Page 22 of Forbidden Hockey

“I’ll take bar top, you deal with the server’s drinks.”

Muscle memory drives my actions as I pour drinks on my side, him on the other. I brush by Rhoda a few times as we maneuver behind a bar top that was really only made for two. There are several near crashes and a couple of actual crashes, but we keep going. Beer foam wets my hands, and wine stains my skin. Customers shout, wanting their drinks yesterday, and I’m about to strangle someone.

“Shit, outta tequila,” Trav curses.

“Over here,” I call. I don’t have time to pass it to him, though. I reach for the vodka as he reaches for the tequila bottle beside it. Our hands brush, and I light on fire—a feat with how much I’m already burning up. A wave of searing heat straight to my gut.

It’s enough to arrest us. Frozen. Staring. Unhinged restaurant chaos swirls, blurring into static, and the air betweenus hums—wired, waiting, unbearable. My brain short-circuits, and I forget how to make my limbs work.

“Dirk, limes. We need more fucking lime wheels yesterday,” Jack yells over the bedlam, shattering the spell. “People are losing their minds for limes out here.”

I jerk back, pretending to care about the damn drink garnish while my nerves sizzle and threaten to combust. Trav snatches the tequila, taking a slow step away like I’ve suddenly turned into a viper, throat working like he’s swallowed something sharp.

Holy shit.

I’m not alone this time.He felt it too.

That means … he was being a protective brute before. Whatever’s going on for him now is turning his world upside down.Welcome to the fucking club, Trav.

For the next two hours, I have to force myself to make drinks, all while my heart wants to fall out of my chest. The night ends, but not the aftermath; my body feels fried from the inside. I can’t even look at Trav, afraid of what I’ll see. If he experienced what I did, he’s not gonna take it well. Nothing about this stupid crush has been going well for me, but it’s a little more acceptable for a younger man to lust over an older one. It doesn’t go both ways. What if he fires me? No, Trav wouldn’t do that without cause, but he would ask me to leave. What do I say?

A thousand scenarios and outcomes flood my mind, but none of them end with me wanting to leave. Just a raw ache. A desperate scrape against my ribs. He doesn’t say anything, and I don’t follow him to his office to demand a conversation.

It’s a whole twenty-four hours before I see him again. Surely that’s enough time for whatever happened to wear off. Heading in for my next shift feels like waiting for a puck to the face—inevitable, stupid, and somehow my own fault.

Trav’s in the bar area. Has he been pacing? He would have known I was coming in. He didn’t tell me not to. Trav flinches when his gaze lands on me. My palms won’t quit sweating

“Hey. Um, hey,” he tries again.

Fuck. Things are weird now. That’s the last thing I want. The only way I know through this is to pretend like nothing happened.

“Hey, Trav. We in for a busy one?”

“Mmhmm,” he hums, more taciturn than usual. Is that how he’s gonna be now? I’d rather never be together and stay friends than slowly drift apart—this is the beginning of option “slowly drift apart” if I let it. I’ve had more time than he has to get used to what it’s like to want him and know that I’ll be pining for him, maybe for the rest of my life.

My brain scrambles and scrounges for anything that will render this less weird. I’m not fast enough.

“If you could get on the floor early, we’ve got a few last-minute reservations and the kegs are running low.”

Kegs, really? That’s the barback’s job. I get it, though. He’s gonna exist in a perpetual state of boss mode.

“Yeah, I’ll start early, Travis.”

The man’s wound tight. He’s all jaw and forearm tension, and it bleeds off him like the electric energy before a storm. None of that helps the static between us, the constant buzz, the bolt of lightning that we don’t dare touch.

But I understand the assignment. We’re choosing denial.

There’s just one minor, teeny-tiny problem. The lightning won’t let us. Every time we brush by each other, it ignites, refusing to be forgotten. It won’t be put in a corner. It won’t go back in the box. And it’s an evil motherfucker, existing to taunt us, to pull at the strings of our morals until they unravel. We can put on professional faces and give all the pretend-it’s-fine energywe want, but that’s not gonna turn off the surge of biochemistry fucking with our sanity.

By the end of shift, neither of us can take it anymore. The shock fades into acceptance—it’s there whether we like it or not, all we can do is learn to live with it.

I find myself in his office, the last place we should be alone, door shut, forehead against the door so I don’t have to look at him.

“Do you want me to go, Trav?” I croak.

“No,” he rasps. “Do you want to go?”

“No.”