13.

  Thursday, 23 September

  "My favourite movie is Die Hard 2: The One At the Airport."

  "No talking."

  I shifted uncomfortably. Behind a little barrier, hidden from everyone else's view, I had four dice. I looked from the dice to the cockpit to my captain. "It's about a baddie who tricks a plane into thinking they're landing safely but they're not."

  "Max," came the warning.

  The captain of the plane looked into my eyes and communicated with me. Sure?

  I responded with I'm sure.

  She picked up a tiny little disc. "I don't like these numbers. Let's re-roll."

  "Yes, captain," I said. She placed the disc in its slot and we re-chucked our dice. "Yessss," I hissed. I put a dice on the side of the cockpit. "Flaps!" I said.

  "No talking."

  "Coffee," said Emma, the plane's captain.

  "Stop making coffee!" I laughed. "We're supposed to land the plane, not warm our hands!"

  "With coffee you get to adjust a bad dice roll," said Emma. "Which we're gonna need two turns from now when we have to deal with these other planes." There were planes between us and the airport; we had to use dice to get them out of the way.

  "Hmm," I said. It looked like she was right. "That's why you're the Max Best of this plane."

  Her lips twisted, amused, and we played in silence for a couple of minutes, putting our dice on various parts of the cockpit. The right number in the right place would lower the flaps, make our plane descend, radio warnings to other aircraft, or, yes, make coffee. Mad as it sounds, my heart was beating faster and I knew Emma's was, too.

  We kept on course until the last 'turn', when I realised my dice weren't going to work. "Mayday!" I wailed. "Abandon ship! Where's the parachute dice?"

  The game was supposed to be played without talking, so Emma smiled and mimed drinking. "Glug glug glug."

  "Ohhhh!" I said. I picked up the coffee Emma had brewed and chucked it onto the table, changed a dice showing 4 to a 3, smashed it down to correct our pitch, watched as Emma deployed the brakes, and gasped as we landed the plane.

  The passengers applauded.

  Emma was flustered in the best possible way. I have to admit my own pulse was still racing. Sir Ian Masters gave one of his mates a little nod. He smiled at me. "I knew you'd love that one."

  "It's really fun," said Emma. "I like that it's co-operative. When I play games against Max he's either ultra-competitive or he doesn't give a shit and either way is maddening. And the game's ironic because we watched a TV show - Max, what was it called?"

  "The Rehearsal," I said. "Season two."

  "Right. It's by this crazy guy who took the money he got from HBO to make a comedy show and used it to build a replica airport so he could study airline disasters. That show was all about improving the communication between the pilot and co-pilot but in this game you're not allowed to talk. It's hard!"

  "Ah, but you did talk," said Sir Ian.

  "Max did," said Emma. "He doesn't believe in rules."

  Ian smiled. "I meant that you communicated non-verbally. This isn't a good game to play with a stranger. With my wife, yes. My son? Mmmmaybe not." He laughed. "It's not the kind of game I would play with my friends but I think we would land the plane. God knows we've been studying each other's faces for clues and tells for long enough."

  We were at the northern mansion of Sir Ian Masters - the guy who founded a games company famous for its space terminators, who wrote the insanely popular Dice Dungeon games, and who was involved in the creation of Soccer Supremo - in Alderley Edge, in the east of Cheshire, just south of Manchester. It was a posh area beloved of Premier League footballers and in a slightly different timeline, Emma and I would have spent the past couple of years saving up to buy a house very much like this one, though ours would have been less organised, less immaculately presented.

  Ian's three friends had gone to Altrincham Grammar School with him almost six decades ago. It was amazing to me that friendships could endure over such a span; Henri and I fell out twice a month.

  The four men had explained the rules of Sky Team to us - it was embarrassingly hard for me to concentrate on anything that wasn't football - walked us through a game, then watched us play twice. Our first go led to the fiery deaths of all involved but then the gameplay loop clicked. I was pretty sure that on a normal game night, the guys would have gone off to play one of the thousands of board games in Ian's basement, but Emma had cast a spell on them.

  I lifted the box and examined it. Ian said, "Would you buy it, Max?"

  "I'd buy it, yeah," I said. "It would just gather dust, though. We would be, like, let's have a board game night! But then when it came time to sit and do it, one of us would go, hey, let me just make one quick call, or let me just check something. Tonight's great because there are the four of you staring at us, so there's social pressure to get on with the game, kind of thing, but now that it's over I'm already starting to think about things I need to do."

  "It's the international break," said Robert, a thin guy with angular features and small glasses. He'd had a good career in accountancy and knew everything there was to know about heavy metal. He was wearing a Black Sabbath t-shirt. "What are your action items?"

  "Oh, loads," I said. "We have seven players on international duty but there are still plenty who are training hard. There isn't a match this weekend so it's an opportunity for the coaches to get more creative. Players are more motivated to do random things so Vikki's testing out some free kick routines, I've done a few more Relationism sessions, things like that."

  Robert nudged his glasses. "What do you mean more motivated?"

  "Yeah, like, if there's a match on Saturday and they know they're gonna play, a footballer doesn't want to turn up to training on Thursday and be told, hey, we're gonna do some experiments today. They'll do it - what choice do they have? - but if you say on a Thursday, this is how Cardiff take corners and this is how we'll defend them, let's practise, that's a session the players will give one hundred percent in. Or you say, we're gonna play 5-3-2 and last time we used that one, we kept getting stuck in the corners so we're gonna drill that. Again, very motivated."

  "Because there's an immediate payoff."

  "Right."

  "And then you have fitness, passing, things that are universally relevant that the players are always motivated to do."

  "Exactly. So if you want to try something or do something with a long-term payoff, it’s very slightly harder. One way you can hack their psychology is to play a practise match and when a certain event happens, you call everyone in and say, hey, that's been going wrong in all our recent games! I know a drill that will help us with that one. Then you do the drill you wanted to do."

  "What if that event doesn't happen?"

  I smiled. "You've got Peter Bauer, Colin Beckton, and Zach Green in the match. They're your coaches and they know what drill you want, so they can make it happen."

  "Diabolical," he said, with approval.

  "Yeah. There's normally no need to be sneaky but we had a poor start to the season in terms of results and there's always a friction between players, who want to get points on the board, and me, who wants long-term success. If I ran things completely the way I wanted, the players would mutiny. Um..." I picked my phone up but put it straight back down.

  "What's on your mind?" said Ian.

  "My new goalkeeper, Haley Goodhew. She moved to Chester from America, left her partner and her dog behind. I told Haley we needed her help to get the season off to a good start, and she has played her part. She mostly kept Bristol City at bay, then kept a clean sheet against Sunderland - you can't ask for more from your goalie. We got two points from two games which in my projection guarantees us a playoff spot at least, and now that the young players understand the standards of the league we will start winning matches. For Haley, though, I think the initial frenzy of moving is over and I got the sense the shock has just hit her. Before the Lionesses game last night, they put some video on the socials. I saw Haley warming up with the other England goalies and she looked fine but I think she might be putting on a brave face. I want to check in with her, then I can relax."

  "Sounds like a noble mission to me," said Ian. "But first, choose what you want for dinner."

  He handed over the menu to a local Indian restaurant. I looked at Emma, who was equally surprised. "You're gonna order in?" I said.

  "Yep. I could cook or I could play games. I know which I prefer. Are you disappointed?"

  "No," I said. "This is mint. I didn't know you were allowed to do this."

  "Allowed to do what?"

  "Cheat."

  Sir Ian laughed hard. "Cheat. That's funny."

  I scanned the menu, then raised my eyebrows at Emma. She nodded and took it from me.

  Ian slapped Gareth, a tall guy with wisps of light brown hair. "Did you see that?"

  "No," said Gareth. "What?"

  "Max chose his food non-verbally. What a connection they have! Emma, what's your secret?"

  She brushed her shoulder. "The secret is, leave it to the captain."

  ***

  I walked to the side of the room, but not so far that I would be inaudible. Generally speaking, randos absolutely loved hearing real-life football conversations. When would they ever get such access? If things got personal, I would leave the room, but that wasn't likely. Haley's Morale had hit abysmal but the reasons were clear. It was only natural.

  She picked up pretty fast. "Max?"

  "Hey, Haley. You free for a minute?"

  "Er, yeah. We're about to go out. Me and some of the girls."

  "Okay, top. That's good. Just making sure you're all right. As all right as you can be, anyway."

  "I'm all right."

  "Yeah but are you all right or are you all right?"

  She paused. "I'm all right."

  "Well, you're allowed to be all right but I want you to be all right, you know?"

  "Yeah. It's just been hard. Harder than I thought. Had a not very good video call with me partner."

