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I didn’t know if I was the one giving him mixed signals, or if it was him. He kissed me, planted his lips on mine, and oh my god, his tongue. The way it was warm and tasted so sweet against mine. I had to snap out of it and remind myself that this was for all for show, I was simply in an agreement with him, and for whatever reason, I’d agreed to it. I know it wasn’t for the kissing, because I usually avoided having to be this close to anyone else.

The party for Jack was underway, a giant surprise, although the only people surprised were the other teammates seeing me and Luke holding hands and being a couple, which was so very surreal.

It meant the introduction I’d gotten as the team reporter was now replaced with, Wren, the guy who made their captain gay, or however my brain was phrasing it. And yet, nobody batted an eyelid at my reintroduction to them. It had my spidey senses tingling, if I had them, they would be tingling, but then again, that was my natural state.

Jack had a party hat forced on his head with the elastic tight under his chin. Everyone seemed to tower above me, which might’ve been more on me for the way my head seemed to naturally rest back. “I made you a present,” I said to him, and although quiet, he heard me and smiled.

“Happy birthday again,” Luke said, going in for a bro hug with Jack while I fished around in my tote bag for the gift. He stayed right by my side, and I think he knew I needed him there.

“Oh, there it is.” The gift was wrapped in some brown parcel paper and wrapped with string. “It’s just something I made, I didn’t feel right coming to your birthday without a gift.”

“You really didn’t have to,” he said. “You’re saving Luke’s rep; that’s as much of a gift as I need.”

I locked eyes with Luke. I didn’t know this was an open secret.

“Not saving it,” Luke said, “but he’s helping. And it’s crappy that I’m forced to come out like this. You know.”

My head hurt trying to play this back and forth wondering who knew what and what was the truth. It was impossible to know if he was coming out, and if he was, then those kisses in his bedroom might’ve meant something.

“Really saving it,” Jack laughed, finally attempting to open the gift. “You had any of the cake yet? It’s so good.”

“Oh. What kind of cake?”

“Chocolate,” Luke and Jack said at the same time.

Now the slight brown smudges around Jack’s mouth made some more sense. I’d half thought he’d fallen into dirt, but I didn’t want to say anything.

I didn’t realize how finicky the paper and string were on the present, but he finally got through them both to see my creation. A small, crocheted orca plushie, perfect for a keyring if I’d looped in an actual keyring. “It’s amigurumi,” I said. “Crochet animals, cute ones.”

“I love it,” he said. “We should get these in the merch store. Everyone on the team should have one.”

The team was around twenty people, and I could’ve made them all little orcas, but the minute someone asked me to make them something, I kinda lost the joy of it. “It’s one of a kind,” I said.

“Except for the big one you have.”

“The big one?” Jack laughed. “Is that really appropriate, cap?”

Luke punched Jack playfully in the arm. “I’m gonna make coach have you do laps of the rink tomorrow,” he said. “You know what I mean, a big teddy.”

Bloo was in my tote, and since he was being talked about, I pulled him out and showed him off. “This one. They’re fun to make, but orcas don’t really produce offspring as often as you might think, so you’ll just be the only one with the small one.”

Pulled in by my waist, Luke’s hands were so welcome on my body. I didn’t want to fall for him, but he was really touching up on me, and I was at the mercy of the hottest man on campus. “What about me?” he asked. “Are you gonna make me one?”

“I’ll have to think about it.”

He kissed me on the cheek. I was blushing so much, my entire face must’ve radiated heat to the entire room of people. “What about now?”

Hugging Bloo under my arm, I pressed my lips together and hummed before I was about to hyperventilate. All eyes on me, I felt like I had to say something to him, to those who were listening. “I still need to think about it,” I let out. “I need a drink. Can I—can we—” I’d been shown around this place before, but it was huge, and I was easily flustered.

Luke walked with me, a hand on my lower back, guiding me almost into a more private area of the house. “If it’s too much, you don’t have to stay,” he whispered in the quiet of a hallway. “I’m just glad people have seen us. And nobody knows that we’re doing this to save my possibly very short career.”

