Puck Shots, page 10
***
“My legs don’t do that,” Luka complains as he tries for the tenth time to match my form and my speed on the ice.
“We’re made up of the same body parts on the inside,” I say, flying past him.
“Then tell me how you get your legs to do it.”
“You just have to watch and learn, my friend.”
He goes again, leaning forward to steady himself, hands cupped in front as he focuses on the way his knees are bending and the angle he pushes out with his skates. It’s not quite right, but better than before.
“Grab your stick and try it the full length of the ice,” Eli says, and I rush to beat Luka to the far wall, ready to race him.
“Not everything is a competition,” he chuckles as I get into starting position like a track star waiting for the gun to sound.
“Afraid you’ll lose?”
“I always lose against you, so it’s nothing new. You should be afraid your boy is about to share all your secrets and seeing as I already have a killer slap shot and am the best defensemen they have, all eyes will be on me soon enough.”
“I hope they are. It would suck getting drafted without you.”
“Are you going soft?”
“I just like having a live-in cleaner.”
“No one said we’ll be drafted into the same team, let alone be sharing a room. Fairly sure the guys in the NHL all can afford their own places.”
“You know you love rooming with me. Tell you what, assuming we get drafted into the same team, because who wouldn’t want both of us, we are clearly a powerhouse on the ice,” he nods and I go on, “If you win, you can get your own place, and if I win, we find a place together. KOKs forever.”
He reaches out a fist, and I bump it.
“KOKs forever,” he says and then gets into starting position.
“Ready when you are,” I call to Eli, who’s holding one arm up in the air like a signal flag.
“Three, two…one,” he screams, and when his arm comes down, we both take off like a shot.
I take an almost immediate lead, just like always, but as I pass Eli, I glance back and find Luka is way closer than I expected.
“Dude, you got this,” I cheer before turning back and putting in all my effort to maintain the lead.
I won, but only by about half the length I did before.
“Shit, I can’t believe that actually worked,” Luka says, and I smile over at Eli as a few of the other guys start crowding around him, asking if they can help them out, too. My chest swells at the way his cheeks flush at the attention.
***
It’s game one at our home rink in Boston, and rumor is there will be scouts there tonight, so my stomach is in knots. I sit on the bench seat, back to the room, and draw over the lightning bolt on my wrist with a Sharpie. The pressure of the firm felt tip against my skin and scent of the permanent ink is good at halfway calming my nerves.
Tonight will be my chance at a great first impression. Though they would have seen me play before, not being drafted last year means if they did, they also saw what a shitshow my life was, too. This year, I have to be better. But as I push out onto the ice, the crowd cheering, and the cool air hitting my face, what used to be like a sense of coming home, still feels off.
I’m fast as ever out there, but I can’t bring myself to try the slap shot. What if I choke? What if they get the puck and score and we lose? What if that is the only thing the scout sees and I destroy my chances at being drafted in my first game of the year?
The coach signals for a change, and I rush the side, gasping for breath as I down some water and watch my teammates out there giving their all.
“Looks like your shadow is still here,” Vinnie sneers, nudging my side and nodding up into the stands to my left. I turn and spot Eli. The second he spots me looking his way, one hand comes up in an adorable little wave, his cheeks blushing instantly before he clasps his hands in his lap again.
I turn back to Vinnie.
“Eli’s not a joke,” I say, deadpan.
Vinnie seems to be searching my expression to see if I am messing with him. I’m not. The second my eyes landed on Eli, that bundle of nerves that wouldn’t shift in my gut out on the ice disappears.
“I didn’t mean…” Vinnie starts, but I shake my head.
“Just don’t.”
I bounce my foot, waiting for the coach to signal the change up again. I need to be out there; I need to show Eli his time and effort helping me refine my moves is not for nothing.
“Flash, you’re up,” Coach says, and I’m over the rail and on the ice in a split second after Hewie leaps over. I fly up the ice, my eyes locked on the puck, and when I manage the steal and spin ready to look for a pass, I picture Eli smiling, leaning forward in his seat watching me, and a wave of confidence washes over me.
I push off, speeding my way toward the net at the other end. A player comes at me from my right, but I dig deep, and he misses his chance to slam me into the wall by what has to be an inch. I line up for the shot, give the puck a tap, then swing full force and send it down the line, it skims through the air, about a foot from the ice and slips through the gap between the goalie’s arm and leg, hitting the back of the net with a satisfying sound of the horn.
Luka slams into me a second later. His deafening cheers flooded my ears. But I can’t take my eyes off Eli standing in the crowd, his arms in the air cheering, for me.