  "Yeah. I had one of those with Jackie Reaper. Max, do not name a shtand after me, kay? I don' even work dere!" Haley let out an amused noise. I said, "I'm here for you, okay? When you're back, let's get breakfast. There's a great place a little out of town that I'll show you. Players don't get bothered there. You've been in the U.S. for so long you probably don't even know about recent advances in breakfast technology. You've heard of avocado on toast, but have you heard of smashed avocado on toast?" I heard a chuckle. "And here are two words I bet you've never heard placed together. Eggs... Benedict. Muffin, ham, yellow sauce. The contrast between the yellow of the sauce and the white of the egg, it's like the sun resting on a cloud. Haley, mate, it's the most amazing thing you've ever seen! And you can eat it, too!"

  Her Morale had bumped up a couple of notches. "This all sounds amazing, Max. I'm very excited to learn about all the new foodstuffs that didn't somehow make it to America. The avocado is smashed, did you say? But how do they do it without breaking the plate?"

  That got me laughing. "I don't know! If the waitress is cute, I'll ask."

  "And if she isn't?"

  "Meh," I said. "Then I'm not that interested."

  Haley laughed again, said she had to go, and we hung up. I tapped the phone against my lips for a few seconds.

  "Babes, that was sweet of you."

  "Hmm," I said.

  Robert said, "What's the dilemma?"

  "Oh, nothing, really. It's sort of the inverse of cutting a player. Telling someone they aren't good enough for the current level is brutal but it's honest. I try to avoid it by selling those players but it still happens sometimes. This with Haley, it's like the nice version, the opposite of cutting, but she was so happy where she was. I feel bad for taking her away from that."

  "Why did she come?"

  I sighed. "I don't know. I was inspirational or whatever."

  Emma smiled. "She wants to be England's number one. Only Max can help. She's in the right place. Her partner and dog are in the wrong place. Max is a big softy, really. Just wants everyone to be happy."

  "Don't you get jealous?" said Alan, the third friend.

  "No," said Emma, looking at me as if for the first time. "I know Max is a flower heart and I have learned to accept that."

  "The hell's a flower heart?" I demanded.

  "You have a flower heart and you go round giving petals to every woman you meet."

  "Come on," I laughed.

  "I heard about your dream Welsh football coach. Your lily of the valley."

  "Llewellyn?" I said, which got a big laugh from my betrothed.

  Sir Ian Masters said, "Haley's here now, right?"

  "Yeah."

  He said, "She has crossed the Rubicon."

  "The die is cast," intoned Robert.

  ***

  Our food arrived and while we raided each other's orders and bickered over who should get the last naan bread - "Ian never orders enough!" - Emma asked Robert, Gareth, and Alan for funny stories about Ian at school. The guys delivered, but Ian was able to one-up them every time. The guys knew each other so well and were so intelligent and easy-going it made sense why Ian came up from his other mansion every Thursday, without fail.

  You can't be a famous football star in a room with four men without some football chat, however. "Max," said Ian. "My friends are too polite to bring up the topic of your work. Would you mind?"

  "Would I mind what? Doing some kick-ups? Maybe I'll let my spicy chicken settle, then I'll do, what, a thousand? Don't say two thousand, guys. Please, not that."

  Ian waited patiently. "I know what it's like to have people ask you the same questions over and over. If you'd prefer to skip it, all you have to do is let us know."

  I shook my head slightly. "I don't mind. Tell you what, Ian, let me ask you something first. Be honest. Why did you choose the plane game for me and Emma to play?"

  The merest hint of a grin played around the corner of his mouth. "You said I would be disappointed in your fighting spirit when it came to board games and I sensed that if I chose something too complicated or obtuse on your first visit, you wouldn't come again. My impression of Emma was that she would fight to the death, which would be a treat for us all, I'm sure, but why not start with a co-op so you know our world isn't only winner takes all, last man standing?"

  I half-closed one eye while deciding if I believed him. "Yes, okay. What else?"

  His grin got bigger. "Sky Team, the game you played, tests non-verbal communication and togetherness. One could almost use it to test how likely a relationship is to last. You're getting married soon and I wanted to know how you would do."

  "And?" said Emma.

  Ian pushed out his bottom lip and turned to his mates. He wobbled his head left and right. "Seven years?"

  Emma gave him a level look. "I'll take that bet."

  "Yeah, yeah, yeah," I said. "As long as there are spiders in my bathtub, I'm gonna need an Emma. All right, football. What do you want to know?"

  While Emma and Ian continued to communicate non-verbally, Robert said, "You mentioned a playoff. That was the match you played recently against Celtic?"

  "That was a playoff but I was talking about one that might happen for our women. The top team will get promoted to the Women's Super League, but the second-placed team will play the one that finishes bottom of the WSL. It might never happen again. They did it last year and they're doing it this year while they expand the number of teams. I've had, ah, four straight promotions, times two (men's and women's), but never had a playoff run. It makes sense that this season would be the playoff arc. We are four points behind Birmingham after two games, but that's only because we had two of the hardest matches first. I assume the teams we played will take points from Birmingham and from each other, but... Yeah. If we do have to play the team that's bottom of the WSL, I would expect us to smash them. It's just so stressful, though. I would rather land a plane, I think."

  "How far ahead do you plan?"

  "Wow. Great question. I think on different horizons. Our next match is against Cardiff and I've already watched a fair amount of them. They have a great goalkeeper, they play 4-2-3-1, and I know their levels pretty well because I'm on top of the Welsh club situation. We're not too far off Cardiff, I think. Then I've got an eye on October as a whole because that's relevant to which players play when. I try to keep everyone involved but some guys aren't going to play much in October because we have tough games so I expect them to train harder.

  "I'm also looking ahead to January because I could change some players then. And again to next summer because some players will need to leave. By thinking about who will leave in summer I can rethink January because maybe it's worth bringing in the replacement already to give him six months to adjust to how we do things.

  "Then I've got the usual five-year plans depending on which club or project we're talking about."

  "What's the longest-term plan you have going?"

  I looked up. "Er, probably the Northern Powerhouse. That's where I get as many of the best kids in Wales as poss into one football club and get them playing together from an early age. Not just a few times a year but every week. It's the dream of all national teams, really, but you need amazing talent ID. The age groups I've got start at 11, but it's the 13-year-olds that I'm basing my plans around. There's a couple of strikers I call the Double Dragons. If you base your team around them you think how old will they be when they can smash up international teams? Who else will be in the line up by then? I'll have a top right back, top box-to-box midfielder, good goalie. There are a few players who aren't sensational but who will be needed to fill out the starting eleven so someone needs to give those guys a career boost. Probably me, sure, but I expect the national team to chip in. It's cool if your under 16s are winning trophies but at the end of the day, if I'm telling you to put those kids in the team you'd better do it otherwise we'll end up with a world-class right side and some cloggers on the left."

  "Do they support you? The national team?"

  "Yeah, course, but it's hard, isn't it? You're in the semi-final of a tournament and your lads are playing great but you've got ten angry texts from Max Best because Luke Evans isn't in the starting eleven. Luke, Peter Brown, Monty Jones, they don't look special to you, they aren't gonna help you put this trophy on your CV, but if you don't use them, there will be hell to pay."

  Alan took a sip of Singha beer. "Are you saying you think you could name the Welsh starting eleven in the 2030 World Cup?"

  I shook my head. "That wouldn't be impressive. Picking the starting eleven for Wales in the 2034 World Cup Final - that's what I want to be doing."

  Gareth said, "Sorry, but are you Welsh?"

  "No, I'm from Moss Side."

  "Oh! Haha. That's why you're so belligerent."

  Ian said, "How's your feud with Diggy Doggy going?"

  "It's on hold until we can find a time to meet. It's weird because Jackie was due to be sacked. Er, Jackie Reaper, the guy who brought me into football. He's the head coach of Tranmere Rovers and in Soccer Supremo terms, his position is very insecure. They planned to sack him on Monday, I'm sure, but now they can't. The owners are so clueless I doubt they even had a new guy lined up. It's such a shambles."

  Emma said, "What Max isn't saying is that he caused half of the shambles. He took four players out of their squad - five if you include Dan - and signed two of their best other ones to Chester for next season. Yes, they are very bad at their job but Max is a chaos agent and it's pretty cheeky for him to make fun of them for not cleaning up his mess."

  "Babes," I complained. "It's not that hard!"

  Emma spread her hands. "What I still don't understand - and you're not allowed to tell lies in front of a knight of the realm - is whether you want them to sack Jackie or not. Taunting Diggy Doggy kept him in a job."

  I shrugged. "I don't think it matters either way. Jackie got fired the minute Mateo sold Tranmere, really. New owners never keep managers for long. Alea Jackie Est."

  "Ooh," said Robert, wincing. "Sorry, Max. Jacta means thrown, not dice. Clever, though."

