The bra was on top of the lamp on her side of the bed because she had thrown it there at some point and it had landed where it had landed.

She did not say anything for a long time.

Then she said, into my chest:

”You are not allowed to leave me, Daniel Walsh.”

I did not say anything.

”Whatever they offer you. Whatever it costs them. Whatever club rings tomorrow or in eight years or whenever they think the moment is to come for you. You are not allowed to leave me. You can leave them. You can leave this club. You can leave this country. You are not allowed to leave me.”

”Em.”

”Yeah.”

”I am not going anywhere without you.”

”I know you are not.”

”Then why are you saying it.”

”Because today was the day I stopped being able to pretend I had picked a man who was going to stay where I could see him. Today was the day I started picking a man who is going to be famous in countries I have never been to and I needed to say it out loud once so I would not have to say it again. Once is enough.”

”Once is enough.”

She put her hand flat on my chest where she could feel my heart through the sheet.

”Walsh.”

”Yeah.”

”Watford tomorrow at three.”

”Yeah.”

”You will win.”

”We will win.”

”Good lad.”

She fell asleep before I did. Her breathing went slow against my ribs. I put my hand into her hair and left it there.

Tomorrow was Watford at three. Sporting first leg at home was thirteen days away. The final in Lyon was thirty-three.

I closed my eyes.

***

Thank you to Sir nameyelus for the massage chair.