Last Chance Saloon - Marian Keyes [153]
‘Exciting,’ she admitted.
Gratitude and gratification rushed through him, filling every corner. He was right, he’d always been right about her! There was untold fire and passion going on beneath her cool exterior. ‘You think this is exciting,’ he grinned, ‘wait till later!’
Startled, she opened her eyes wide. How presumptuous of him!
‘After kick-off, I mean,’ he stuttered.
The singing started all around her.
‘My old man
Said, “Be an Everton fan,”
I said, “Fuck off, bollocks, you’re a…” ’
Luckily Joe didn’t sing. She just wasn’t sure how she would have felt about. But the tribal energy was highly potent, very male and sexy. Though the day was cold, it didn’t seem to matter.
‘Have you been a football fan for a long time?’ she asked, shyly.
‘Oh, yeah. Long before Nick Hornby made it fashionable for the middle classes. I’ve been a devoted follower of Torquay United since I was four.’
Katherine thought of Joe as a four-year-old boy and briefly her heart twisted with yearning. ‘And are Torquay United good?’
‘Christ, no.’ He shook his head vehemently and grinned. ‘They’re… How shall I put it? Success-challenged. Or maybe it’s talently challenged. They’re only in the third division.’
‘So why do you support them? Sticking up for the underdog?’
Again he shook his head. ‘Nah. It’s a question of where you’re born and brought up. I’m from Torquay so I don’t get any choice in the matter.’
‘Kismet.’ She understood.
‘That’s right.’ What a woman! ‘Destiny. Fate.’ Every other woman he knew, no matter where they were from, supported Manchester United and wanted him to also. He gave her a sidelong smile. Every time they made eye-contact, her stomach squeezed with nervy pleasure.
‘So why are we at an Arsenal match?’ she asked.
‘Because when I first moved to London, traipsing down to Devon every other weekend just wasn’t on. And I happened to be living a hundred yards from the Arsenal ground and seeing some football was better than nothing…’
‘I see,’ Katherine said, sternly. ‘So it’s not because you love Arsenal as such?’
‘I do now.’ He hurried to reassure her. ‘But, back then, I was anybody’s.’ He crinkled his eyes at her. ‘But, hey, I was young, merely a boy. I knew nothing about loyalty.’
‘And you’re mature now?’ Katherine smiled back at him.
‘Oh, very.’
‘Glad to hear it,’ she said solemnly.
‘And though it was a slow burner, eventually I fell in love.’ He swallowed and added hastily, ‘With Arsenal, I mean.’
The pitch stretched ahead of them, enormous, emerald green, stripy and, as yet, empty.
‘We should be about to start,’ Joe said. And he turned, casually picked up her arm and looked at her watch. It was a nothing gesture, what anyone would do to anyone. But it was the closest, most intimate thing Joe had ever done to her. Her breath caught in her chest, as his chilled fingers closed around and held her wrist. But then he said, ‘Thanks,’ gently let her go and it was over. It took a while for her breathing to return to normal.
Suddenly a charge seemed to run through the air. ‘Here we go,’ Joe said quietly to her while, as one, the entire stand stood up, clapping, whistling and cheering. Apparently the Arsenal team had run on to the pitch, but all Katherine could see was the backs and heads of people in front of her. Then, from the booing and catcalls, she concluded that the Everton boys had arrived.
They sat down again and from the moment the game started the atmosphere in the entire stand tightened up, becoming electric with expectation and tension. The dormant aggression became overt and the thrill beneath Katherine’s skin was pleasantly just the right side of fear.
‘The team in the red and white are our boys,’ Joe murmured to her.
‘I know!’ Tara had conveyed the basics.
‘Nice one,’ Joe praised. This got better and better.
The man on Katherine’s other side was a diehard who seemed to have a personal grudge against Everton. Repeatedly he leapt to his feet and roared, ‘Come and have a go if you think you’re hard enough!’
When Everton missed an open goal he burst into lusty and triumphant song. ‘Score in a