A Life More Ordinary

Just One of Those Things

The sun was high in the cloudless sky as the faintest of breezes whispered across the cricket ground, teasing the pages of newspapers at the boundary edge and hinting at the possibility of the weather closing in later in the evening.

Out in the middle, shimmering in the heat haze, our final two batters were seeing out the remainder of our innings as I finally removed my pads from my sweaty legs having recently cut, pulled, hoiked and edged my way to a not-particularly rapid half-century to take our team’s overall score past the 200 mark. I casually threw my pads into my kit bag before sitting back on the stone steps at the entrance to the old, wooden pavilion. Behind me, the club tea ladies busied themselves slicing fruit cake and filling glass jugs with weak squash as on the jukebox at the adjoining bar Roxette questioned a presumably flighty love interest on their abilities to do whatever it was that they did.

A bead of sweat trickled down my forehead, so, in search of something with which to dry myself, I rummaged among my previously discarded pads, gloves and box, hoping against hope that there would be a clean, soft and delightfully fragrant towel within. Discovering that no such towel was to be located, I picked out the only thing that was even remotely suitable for drying and while soft, the old pair of boxer shorts that had been in my bag for about three months were neither clean nor delightfully fragrant. Undeterred, I wiped them across my brow, pulling a face of disgust as I inhaled the pungent, stale smell from the black material.

I opened my eyes to discover that I was no longer alone and instantly tried to make it look as though I hadn’t just wiped my face with my own dirty shreddies.

The newcomer, who I had previously known well enough to nod a polite hello to, looked at me through the bluest of eyes, a mixture of curiosity, surprise and a hint of revulsion all channelled into one raised eyebrow beneath her short, blonde hair.

‘I hope they were clean…’ she smiled.

My cheeks flared what I hoped was a gentle pink but in reality I suspected that I looked positively puce.

‘Ah…er…so do I,’ I replied, awkwardly, wrinkling my nose at the memory of the smell and tossing the offending garment back into the darkest corner of my bag.

I floundered and scrabbled around mentally in search of a follow up comment to try and salvage the situation.

‘Could have been worse though…’

She frowned and I fancied that I could actually see her thought processes on exactly how it could have been worse written across her forehead.

‘Could it though?’ she asked, after what seemed like an eternity.

‘They…could have been… someone else’s?’ I winced, painfully aware of quite how badly this conversation seemed to be going.

An uncomfortable silence hung between us that was finally broken by the sound of her laughter.

I relaxed a little, relieved to have seemingly reduced my level of shame to somewhere in the region of mild embarrassment.

‘Melissa,’ she said with a smile, holding out her hand, which I shook gently before introducing myself, wondering whether or not I should have given my hand another wipe after the whole ‘pants debacle’.

As our innings ended, thirteen hot, sweaty cricketers and two slightly cooler, sweaty umpires made their way off the field and filed into the ramshackle clubhouse, queuing for tuna and cucumber sandwiches and picking at piles of grapes and melon in a bid to convince themselves that they were being healthy in direct contradiction to the amount of alcohol that would likely be consumed later that evening. After a brief chat with my teammates, I made my way back to Melissa where we made small talk over lemon drizzle cake and a couple of home-made sausage rolls that had already flaked pastry over my plate.

‘So,’ I asked, covering my mouth with my hand as a sudden thought made a break for freedom from my consciousness, ‘big cricket fan?’

She gave a small smile, which in turn became a short laugh as she looked coyly at the ground. I winced, internally as even with my appalling social skills I began to figure out where this might be heading.

‘Ah…I like it, but I’m not a huge fan. My dad used to play a bit but he’s swapped his googlies for runner beans these days.’

‘Well, I hope he had it done on the NHS,’ I joked and she was kind enough to laugh at my feeble attempt at humour.

It was my turn to look sheepish, my ego, while neither huge nor out of control, was still enjoying a gentle massaging.

‘I think I’ve seen you around the club quite a bit lately,’ I said in as casual a manner as I could manage, while my morals swooped down and perched upon my shoulders, my disappointment at the current situation not far behind as I knew how this should unfold. How it had to unfold.

Again, that demure smile, her eyes looking up at me from beneath her fringe. She opened her mouth to speak and then cast a glance over my shoulder at my captain, who had come to discuss the second innings of the game with me.

