CHAPTER 9

ETNA

For the first time, hockey is not the most important thing happening in my life. Maybe it’s because our season isn’t going that great.

I don’t think that’s the case, though. I think I’m definitely far more preoccupied with what’s going on in my personal life.

I’m excited. Truly, consumingly, excited. I’m legitimately marrying my best friend. Not marrying a guy who I will later claim as my best friend because we’re married. I’m not trading in my best friend for a husband. Yes, I have some controversial opinions on this that I keep to myself. Don’t care.

But I’m actually marrying my best friend. My husband isn’t becoming my best friend. My best friend is becoming my husband. My best friend who was only ever intended to be my friend. That was the limit our friendship was supposed to reach. Best friends.

The kind of friendship that would endure through ages. No matter what we did in life, we’d be best friends. We’d live next door and raise our families together. We’d own property together and our kids would grow up best friends. Our families will vacation together and spend holidays together.

That was the life we once talked about.

But it’s different now. Now, we’re marrying each other—not some random girls. Now, we’ll own everything together. We’re sharing our lives together completely. We’ll have kids together.

Well, maybe. Probably. It’s not like we’ve talked about it, though it’s on my list of topics to discuss.

Once again, we’re sitting on the couch with our tablets, but this time, Keno’s is open with his calendar and mine is open to my marriage to-do list. We’ve narrowed both our lists down to definitely dos and maybes.

Once we did, it became clear what was necessary right now . We need to pick a date.

“Okay, our season ends April thirteenth, and we know we’re not headed to the playoffs.”

Keno snorts. “That would take a miracle.”

“The only thing we need to think about concerning our date is our hockey friends and whether they’ll make it to the playoffs and whether we want to take that into consideration.”

“I’d like Lo to be there, which means we need to think about Toronto and Buffalo at the very least.”

“What about your Gays Can Play guys?” I ask.

“If we’re going to take into account every team, we might as well not choose a date until after mid-June.”

“What if we went wild and held our wedding in the middle of the week?” I suggest.

He raises a brow. “Okay, but why?”

“Because we have a much better chance of getting a venue we like, since weddings typically happen on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. There are also notes in here about prices being better for the same reason.”

Keno shrugs. “Sure. How about”—he consults his June calendar—“June twenty-eighth. It’s a Wednesday. Smack in the middle of the week.”

“Okay, cool. That was easier than I thought.”

“Yep, worked out well. What next?”

“Next is finding a venue. Everything depends on a venue. No, wait. We need a budget first.”

Keno waves me off. “I’m not concerned about a budget. Let’s just plan something we’re going to love.”

“Okay, then we’re back to the venue.”

“By when?”

“According to all my lists, six months ago.”

Keno snorts. “Okay, cool. By January 31.”

“Let’s make it a to-do every single day until then.”

“I’m going to divorce you before we get married if my phone notifications go off every day.”

Grinning, I make sure he sets a recurring notification for the next month and a half.

“Honestly, the first couple months we’ll be playing catch up since we’re supposed to take like a year to do this. On the list for months one through six that we didn’t cross out are: select a venue and caterer, choose a theme, make a guest list, insure rings we don’t have yet, wedding insurance, choose a color palette and consider design ideas, hire priority vendors like photographer, band, videographer. Shop for our wedding dresses.” I grin at him.

Yes, we left it saying dress, though I don’t believe either of us plan on wearing an actual dress. To each their own, but we’re not into wearing dresses.

“Book hotel room blocks, engagement photos—though I’m still miffed we chose to leave that on here—decide on wedding invitations, buy attire. Send save the dates, register for gifts—another thing I’m still shocked we kept—florists, bridesmaids dresses and groomsmen outfits, rehearsal venue, and ceremony musicians, though my note says that we’re going to use the same guys as the band for the reception party. Then there are rentals and hiring an officiant.”

“In a month,” Keno says. “Sure.”

“People get this done in weeks, so I think we can handle a month.”

“That’s the order of priority, right?”

“According to the lists online, yes.”

“Then we’re going to have to knock out like one every other day for the next month. Start the list again, I’ll program them in.”

We spend the next hour doing this. Arranging and rearranging until we don’t have too many tasks stacked on a single day. We’re constantly questioning whether we need something, wanting to shorten this list, but we always come back to not wanting regrets.

