Page 7 of Puck Shots (Love The Game #6)

Eli

I contemplate forgetting about the invite from Cosmo and just staying at the frat house with the other pledges. But then Toby and Rick, the other neanderthal from the woods, started huddling and whispering in the corner of the common room and I thought it was safer to get out.

I used the maps, following the little blue dot as I walked through the college, off campus and down a few blocks to the ice rink. I’m early, and Cosmo isn’t finished training or whatever it is they’re doing in there, so I try to sneak in quietly.

The cool air fills my lungs and brings calm to my racing heart.

I can already hear them calling out to each other, their skates make scraping noises as they race across the ice.

I sit up in the stands in the corner near the rail, hoping they don’t notice me, and watch.

There’s about fifteen of them on the ice, and despite their chunky gear, I spot Cosmo right away.

He’s zooming up the ice, his red hockey stick in one hand, controlling the puck in taps back and forth so fast I can barely keep up.

The others have pucks, too, but they are way behind him, he glances over his shoulder maintaining his speed, but he’s getting closer and closer to the wall.

Fuck, he should slow down, look, something.

I’m about to call out when he changes direction almost on a dime and skates around the edge before making his way back up past the others.

“Fuck, Flash, did you get faster?” one of the guys shouts, and Cosmo spins and starts skating backwards, letting the puck he was controlling slide off to the side.

“You just got slower, Rover,” he replies, spinning to skate backwards for a few strides and then turning again in a seamless move that looks entirely impressive.

“I’m three seconds faster than last season, thank you very much.

I swear, no one will catch you this year.

The scouts will be drawing up your NHL contract before the end of game one, you just watch,” Luka says.

I recognize his Irish accent right away.

He looks like he’s having more fun on the ice than the rest of them, weaving between them, and getting in their way as they try to race each other up and down, laughing.

Cosmo waits at the far end for the rest of them to get back, and then when they all turn, he takes off, too, dashing ahead.

The way he moves is so different from the others.

I start to pick apart his movements, the key differences, that seem to give him so much more speed.

Luka calls out, “Flash, it’s coming to you,” then sends a puck flying across the ice ahead of him. Cosmo collects it on the way up and then sends it into the back of the net raising his hands in triumph as he slows and skims around the back of the net, meeting Luka at the side.

“I’m done, boys,” he says, and the others finish their last run and join him at the edge.

Most of the guys head into the tunnel, but one of them pulls off his helmet and nods my way.

My stomach flips as a few heads snap toward where I’m sitting.

Cosmo just smiles and waves, sending a swirl of butterflies through me instead, as I feel my lips pull up into a smile, too.

He says something to them that I can’t make out, and they turn away and walk past him into the tunnel.

“We’ll be about ten minutes, just have to shower,” he calls up to me, and I nod and wrap my arms around myself, the room suddenly so much colder now that he’s gone.

I wait out the front of the rink, contemplating ditching and heading back to the house.

He doesn’t really want me hanging out with him and his friends.

What will I even talk to them about? I struggle at home talking with Dad and John, too.

Mom’s always been the one I connected with more and it had nothing to do with being gay, and everything to do with her being a forensic scientist. While John never wanted to know anything about what Mom did for work, I begged her for weeks to let me watch her in the lab.

Strict protocols meant I had to stay outside and watch through the window of an adjoining office, but it still flamed my love of science.

A couple of guys come out, jump into cars and leave, none of them paying me much mind.

Maybe they left already, and this is like a hazing thing.

Invite the pledge out and then ditch him.

I wouldn’t even mind, not really. Watching Cosmo on the ice was the highlight of my day.

I can still picture him flying down the rink, miles ahead of the rest of them.

I close my eyes and rest my head back against the brick wall, picturing it again.

Imagining the way his body moves in a perfect combination of strength and control.

“Are you asleep?” Cosmo asks, and I laugh as I open my eyes.

“If I was, I could hardly reply now, could I?”

He shrugs. “You could talk in your sleep for all I know.”

“That’s true.”

“So you do?”

“Do what?”

“Talk in your sleep.”

“Not that I know of, but I could. I wasn’t sleeping, though. Just…” I can’t exactly tell him I was picturing his strong thick thighs propelling him down the ice. “Umm, relaxing, you know, while I waited for you.”

