Chapter Two

July

The problem was that Matt kept showing up at Aiden’s door and Aiden kept letting him in. The problem was that Aiden knew he shouldn’t be doing it, that it was going to backfire horribly, that years of work were going up in smoke every time Matt touched him.

The problem was that as much as Aiden knew these things, logically, Matt kept showing up at the door and Aiden kept letting him in. For all of his logic and all of his knowing, he couldn’t say no .

They never made their way up to the bed, and it was mostly just blowjobs and handjobs and a lot of heated making out and grappling on the couch, but Aiden kept doing it.

They never talked about it.

They didn’t need to talk about it. The sex was good. It had always been good with Matt, because there was something about him that Aiden’s body just responded to instinctively. Matt had been his first. His first everything , from the initial angry kiss onward, the only one who’d been able to tear him away when he’d been too absorbed in hockey to even consider trying to date. The only person who had proved to him that his lack of interest in girls wasn’t solely due to a drive to improve, a focus on the sport that couldn’t be shaken. And when Aiden and Matt were kids, before things had fallen apart, he’d thought it was familiarity, the kind of thing that happened when you loved someone, when you knew them and their body so well.

But they weren’t in love anymore, they hadn’t seen each other for ten years, and that feeling hadn’t changed at all. Aiden didn’t want to think about it too closely. This wasn’t a situation where the breathing exercises and mantras he’d used in his playing years could help. This wasn’t floundering in the deep water, this was drowning, this was water in his lungs and not even trying to struggle to the surface.

Every time Matt left, Aiden sat and wondered how he was going to feel when the Safaryans went home to Hamilton after the week was over. When Matt was gone again. Every time Matt left, Aiden mentally crossed another night off of the calendar.

Eventually: Saturday, by Aiden’s calculation, the last night. He wasn’t really expecting Matt to show up, but when the doorbell rang anyway, Aiden felt such an overwhelming sense of relief that he almost smacked his hand against the side of his head, as if that could shake it away.

This time, Matt didn’t move immediately to touch him, just stood there in front of Aiden’s door, face twisted like he was in actual, physical pain. “Aiden, can we please—can we talk?”

Aiden wanted to say oh , you only want to talk when you want to talk, huh? Aiden wanted to say that there was nothing to talk about, get out . He said none of that. He couldn’t open his mouth.

“Is it true? That you retired?”

Aiden’s mouth went dry. “It’s true. How did you know?”

“Duncs told me. I really... I can’t believe it.”

“You can believe whatever you want. I did.”

Matt just looked at him for a long time, studying Aiden’s face. “Why?”

It felt like being in the Twilight Zone , having a relatively normal conversation with Matt about the end of his life. “What do you mean, why ? I’m old as fuck, it was the last year of my contract, I kept getting hurt and Gabe’s perfectly capable of taking over. It was time.”

“I just can’t picture you not playing,” Matt said slowly. “I can’t picture you not wearing that sweater.”

“It had to happen eventually.” Aiden managed to keep his voice even, somehow. He wanted to laugh: hysterical, furious. He didn’t. “So it happened now.”

“How are—how are you doing? With that?”

“Are we really doing this? You’re just going to drop back into my life like nothing happened to talk about retirement?” Aiden couldn’t quite believe that Matt would even care about this, let alone that he’d turned back up here, on the last night, to talk about it. Aiden wasn’t his problem anymore.

“ You’re the one who ended things.”

“No, we both mess—”

“I didn’t mean for any of this—”

Aiden was suddenly desperate for the conversation to be over, desperate to keep Matt from telling him why he was here again or what the hell he expected from Aiden, desperate not to spend this last small stretch of time they had together the same way they’d spent the last six months of their relationship, desperate to turn off his brain.

“Matt, can you just—can you just stop talking , fuck—”

Matt’s mouth twitched. “That’s what you want, huh?”

“Yes.”

“That’s all you want?”

“ Yes. ”

Matt got down on his knees, there in the entryway, looked up at Aiden with anguished eyes that cut right through him. “Okay, baby. Make me.”

When it was over, even though he’d come, Aiden didn’t feel any relief. Matt started dressing, face expressionless, not looking Aiden in the eye. Aiden watched him do it from the couch. He wondered whether everyone handled retirement as badly as he was handling it, or whether his competitive nature had to be the best at being the worst, too.