“I’m fine, I just didn’t have anything prepared to say, and I—”

He took my hand and wiped it down the front of his shirt. “Let me know if it gets too much. I’ll happily walk you home, and I’m hoping you’ll let me.”

“A drink first, and then I’ll see how I’m feeling,” I told him. “But no alcohol though.”

“You’re not even legally allowed to drink,” he said, a big smile as his finger traced around on my palm, he wasn’t even looking at it, just soothing me somehow. “And we’re not allowed alcohol in the house, team policy, so don’t worry. We do have plenty of energy drinks though, so some of these guys might get a little wild from the caffeine.”

I hated that he knew how to calm me, and that he could almost sense my anxiety. I didn’t expect that from him when we first met. It was wild to see how the idea of a person could be flipped on its head, and not everyone was going to see Luke in this light. The light of the hallway, where we were keeping up the pretense of our fake dating and nobody to show off to.

The kitchen was where most of the action seemed to be. The other teammates had brought friends into the fold. I knew they weren’t on the team because it was quite literally my job to know all the members.

Navigating around all the people with Luke’s grip on my hand. “If Julia saw how many people were in the kitchen, she’d scream,” he said.

I’d still yet to meet her. “Really? Does she know you’re having a party?”

“She made the cake,” he said.

We made it to an ice bucket on a counter with a bunch of vitamin waters, caffeinated drinks, and sodas. I wasn’t intending on staying awake all night, so I grabbed a can of soda while Luke took a vitamin water.

Snaking through the people who tried stopping Luke at every opportunity, we went outside into the yard for the fresh air and to be away from the larger groups of people.

“You better not be making too much of a mess in there?” A voice snapped.In the encroaching darkness, sat on the sofa around the firepit, a woman.

Luke pulled me along with him as we walked right toward her. “I thought you’d gone home,” he said.

“Oh no, not with you lot having a party. I’m on strict orders to make sure you’re not destroying the place, and that the only junk food you eat is that cake,” she said.

I stared at her from behind Luke, the glow of the fire highlighting her face from beneath was scary.

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep them on track,” he said. “You should go home.”

“I should, my wife is probably going to be waiting up,” she said. “And speaking of the rainbow community, I heard you’ve joined us.” She gestured toward us and then to the sofa on the other side of the fire pit. “The guys were talking about it earlier. Something about you using some choice words online.”

Luke sighed. He’d clearly grown pissed by the entire situation being brought up and thrown in his face every other minute. “Really?” he grumbled, leading me to the seat where I sat and kept quiet. “I’ve never said it in a bad way, you know. I just think it was blown out of proportion.”

She nodded. “Well, it’s good to see people coming out, but I don’t want you ever think you’ve been forced out of the closet,” she said. “My wife was forced out of the closet, and it impacted her for years.”

“It’s fine,” he said, reaching for the hand I held my can of soda with.

“I take it you’re the lucky guy,” she said. “I’m Julia. These boys’ personal chef. Did you try some of my cake?”

“I’m Wren,” I said, switching my soda between hands so I could accept Luke’s safety blanket. “And he’s Lucky, technically.”

She slapped her knees. “You’re right. So, what do you study?”

“Journalism, communications, creative writing, you know, that area,” I told her. “I write for the Caldwell Chronicle, and my goal was to write for the Orcas this season, and I got it, which I guess is how we met.”

“After that, we just kinda clicked,” he said, again unsure if he was telling the truth about his view on what happened. I didn’t know if we immediately clicked, but there was something that happened immediately, and I couldn’t put my finger on it.

“Same thing for you?” she asked.

“I—” I caught Luke’s eyes staring at the side of my face, smiling. I wanted to put my mouth back to his again. “I kinda thought he was a bit of a jerk, but I figured now, he was just scared to show his feelings.” He squeezed my hand playfully. “And then we shared our first kiss. It was a total surprise.”