12
Eli
When Cosmo scored that goal I couldn’t help but cheer. It’s easy to get caught up in the mob mentality of the crowd, but it wasn’t just that. It was him. The way it felt like he kept looking back at me, checking I was there. Checking that I was watching before he went for it. It was like he was trying to make the slap shot for me instead of for his team or himself. But that’s silly. He can’t have been actually looking at me. It’s probably one of those tricks of the light, like the old paintings like Reginals Ducksworth whose eyes follow you around the room. But old paintings appear that way because they are two-dimensional. The artist creates the illusion that the eyes are looking right at you regardless of where you are in the room by painting the shadows and light on the painting. It’s all about perspective. I guess my perspective, tracking Cosmo who is very much a three-dimensional person, is being affected by the volume of bodies in my peripheral vision. He could realistically be looking at anyone in a ten-seat radius and I’d still feel like his eyes were on me.
I heard a few of the guys at training say they expected scouts here tonight, so he was probably looking for them.
I wander slowly along the path towards the frat house, the approximately five-thousand spectators making their way home all at once. It always blows my mind how so many people can fit in spaces like these. Normally, the number would totally freak me out, but after being there a few times now and clocking all the emergency exits, I find I can sit in my allocated seat and watch the game, mostly unaffected.
“Wooo, Boston rules!” a clearly drunk guy yells as I’m shoved sideways, and he stumbles past. I manage to steady myself before falling, he’s not so lucky and tumbles off the path onto the grass, landing flat on his back.
“I’m good,” he cheers, hands raised.
“Sorry,” a girl calls, jogging past without actually looking at me. She grabs his hands and tries to pull him to his feet, but he’s got a good fifty pounds on her, and as drunk as he is, he’s practically a dead weight.
“Do you want help?” I ask but she either doesn’t hear me or is choosing to ignore me.
I’m used to being invisible. I’ve been trying really hard not to let myself stay in the comfort of the norm in the house. Putting myself out there and actually getting to know the guys in the house is the only way I will get the votes to stay. I’m not holding my breath, though. It would suck to have to leave. I know I didn’t really see myself as a frat kind of guy when I came here, and I’m still not entirely sure I am one, but I know it would be hard to leave, and Cosmo is one hundred percent the reason why. Urgh, I have to stop crushing on him. He’s totally out of my league. While I am invisible to almost the entire human population, he’s a brilliant spotlight drawing every eye in the room right to that gorgeous smile and blue-gray eyes.
My phone chimes, and I swipe it open to check the message.
COSMO:
You still at the rink?
ME:
Was just about to head back to the house.
I send off my reply, already turning and heading back the way I came.
COSMO:
Want to walk back together? I’m on my way out the back gate now.
ME:
Sure, meet you there in a sec.
I can’t believe he wants to walk back with me. Is this some frat prank? No, he’d never do that. My stomach churns with the guilt of even thinking he’d do something like that. We’ve become friends, at least I think we are. Sure, I’ve fantasized more than once about us being more than that, but I always come back to the reality that he’s just a nice guy and looking out for me. But what if it’s more?
My heart is pounding as I take off at a slow jog towards the rink. I’d only left about five minutes ago and had been strolling slowly under the starlit sky, replaying Cosmo’s moves on the ice. The back gate is actually closer to the path I’m on, so it doesn’t take me long to get there, and with my throat burning and my heart beating at superspeed in my ears, I manage to get there just before he walks out.
“Great game tonight,” I say as soon as I see him, and his smile grows wide.
“Thanks to you.”
“You made the shot.”
“The look on their faces was gold, did you see the goalie do a double take?”
I frown. “That’s when they like look at something twice, right?”
He nudges my side.
“Yeah, it is.”
“Thought so, was just checking it didn’t have some secret hockey meaning separate from the usual definition of the term. But now that I think about it, he actually looked back and forth from you and the puck in his net three times, so it was a triple take. Is that a thing?”
“It should be.”
My cheeks warm under his gaze, and I quickly turn my attention to the path ahead.
“You didn’t want to go out and celebrate the win with the team?” I ask as we head toward home.
“We’ve got another game tomorrow, so no celebrations tonight for anyone. Most of the team are still showering and getting changed.”
“You didn’t shower?”
“I did, but do I smell?” he asks, eyebrows pinched together as he sniffs his underarm.
I laugh. “Yes.”
“Seriously,” he asks, sniffing the other arm.
“Everyone smells, but you don’t smell bad. You smell…good. Like mint, actually,” I say, taking another long breath of him. He smiles and relaxes a little.
“Thanks again for all your help. Luka was like a gun out there; he was telling all the guys about you in the locker room afterward, too. I told them how you helped with my super-speed slap shot. Some of the guys even told the trainers they should ask you to show them the program, maybe they can use it to help improve everyone’s game.”
“I figured it’s the least I could do, seeing as you’ve been helping me so much with the frat stuff. We will find out soon if I made it, and your obligation will be over.”
He stops walking and looks at me deadpan.
“Is that what you think you are?”
I shrug. “John asked your brother to see if you’d keep an eye out for me, so…yeah, I guess.”
He takes a step closer, my heart thundering inside my chest, waiting for him to speak, but he lowers his gaze and reaches out slowly and takes my hands in his. The faded lightning bolt on his inner wrist catches the light. He’s always got one there, drawn in black marker. I keep meaning to ask him about it. But I can’t seem to find any words right now as the warmth of his touch spreads up my arms and fills my chest with something more dangerous than getting on the ice with him. Hope.