“Cool. Well, you remember Luka,” he says, and Luka nods and smiles my way. The rest of the guys look really confused to see me waiting for them.

“Yeah, hey, umm, thanks for inviting me.”

“Thanks for finding the president’s lacrosse stick before he got home and kicked Flash out of the house for good.” Luka laughs, and we start walking towards a neon sign that reads, The Rook.

I follow them in, weaving between tables until they crowd into a booth near the small stage set up in the back.

“In you go,” Cosmo says, gesturing to the booth seat circling the large round table.

“I can’t.”

“Why don’t your legs bend?”

“They do, I just… nevermind. It’s fine,” I say sliding into the seat, my heart racing the whole time.

I’ve never really been great with small spaces and the idea of being trapped between two guys, though the main attraction in more than one wet dream, is not really filling me with anything but terror right now. Cosmo slides in after me, and a huge red head sits on my other side.

“That’s Rover,” Cosmo introduces, and the redhead, Rover, leans back to offer me his hand.

“Hey,” he says, squeezing my fingers tight for a second before letting go.

“Hey.”

“And that’s Micky, Hewie, Pete, Chang, and Ferris, but these guys all call him Reddy, and Luka, of course,” he goes on to say, and each of them nod at their name and offer small smiles but little else.

“Guys, this is Eli, he’s a legacy at KOK, and the reason I’m still a brother, apparently.” That gets a few chuckles, and the waitress arrives and takes down our order. I keep mine simple, burger fries and an OJ, and then sit back as the English language morphs into some unknown sports slang.

“You were absolutely buzzing out there today, Flash,” Hewie says, reaching out to grab his diet coke as the waitress returns with our drinks.

Chang, who’s sitting on Cosmo’s right, slaps his hand on his shoulder.

“Bro, you were like a ghost out there, I couldn’t even catch up.”

“Like you can ever.” Luka laughs, and Cosmo shakes his head.

“We’ve all got our thing. Micky’s slapshot was straight up sniper level. I’m surprised that thing didn’t bust through the cage,” Cosmo says, grabbing his drink and passing me my OJ.

Chang grabs the jug of water and starts filling glasses, passing them round.

“You guys circled the puck like it was on a string, the other team couldn’t touch it. Reddy, dude, you were dialed, stood on your head for three straight.”

“Thanks, man,” Reddy grins wide at what I presume is a compliment.

What I can tell right away is that Chang is a good hype man in his team.

Every word out of his mouth so far is either celebrating or pumping up the guys.

It must be nice to be around someone like that.

Someone who only points out the positives.

In science, it’s usually people trying to pull apart your research, find holes or gaps.

“What do you think, pledge? You think we’ll dominate this year?” Pete asks, and I freeze.

“Ummm, I don’t know. I don’t really… I mean…

” My mind is trying to grasp the lingo they used to make myself sound even half like I know what the hell I am talking about but I’m me, so what comes out is, “Cosmo has you all beat on acceleration and deceleration, a perfect example of Newton’s laws in motion, but Micky’s demonstration of kinetic energy transfer was amazing to watch.

The force transferred from the stick to the puck to send it hurtling at super speed down the ice was amazing.

If I blinked, I would have missed it. It was like watching physics in real time.

” They’re all staring at me, Cosmo wearing a big smile but the others not so much.

“I mean, but with cooler collisions,” I add, and Chang laughs first, starting a chain reaction with the rest of them.

“Yeah, I've taken my share of solid hits along the boards, but I just eat it. Gotta keep moving when those fuckers are on the ice, or you’ll get caught flat-footed,” Chang says with that same happy smile.

Cosmo leans in close enough that I can smell the sweet woody scent of his cologne mixed with a touch of coffee and something else, maybe. My head spins.

“He means he got hit hard against the wall but just took it and kept going, cause when he’s against those kinds of players, if they catch you standing still, they’ll crush you.”

“I think I actually got half of that myself,” I whisper back, and I can feel the smile tease at the corners of my mouth.

“You’re doing great.”

“Thanks, but I still have no idea about half of what anyone is saying.”

Cosmo snorts, and it’s more adorable than it should be.

“You really are lost in all this, aren’t you?”

“I know how to speak three languages; dude bro just isn’t one of them.”