Julia couldn’t hold back her smile it seemed, she cooed and awed at us. “In all the years I’ve known Luke, he’s never brought a girl or guy home. I always heard the rumors by the other teammates about him being a playboy on campus. He’s definitely very attractive, so I just assumed they were telling the truth.”

The same rumors I’d heard about him as well. There was always another girl and another rumor about her fling with Luke. Maybe his nickname was because he got lucky and less because he was lucky on the ice.

“I’ve actually not been,” he said. “I’ve always been far too focused on the game. I don’t have time for relationships, well, I—I never had time before now.” The way he squeezed my hand in his, I was slowly convincing myself that he meant it.

“I’m gonna leave you two then,” she said. “I’ll take your word that you’ll make sure the clean up as well. And if they don’t, I’ll be telling your coach. He’s already told me he’ll punish the team.” She laughed. “Which I think I’d happily come and watch.”

Once Julia left, it was the two of us alone. Luke tugged at my leg, pulling it up over his until I was nearly laid across his lap. He even readjusting the pillow on my back.

“I think we’ve convinced everyone,” I said, sipping my soda.

“But this is fun, right?” he asked. “You are having fun, right?”

Gulping hard on a fizzy pocket going down my throat, I nodded.

“You can tell me if I’m coming on too strong with all this, and I don’t mean to be sprinkling in detail left and right,” he added. “I don’t know what I am. I’m not—you know, gay, I’m—”

We were getting somewhere, but I didn’t want to be interrogating him, even if all the questions were right there on the tip of my tongue, ready to get muddled in my mind.

“If I tell you something, you’ve got to promise it stays between us,” he said.

I prompted him with a pinky. “I promise.”Seeing his smile had my stomach fluttering. It felt cruel to not have a straight answer from him, even if the answer wasn’t so straight. “What is it?”

Wrapping his pinky around mine, he dropped his eyes from mine and looked at Bloo tucked under my arm and now trapping against the sofa too. “I’m still a virgin,” he said. “I mean, I’ve had a hand job before from a girl, and it was a really long one, like, I couldn’t cum for ages.” He pressed his tongue between his teeth and looked at me. “Oh shit, fuck, I shouldn’t be telling you any of this. You don’t need to know that.”

I kept our pinkies together tight. “I’m not a virgin. I’m just—anxious. I’ve always suffered with anxiety, but it got a lot worse after my dad died, and I never speak about him because—” Shivers traveled up my sides and in my cheeks. “He was the only person who told me I could do whatever I wanted, and he gave me confidence, but then it all stopped, and I feel like sometimes I’m letting him down.”

The floodgates opened, but somehow, I was relieved to have told him. A weight from my chest. My airwaves cleared.

Luke let my pinky go as he pulled me into a hug and kiss my forehead. I was almost curled up with my head cuddled into his neck. “You’re probably one of the bravest people I know, you’re you, authentically,” he said. “That’s more than can be said for me. Not that this is about me, but you are you, Wren, and your dad would be proud. He is, up there, around us. He’s proud of you.”

I nearly spilled my can of soda which caused me to laugh. “Thank you,” I said, between tears and laughter. “I nearly got this all over you. And the sofa. Jeez.” Picking my head up from his body, there were tears in his eyes. “I’m fine. It was like seven years ago.”

He kissed me. “I do like you, Wren,” he said. “But I’m not gay.”

I wiped my nose. “I’m a mess,” I said under a breath. “You could find a more attractive guy, or—girl, I don’t know.”

“I’m also not straight. I don’t know what I am. But I like you.”

Deep in my mind, there was probably a word for what he was saying, but it was far from reaching distance. “Thank you.” It was all I could summon.

“I feel like I’m the reason you’re sad,” he said. “You want me to walk you home? Or you can stay in my room? What do you want to do?”

I didn’t know what I wanted to do. My limbs were heavy right now, I’d emotionally purged all over Luke’s shirt. I couldn’t imagine he wanted to waste any more time with me when he had a party to get back to.