“My brother asked if I’d make sure no one messed with you. That’s it,” he says, his gaze still on our joined hands. I’m surprised I can even hear him over the beating of my heart. It’s so loud that I’m sure it’s about ready to burst free from my chest. But I’m a science guy, and I know that can’t really happen, no matter how much it feels like it will.
“I sort of figured the rest was, you know…connected. Like a chain reaction,” I say in a whisper. I can’t look away from where his thumbs brush lightly over the backs of my hands. Does he know he’s doing that or is it an automatic movement like walking or breathing?
“I don’t know what the brothers’ decision will be, and I don’t know if you even, or if we could. Like I don’t know what this means for everything else, but…”
Is he nervous? My chest fills up like a balloon at the thought that I somehow made Cosmo nervous. It’s kind of adorable watching him awkwardly stumble through his words. He’s normally the cool guy, striding through the crowd with ease, talking comes easy to him, but not right now. Right now, he’s struggling to string together a full sentence.
“Cos, whatever it is you can tell me,” I say, and he looks right at me then, his blue-gray eyes filled with light.
“I like you,” he says, and if I hadn’t been able to see his lips move when he did, I am not sure I would have believed my ears.
“I like you, too,” I say, the words coming way easier than expected.
He shakes his head like he disagrees.
“No, I mean, I like you, like you.”
A chuckle escapes my lips, and he goes to pull away, but I hold on and step closer.
“That’s what I meant, too. I like you like you as well.”
“Really?”
I nod, and he releases one hand but laces the fingers of the other with mine and we start to walk again. His grip is firm but not tight, and I kind of love the way his arm rests against mine as we stroll along the path towards the frat house.
We don’t talk for the longest time. I keep glancing down at our joined hands, half expecting to look and find I’m not holding onto anything and this was all some kind of fantasy like all the other times. It’s amazing to think all the signals I was sure I was imagining were actually not in my head.
“So there is this film festival in the quad tomorrow, they’re showing last year’s student-produced top-marked films. Did you maybe want to go?” Cosmo asks as we take the path that leads along the back of the frat houses and past the woods I love so much.
“Sure. Are you going with a bunch of guys from the house or your team?” I ask, and I watch his cheeks warm under the low lights.
“Some of the frat brothers will probably be going. There are a few who take a Storytelling for Film and Television course, and Luka and I were extras in one of their films last year, but I was thinking we could just go. You know. Just us?”
“Oh.”
“You don’t have to. It was just an idea,” he says before I get a chance to finish my thought.
“No, I want to. I was just…surprised.”
He looks down at me with a small smirk teasing at the corners of his mouth.
“By what? That I want to spend time with you around other people?”
I shrug.
“I guess so. Yeah.”
He stops, and using his free hand, he brushes my hair behind my ear.
“You are adorable, you know that?” he asks, and I know my face must be as bright as an apple with how hot I feel, but I can’t look away. His tongue swipes over his lower lip as his gaze moves briefly to my mouth and back up. “I’ve never really been good at hiding who I date, but if that’s what you need—”
“No,” I blurt, and his face lights up in a wide smile. “I want to be seen with you.”
He laughs, and I shake my head.
“I mean, I don’t want to hide away either. I’m cool with it being just us. That’s what I meant,” I say, and he cups the side of my face with his hand, and a terrifying but also fucking incredible thought crosses my mind. Is he going to kiss me?
“Good, because you really shouldn’t hide that pretty face away.”
His gaze momentarily moves to my mouth again, and I wonder, should I kiss him? But before I can make up my mind between that being the best idea I’ve ever had and a sure-fire way to screw this up by going too fast, he makes the decision for me and the second his mouth is on mine, the entire world disappears.
This is nothing like the dream of kissing him. It’s better, way better. His mouth fits perfectly with mine, warm and soft. His tongue teases at my lips, and when they part and it melds with mine, his hand slips to the back of my neck, fingers lacing through my hair as he pulls me closer.
I’m half hard already, and even though we’re pressed together, it’s like my body can’t get close enough. I need him like I need breath. Like I’ve been adrift at sea in the sweltering heat, and he’s the rain I prayed for.
It’s better than any fantasy and dream, any thought of what this could be, because this is real. This is him. This is us.
I have no idea how much time passes when we finally come up for air, but he’s got a pink glow around his mouth from the slight scruff on my face, and judging by the tingle around my lips, I’m guessing I do, too.
“That was…”
“Amazing,” I finish.
“That’s exactly what it was.”
“Should we…” I ask, gesturing to the path ahead.
“Yeah, we should. Oh, I forgot to tell you. I beat Sam in chess yesterday,” I say and start us on our walk again, arms swinging in time with our step, a goofy happy look on his face.
“I would have paid to see that. Did he take it well? Tell me he chucked a giant tantrum like a toddler?”
“Ha, no, he took it great. He did say he was recovering from a cold and asked for a rematch next week, though.”