Matt said, “So this is it, I guess.”

“Guess so.”

“We’re going back to Hamilton tomorrow morning.”

“I know.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“Aiden—”

“ What , Matthew?”

“Never mind. Have a—fuck it, fuck you , enjoy your retirement.”

“Doing great, buddy,” Aiden said, walking him to the door, “no regrets.”

Matt didn’t look back when he went.

Matt said goodbye to his family at the airport. He was grateful that he and Miles had managed to talk them into flying instead of the eight-hour road trips they’d loved to take when Matt was a kid, like they had to make up in quality time for all of the hockey-related travel, for all of the time the Safaryan boys had spent with billet families instead of at home.

Miles and Jess were flying back to Hamilton to spend even more time with their parents before they returned home to New Jersey to prepare for the season. There had been a time when Matt would have gone with them, but he was already relieved he’d planned to spend most of the offseason back in Montreal. He’d had a house in Hamilton too, for a little while, but eventually, when he realized he almost never actually wanted to be there, he’d sold it.

It was easier not to deal with his parents’ quiet disapproval. It was easier not to be under constant scrutiny, like the way Miles was eyeing him now as they prepared to part ways at the security gate, after Matt had hugged Ellie and Theo goodbye and kissed Jess on the cheek.

“I’m fine,” he told his brother, for the umpteenth time.

Miles just shook his head, clearly disbelieving, and even though he was annoyed, Matt felt a surge of warmth in his chest, knowing just how much his brother cared about him. They’d always been close, only fifteen months apart, constantly in an intense friendly competition about anything and everything. Both of them had the scars to show for it.

Matt had stuck by Miles through a rough transition from the minors to the big league, and Miles had helped Matt pick up the pieces of his shattered life after Aiden left. When things had gotten really bad.

“Really. You don’t have to worry about me.”

“I always worry about you,” Miles grumbled, but gave him a brief, tight hug and a slap on the back before they went their separate ways.

Matt put his earbuds in on the plane and turned on a long white noise track and pretended he didn’t hear anyone who tried to get his attention. He had to take some time to pose for photos and sign autographs on his way out of the airport no matter what he did, but thankfully, the cab driver was probably the only person in Montreal who either didn’t give a fuck about hockey or had a good sense when someone didn’t want to be talked to.

It was a relief to get back to his condo, alone, after that week. He still felt a little like crawling out of his own skin, but he tamped the feeling down by unpacking his shit and making sure all of his plants were watered and rotated. He threw in a load of laundry.

By the time he was finally done, he was exhausted, and home was quiet and empty. Emily had never lived here with him; he’d purchased it after the divorce. It had only ever been Matt here, alone with his thoughts, so this wasn’t anything new. He’d been content with that for two years now.

He couldn’t be content with it anymore.

Every time he closed his eyes he thought about Aiden, about the way he’d melted into Matt’s arms that first night, a surrender as easy as memory. About the way Aiden had looked at him the last night, like he was going to cry but didn’t have anything left inside to do it. About the familiar smell of his hair and body, like ten years hadn’t passed at all.

Every time he closed his eyes, he thought about what it felt like to touch Aiden again, how much he had missed it. On what a visceral level he’d missed it.

He was still furious. The way Aiden had cut him off when he’d tried to talk, tried to say anything. It flayed deep. It was like being thrown back a decade in time again, when all he’d wanted was for Aiden to understand him. To listen to him. All of it churned around in his chest like a maelstrom, confusing and all-consuming. For the first time in five years at least, he couldn’t stop thinking about Aiden when he tried.

He had to stop fucking thinking about this. He couldn’t afford to be distracted this year, his contract year, maybe his last year with the Royal.

Whatever Aiden Campbell was doing with his life, it wasn’t Matt’s business anymore. Whether or not Aiden Campbell had decided to fuck him again it wasn’t Matt’s business anymore .

He texted the team group chat: Boys. Who’s back in Montreal?

Alex Morin immediately wrote back, We never left, mon capitaine.