  I made a fist. "I would have got away with it if it weren't for you pesky pensioners!" I sipped on a Kingfisher beer; Emma was driving. "Do I want Jackie to be fired? No, because he's the best chance for Tranmere and I want them to do well. But if he does get the chop, it's not bad for him. He got a club promoted from League Two so there will be plenty of interest in giving him another go at that level, or he can come to work in the MB extended U. He'll be just fine."

  "How's he taking it?" said Gareth.

  "Quite well, I suppose. Anyone with a brain in the world of football knows he is blameless."

  "Yeah," said Emma. "They know to blame you."

  "Fortunately," I said, loftily, "not many people in football have a brain." Pleased with myself, I took a bigger swig.

  Ian said, "You've been using the contretemps with Diggy Doggy to sell your bond issue. How's that going?"

  "Um," I said, reaching for my phone. "No clue. I didn't really expect anyone to buy them, right, to the point that I didn't even think about marketing them. Funding a stadium for a club you've never heard of? Even by my standards it's soooo niche. But this Doggy thing came up and this is the problem when you have overachievers running things for you. Emma's best friend Gemma has been helping me with the stadium, from getting planning permission to organising the mini bonds. I should get her something. Babes, remind me to buy Gems a hamper."

  "Gift basket for Gems, got it." She mimed writing it down, crunching the paper up, and throwing at my head, two-handed. Weird technique.

  I rose above it. "I expected Gemma would launch the bond issue, whatever that involves, and some would get picked up by randos and insiders and I would buy the rest. So imagine my surprise on Monday morning when I went to check that Doggy had bought some. There was a whole website! Photos, testimonials, videos, drone shots, brochures, PDFs. Gemma went crazy bonkers on it."

  "It's pretty basic, babes."

  "There's a tab on the website about bats! Interviews with local conservationists saying that the club had always gone above and beyond when it came to bats and conservation and planting native trees and so on. Gemma went next level."

  "Not as next-level as you went with the fucking bats, babes."

  "That was in my original promise! I promised not to fuck up their habitat! Guys, I put up some bat houses and the bats loved it but next year, they were full of wasps. So I put more bat houses up."

  Alan said, "And now they are full of wasps?"

  I frowned. "How did you guess?" While the room laughed, I followed a link that took me to the latest sales amount. "Shit," I said, eyebrows lifting. "It's up to 380,000."

  "Is that good?" said Alan.

  "It's 380,000 I don't have to put in," I said.

  "Do you want to pitch the project to us?" said Ian.

  "To you?" I said, amazed. I turned to Emma. "This is a trap, right? It would be rude."

  Emma shrugged. "Not rude, because you were invited to talk about it. And it's a great project. Great for Manchester."

  I frowned and waved my finger around the guys. "Did you ever lend each other money?" They said they hadn't, though Ian hesitated. I got the sense that he had bailed one of his mates out once upon a time. If they wouldn't even talk about it, I didn't want to get involved. "Yeah, nah. I'd rather come and play board games and eat Indian food and not worry that I owe you money. I don't have loads of places I can go and just stop thinking about football."

  "Ah," said Robert. "We're imposing."

  I held my hand up. "No, you're not." I laughed at my stupidity. "That was badly phrased. I'm enjoying this! Footy talk's very much on the table; the mini bonds will take care of themselves. I'm trying to tell myself not to stress about it. What happens, happens."

  "Max," said Emma. "Promise you'll try to sell some bonds at the races."

  "Oh, what's this?" said Ian.

  "We're going to Newmarket tomorrow and Saturday. Dubai Future Champions, the Dewhurst Stakes. Elliot Speed pissed Max off so to apologise, he invited us."

  "Sorry," said Robert, "but did you say Elliot Speed? One of England's greatest ever goalscorers? Liverpool, Real Madrid, Manchester United? He pissed Max off?"

  "Yeah," I said, looking at some of the names on the list of mini-bond investors. The Conspiracy hadn't chipped in, yet. It was almost all randos. "Being noisy in his car when Emma had a hangover. No big deal but if he does it again he'll spend the rest of his life in a burlap sack."

  Emma said, "There will be loads of rich people there, including a superagent who isn't Don Pino, and everyone's telling Max to mention his bonds to the superagent because this guy will want to be friends with Max because he wouldn't want Don Pino getting the - ha - inside track on the wonderhorse that is Max Best."

  I frowned. "Why did you say wonderhorse when the word stallion is right there? Did I...?" I gave the guys a nervous look. I leaned towards Ems and whispered, "Last night... Was my Klingon accent not masculine enough?" I leaned back. "Sorry guys, we've lost Emma."

  Emma had slipped off her chair and was bright red. "I'm okay," she wheezed. "Just never expected that. I've never heard anyone say the word Klingon out loud before. Surprised me. I'm fine, I'm fine."

  "Newmarket in Suffolk?" said Gareth. "That's a long drive."

  Emma nodded. "We're going part of the way tonight so it's not such a pain tomorrow. I'm dead excited!"

  "Are you into horse racing?" said Alan.

  "She's into hats," I said. "Wants to wear a massive show-off hat like at Royal Ascot, but I told her it's not a big-hat event, it's a small-hat event. She doesn't care. And she has the nerve to say I'm the rule-breaker! Yeah, there will be tons of guys there with more money than sense but I don't want to get involved in any conversations. That's why I've invited Aff, one of my players at Saltney Town, and his mum, who's my mum's carer. They're Irish so they love horse racing and I called the Irish Embassy to ask if that was a lazy stereotype and they didn't say I was wrong."

  Emma said, "Angela is really looking forward to it. Aff is happy about tomorrow but not about Saturday because he's going to miss a match but Max said that if he didn't go to look at the horses with his mum, Max would fire him on Friday and reinstate him on Monday so he would miss the match anyway."

  Ian smiled. "Max has an interesting management style, all right. I thought it was the international break?"

  "It is, but Saltney are playing," I said. "The Cymru tends not to have many players in the national team. You can request a postponement if you've too many players away but I don't tend to do that. Just get on with it, I say. You've got a squad of lads hungry to play, right? Get on with it."

  Gareth, who I was starting to suspect was secretly Welsh, said, "But aren't you needed for the Welsh team itself? It's their big match against Poland. It could be critical in deciding if Wales qualify for Euro 28!"

  "It's a big game," I agreed, "but I don't need to be there." Not when Ass Man, the half-power Bench Boost that was currently linked to my mate Llewellyn, could be triggered remotely. "I’d really like to be there but on Saturday, Emma will be wearing the sexiest dress of all time and if that wasn’t motivation enough, I know for a fact she’s going to pretend to be the Princess of Iceland and I also know there will be actual ambassadors and Saudi princes and minor royals and she will cause a diplomatic incident. I'm gonna be there."

  Emma was nodding along at everything. Sexy dress yes, diplomatic incident yes. She suddenly got excited. "Sir Ian! Could I ask a favour?"

  "Of course."

  "Do you have a lucky dice? You must have a lucky dice! Can we borrow it? Max was less than enthusiastic about the money I was going to invest in his mini-bonds so I'm gonna bet it all on the tallest horses."

  "The tallest ones?"

  "They have to be the fastest, right? That's logical."

  "You've got me there," agreed Ian.

  "But if I had a lucky dice, I could use it to choose which horses to bet on! I'd have the advantage!"

  The friends looked at him. Alan said, "Go on, Ian. She won't lose it."

  "No, I won't! I'll be super careful! Honest! And when I'm drunk I'll give it to the Brig for safekeeping!"

  "The Brig?" said Robert.

  "Long story," I said. "Army guy. He'll call it 'the package'. Package inbound! Eyes on the package. No way is he losing it; he'd rather, heh, die."

  Sir Ian Masters got up and departed. I thought he would be going down to his dungeon and I was wondering how these nights went when there wasn't a weirdo and a hot blonde around. "So do you normally play another game or do you get boozed up and talk about Alty Grammar?"

  I never got the answer because Ian came back with a leathery bag. He took out a really weird dice. It looked right, but wrong. "It's a truncated octahedron," he explained. "14 sides. 8 hexagons, 6 squares. The hexagons are more likely to come up, but noobs don't know that. That's why it's my lucky dice. I call it Hexcalibur."

  Emma picked it up and held it with extreme reverence. "I'm actually getting emotional," she said, and it was true. I went behind her and put my arms around her neck. She used her hands to fan fresh air onto her face. "I've got the best parents, the best best friend, I'm gonna marry the best football manager, and now I've got a dice from the country's best gamesman. Why am I so lucky?"

  "And I write poems for you," I reminded her. "Tell them about the poems."

  She got a panicked look but inspiration struck. She rolled the weird object. "Dice says no." Cue much laughter.

  Robert said, "Can I ask something that might seem a little off? Earlier, when we said 'the die is cast', you reacted quite strongly. Would it be possible for you to say why?"

