Page 23

TWENTY-ONE

CHARLIE

We land in Miami just before noon, the time difference doing wonders for me since I got all the recuperative sleep I needed on the flight.

I literally woke up from the rattling of the plane when we landed, and then proceeded to single-mindedly ignore the fact that my head had been resting on Nikolay’s shoulder.

Nothing to see here, nothing at all.

I can hope all day long that no one else saw that, but chances are at least a handful of our teammates did. No one says anything, though, which I’m sure is a byproduct of Nikolay’s scowl. The same scowl I dreaded less than a week ago seems almost adorable when aimed at other people.

I think it’s thanks to the fact that I now know what a goofball he is. Can you ever fear someone’s wrath after you realize they’re listening to Celine Dion songs during a flight?

No, you can’t.

So I just go with the flow, following everyone out of the plane, picking up my bag with them, climbing into a bus, sitting next to Nikolay again, this time near the front, and hearing the faint sounds of “The Power of Love” when the bus starts moving.

A hand appears between us suddenly, coming from behind, and I turn just in time to see Benny’s head appear over Nikolay’s seat as he taps him on the shoulder.

Nikolay moves one of the earpieces back and turns back.

“Great song selection, Santa,” Benny says with mirth coating every word.

Nikolay barks out a laugh and then... they start singing. Together.

With big fucking smiles on their faces. I can only watch, open-mouthed and transfixed, as the whole team joins in for the chorus and they tweak the lyrics just a little.

“I’m your baaaaaaaabyyyyyyyy,” they belt. A bus full of adult fucking men, men who fight other men while on the ice on a weekly basis, all of them drop their macho attitudes for two minutes and sing like lovesick teenagers.

I sit and watch, waiting for someone to explain the inside joke to me, but they just sing the rest of the song. Till the very fucking end .

When I turn in his direction, I catch even Laney mouthing the words—with the lyric change and all.

It’s bizarre, puzzling, and . . . delightful.

When the song is over, Benny proceeds to tell me about the grand gesture he and Bates concocted to get back with his boyfriend Chris, and I laugh through the whole retelling since his elaborate gestures and mock-serious tone are funny as hell.

That’s the moment.

The one I’ve been waiting for all my career.

No, I’m not looking at the Stanley Cup after fighting tooth and nail for months on end, but weirdly enough, a deep sense of belonging settles into my heart in that moment. If this is what it’s like to be a Pirate, I don’t ever want to be anything else.

“Sweetheart and Santa,” Laney shouts in the lobby of our hotel. He could’ve just spoken normally, seeing as we’re right next to him, but who am I to tell him how to do anything? “Here are your keys,” he tells us and quickly moves on.

There’s a way to do things in the NHL, and as far as I know this extends to most teams. The older guys in the team, the better players in the team, always get their own rooms during roadies. I’ve had my own room for damn near ten years, and that translated when I was signed by the Pirates.

“Hey, can I come up for a while?” I hear from my left. I turn and see it’s Benny, and he’s asking Nikolay. He looks at me with the request in his eyes, which I appreciate, and I nod without hesitation.

I have no clue if Benny hanging out in Nikolay’s room is something usual or not, but given the way my body—and mind—keeps reacting to him whenever we’re alone, I don’t think having a third party there would do us any harm.

We get on the elevator with our bags and Benny in tow, and soon enough we’re in our room. Two queen-sized beds are separated by about three feet, which is more than usual I think. Not that it’ll do any good if I get a wild idea in the middle of the night and decide to cuddle up to Nikolay to get another feel of his hard body pressed against mine.

“I’m going to unpack,” I declare, way too loudly for such a lame statement.

Benny smiles at me, looking a bit confused, and Nikolay just smirks. God, I want to kiss that smirk off his face. Before I can go down that rabbit hole, though, a thought strikes me and I turn to Benny.

“Unless you want privacy?” I check in with him.

“No, it’s fine. Maybe you can help too,” he says happily and goes over to one of the beds, sits with a bounce, and looks at us expectantly.

Like two good, obedient kids, Nikolay and I walk to the other bed and sit facing him... next to each other. I mentally order myself not to shift nervously. It’s a totally normal distance between our bodies. Even though I think I feel the warmth radiating off him, I don’t think it’s physically possible.

“What is troubling you,” Nikolay asks and clasps his hands like he’s a priest waiting for confession. I bite back the snort at his Russian accent, knowing he’s full of shit but still unwilling to let anyone else in on that secret.

“See, Chris has some anxiety over me traveling at night. Specifically, travelling by any type of car.” I frown at that. He must’ve had a shit season, then, because we’ve been on the road in the dark plenty of times already.

“What do you mean some anxiety ?” Nikolay asks, his tone surprisingly gentle.

“He doesn’t sleep well,” Benny starts listing off things. “He obsesses over seeing my location on his phone. He basically just suffers.”

Nikolay just hums to that, and I feel the question forming on my lips before I even consciously think about asking.

“Has he thought about getting some help?”