That was true at least for the Morin twins and for Xavier Fournier, the Royal’s starting goalie, all of whom were from Quebec and spent the offseason in Montreal, even though Fourns was really from Saguenay. He got a few responses from the other guys—some of them had returned early; a few others, like Jamie Ayer, were still training at home before planning to come back later in the offseason. Still, there were enough of the team in Montreal that he felt a little more at ease.

Matt asked, Anyone want to skate tomorrow?

Bit early for that, eh Cap? I’m personally planning to stay away as long as possible, Amanpreet Singh replied. Manny was one of the veteran wingers, a solid third line checking presence whose solemn face belied a jokester’s personality. Between Manny and Saari and Jammer, it was sometimes hard to keep a straight face at practice, and Matt was always grateful to have guys who could keep it light.

It would be good for him to get back on the ice as soon as possible, even if there was always the danger of overtraining. But he needed to do something. If he sat alone in his house by himself for all of this time, he was going to continue the summer’s streak of stupid fucking decisions. And that was something he absolutely could not afford to do.

Nah, he said. I’ll be at Brossard tomorrow bright and early, whoever wants to come.

That’s our Safy, Manny said, with a winky face.

He just had to get back to work. All he had to do was get back to work, and then he could stop thinking about sex, about Aiden Campbell, about the quiet solitude of his condo.

He’d done this before and he could do it again.

He just had to go cold turkey.

“Bro,” Pears said, “you gotta get out of the house.”

“Actually, I’m doing great in the house,” Aiden replied, rubbing his neck. The bruises Matt left there hadn’t faded, and Aiden felt Pears’ eyes on them, felt the red rising on the tips of his ears. Like he was sixteen, not thirty-six.

“Hmm,” Pears said, and his eyebrows went up. Even in his mid-thirties, he still had the same perpetually semi-stoned expression and fluffy brown hair smashed down under a snapback that he’d had since his rookie year, when Aiden had first met him. Something about Isaac Pearson would always look a little adolescent, no matter how old he was. “Don’t really believe that, my dude. So that’s an order.”

“You’re not my captain anymore.”

“Ooh, harsh. Well, I still got responsibilities, bud, so you’re coming with me. You wanna fight about it?” Pears’ hands flew up in a comical mock-boxing pose, and he jabbed at the air in front of Aiden until Aiden grabbed his fist and held on.

“Jesus Christ, Pears, no.”

“Then come on out, Soup.” Pears gently disentangled his hand. “Just you and me. It’ll be super chill, don’t worry.”

“I don’t—”

Pears smiled his impish, shit-stirring smile. “It’s not like you got anything else to do, huh?”

“Oh, that’s low.”

“No, that’s Pears,” Pears said, and flashed a pair of finger guns at him.

“You’re fucking awful,” Aiden said, unable to hide the reluctant smile twitching at the corner of his mouth.

“That’s why I wear that C, baby. Come on, Soup. I got you.”

It turned out that Pears’ plans involved driving Aiden up to Storm King State Park, dragging him, in silence, around the emerald green?bordered trails and up the mountain for four hours until both of them were exhausted and sweaty, and then smoking him up while they sat at the summit, legs dangling over the edge and watching hikers in the distance below them. Looking at the blue river curving out ahead among the trees.

Aiden had never been a big weed guy—he was too much of a control freak to really enjoy it. The last time had been so long ago, he’d still been with Matt, incredibly young and lost and fucked up in Amsterdam. He remembered sitting down at a bus stop, his head on Matt’s shoulder, his body feeling like it had suddenly tripled in weight, half-convinced that he could fall asleep right then and there.

“Bro,” Pears said, as soon as it was clear that both of them were feeling it. Pears kept patting Aiden’s knee with gentle hands, over and over again. Normally Aiden would have found it annoying. He focused, instead, on the sensation of fingers on his skin as Pears kept talking: “I’m not gonna tell you I’m worried about you, because I know you hate that, but...you seem like you’re kinda in a rut.”

Aiden exhaled a small cloud of smoke and passed the joint back to Pears. He felt calmer, a little, although whether that was due to the pot, being out in one of his favorite hiking spots within driving distance of the city or Pears’ aggressively Zen vibes, he didn’t know. “I’m retired and I don’t know what the hell to do with myself, of course I’m in a rut. Like, what are you planning to do when you’re—you’re done?”