  I had to think back. "Mmm, yeah, sure. I was just thinking it's a good phrase to use at the end of a transfer window. You've done your deals, you've got your squad. You've made your choices and the only way ahead is ahead. Nothing really earth-shattering. It's just that I've been quite introspective recently and I think it's because this is the first time there's nothing I can do in January to accelerate us. We're on a fixed path now and it's a two-year cycle. We'll get good this season and next season will be the charge.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  "Which is still amazing, unbelievable, but actually living through this particular year is... It's not boring but it's not vital. There have been so many years of just non-stop life-or-death moments.

  "I managed a megaclub, fought the captain of Germany, caused a riot in Hungary, scored a rainbow flick in a Wembley cup final, was 20 minutes from knocking the Scottish champions out of the Champions League." I shook my head, amazed at how cool it all sounded. "That stuff is addictive. It's dangerous." I put my hand on Emma's shoulder. "Maybe I need this time to decompress and, of course, it's my wedding soon and I'm excited to become part of a bigger economic unit."

  Emma gave me a dig in the side. "Stop describing our wedding in macroeconomic language."

  I rubbed the sore spot and slipped back into my chair. "The league is tactically interesting - we're using the first half of the season to learn about all these Championship teams and we'll get better results in the second half. And playing tough teams every week is fascinating in some ways. Like, I've learned that the other managers are really impressed by Sandra. She spots things and makes quick decisions, quick changes, which is very much the Chester way. One of the biggest tactical trends is when teams who play two in central midfield play against teams who use three. Well, we can do either. We do whatever's best in any particular scenario and even though we're mostly losing we're more competitive than other managers expect.

  "We're ahead of quite a few teams in terms of defensive shape, out-of-possession work, and how we react to going a goal down. Lots of how we approached life in the lower leagues is still valid and our approach and mentality will shine through as our skills improve. It's good, yeah. It's pleasing. But also, if we're on the right track and I've made all my decisions, I really feel like I could take the rest of this season off. The die is cast, right? I don't need to be there. But I've already had one adventure this year and I can't go off and have another. I enjoy having little chats with players to keep their Morale up, or getting into the weeds about tactics or individual technique, but..."

  Alan said, "There's no danger of you being relegated?"

  "No," I said. "We have a slightly bored data team and they're constantly finding new graphs to send me. They made up some mad formula saying that near the end of this season we'll be one of the six strongest teams, so if we stop using kids in our matches, we could get into the playoffs."

  Ian looked interested. "You don't think they're right?"

  "First of all, I'm never going to stop giving chances to kids. It's just not in my nature as a manager and their exposure to the first team is gonna help me win the Youth Cup again. But put that aside for now. I actually sat down and made my own projections."

  To get an idea of how strong we could be coming into the home stretch of the season, I looked at how our first team squad were progressing and extrapolated those numbers across another 20 weeks, being conservative to allow for some injuries, some personal problems, and the fact that the higher players got, the harder it was for them to improve. I came up with an average CA of 131, which was really quite decent.

  "I think we might get to 8th... But Crystal Palace, Wolves, Ipswich, even though they lost some good players, they've got Premier League parachute payments. They will trampoline back up for sure. If we did get into the playoffs, we would get crushed. And that's a good thing," I said, gesturing with the beer bottle. "Because if we got promoted a year too early, we would maybe get 5 draws the entire season and become a worldwide joke." I blew into the top of the bottle and liked how it sounded. "If it's possible for us to get into the playoffs at the expense of Wrexham, I'd be motivated for that, but only to get knocked out right away."

  Emma said, "Isn't the playoff final at Wembley?"

  "Yes, but I don't want to go just for a day out. I want to be one of those managers who wins every final they play. Nah, look, we'll finish 12th, maybe. 14th, probably." I tried to play Three Blind Mice on the bottle, but Emma asked me not to by way of her fist.

  Ian said, "What if you played? Wouldn't it make a big difference?"

  "Not enough."

  "Why haven't you played?"

  I shrugged. "I was waiting for the Europa League draw to see if there were matches Saltney could win. Each win's worth about 450,000 Euro. That's tidy."

  Alan said, "Were there?"

  I put the bottle down and bit my lip. "Yeah." I closed my eyes. "Yeah, it's really tempting to play a few more games. What's maddening is that the first one is at home and it's the easiest. CSKA Sofia from Bulgaria. If I played I would expect to win it. 450 grand, easy as you like."

  "So why don't you?" said Robert.

  I made a slightly frustrated little head bob and rubbed my nose hard. "So... it's fun playing in Europe, scooping up UEFA prize money, but my bread and butter is Chester FC. The fans like me and tolerate some amount of bullshit but there are limits. Where are those limits? Being back at the end of the transfer window seems like a line. Do I want to cross that line? Part of me wants to, but right now I feel like Chester can lose every match in October and the fans will keep the faith. We could lose 6 in a row before they turn. If I take the piss, maybe that number goes to 4 and I have to rebuild that trust again." I picked up the beer. "There are some glorious names in that list. Nice, Frankfurt, Rapid Vienna, Marseille. Napoli, for fuck's sake! Wow. But it's not worth burning my relationship over. Cardiff, Luton, Wolves, Hull. There's something to love about every one of those. Wolves were the best team in the world at one point."

  Ian frowned. "So if you're not going to play those extra matches for Saltney, why haven't you re-registered as a player for Chester?"

  Good question. I had been delaying it because there were no upcoming matches that motivated me, and why do something before I absolutely needed to? I half wondered if a Premier League team would spot the opportunity and try to get me. Five million quid to play for them until the end of the season? It would be difficult with the whole Sentinel thing, but if I played for Burnley, for example, under my UEFA Pro buddy David Bakero, I could probably play pretty hard because 1) I wouldn't be all that good anyway and 2) we would still lose most matches and get relegated. It was a manageable risk. There was only one problem with that - Burnley weren't interested.

  But six million to play for Everton? Ten million to play for Notts Forest? A trillion to play for Man City?

  They had my phone number. The smart ones would sense opportunity.

  I smiled and raised my beer to Sir Ian. "I'll cross that Rubicon when I get there."

  ***

  Friday, 24 September

  I'm sure everyone reading this has been to a stuffy racetrack in the south of England, with horses that cost more than football clubs, breathtaking Icelandic princesses, the thirsty daughters of famous former England internationals trying to pinch your arse every three minutes, roving bands playing tunes, large drunk women in tiny hats, and warring superagents vying for your attention.

  Yeah, my experience at Newmarket barely warrants a mention, but I have to bump up the word count somehow.

  We spent the night in the spa hotel where I had gone to meet the PFA Free Agents, then drove down. Newmarket is the home of British racing (unless you're a Formula One fan), and it's just east of Cambridge, which is just east of Tempsford, where Temps Perdu was based. While I wasn't especially interested in this world, it was very possible that the bosses, workers, and shareholders of that company were interested in racing. Regular trips to Newmarket would give me an excuse to stay overnight in Tempsford. Why is that Max Best always lurking around our town? Oh, it's because he loves his horses. Got it, that checks out, he's definitely not the mastermind behind the recent activity at my company.

  We went to the hotel in Newmarket where Ruth and the Brig were staying. They were dressed already - the Brig in a classic dark suit that looked great on him, Ruth in a frilly pink dress that hugged her curves - and we got changed in their bathroom. I put on my newest Boateng Boateng suit - one created specially for an autumnal day at the races. Tweed, checked, base colour grey, blue vertical lines, light brown horizontal. White shirt, textured blue tie, and to top it off, a tweed flat cap that matched the suit. I wasn't keen on covering my hair, but Boateng promised me the cap was both virile and wryly amusing. 'James Bond meets sexy farm hand', he said.

  Emma, meanwhile, was in black. Black heels, black skirt, black lacy top with sheer sleeves and a cheeky strip of mesh that plunged from the neck. The outfit as a whole straddled the border of naughty and demure, but then her hat was a veil hat without the hat. In other words, a veil, but with white flower things on it.

  "Babes, this is incredible. It's a sensation. It conceals, it reveals, it, er... congeals?"

  She treated me to a peck on the cheek. "Appeals, is the word you're fumbling for."

  "Appeals, yes, boy does it appeal. If I may say..."

  She gave me a warning look. "Hmm?"

  "It almost goes without saying that you are lovely beyond mortal comprehension, but..."

  "Hmm?"

  I made an expressive gesture aimed towards her head. "I thought you wanted a hat! We literally came here so you could wear a hat."

  "This is a hat, babes. Look, it's on my head. Head clothes are called hats."

  "Mad," I said, realising that I would never truly understand this woman. I went behind her and looked at us in the mirror. "Very Lady Chatterly's Lover, aren't we?"