“Yes.” Benny nods a handful of times, then reaches next to him blindly and takes one of the pillows to put on his lap and hugs it to him. “He’s been going to therapy for the past four months, twice a week... and it’s helped,” he hurries to add, his blue eyes big and trusting on us. “And I’ve asked what I can do short of quitting my job to help him, but we’ve come up with nothing and I just—” He cuts himself off and closes his eyes, looking pained.

“I just want to help him.” He looks straight at Nikolay then. “I know you’re going to give me the weirdest fucking suggestion ever, but I also know it will be creative and possibly even helpful.”

He looks heartbreakingly hopeful at that moment, and it breaks my heart a little because how the hell will Nikolay help him?

For about a minute we sit there in silence and both Benny and I stare at Nikolay. He’s clearly racking his brain for an answer, when suddenly he snaps his fingers and points at Benny.

“Blow jobs,” he cheers triumphantly.

“What about them?” Benny asks, clearly confused but instantly intrigued.

“How about you give him a blow job right before you leave for a roadie where you will have to be on the bus at night, and then you give him another blow job as soon as you get home?”

Benny opens and closes his mouth a few times, making complicated grimaces in between, while my brain is still trying to catch up to everything that just came out of my roommate’s mouth.

Is he for real?

“Explain,” Benny finally demands.

“Well, my fellow countryman Ivan Pavlov made a few discoveries about the psyche of humans. I don’t know if you’ve heard of him,” he drawls sarcastically.

Now I’m the one opening his mouth to respond when a lightbulb seems to come on inside my brain and I understand it.

“Positive reinforcement,” I say the second I remember the name.

“How do you know about it?” Nikolay asks me, looking pensive.

“One of my cousins is a therapist and I used to help him study,” I tell him absentmindedly.

“What does it mean?” Benny asks.

“It means that you basically train the mind to expect something good at a certain time or a...” I try to remember the word. “Trigger, I think it’s called.” Benny’s still frowning, so I keep explaining. “Pavlov’s experiment with a dog?—”

“He experimented on dogs ?” he demands, horrified. I can’t say I blame him, but I bet he’s imagining something much worse.

“He would ring this bell before feeding his dog. Eventually the dog started salivating just at the sound of the bell even when he didn’t feed him right after.”

“Huh,” Benny says simply, and stays quiet for a long moment. “So you’re saying Chris would be the dog?” he asks, directing the question to Nikolay this time. “The bell would be me leaving or arriving home from a roadie, the food would be the blow job, and salivating would be him not freaking out?”

My face is screwed up in concentration while he draws the parallels, even after I think I’ve wrapped my mind around the whole thing.

“More like, salivating would be the bliss of a good orgasm,” Nikolay corrects, but he does so with a triumphant smile on his face.

“You could ask Chris,” I offer with a shrug. “His therapist would not only probably know more about it, but maybe have some thoughts on it? I mean, it depends on their speciality, but I’m pretty sure all trained psychologists know about positive reinforcement.”

“You could also try phone sex tonight.” There goes Nikolay again with his blunt suggestions. And why can’t he stop talking about sexual favors? Can he just shut up and put me out of my misery already?

“Uhh,” Benny hesitates for the first time—fucking finally. Though he did say he wanted weird suggestions. He leans back, though, and smiles widely at Nikolay. Maybe a bit too wide. “I’ll think about that.” He stands and basically sprints to his discarded bags by the door. “See you guys for the team’s dinner,” he shouts without looking back, and then he’s gone.

And I’m alone with Nikolay once more.

And we’re sitting right next to each other.

Like a springboard, that thought has me jumping off the bed and repeating my earlier words. “I need to unpack. ”

“And I need to nap,” Nikolay says in a scratchy voice I ignore. I focus on opening my suitcase and taking out my clothes for the day and a half we’ll spend here. When I’m done putting everything in place, I finally risk a look at him and see he’s on his back, almost like a mummy, his mouth slightly open.

That mouth . . .

Right, I need a cold shower. Now.

Like his body is an alarm clock, Nikolay wakes up less than a minute after I’m done getting ready to head over to Miami’s arena for our late practice. We’re playing early tomorrow, then getting right back on the plane to head over to Tampa.

After that, it’s a game in Boston, another one in Montreal, and then two back-to-back games in Detroit.

Long roadies like this one are only fun when you’re winning, and I’m sure we could win every game if we keep our heads in the game.

None of those teams are better than us, not really, but our stats this season have left a lot to be desired. We need to show up and live up to our potential.

With that in mind, Nikolay and I walk with every other player into the visiting team’s locker room and suit up.

Laney’s lip curls up when he sees we’re ready to go, but he lets us practice with the team normally—small wins. And he even lets us practice with the second line for a little while—bigger wins.

It somehow stings more, though, when after a quick session in the gym and quick showers, Laney comes in and announces the lineup for tomorrow’s game.

We’re still benched, but . . .

“Santa and Sweetheart,” he says at length, and Nikolay grumbles beside me. I assume it’s because of the still-benched thing so I empathize. “You’ll suit up tonight.”