Pears rested the joint on the rock. He offered Aiden some trail mix he’d had in his backpack and, when Aiden shook his head, dumped nuts into his own hand. “Finish my degree, start a business.”

“I—what?”

“Yeah, man.” Pears popped a chili lime cashew into his mouth and chewed contemplatively. “I’m thinking, like, maybe a mobile DJ service.” When Aiden looked sideways at him, Pears grinned. “I mean, fuck, man, I don’t know what kind of business yet. But I’m definitely gonna do some kind of a feasibility study to make sure it gets off the ground the right way. We’re not the kind of guys who can just sit around, you feel me?”

“Yeah. I’m definitely not.”

“You don’t really seem like you, hmm...put a lot of thought into it beforehand.”

“No.”

“Why?”

Aiden thought about not telling him. About not saying anything. But once Pears got on the scent, he didn’t give up. “It was just every time I thought about not playing hockey, it felt so wrong that I just—didn’t. By the end, hockey was the only thing I had left, anyway, so thinking about losing that, too? It was easier to just not do it. It was like my brain just couldn’t get itself to focus on the concept at all. Even when I did retire it wasn’t a choice so much as it just...sort of happened.”

“You ever thought about therapy, Soup? Like. Regular therapy, not a guy talking to you about goaltending to get you into the game.”

“No, there’s—there’s not anything wrong with me, the whole thing I’m known for is steadiness, my mental fortitude—”

“Oh, man, no, it’s not just because there’s something wrong with you. I mean, there’s a lot of shit wrong with you, but therapy’s not gonna do one damn thing for that.” Pears flashed him a smile. “It’s to give you better skills for coping with shit and kicking ass at it. In your case, specifically, not hockey shit. It’s pretty dope, you know?”

“Isaac, what the fuck ?”

“I’m just saying, you gotta like...grow up, accept responsibility for your own damn self sometime, right? For me it’s like—I gotta be the best Pears I can be, right? For the team and for myself. Talking this shit out helps me do that. Anyway, Soup, just saying, you might wanna think about it.”

Aiden thought about all of the thoughts he’d boxed up and shoved away over the years, all of the shit roiling in his chest and his head, and trying to tell someone about it. The idea was almost laughable. He thought about all of the mindfulness practice he had done over the decades, about being aware of his body, about focusing only on the moment, letting go of the future and the past. About how he was still doing it.

He looked at Pears. Pears looked back, expectant, hopeful.

Aiden said, “I’ll think about it.”

“Awesome.” Pears watched Aiden from the corner of his eye like he was a skittish animal. “There’s one more thing.”

“Please don’t.”

“Sorry, Soup. But I gotta know. That night you went out with Gabe—you didn’t just walk away, did you?”

Aiden thought about lying. He thought about accept responsibility for your own damn self . “No.”

“Ohh, buddy.”

“Yeah, uh. It wasn’t my best moment. Moments.”

“Ohhhh, buddy .”

Aiden stared out into the long distance. There was a disconnect between his body, relaxed in a way it hadn’t been in a long time, and his head, cycling through all of the stupid things he’d done over the past week and all of the complicated feelings he’d had about them. Like he could see them clearly for the first time.

“I know it was a bad idea. A really bad idea. But I couldn’t let him go...”

“Soupy, you don’t have to explain yourself to me, I’m not trying to make you feel like shit. It’s just that I remember what it was like when you guys broke up the first time, and I don’t wanna have you going through that again while you’ve already got so much shit of your own going on, you know? Let’s climb one mountain at a time, buddy.”

“Yeah, well,” Aiden said, and laughed. “It’s too late for that now.”

Pears’ mouth tilted up in one of those lazy, rueful smiles. “Well, just remember, Soupy, whatever’s going on, you’re not alone .”

Aiden, strangely, did feel a little better. To get it out there in the universe. To hear that, even if it was ultimately a meaningless platitude, as useless as the mantras he’d used to help himself through his season. “Thanks, Pears. For being you.”

Pears smiled again, and said, “I’ll send you the playlist.”

They sat in silence, for a while, watching the sun go down.