  "Don't know. Haven't seen it. Is that gonna be your favourite movie... tonight?"

  "Could be," I said, getting very slightly horny. How could I not? My eyes drifted from her 'hat' to her cute little nose to those wicked lips, and kept going down to another part of the outfit. "This top of yours. This part in the middle, here," I said, touching the mesh that covered but didn't cover her cleavage. "Is this like a vent on a computer server?"

  Emma's eyebrows raised slowly. "Excuse me? Be careful what you say next."

  Danger? What's that? "Just wondering if it's designed for airflow or to fit a bigger graphics card or what. Do they make water-cooled bras? That'd be worth looking into."

  She bumped her arse into me in the direction of the door. "You can go now."

  "No way," I said, nuzzling into her neck. "You've got so many vents on you that you're gonna be cold and you're gonna want my jacket and I'm the one who's going to be freezing."

  She relented. "That's true. But maybe don't compare my boobs to a computer server." She opened her make-up case, then shot me a look. "What are you doing?"

  "I'm trying to think of a pun. Something about AI but it's Eh? Eyes are up here. Because everyone you talk to will be looking down here."

  "Babes," she said, as she applied an extremely bold lipstick. "You know what they say. If you've got it, flaunt it."

  I nodded. "I should get Boateng to make me a suit with a mesh waistline. Let people stare at my abs."

  She paused in her work. "So it'd go tweed, tweed, see-through, tweed, tweed. I can't imagine it, but I'd pay to see it."

  "Yes, miss," I said, in my version of a farmer's accent. "Will you be wanting to check the hay in the barn this evenin', miss?"

  Emma's twisted smile came out, which didn't seem to be very helpful in terms of applying her lipstick. "Of course I want to check the hay in the barn. And if you're good, I might want to rearrange the horses in the stable." She tilted her head. "That's terrible. Cut that."

  I left her to finish getting ready and went into the hotel room. Ruth and the Brig were out on the balcony, drinking coffee. Ruth pulled her sunglasses down and peered over the frame. "My, my. No shit hoodie today, I see."

  "You like this?"

  "Very equestrian."

  I beamed. "Equestrian! Yes! That's the look I was going for."

  "I think you'll be a hit."

  I made a scoffing noise. "Emma's dressed like she's at a sexy funeral. No-one's gonna be looking at me."

  "You almost seem disappointed," said the Brig.

  I shrugged. "It has been twelve hours since I was last drenched with the adoration of strangers. I'm getting withdrawal symptoms."

  Ruth said, "You're going to be popular with at least two people today, Max. Your friend and mine Don Pino will be here."

  "The fuck?" I said. "Is he stalking me?"

  Ruth said, "He might be. And Martini is here today, though that's to be expected. He owns a lot of racehorses, as well as a lot of football players. He has some runners, today and tomorrow."

  I tutted. Martini was another superagent. Where I had set a minimum PA for my agency's clients of 130, Martini and Don Pino operated in the 160 and above range. Martini was worth a hundred million pounds, at least, and to my untrained eye that number would have been a lot higher if he hadn't developed a passion for horses. "What is it with these guys? There are loads of people like this. They do well in football and move to horse racing. I don't get it."

  The Brig said, "It's one of your progression stories, Max." He only called me 'sir' when he was on duty. "You move up in the world, start from the bottom of the next ladder. Football, racing..."

  "Formula One," said Ruth.

  "Mmm," said the Brig, nodding.

  "I like the framing but football's the best sport. Horse racing is posher, F1 is more glamorous, but they're both utterly tedious." I wasn't getting a lot of encouragement for my theories. "Soz, did you see me score a rainbow flick at Wembley? Did you see Wibbers score a last-second scissors kick to win me a wedding? Thousands of people going mad, cheering, hugging strangers."

  Ruth sighed. "As if that's a good thing. Please don't ruin everyone's day by saying how shit everything is."

  "Nope," I said. "I'm going to behave myself. Primary goal: Emma has a lovely day. Secondary goal: I somehow find some way to enjoy this at least on a microscopic level. Let me practise my horse vocabulary. Er, fetlocks. Hands. Try."

  "Is that all you learned in three years of living next to a stable?"

  Emma emerged from the bathroom and sashayed through the hotel room, joining us on the balcony. I made my eyes go wide and said, "Giddy-UP!"

  "My goodness," said the Brig.

  "Ems!" cried Ruth. "I love your hat!"

  ***

  We met up with the others in our party - Briggy (surprisingly girly flowery dress, wide hat covered with tissue paper (citation needed), carrying an A4-sized purse-handbag thing that looked like a Battenberg cake); Aff (good, solid suit); and Aff's mum, Angela (dark, flowery dress, small red hat). I had splashed out on the most expensive package for everyone, 250 quid a head, champagne, four-course meal, afternoon tea. After giving her a lecture on the dangers of gambling, I handed Angela seven ten-pound notes, one for every race.

  Sadly, that was my last chance to be myself for a while, because Elliot Speed found us and after chatting to Ruth for a minute, he whisked Emma and I away to join his group. I appreciated that he was making an effort to be civil, and I tried to respond in kind, but the guy and his friends were deadly dull and had no self-awareness. They bragged about how much time they spent in Dubai, how well they knew the Saudi princes who owned racehorses, and discussed the latest gossip from various stables like it was Game of Thrones.

  The first race started and we went to the front of the (gorgeous) stand. We had a perfect view… of an empty field. The horses were miles away, and we had to watch on the big screen across from us, or various TVs scattered around. I could have done that from the hotel room without having to stay polite as loads of stockbrokers from 'the City' stared gormlessly at Emma's chest.

  The horses finally came into view. They ran at various speeds until one was the winner. This was generally considered to be exciting, especially by Emma, who was leaping around. In our group, there were more losers than winners, of course, and that was replicated all around Newmarket. Thousands of horses lived here or in the area. Thousands of jockeys and trainers and stable hands. Vets, equipment, hay, specialist equipment. There was so much money behind all of this! Literally an industry.

  I thought I was hiding my disdain for the whole thing very well, but Elliot Speed sidled up to me. "Not your thing, is it, Max?"

  "Oh, er..." I shot a look towards Emma, who was centre of attention in a group of twats. She was having fun, at least. "I don't get the sporting aspect of the sport, TBH. Like, there's a reason the hundred metres is the most-watched sporting event and it's because virtually everyone on the planet has run at some point. You can watch the Olympic final and know what it means, right? The best one is the one who goes fast, and you have some sense of how hard it is to go fast. Everyone has lost a race, so you've met someone faster than you. You know they would lose a race against someone. Keep going like that, all over the world, all 8 billion people, and every single one of us has some conception of what it means to be the very, very best in the world at this one thing.

  "Football's probably one of the other big sports where it's easy to get a sense of what it means. Loads of people have kicked a ball around their garden and there's a huge step up from someone average to someone who played for a football club at some level, so when someone on TV scores a goal you've got some sense of, hey, that's quite hard, what that guy just did.

  "Horses? I have no connection to this at all. How much of the win is the horse, how much is the rider? What's the skill. Is there skill? I just don't have any feeling for it, whatsoever. I grew up in the city and the only horses I saw had police on them."

  He listened patiently. "I could talk for hours about choosing horses and training them and the fresh air and the work and how satisfying it all is, and that incredible rush you get when your horse is a winner. I've scored goals in World Cups, Max, and the feeling's up there. But you're not into it, not yet at least. That's okay. If you want to enjoy your day, put a bet on. Not much," he said, putting his hand up to forestall my inevitable complaint. "Just enough to be invested in the outcome."

  "Feels like a slippery slope towards bankruptcy, or even worse, owning a horse."

  "Ha," he said. "On England duty, I used to share a room with Chris Johnson. He loved a bet. One day, we were there in our room, it had been raining, he was bored to death. There are these raindrops on the glass. Elliot, says Chris. Let's bet on which of these drops to the bottom first. A tenner says this one. Well, I take his bet, knowing I'd win."

  "How did you know?"

  "The one he chose was a piece of pigeon shit."

  I laughed. "Come on. No way is that a real story!"

  "I swear to God, Max. He was always like that and to me it was a warning. I always knew he'd end up in trouble, and he did. He's all right now, thank God, but he struggles with it. Gambling's a bit of fun but don't let it get anything more than that. Go on, put a bet on for the second race and you'll enjoy it more."

  "Right," I said, and used it as an excuse to rescue Emma from the stockbrokers. "Babes," I said, as I slipped my arm around hers and headed towards the little kiosks. "We're going to put a bet on the next race."

  "I already did."

  "Wild. When? Never mind. I need some cash."

  She stopped walking and her eyes flashed. "I told you to bring cash and you said no, it's cashless, and anyway I don't want to ruin my silhouette."

  I stepped away and turned around, slowly, with my hands out. "See this? Imagine it with mad bulges everywhere."

