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ALEXEI

F UCK!

How can this be happening, how can this be real?

Stef, my Stef, and horror boy.

If you told me they were the same person a couple of weeks ago, I’d think I won the lottery. But for him to tell me he knew and he lied to me? That’s a fucking nightmare.

I came out to my teammate for him. I told someone I’d been sexting with online my name and what I do. I exposed myself for him. Put myself out there. And he lied to me.

When I get to Pawlowski’s place, he’s playing Call of Duty with a few of the guys he lives with and I regret going over there. But the second he sees the look on my face, and the fact I’m standing in the doorway in a t-shirt in the cold, he tells me to come in and leads me upstairs to his room.

“What’s happened?” He asks.

I sink onto his single bed. Posters of hockey players over my head and a couple of trophies from his junior career all lined up neatly on the shelf.

“It’s Stef.”

“Is he alright?”

I run a hand over my face. “No, he’s a liar.”

He shakes his head. “What do you mean? What did he lie about?”

“Everything.”

“Hold up a second.” He holds his hands out. “Is this Stef we’re talking about? Alice said he’s like the nicest person she’s ever met.”

“Yeah, I thought so too.” I run a hand over my stubble, feeling like I’m having some sort of out-of-body experience.

“Did he make out with some other guy or something?”

“No.”

“So what did he do?”

Pawlowski’s looking at me like I’m having some sort of psychotic break, and I know what I’m about to tell him isn’t gonna do much to change that. But somehow, it’s the truth.

“About a year ago, I started talking to this guy I met on a male/male romance forum.” I can’t look at him while I talk, my face is burning.

“His handle was RedRum237, like the Stephen King book, so I called him horror boy, and we started… like sexting. We had an online-only relationship. But when we agreed to meet, I chickened out and stood him up at this diner we were supposed to meet at and he got a boyfriend, so our conversations just started to be platonic.”

“Okay?” He takes a seat on the bed next to me. His bulky body making the mattress sag.

“Stef told me that he’s horror boy. He’s the guy I’ve been speaking to online for the past year.”

“How is that possible? Did he know the whole time?”

“No, he said he only found out a couple of weeks ago.”

There’s a pause while he absorbs all the information. “So wait a minute, I know I’m not the smartest guy in the world, but, you two becoming roommates was just a weird coincidence? He didn’t know when he moved in with you that you guys had shared dick pics online?”

“Not dick picks, and no.”

“But haven’t you guys been… sleeping together?”

I nod.

“And you didn’t recognize his body from the pictures he sent you of his ‘not dick?’”

I shake my head. Wow, I really am fucking blind and stupid. I literally saw that little freckle and thought of horror boy, but told myself it was a coincidence. Idiot.

“How did he figure out it was you?”

“He said it was when I got a concussion and he came into my room. I guess he recognized my sheets and saw my scar and saw that I had all the same books as Kelsier38 – my handle.”

Pawlowski pats my back.

“Do you think maybe you’re giving him shit for no reason here?”

My head snaps up. “What the fuck? He lied to me.”

He runs a hand over his face. “Stef is fucking awesome man, and it’s obvious how into each other you are.

So he’s smarter than you and figured out that you guys are in some weird-as-fuck coincidence where you ended up living with a guy you’re talking to online?

So he figured it out before you did, so what? ”

“He should have told me the second he realized it was me.”

“Agreed. But… if it was the other way around, would you have told him?”

“Yes.”

“You wouldn’t have worried that he’d be disappointed it was you?”

That makes me pause.

“Had anything even happened between you yet?”

“No.”

“Who initiated this thing between you?”

I think about going into Stef’s room and kissing him. How surprised he was. How nervous he looked when I started lavishing all that attention on his body.

“As soon as something happened between us, he should have known I’d be happy he was horror boy.”

“Would you have been?”

“Yeah, of course I would.”

“But dude, uh, how do I say this without you getting mad at me?”

My nostrils flare and I try to relax my face. “Just say it.”

“You kinda have ridiculously high standards, like mostly for yourself, but for other people too.”

I frown. “What do you mean?”

“I know your dad’s rough on you, but-”

Anger bubbles at the mention of my dad. Someone verbalizing the way he expects so much of me. “What’s this got to do with my dad?”

“I don’t know, maybe everything? Why were you even talking to some guy anonymously online anyway? Why did you stand this horror boy up when you agreed to meet? Who are you scared of disappointing?”

I shake my head. “None of this takes away from the fact that Stef lied to me.”

“No, it doesn’t. But maybe it explains why you’re being so hard on him.

Why you’re so hard on yourself. The things your dad expects of you man…

people aren’t perfect. We fuck up. We get scared.

We do stupid shit. But I bet he didn’t mean to do it.

He was probably just scared and did the wrong thing.

He knows you’re not out to your dad. Maybe he thought you’d freak out and he wanted to give you time? ”

Stef’s face when I was calling him a liar comes back to me and something floods over me, bringing a lump to my throat.

“Fuck.” I sink back on Pawlowski’s bed, letting my head bump the wall. “Have I fucked this up?”

“No, just go home and apologize. Talk to him. You’ve got a right to be mad that he didn’t tell you as soon as he found out. But, you can make it right man. Things are messy sometimes. It’s like, if something’s not perfect, you think it’s shit and you discard it.”