Once Matt got on the ice, he felt a little better. He had been playing it pretty cool overall, being extremely normal about everything that had happened to him in the beginning of July. But he’d also played it cool when Aiden had broken up with him the first time, for a few months at least, and that had ended up as a disaster of epic proportions.

Either way. It was good to get back out to Brossard and push himself to his limit. Although there were a few other guys who were back in the city, only the Quebecers humored him and rolled out. The Morin twins, of course, although Matt liked them best in small doses even after all of these years. And Fourns, who would have lived and slept at the rink if the equipment managers had let him.

Matt warmed up by shooting some pucks on Fourns’ empty net, then went into a pretty brutal skate that took him the better part of thirty minutes. While he was doing it, he could see, out of the corner of his eyes, that Fourns had shoveled all of the pucks out of the back of the net, dumping them in a bucket beyond. By the time he had gotten into the crease, finishing his own warm- up and humoring his captain, Matt shot some more pucks in his direction.

Fourns gloved the last one and rose gracefully from the ice where he’d been on his knees. It was funny watching him move. He was a very different player than Aiden had been. Fourns was tall and stocky, with an explosive athleticism, while Aiden had dropped down draft rankings because even though he was tall, he was lanky as hell, and relied more on positioning.

But they had that same easy grace, the same flexibility.

Fourns pulled his helmet off and shook out his hair, then squinted at Matt, who was sweating heavily, his face red. Everything ached. He was in excellent shape, even in the offseason, but that kind of skate took it out of you.

“Cap,” Fourns said, “you like to tell me why you’re bag skating yourself already in motherfucking July ?”

“Who’s bag skating?” Matt asked, looking away guiltily.

Behind them, the Morins fired a series of rapid pucks on the net, the bang of the missed shots hitting the boards too loud in the mostly empty practice rink.

Fourns raised his heavy eyebrows and wrinkled his nose. He looked like a teaching assistant who never had enough coffee, a perpetual five-o’clock shadow on his cheeks no matter how often he shaved. “Cap,” he said, disapprovingly.

Fourns hadn’t been around for the aftermath of Aiden Campbell. He knew, generally, about Matt’s bisexuality and the divorce, but the roster from those years had kept Matt’s secrets for him. Even if Fourns had known, Matt wasn’t ready to talk to anyone about that particular open wound.

“I just want to get back in the swing of the season. Make sure my knee’s going to hold up,” Matt lied, hoping that Fourns wouldn’t call him out on the obvious: pushing it that hard this early was a sure way to aggravate things. Thankfully the knee still felt mostly okay. He’d have to make sure he took extra time stretching and keep up with ibuprofen every morning and maybe see about Toradol shots later on, but for now, it was fine.

“Sure.” Fourns wriggled his hand out of his blocker; it looked comically tiny in his baggy sleeve before he raised it to brush the sweaty strands of hair away from his eyes. “But, man, I will talk to the trainers if I have to shut you down.”

Aiden’s hair was longer than Fourns’ now, Matt realized with a little jolt. When they’d been younger, Aiden had always kept it mostly short and styled. By the time the playoffs came around, it brushed at the nape of his neck, shaggy enough for Matt to get a hand in there and really pull.

“Cap.”

“Sorry,” Matt said, shaking his head, like that alone would clear the cobwebs. “I’m a little distracted today, I guess.”

Fourns looked at Matt with his tired brown eyes. A level, searching look. He didn’t say do you want to talk because he probably knew that Matt would never. That was part of being a captain of the Royal. You bore the weight of that mantle, and you couldn’t share it with your team, no matter how much you would have liked to sometimes.

Besides. This wasn’t anything like losing games and dealing with media shit. This was something beyond. It was funny: years ago, this was the kind of thing Matt would have turned to Aiden for, knowing Aiden would’ve had something to say, even if it was completely fucking stupid and off the wall, that would have made him feel better. And that was the problem, of course.

He couldn’t talk to Aiden about it. Aiden didn’t want to talk to him.

Couldn’t you? The traitor thought wormed its way into the back of his head. Couldn’t you talk to him?