We’re getting married once. We both agree on that. So this wedding needs to be everything.

Then we tackle the following five months of tasks, thankfully spacing them out quite a bit so we’re not so overwhelmed. One of the more exciting aspects we’re looking forward to is booking our honeymoon. I don’t know if we’re warming up to the idea of lots of sex or just being together. Personally, I think maybe it’s a touch of both.

Not going to lie—after looking over Keno’s extensive sex research, I’ve been a lot hornier lately. The shower has seen me and my hand often.

When we’re finished with the wedding shit, we add a couple more items that weren’t included and are probably more unique to our situation than what’s typical. On Christmas Day, we add ‘ tell families .’ On the twenty-ninth of December when we play Toronto again, we note ‘ tell friends .’

Then we make sure those coincide with everything else, like changing our statuses online and modern-day stuff like that.

We’ve already got something on our list to do today. Though, we also added ‘ choose date ’ and then knocked that bitch off as complete. It’s nice to see progress.

“Okay, now… what do we do with the sex list?” Keno asks, changing his screen to the list we whittled down to things we’re willing to explore. I’m not sure if he’s excited or still very nervous.

“What if we treat it the same way? Give ourselves deadlines to work up to for the different sexy acts?” I suggest.

“Sure, but let’s not call them deadlines. It sounds like work.”

I laugh. “Okay, what’s first?” I tap out of my list and open the calendar app we share. Oh yeah, December and January look frightening. Especially seeing all the games and training schedules added in. We’re not sleeping for the next month and a half. I appreciate how it’s all color coded—games in maroon, because that’s one of the team colors. Training sessions in gray—another team color. He added wedding stuff in white, which must be a play on the virgin tradition that neither of us is bringing to the table.

Maybe for the sex stuff, I’ll give it a sultry red. No, that’s too close to maroon. Hot pink! Yep, that’s it. Pink for the win.

“I guess we’re starting off PG with cuddling and handholding,” Keno says. “No cutting corners.”

That’s what we decided. We’re doing things until it becomes natural. All the little gestures, like holding hands.

“Maybe that’s a daily task for the next six weeks. We make it a point to hold hands at least once a day. And cuddle too.”

Keno looks at me. “Really?”

I nod. “You’re worried about the affectionate part of our relationship and we both saw it was a little awkward because we’ve altered the terms of our relationship even though nothing has truly changed yet. I think if we add a lot of these little things in, like kissing, holding hands, hugging, and cuddling as a daily reminder, we’re going to fall into a habit where we become comfortable showing each other affection.”

The smile I receive is soft and maybe… touched? Like he appreciates the thought I put into it. The consideration I’ve taken.

“Yeah. Let’s do that.”

Like the venue, I put in a recurring reminder for all four things. Little things that people don’t always think about but can say a lot about how they feel.

“I wonder if maybe we should talk to someone—like couples’ therapy,” I muse. “Are there things we should be talking about that we haven’t thought of yet? Neither of us has been in a long-term relationship, so it’s not like we have anything to build on from experience. We have nothing to learn from by mistake, either.”

“More research,” I suggest. “Write that down for one of January’s tasks.”

I laugh. “Okay. Anyway, what’s next?”

“Kissing.”

“Didn’t we just add that?”

“Yes, but I imagine them like… goodbye kisses. Or just-because kisses. Like pecks or whatever. I’m talking about tongue kisses. Filthy making out and shit.”

Laughing, I nod. “You’re so romantic.”

“Oh! We should add in romance!”

“Calm down, man. Sexy stuff first. We’ll give ourselves pop-ups for romantic gestures personally, so we become accustomed to thinking about it regularly.”

“Like date nights.”

“Yes. Right.”

“But spontaneously.”

“Some scheduling is fine.”

Keno and I grin at each other. Every single day when I meet his eyes, I’m more convinced this is going to be perfect. We’re going to work out amazingly well.

“Making out can start after Christmas. Let’s focus on getting some sweet moments so we’re comfortable touching each other so we’re not immediately trying to push into sexy.”

“Touching each other is on the list.”

I snort. “You know what I mean.”