  She smiled. "Yeah. Hubba hubba. Okay, fine, Jesus. You can have a tenner."

  "And I need the lucky dice, please."

  "Nope, that's for me. If we use it too much, it will lose its magic. Ian said."

  "No, he didn't."

  "He did. Get your own system."

  "Urgh," I said. She withdrew ten pounds and was about to hand it over to me when she pulled it back. She gave me the lecture about gambling I had given Angela, which, to be fair, was funny. "Need to hurry," I said. "Got to choose a hoss. Which one?"

  "You've got that guide," she said. I lifted my arms to show that my silhouette was bulge-less. "Babes," she said, digging into her little handbag and handing over her copy.

  "Okay, what have we got? Cornwallis Stakes, five furlongs. I'm really much more at home in the eight furlong category."

  "Stop talking shit and choose a horse."

  "Which one is tallest?" I wailed. Emma laughed. "Oh!" I said, and got my phone out.

  "Who are you gonna call?"

  I grinned while raising my eyebrows in a very specific way, which meant 'wait and see'. The call connected; I put it on speaker. "Max?" said a voice with a German accent.

  "Pascal!" I said.

  Emma's surprise was evident. "Hi, Pascal! It's Emma!"

  "Oh! Haha. How is everyone? How are you?"

  "Everyone is amazing. Listen, we're on a tight deadline. I'm at a racetrack and I need you to pick a name for me. The winning name, mind."

  "I know nothing of horses, Max."

  "Just pick a name!" I said. "The one that resonates."

  "Why did you call Pascal for this?" said Emma.

  "Duh," I said. "Have you never heard of Pascal's Wager?"

  "No."

  "Well, this is it. Okay, mate, you ready?"

  Pascal sighed.

  "Option one, You Glow Girl."

  "That one," said Pascal.

  "No!" I demanded. "Take this seriously or you're fired."

  Pascal chuckled. "Okay."

  "You Glow Girl. Option two, Nordic Nights. Three, Orange Is Sus. Four, Piggy Bank. Five, Ultra Squishy."

  "Piggy Bank," he said.

  "Amazing. Thanks."

  "Do I get a share of the winnings?"

  "Sorry, mate, you're breaking up. Can't hear - " I made some staticky noises into the phone.

  "Bye, Pascal!"

  "Bye, Emma."

  Putting the bet on was easier than expected, and I took my little ticket back to Elliot Speed's group.

  "Max," said Elliot, after the race had got underway.

  "Yeah," I said, watching on the screen as the world's slowest horse ambled around the racetrack. "You're right, it's much more intense when you've placed a bet. I never thought I could hate a horse. I'm learning a lot today."

  A light laugh came from my side. Elliot said, "Max, I want you to meet Martini."

  The superagent's hand was outstretched. I went to accept the handshake but paused. I jerked my thumb towards the TV. "That's not one of yours, is it?"

  He laughed again. "No." I shook his hand. He was charmed by the whole thing; the exact opposite of how my first meeting with Don Pino had gone. Martini had a friendly face, bad hair, and while he was in his 50s and veering towards plump, he looked like he could do well in a game of 5-a-side. "Do not give up on your horse. He's very clever."

  "Really? Wouldn't it be better if the jockey was clever?"

  Again, Martini thought I was being hilarious, but sure enough, Piggy Bank started to make ground on the leaders.

  I rushed to the edge of the terrace and heard people cheering on their horses. I got a sense of the lingo and soon I was yelling, "Come on, Piggy! Come on, the boy! Get the gap! Go through! Head down!" Incredibly, my encouragement didn't seem to register with the horse. Clever? Give me a break.

  I went back to Martini and Elliot. The agent tried to commiserate with me. "Second place? Not bad!"

  "Tsh," I said. "Second place is first loser. The beast failed me."

  "Babes!" said Emma, moving fast on her heels, like an expert in wearing stilts. Which, in a way, I suppose she was. "Well done, babes! Are you gonna call Pascal?"

  "What? He picked a dud. He picked a worm."

  She smiled at Martini. "I'm Emma."

  "Martini."

  "Can you explain to Max what an each-way bet is?"

  Martini tipped his head back and laughed more. He clapped me on the back. "Max, you won."

  "I did?"

  "Babes, give me your ticket and I'll collect your winnings. Do you want to go again on the next race?"

  "Er, yeah, but I've got two racehorse owners here. Let me see what they think." I opened my brochure thing. "Okay, the first horse, it says this. Much improved when taking 8-runner maiden at Wolverhampton and looks nicely treated on switch to handicapping. What the fuck language is this?"

  "Don't bet on that one," said Martini.

  "Okay. 1.5 million half-brother to 3 winners... It's like hieroglyphics."

  Martini said, "The horse cost 1.5 million guineas and has good lineage."

  "What's a guinea?"

  "It's one pound and five pence," said Elliot. "The five pence goes to the auction house when you buy the horse. Essentially, it's one pound."

  I thought I understood, more or less. "That horse was the same price as Foquita? Wow. Babes, I want to bet on Foquita." I looked at Martini to see what he thought about that. He pointed to my brochure. "Um... Oh. Ahaha."

  "What?" said Emma.

  "It's his horse," I said.

  "Still want to bet on it?" said Martini.

  It might have been funny to change, but not very diplomatic. For once I took the easy win. "The die is cast," I said. Emma took my betting slip and went to our favourite bookmaker, who was our favourite because he was called Dan Chester. Martini was hanging around with us even though the race was about to start. "Don't you need to, like, discuss strategy? Decide on how many pitstops you want to do, team orders, flat back four?"

  He smiled. "The jockey is the captain of the plane. When the race starts, they are on their own. Just the thunder of the hoofbeats, the pounding of their hearts, the breath of the horses, and in the final stretch, the roar of the crowd."

  "I don't know," I said. "I think if I owned a horse and it was racing, I would want to run behind it and yell at it to go faster."

  "You wouldn't stay behind it for long."

  I blew air through my lips. "I could beat any of these horses. I've got centre backs who are faster than these things."

  Martini appraised me. "Over what distance? Three furlongs?"

  I held a finger up. "I know this one. A furlong is one guinea plus one shilling."

  He laughed again and clapped me on the back. "I like you, Max Best. Let us enjoy the race, and then I have something I would very much like to discuss with you."

  ***

  The horse won, and Martini invited Emma and I to the Parade Ring, an area just off the racetrack where the jockeys brought the horses close to those members of the public who were willing to pay just a little extra for certain perks. I thought I saw Don Pino, but when I looked again, he was gone.

  Elliot came over with his daughter Katie, whose long, black hair looked amazing against an all-white jumpsuit thing that in my opinion was most notable for the vertical oval-shaped gap in the fabric that showed off her cleavage. It was really interesting how she had taken the same basic design principle as Emma, that of displaying her lovely bewbs, but had come up with almost the exact opposite outfit.

  The five of us stood in a very pleasant circle, with smiles and boobs as far as the eye could see against a backdrop of wonderful horses, green grass, a bracing English wind, and the knowledge that in just a few short hours I would be throwing Emma onto our hotel room bed, acting like her rough-and-ready groundskeeper.

  "Max," said Emma.

  "What? What?"

  "You spaced out. People are trying to talk to you."

  Katie played with her hair as she spoke to me. "What were you thinking about?"

  I looked around. "There's all horses here. I was wondering if I could get some hay."

  Emma's expression froze and there was only the smallest hint that she was holding in a laugh.

  Martini said, "Max, there are some things I know. I know what is good Ghormeh Sabzi and what is not. I know never to drive behind a car carrier. And I know winners." He pointed. "This horse is a winner. The players I sign are winners. You are a winner." He smiled at Emma. "One only needs to look at your fiancée to know this." While Emma smiled, Katie's face went bonkers, which nearly made me laugh. Martini continued. "Four straight promotions, cup wins, and so incredibly close against Glasgow Celtic. With a team that barely existed five years ago!" He smiled at someone who called out his name, then lowered his volume somewhat. "I have a friend, Max. A connection. He is one of Britain's richest men. He made his fortune gambling, betting on winners. You know him as the owner of a much-admired football club."

  Huh. The description, narrow as it was, actually covered two clubs: Brighton or Brentford.

  "Brighton," he said, smiling as he tracked my thought processes. "Yes, I'm talking about Tony Bloom. You know that he also owns Hearts?"

  I did. "Yep." Emma was watching with interest and she reacted almost microscopically. "Heart of Midlothian," I said. "Edinburgh."

  "Oh, nice," she said. "If it's a scouting job in Edinburgh, we accept. Don't we, babes? They've got a great castle, if you get my drift." She did a comically large wink.