No. No: he couldn’t talk to him. Aiden hadn’t let him. But Aiden had been like that before, sometimes, when he was too overwhelmed by the moment. He’d shut down, but it didn’t necessarily mean that he didn’t want to... Maybe with a little distance, he wouldn’t push Matt away. Who the hell was he kidding? It was entirely wishful thinking. Idiocy.

Matt kept up with the fast pace of the practice that he had set for himself, but the whole time, that poisonous suggestion echoed in his head.

Couldn’t you just talk to him?

Time went by.

Aiden wasn’t over it, but eventually it felt like an old bruise, the kind that only hurt if you pressed on it. He kept carefully to the Routine, modified for retirement: yoga and gym, cooking, cleaning his house. He learned how to play a few complicated new songs on his guitar. He didn’t drink for seventeen days. He only pressed occasionally, when it was late at night and he was alone in his bed, horny and unable to stop thinking about it.

It was easy to remember when he wanted to remember. The end of it, the unraveling. The more serious things had gotten, the harder it had been to be apart the whole year, to keep it quiet during the summer. Matt wanted more than Aiden could see himself giving, when their careers, their lives , were hundreds or thousands of miles away, depending on the time of year.

But if there was one thing Aiden could recall with perfect clarity, at any time, any day, it was the way Matt’s face had crumpled after he’d asked Aiden to marry him and Aiden had said no. When Aiden had said, I don’t think this is going to work and it isn’t fair to you to keep trying when I can’t give you what you want.

Years ago, he’d forced himself to stop keeping close tabs on Matt’s career other than news that wasn’t actively avoidable, like when the Royal had won the Cup, or when Matt had gotten a Defensive Forward of the Year award the same year Aiden had won one of his goalie awards and they’d spent a lot of time avoiding each other at the awards presentation. It had hurt too much to do it, a kind of self-flagellation that accomplished nothing.

Since Matt had left New York, Aiden couldn’t stop himself from reading articles. Matt had gotten divorced. Matt had gotten hurt. Matt had had surgery to repair his MCL. Matt was back on the ice. Matt was in the last year of his contract, although no one seemed sure whether the Royal would bring their franchise player back in free agency. Matt had expressed a desire to retire in Montreal, but after the nagging injuries wasn’t playing at the level he’d used to. There was some speculation he might accept a team-friendly deal—even league minimum—just to finish his career there, but that depended on the front office and the cap space they’d have to work with.

Aiden understood, probably better than anyone, what Matt must be going through. Aiden had never wanted to play anywhere except New York, never wanted to get used to the rhythms of living in a city other than New York, never wanted to love another city the way he loved New York. And in the end, it hadn’t saved him. He wondered if Matt felt the same way about Montreal. He wondered if Matt didn’t. Whether things could have been different if Aiden had tried harder and been braver. Less stubborn.

He’d tried to stop thinking about the what-ifs years ago, because there were so many it drove him a little fucking crazy. It was easier said than done.

He looked at a few listings for therapists, but ultimately, the thought of running through mindfulness exercises, again , or telling a complete stranger about all of the things he had spent years ignoring, wasn’t particularly appealing. And his sports psychologist was a sports psychologist, he couldn’t help with...whatever Aiden was doing right now.

He thought about what Pears had said, about having a plan after hockey, and none of the options he could come up with sounded appealing, either. He couldn’t really see himself going back to school in his late thirties. He couldn’t really see the point in any of it. Couldn’t really see the point in anything.

Technically, Aiden never had to work again. Caroline had negotiated him several very generous contract extensions, and his financial adviser had made sure he’d invested it wisely. He didn’t have to do anything if he didn’t want to. But the thought of spending the rest of his life like this ? Aiden could feel the tightness in his chest whenever the thought came up.

The clock, glowing red in the dark, read two in the morning. He rolled over, tossing and turning. Nights like this, trapped with his own thoughts, the room felt a lot smaller than it was, too hot, like there wasn’t enough air.

His phone buzzed.

Hi.

The text wasn’t from a number he had saved in his contacts. It didn’t matter. He recognized it anyway. You never changed your number?

You never changed yours.

Never got around to it.

Yeah. Well. Me neither. Can we talk? And don’t say there’s nothing to talk about.