“Which brings up the next things. To get comfortable naked, we decided we should start showering together. No pressure to touch. Then… touch is later. Like… exploring each other’s bodies.”

His cheeks are red again. My fingers itch to touch his skin. Is it hot to the touch?

I spread out a few reminders for each.

Next comes touching and making out. Handies. Blowies. Frotting. Then we start getting more daring with fingering and shit.

We did, in fact, take off rimming. But we added some toy play, which we thought might help work us up to some sexy time without falling straight into it.

We’re both afraid of forcing the situation and becoming too self-conscious. Which is why we’re working up to all sexual acts with something affectionate. We’re very aware we’re doing this in a most peculiar way.

It works for us, and I think we’re both extremely excited about it. But it also means there are some hurdles most couples don’t have. Most couples aren’t coming from a life of strictly heterosexual encounters and proclaiming a monogamous homosexual life from here on out.

“Do you think we should save our holes until our wedding night?” Keno asks.

Laughter bubbles out of me as I shift to look at him. “What?”

He’s grinning. “Yeah. I mean… it’s a play on virginity, right? We could totally wear white on our wedding day.”

“Oh my god, no!”

“No? You hungry for my dick now?”

“Dude, it’s been like three months since I’ve gotten laid. Yeah, I’m horny.”

Keno tilts his head. “That’s fair, but I’m not saying we don’t get orgasms. Just not sex.”

I stare at him for a minute. “I don’t think we should do that, though I like the mockery of wearing white and virginity and all that. But I think we’re looking forward to a sexy honeymoon, no?”

He nods, his smile ticking up a bit.

“Then I think we need to work on getting comfortable fucking asses before then. So we can enjoy our honeymoon to its fullest.”

He hums. “Yeah, okay.”

“Maybe we can save something for the honeymoon, though. There’s a whole list of kinks you’ve added.” I raise a brow at him.

Keno laughs. “I swear I told you the truth. They were on like every search!”

“Uh-huh. You have a secret hunger for the kink lifestyle, don’t you?”

“I won’t pretend that some of those things weren’t intriguing, but I’ve never thought about any of it until I was researching gay sex positions.”

It takes us another hour to finish scheduling all the sex things. Then we lean in close together, pressed right up against each other, and slowly scroll through the next six months of our candy-colored calendar.

“I feel a little silly scheduling some of these things,” Keno admits.

“It’s not a forever thing,” I promise. “We’re taking a platonic relationship and recoding it into a romantic one. I think it’ll be easy to fall into the habits we’ve already created over the last year and a half. I’m afraid that would leave us feeling unfulfilled and be the opposite of what we’re hoping to get out of this.”

Keno nods. “I know you’re right, but it feels… cold. Like, ‘ it’s three o’clock. Time for a kiss .’”

I chuckle. “It’s not that clinical. But… maybe we make it into personal challenges. When we see the reminders, or better yet, before them, we ask ourselves every day—is there a moment when I think he needs a kiss? Will he benefit from a hug right now? We’re just sitting on the couch watching TV; maybe this would be better if we were cuddling? When we’re walking into the house or driving, can we hold hands for a minute? That kind of thing.”

He’s watching me again. Giving me that smile that’s soft and sweet. I’d love to know what he’s thinking.

“Yeah,” Keno says, his voice soft. “I like that better.”

I lean in close and press my mouth to his. Just a little kiss. A peck. I feel his lips curl up and he presses into me a little more.

“I like this a lot better,” he whispers.

“We’re competitive. That’s part of what makes a good hockey player. Sometimes we just need to put things into terms we understand and are comfortable with. This wedding? A fucking challenge because it’s something we have no idea about, but we’re going to rock the fuck out of it.”

He grins. “We fucking are!”

“We’re going to nail this marriage thing too,” I assure him. “And sex and love. All of it. I promise.”

“That’s a big promise, Etna.”

“It is, but I know if I asked you for a promise, you’d make the same one. You know why?”

He shakes his head.

“Because it’s something we both want and believe in. We won’t let it fail.”

Keno sighs. His hand slips into mine and we share a smile. “No, we won’t. It’s going to be the best marriage of every marriage. We’ll go down in history as the example everyone strives for.”

I laugh. “That’s the spirit.”