  "Christ," I mumbled, as I bit the side of my index finger. Was our wedding going to be in Edinburgh Castle? That seemed way over the top for a Championship footballer. Easy access to hay, though. My mind drifted away.

  "Instead of scouting, what about player-manager?" said Elliot Speed.

  Time felt like it stopped. A super intense few hours of thoughts and feelings were compressed into tenths of a second. The spell was broken when one of the nearby horses did a big poop. Clever? Use the toilet, mate. "Soz, what?" I said, realising that whatever was happening, Elliot was part of it. He had talked to Ruth about me, then taken that info to Martini, and together they had pitched the idea of me as player-manager of Hearts to the club's owner.

  And he had gone for it. Had he?

  Or were they plotting to line me up before going to him?

  "Tony Bloom is a genius," said Martini. "And his data team are the best in the business. You were on their radar anyway, as a manager. Your signals are getting stronger and you are getting more and more references. The latest to rave about you is Ruud Baas, who is very well respected. We watched you in the Champions League qualifiers and showed Tony that his data models can't handle a player like you. You're much better than his models suggest. He is very defensive of his data and his team but he had to admit there was some merit to our argument."

  Elliot said, "The fact that you smashed Celtic in the first leg is weighing strongly in your favour. It was a complete dismantling. The second leg was unfortunate, but for 70 minutes you had them on the ropes."

  "I had them out of the ring, back in their dressing room, curled up into a ball, crying."

  Martini smiled. "I agree. Tony Bloom agrees. All that with a squad assembled out of odds and ends, bits and pieces. Loans, free agents, youth prospects, your former players! Imagine what you could do if you had real resources behind you!" He had been getting louder and had to subdue his own enthusiasm. "I am convinced you could blow up the Rangers/Celtic duopoly in short order. They are woefully mismanaged, complacent, bloated. Hearts is massive and there is so much untapped potential. Tony Bloom is willing to pay big money to acquire you.

  "We know it would take a big offer to prise you away from Chester, and at those numbers, does it make short-term economic sense? No. Bloom would lose out in every respect except sporting. You would win the league, cups, go deep in Europe. Fifty thousand Scottish children would choose to support Hearts instead of a team from Glasgow - the start of a sea change in Scottish football. It would be easier to recruit talented young players, to attract bigger name players from abroad."

  Elliot said, "Max, do you know it's easier to get players from the rest of the world into Scotland than it is into England? The work permits are easier to come by. Tony Bloom wants Hearts to win the league, but he also wants to turn it into a staging post. They recruit talented players, train them up, get them used to the language and the weather, then sell them at a huge markup to the Premier League. You would be amazing at that. It's what you're doing now, but at Hearts you would be rewarded for it."

  "Rewarded," I said.

  Martini coughed and used his eyes to indicate I should step to the side. I looked at Emma to tell her to come. She communicated that it wasn't appropriate. I put my foot down with a tiny little eye-squeeze. She came to my side and I held her close to me. Martini nodded. "No secrets from your future wife. I like that. It's crazy, but I like it."

  "I give it seven years," I said. Emma dug me in the ribs, but leaned into me more.

  Martini took out his phone and tapped. He brought up an email from Tony Bloom that detailed the financial package I could get as the player-manager of Hearts.

  

  
• Base salary: ￡2.5 million (five times what he’s on; also the highest ever for a manager in Scotland)


  
• League champions bonus: ￡5 million


  
• Champions League league stage qualification bonus: ￡5 million


  

  "Christ," I mumbled. My stomach was churning, and I was really starting to regret how much curry I had eaten the night before. "Is this negotiable?"

  Martini smiled, and for the first time he gave off shark vibes. "Everything's negotiable."

  "Can we negotiate it downwards?"

  Martini's eyebrows nearly flew off his head. "Come, Max, it's a lot of money but only if you are very, very successful."

  "Dude," I said. "I would hit those targets every year. I would feel bad about taking so much money from an old man."

  "You know," said Martini, slipping his phone back into his pocket. "I really don't think he would mind."

  ***

  Saturday, 25 September - The mid-point of the international break

  It was Future Champions Day 2, with another seven races. We had lunch with our group, now expanded to include the horse-loving Brooke, the Brooke-loving Zach, and our new coach Vikki, who wanted to experience as much of life in England as she could in the time that she was here.

  I was in the same suit, as were the Brig and Aff, but the women had changed. Emma was in a sleek silver nightgown with the skirt cut at a literally breathtaking angle, but she wore a jacket on top of it that kept it all classy, somehow. It left so much to the imagination that the imagination burst into flames.

  We had spent much of the night in the roles of Lady Emma and her mute groundskeeper 'Barnaby' - of course we had - but the offer from Hearts was so monumental and potentially life-changing, it was hard to think of anything else. Approaching 13 million pounds a year! Okay, they wouldn't let me run off to manage Saltney or do side quests, but I would be able to keep those projects going pretty well. I could easily find myself pulling in 15 to 20 million while breaking up one of the most annoying monopolies in sport.

  It was tempting.

  It really was.

  The Chester mob ate together, then we went to the side of the track to place bets and to cheer for the green livery, the blue one, the striped one. It was like being a hard-core football fan for a minute, then having a complete brain wipe and starting afresh at the next race. Honestly, not a bad way to live. Vikki seemed to be having a good time, Zach lost every bet, Emma kept asking the Brig about his package.

  At 3 p.m. the main event started, and that was either the 7-furlong Darley Dewhurst Stakes or Wales versus Poland - take your pick.

  I charmed a nice girl into putting the football on a corner TV so that I could watch it. Before kick-off, I had triggered the Ass Man Bench Boost, but hadn't told Well In to do anything different. Perhaps my intervention would help, perhaps it wouldn't. I had already done the best thing I could do for Wales in the short-term, which was to get rid of the old assistant manager and install Well In. Now we had a charismatic manager who could inspire the troops, backed by an assistant manager megabrain who could deal with the tactics, make in-game tweaks, and decide on the subs. Perfect.

  Would I bring Sandra to Hearts? Maybe. Could be better to keep her at Chester. She could continue my work this season, and she would make a good fist of next season's promotion push. I had been too stunned by Martini's offer to ask pertinent questions like how long the contract offer would be, but I could imagine taking an 18-month gig at Hearts. Return to Chester in time for the Premier League campaign! Miss all the boring bits!

  "How are they doing?"

  I turned and saw Don Pino, wearing a dark suit, no tie. "Wales are on top but Poland are dangerous on the break. I'm waiting for my boy Well In to tighten things up."

  Don nodded, but he looked a bit glassy-eyed, as though he was confused, and I wondered how much he really knew about football. Not all that much, maybe! It hadn't hurt him so far. In fact, maybe it was an advantage. He could claim his players were the best and he could really believe it. "I saw you talking to Martini yesterday. I wonder what you discussed."

  "Horses. The fact that I could definitely run faster than a horse. Miscellaneous other topics."

  "Oh," he said, eyebrows raised. "Miscellaneous? That is worrying, indeed." He looked around. "Before you make a mistake - Scotland is too small for you - let me fill you in on a project I have been assiduously working on for some time." He looked around again, leaned closer, very conspiratorial. "Player-manager in Saudi Arabia. Big money. Huge money, Max. They are incredibly ambitious and they want the best. Ha. The actual Best. The World Cup will be held there in 2034 and they want a competitive league, the best players in the world, and a strong national team."

  I couldn't believe what I was hearing. "Saudi? You must know that I'm on record as not being a fan. I've said things, mate. I've said things that would get me chopped up over there. Over here, maybe! They don't respect boundaries. Emma! Emma drove me here and have you seen what she's wearing? Why would I want her to live in a place she wasn't welcome? What the hell? Is this why you spent deadline day with me?"

  "Yes," he said, simply. "Saudi is not what you think. Not as autocratic as you think. You're allowed to have opinions because everyone involved believes you will change your opinions when you experience the country itself. They love football, Max. It's a young country, many young players, lots of talent. You would love working with them and they would love playing for you. With you."

  I rubbed my forehead. Saudi Arabia? Me? Absolutely no way. Not ever. Not even passing through. It was one of the hardest noes imaginable. No amount of money could turn that no into a yes.

  I thought about my mother. About Temps Perdu and the ghost of a chance. Every day, the scientists at that company rolled handfuls of dice, and when every dice came up as a 6, there would be worldwide jubilation and such a boom in the share price that it would be out of my reach forever. I would be happy, of course I would, that a treatment was on the way. But would it come too late for my mum?

  Of course it would.

  "How much?" I whispered.

  "Thirty million a year," he said, softly, breathing the words into my ear like a refreshing breeze in a desert.

  My first thought was: I could learn to ride a camel. "Pounds or guineas?"

  "Pounds," said Don Pino, with a smile.

  Thirty mill a year. 60 mill in two years. That would be enough. That would one million percent be enough.