He hesitated for a long time. The thought of talking to Matt, in his house, with nowhere to go and no way to escape if he said something he didn’t want to, had been terrifying. Had made him feel like he wanted to peel his skin off. He had control now that he hadn’t had before. Matt wouldn’t see him, wouldn’t see how desperately Aiden wanted to talk to him, how desperate he felt in general, whenever Matt was involved. It was probably still a stupid idea. A disaster. Asking for trouble.

We’re all going to die one day, Aiden thought, the way he often did when he was trying to calm himself down. None of this really matters.

Aiden said, Okay.

It was strange seeing Matt’s number pop up on the screen without an accompanying picture. “Hi.”

“Hi.”

He could feel his heart beating rapidly in his chest, almost too loud in his ears. His free hand, twisted around itself, was damp with sweat. Nothing really matters, he told himself, we’re all going to die one day. It didn’t matter if he was talking to Matt again. Whatever happened, he’d already made a disaster out of it. It was done.

“I—Jesus, this is fucking weird.”

Matt audibly exhaled. “Thanks for not hanging up.”

“Yeah, I—it’s fine.”

“I just wanted to talk to you about what happened in, in New York. Don’t cut me off just yet. I’m sorry. I wanted to apologize for the way we left things but for all of it, too. I shouldn’t have done it, but I saw you, and I saw how Walker was with you, and it was like everything just came rushing back to me, I couldn’t just stand by and watch without trying to talk to you, trying to—”

“We didn’t exactly do a lot of talking.”

“I was trying, but it’s not fucking easy , Aiden, especially when you wouldn’t let me. But I wanted to fucking, I don’t know, apologize. To tell you if you weren’t comfortable with anything we did, I’m sorry for pushing. And to tell you, uh, I’ve been divorced for two years, in case you didn’t know.”

He knew now , but he hadn’t thought about it at the time beyond noting the lack of a wedding ring, which Aiden certainly knew meant nothing. He didn’t like realizing that he hadn’t thought about it. “In case you didn’t notice, I wasn’t exactly turning you away.”

“I know, but it was—fuck, I can’t stop thinking about it. About you . It was like no time had gone by at all when I was with you. And now I feel so fucking old.”

Aiden exhaled. “I’m sorry I kicked you out. I wish I hadn’t, I just, I’ve been—it’s been fucking hell. Trying to adjust to life without hockey, to figure out what the hell I’m doing, it’s been...and then to see you like that...”

Matt’s breath sounded a little ragged. There was a long silence on the other end of the line. “It’s been a weird decade, huh?”

“Yeah. I—how are you?” He almost wanted to laugh: how are you. Such a banal fucking question, after all of that time and all of their history.

“I mean, I’m okay. I guess. No complaints about the career. But my knee’s been giving me some trouble again, no idea what the fuck I’m going to do about my contract extension...you know. The usual.”

Aiden thought about his last season, his weak knee and hip huge pains in the ass no matter how he stretched before games. The inevitable countdown until one or both of them gave out again. “More than you know.”

They sat silent for a long time. It was almost 2:30 in the morning now, but Aiden was wide awake. He listened to Matt’s quiet breath and remembered all of the other nights of his life he’d done the exact same thing, in New York, in Winnipeg, in hundreds of anonymous hotel rooms while Matt was in Montreal or Hamilton or somewhere across the continent.

It had always felt comforting then. A lifeline. No matter what was happening around him, no matter how chaotic his life had gotten, there was Matt’s steady, warm breath, just a phone call away. Now it just felt like a bitter reminder of all of the years he’d lost. And yet, the thought of losing even this connection...

“Are you living in New York in the offseason now?”

“Yeah, I...well. It was easier than going home, after a while.”

“I mostly stay in Montreal. Same reason.” Matt hesitated. “Aiden...are you okay?”

He’d never really been able to lie to Matt. “No. Not really. Not having anything to do? It’s pretty terrifying and kind of lonely, actually.”

“You’re not seeing anyone?”

“What the fuck, Matt, I wouldn’t have let you do that if I’d been seeing anyone.”

“Would you have? You didn’t ask about my marriage, I just—”

“I should go.”

“Yeah. Yeah, you should. It’s late.”

“Matt...”

“Yeah?”

“Nothing. Good night.”