That does brighten my mood a little, but what really pulls me out of the self-hatred spiral is walking into a steakhouse later that evening and sitting down with the rest of the team.

I’m surprised to see every player there, and though my fragile ego wants to focus on the fact that I’m probably the only one who hasn’t been attending these dinners all season, I force myself to focus on how all the young guys are also here.

They seem to be happy to be here as well.

None of them look eager to get out of here to go to a club and get drunk or find someone to hook up with. They all take their jobs seriously.

Has it always been like this in the Pirates team?

Has Nikolay never had a ready hookup in a new city?

I shake my head forcibly—no reason to be thinking about that—and I guess since he’s sitting next to me, he notices .

“You okay?” He’s frowning, and is that worry in his eyes?

“Everyone shut up.”

The hard tone of the words has me looking away from icy blue eyes and into Bear’s caramel ones. He stands and looks straight at me. Nerves attack me viciously at that moment. What the hell is happening right now?

“I have something to say.” He keeps going without looking away from me. “Something we should all be saying. But I wanted to be the first to apologize to you, Charlie.” He nods earnestly at me, though his face is still etched into hard angles. I can’t seem to breathe. “For all of us, not only me. And yes, that includes apologizing for that big oaf’s behavior all season. We haven’t treated you the way you deserve and I won’t make excuses for any of us. I will only say that from now on, hopefully we all think twice before following Santa’s lead.”

There’s enough humor in his voice to make all the men around the table chuckle lightly.

“I can promise you things will be different now that we know he’s even crazier than we thought.” The laughs are a bit louder then. “Here’s to you being a Pirate, Sweetheart.” He raises his glass and everybody else follows suit.

I get choked up and try not to show it, but the blush burning my cheeks can’t be hidden from anyone. I raise my own glass of Coke, though, and smile at Bear with gratitude pouring out of me .

I feel Nikolay lean in once everyone’s taken a drink and they’re no longer focused on me.

“I like the blush,” he whispers.

His words only make me blush harder.

“What are you looking at, you creepy old man?” I demand when I’ve had enough of feeling Nikolay’s intense stare on me.

“Creepy old man?” he demands, clearly offended. I look up from my lava cake to the other side of our room in Tampa and give him the flat stare he deserves.

“I refuse to use your ridiculous nickname, and Santa Claus is a creepy old man who breaks into people’s houses and eats their food. I thought it was only fitting.”

He matches my blank face for five seconds, and then he bursts out laughing. Like a full-body laugh that has the edges of my mouth tipping up despite my sullen mood.

“So you’re in a bad mood, huh?”

I’m still taken aback by the easygoingness of him now that he doesn’t hate me. A mere week ago we were about to beat the crap out of each other during practice and now we’re laughing together.

“I’m just surprised you’re ordering that plate of sugar when we’re supposed to be staying in tip-top shape to try and get back on the ice.”

“Don’t food-shame me, Nikolay,” I tell him and go back to my cake, which is the only thing making me feel better at the moment—besides Nikolay’s laugh, but I’m just going to keep ignoring that. “And of course I’m in a bad mood. We lost against Miami, a team that sucks , only three hours ago, Nikolay. And Laney didn’t look like he wanted to put us on the ice once . For fuck’s sake we just lost the number two spot in our division. If we don’t get back to winning fucking games we’re not even going to make the playoffs.”

Something in my tone must clue him in—maybe it was the unhinged screeching—because he walks over and pulls out the other chair at the tiny table in our room and loses all the humor bullshit. He leans in a little and places both hands, palms down and fingers spread out a little, on top of the table.

“We’re going to get our spots on the ice back, sweetheart.”

I can tell he meant for my nickname to sound condescending but instead it comes out tender—another thing I couldn’t have imagined coming from him a week ago—and that’s not helping my focus.

Even if we do get back on the ice, if I can’t stop thinking about kissing Nikolay again, what good could I possibly be for the team? The team I now finally feel a part of?

I don’t want to let them down. I won’t .

So yeah, I continue eating my feelings without shame. And Nikolay lets me, giving me some much needed silence for the rest of the night.

There are no smart remarks when we get in a quick practice on the ice in the morning, and he doesn’t even tell me “I told you so” when Laney announces he’s putting us back in that night when we play against Tampa.

“Make sure you get some rest,” he tells us, a warning clear in his tone.

We both nod like bobbleheads and follow his instructions to a T, only... when Nikolay peels off his shirt when we get back to our room, and I can’t unglue my eyes from his back—the one rippling with muscles—my mind conjures up the image of him taking off my shirt, undoing my pants and...

Another cold shower then .

Thankfully, I know he can be asleep in no time at all when it comes to napping, so I jack off in the shower with the memory of our kiss fueling every ounce of horniness in my body.

He’s still asleep when I come out, just as expected, but unexpectedly, a deep sense of loss fills me as I see him in the other bed.

How can I want to just be close to him so much?

How can the three feet that separate us feel so immense?

Most importantly, how in the fuck am I going to play the best hockey of my career with him right next to me?