I grimaced an apology in Melissa’s direction and she gave me a disappointed smile that my inner voice was quite happy to point out to me was nothing like the disappointed smile I was going to draw from her later that evening. My heart sank as I reluctantly turned my attention back to the suddenly unimportant game of cricket.

The second innings was wrapped up within thirty of the scheduled forty-five overs and most of that time for me had been spent trying not to look as though I was peering through my sunglasses in the direction of the bar, where Melissa sat nursing a coke and chatting with Alf, a former player of the club who, now in his eighties, spent every Saturday afternoon telling everyone and anyone how cricket was much more difficult in ‘his day’ playing on uncovered pitches and using ancient equipment. To be fair to Alf, most of us felt that he had a point – the problem was that we’d heard that point repeated ad nauseum but still appreciated that we had an unspoken responsibility to accommodate Alf’s opinions and most of us were generally happy to see him on a weekly basis as a stark reminder of what awaited us in years to come. Somewhere at the back of our collective consciousness I imagine that we were treating him how we would hope to be treated in the autumnal days of our lives.

After a quick shower, timed so in a bid to avoid the attentions of ‘Grabby Ben’, who had a penchant for pinching, slapping or cupping whatever areas of flesh that he was able to find of his teammates, I dressed and packed away my kit before heading to the bar, keen to catch up with Melissa, the nervous excitement dulled by the certainty of what had to happen.

It took half an hour to extract ourselves from Alf’s reminisces of days gone by, which we both listened to politely, making what we hoped were appropriate noises at the right moments and nodding sagely when the conversation became more serious, in particular when Alf would recall former players who had long since departed on their awfully big adventures.

With the sun sinking slowly behind the nets on the far side of the pitch, we stole away from the crowd and wandered slowly off towards the side of the ground opposite the clubhouse, where a small bank of grass rose up towards a narrow stream that had run dry due to the current high temperatures. Amid more small talk, we sat down on the grass and watched the beginnings of the usual Saturday night drunken shenanigans involving Vodka Pete, The One-Balled Womble and Stairway to Kevin, so-called because after every game he played he would inevitably be found passed out on the stairs by his wife the following morning.

It was Melissa who broached the elephant in the room. Or technically outside the room and on the field of play, but you get the idea.

‘So…your girlfriend didn’t come to watch this week then?’ she asked, tentatively and with a tone of apprehension not quite hidden in her voice.

I puffed out a long, drawn-out breath and turned to look at her, tilting my head slightly to the side. She avoided my gaze for a moment.

‘No,’ I replied, slowly and quietly. ‘Out with friends, I think.’

She nodded.

‘You don’t sound very sure,’ she frowned, laying back on the slope before propping herself up on one elbow.

‘I’m not, if I’m honest. I’ve got my doubts. But…’

I picked at the grass between my legs, my tired heart having been given an absolute pummelling of late by indecision, insouciance and infidelity. I began to doubt my own sanity and my values. This moment, right here, felt good and full of fire and right. It felt new and exciting and a million miles from the tortured self-doubt and the pain that I’d been experiencing for weeks. No, for the whole of my life. It would be the easiest thing in the world right now to lay down here and betray the person who I thought I was, who I wanted to be. The easiest thing. And the most difficult.

‘I wasn’t not mentioning her,’ I began, wanting to be understood as I always did. Wanting to make things right.

Melissa reached out and put her hand on my arm. Her touch was cool and soft against my skin. I looked into her eyes, then down to her lips, sweet and tempting, mesmerising and bewitching.

‘I know,’ she said. ‘But it’s not just on you. I could have mentioned her at any time, couldn’t I?’

I shrugged, not grumpily more in resignation. Our eyes met again and I saw compassion and understanding along with my determination to be a better person reflected back at me.

‘Timing’s never really been my strong point…’ she smiled. ‘Thank you, for…not doing what you want to do. And what I want you to do.’

I wanted to take her hands in mine. I wanted to lose myself in her eyes and in her scent. I wanted to kiss her and find that time had slowed so that I could hold eternity in an hour.

But time had other ideas. And it began to rain. Forwards in time…

Copyright Alec Hepburn, 2025.