  On the TV, Wales's tall striker, now at Wrexham, headed in from a good cross, sparking scenes of wild joy on the pitch and in the stands. I knew so many Welsh people now. They would all be thinking of me and the bright, shining future I had promised them. Goals like this would be commonplace. Days like this would be regular events. They would live their lives drenched in glory.

  That's what I had told them.

  I tried to imagine the same scenes but with people wearing green-and-white, holding up banners I couldn't read.

  "I need to think about it."

  ***

  I went back to our group and tried to act normal. Emma saw right through me, of course. I felt that Brooke was eyeing me closely, as if she could sense that I was thinking about binning Chester off.

  I placed a couple more bets, lost that money, went to get something to drink, but found myself staring into space while wondering what it would be like never to have to think about money ever again. Three years in Saudi would do it.

  Thirty million a year? That was around 550,000 a week. That was superstar money. Don Pino was fishing, surely? Just seeing if I was interested, and then he would go and make it happen.

  But then again, Old Nick had some influence in the Middle East. He had been in the background when a Qatari sheikh had tried to buy Manchester United, and he had convinced a Saudi club to buy one of my players for an inflated fee. Me going to the Saudi Pro League would suit Old Nick just fine, wouldn't it? I would get XP from managing and I wouldn't want to play because the levels weren't that high and I had no connection to the rivals or the history of the clubs. And if I did play and did do well, I would most likely be safe from the Sentinel because almost no-one in the world would think of me as a good player just because I scored a bunch of goals in the SPL.

  I nodded to myself a few times. Yeah. Old Nick could be part of this. But that would mean the money was real.

  Someone squeezed me on the arse.

  When I turned, Katie Speed was trying to smoulder at me. It could have worked on another day, but she had come wearing a dress almost exactly the same as the one Emma had been wearing the day before. It didn't have the sheer sleeves and it came with a different hat, but it was almost beat for beat the same.

  "Do you like me?" she said, possibly encouraged by the way I was staring at her body.

  I dragged my gaze from her cleavage and locked eyes with her. What did she want? She couldn't seriously think I would leave Emma for her. Could she?

  She said, "I like your suit. I preferred you in your boxer shorts, though. Hahaha." I frowned, trying to work out what she was saying, but I remembered I hadn't been wearing much the first time we met. Katie stepped closer and took my lapel in her fingers. "You know, I go to Edinburgh a lot. We could spend some time together. I could show you around." I thought she was quite dim and not at all sexy, but she surprised me on both counts when she dipped her head and looked up with a twinkle in her eye. "I know where there's some hay."

  I smiled. "That was a great line. Katie, nice to see you again. I need to get back to work."

  I went back to the TV that was showing the Wales match. There was still half an hour to go so I texted a couple of members of my group to tell them where I was. They came up to watch the end with me. I sat between Emma and Angela, who was such an amazing carer for my mum and Anna. I was really pleased to have given her this break; it seemed like she'd had an amazing time. Getting dolled up, spending two full days with her son, getting close to the horses, getting slightly sozzled on premium champagne.

  Everyone was excited from the day, everyone had stories that they told and re-told, but as the match entered the last ten minutes, it sucked up more of our attention. Nine minutes to go. Eight. Wales leading one-nil but clinging on as Poland turned up the heat. A win would do so much - it would practically assure Wales of qualification. They made the last substitutions, trying to waste a little bit of time, hoping some extra pace would push Poland back. Brave, but I very much doubted it would work.

  "It's their tournament," I said, rocking gently. "They're the co-hosts. It's unthinkable they wouldn't be in it. Come on, Wales. Come on, the lads! Get the gap! Go through! Head down!"

  Six minutes left.

  Well In on the touchline, pointing, gesturing. If ever there was a time to flap your arms about, it was now.

  Five minutes left.

  Gwen and the rest of the FAW, biting their nails. Her daughter, Mari, with her fingers covering her eyes.

  Four minutes left.

  Yelps of dismay as Poland created a great chance! The ball was on its way in...

  It went wide. The roar of relief, followed by nervous giggles.

  Three minutes.

  Two.

  Whistles as the Welsh crowd demanded the ref do the right thing.

  "Blow the whistle, dude," I said, digging my nails into my scalp from the tension. The unbearable tension. This is where football got you. It was intense because there were so few goals, because the time dragged when you wanted it to speed up, because it sped up when you wanted it to calm the fuck down.

  One of the Welsh subs got on the ball and chipped it over the halfway line, seemingly to no-one. Just kicking the ball away to waste time? No! It was a pass to another sub. Away he went, his pace incredible, pulling away from the defenders with ease. The goalie rushed out. The Welshman pushed the ball around him - too wide? - and five yards past the keeper, the young tearaway stopped the ball. Just stopped it, stopped moving. Enjoyed the feeling as 74,000 Welshmen screamed, begging him to kick the ball into the empty net.

  I was up on my feet, riding a chair like it was a clever horse, and I was sure I saw a cheeky grin on the player's face.

  The goalie scrambled back, but too late. Far, far, too late.

  The kid rolled the ball into the net.

  Two-nil Wales.

  Job done.

  The kid jogged towards the nearest camera and made a heart shape with his fingers before he was simply covered in teammates.

  GOAL

  Roddy Jones 90+2

  Zach was yelling, "That's how it's done! That's how it's done!"

  "Made in Chester!" yelled Aff. "Made in Chester! Ahhh, fair play to you, lad! Fair play to you, Max. You've done it again, so you have."

  The Brig came over to shake my hand. "Well done, Max. Well done, sir."

  Emma and I looked at each other, and in the space of a couple of seconds we said enough to land several planes.

  At the final whistle, I hugged anyone and everyone, sometimes twice, then walked around in a kind of a daze. There had been no hints that Roddy would play. I wondered how that decision had come about. Even with a half-strength Bench Boost, Roddy would have had the lowest CA on the pitch.

  Yeah, but he could run fast and take the ball around the goalie. It's not that hard. Giving 70,000 people and an entire nation a moment they'll never forget? That's a rare skill.

  Brooke came over, beaming. "Why do I think that goal's gonna cost us a fortune when we renegotiate his contract?"

  "Because it will!" said Ruth. Roddy had joined our client list as soon as he was old enough.

  I smiled at both women. "Seems like a sharp marketing person would already be calling sponsors, pitching new partnership ideas."

  Zach pulled a face. "Max, it's her day off!"

  Brooke and Ruth eyed each other, their fingers twitched, and at the same exact moment, they whipped out their phones.

  "Bosssss!" complained Zach.

  I shrugged. "Strike while the iron is hot."

  "The iron's always hot around here. Shoot."

  "Max," said Angela, pulling me away from the others. I thought she was going to say she was tired from all the excitement and could I ask her son to take her home, but that wouldn't have made sense. She would simply have told him it was his bedtime. "Max, it's Gemma. She's looking in on your mum and Anna."

  Something in her tone struck me like a gut punch. "Mum? Is she all right?"

  Angela kept pulling me away until we sat on a couple of chairs in a relatively quiet section. "How do I put this on speaker? Ah, it's that one, isn't it? Listen, now. Gemma, we're here."

  We heard a bossy Polish voice. "Give that to me. Max Best?"

  "Anna. Are you all right?"

  "No, I am not all right. You did that, didn't you?"

  "What? What did I do?"

  "You made Wales beat Poland."

  "Oh." I had spent so much time thinking about the match in terms of the Welsh friends I had and my Welsh project I hadn't really stopped to consider that I knew a few Polish people. Anna wasn't a massive sports fan, though. "I might have had some small input."

  "Max Best, don't treat me like a fool. The man on the television said that the Jones child learned to play football from you!"

  "Not being funny but that boy learned it from the feet of God himself. I am genuinely blameless." Apart from a little long-distance Bench Boost.

  "Nonsense. But listen to me very clearly, Max Best. I am dying."

  "No, you're not. Stop saying that."

  "I can feel it. When I saw the pain in the eyes of the Polish boys, I felt it. I have to go home to be buried in the same graveyard as my mother and father. I want to die on Polish soil. I long to go home and I want you to drive me."

  “Drive? We’ll hop on a plane. Twenty minutes, approx.”

  “I have never taken a plane in my life and have no intention of starting. You will drive me.”

  I felt a pressure all over my body, and it was building. "No. You're going to live to be 200."

  "This is the end. I want to go home." She pulled out the biggest weapon in her arsenal, the one that told me how serious she was. The one that told me that she knew, and that this was real. She spoke softly and said, "You owe me, Max Best."

  While Angela's hands shook, I put my hands on my head. Winners, losers, Scotland, Saudi. No-one chooses how to live; we're all just choosing how to die. Anna wanted to die at home and she had earned that much.

  "Anna?"

  "Yes?"

  "We leave in a week."