I look at him, seeing this idiot I’ve played hockey with for the past three and a half years in a new light. “You know you should have taken psych, you missed your calling.”

“Fuck psych man, I’m going to Vancouver.”

I push off the wall. “You got accepted?”

He nods, a shy smile spreading across his face. “Did you get anything back yet?”

I shake my head. “I haven’t checked my email in a while, when did you get it?”

“Yesterday.”

I think about reading my email on my phone, but I can’t face it. Not like this. “I can’t deal with that shit right now. I need to make things right with Stef.”

Pawlowski gives me a shove. “So go already.”

I rush back to the apartment like a man on a mission. But when I get there, Stef isn’t home. His violin case isn’t by the door where he usually leaves it, so I think he’s gone to the music department to rehearse for that show he has coming up in the city.

But then I see a note on the kitchen counter and my stomach drops.

Alexei,

I’m so sorry I lied to you. You were going through a lot and I didn’t want to take away the two people you seemed to be able to talk to at the same time.

I knew you might be suspicious of my intentions, or not believe that living with you was a coincidence I didn’t orchestrate, and I understand that.

But I also understand why you’re mad at me, and you have every right to be and I’m so sorry.

Please don’t let this drive you back into your shell.

Just because I made a mistake, it doesn’t mean you should undo all the hard work you’ve done on yourself.

I need to rehearse for the big show tomorrow and I think it’s best if I spend some time away from you so we can both focus. I don’t want to get in the way of you making it to the Frozen Four. I know how important it is to you.

I’m sorry.

Stef

Fuck. All I wanna do is go to him and tell him I understand. If I would have just let him explain, I would have seen that he was trying to protect me. When was the last time someone protected me ? Off the ice at least?

He’s been like my real life defenseman, taking hits for me. And I didn’t even see it.

His show is tomorrow, and I’ve been too in my head to even realize. Too focused on hockey and complaining about my own shit to even think about the fact he’s gonna be stressing out.

I want to go to him, but he asked me to stay away, give him space so he can focus. If I go to him, I might fuck that up.

Pawlowski texts, asking if I made it up with Stef yet.

He doesn’t wanna talk to me, he’s got that big show tomorrow

He does, go to him, he’s probably with Alice. Want me to text her?

No, don’t. Let them focus on the show. I’ll talk to him after

You sure man?

Yeah, positive

If I force him to see me now, it’ll be for me, for my state of mind, not his.

I’m not about to fuck up his big show, and like Pawlowski said, he has Alice.

She’ll know how to help him prepare for this thing better than I can.

And then there’s this Dartmouth game. Something else I can’t afford to fuck up.

The game against Dartmouth is at their arena in Hanover.

Pawlowski sits next to me on the bus and pretends he can’t see me checking my messages every five seconds to see if Stef has texted.

I’ve promised myself I’ll leave him alone. But if he texts saying he needs me, you’d best believe I’ll drop everything and be right there.

It scares the shit out of me to know that I’d even consider getting off this bus right now and go to him, but I know he’d never ask or expect me to do that, and that makes me want to do it even more.

I share my headphones with Pawlowski, but I’m not even listening to the music.

I can’t. All my favorite songs remind me of Steff.

And when SZA comes on, I can’t help but think about him playing it for me on his violin and I have to skip it.

Pawlowski looks at me, but doesn’t say anything.

He must understand. That’s mine and Stef’s song.

Even if the lyrics don’t exactly make the best love song.

The arena is packed. The Dartmouth crowd looking for a win. They’re just below us in the standings right now and they’re gonna be out for blood. Just as hungry as we are.

It’s always harder to play an away game. The momentum in the arena is against you. And you don’t have the support of your home crowd. And if you’re Pawlowski, your girlfriend isn’t playing We Are the Champions for you on her trumpet every time you find the back of the net.

I hope the team can’t sense my low mood as I give them a pre-game pep talk in the locker room. It’s not their fault I’m a fuck-up off the ice. The least I can do is give it everything I’ve got out there. Be something other than a fuck-up in at least one aspect of my life.

My dad comes to every away game too, and I know he’ll be in the stands, watching, judging every move I make. But at least I’ll have to get straight on the bus after the game and he won’t be able to dissect it all over dinner. I get to escape the autopsy at least.

Dartmouth’s men are on me from the off. I take more hits in the first ten minutes than I have in most of our games this season.

I shake it off. They’re going for my bad shoulder, but I’ve learned how to protect it as best I can.

It only gets worse after I score the opening goal with an assist from Pawlowski. I’m smashed into the boards, I get tripped, hit with a stick, elbowed in the face. I feel like the number one draft pick out there in my rookie season. A target on my back.

A huge D-man who looks about 25-years old hits me with a fucking hip check and takes my legs out from under me.

I go smashing onto the ice, luckily on my good side, and get straight back up. If these dicks wanna see how tough I can be, then I’ll show them.

They score a leveler on a power play just before the end of the first period and we go into the locker room feeling shellshocked.

“These guys are fucking crazy,” Pawlowski says. “You okay Cap?”

“I’m fine.”

“They want your blood.”

“Well, they’re not gonna get it.”

We go back out fighting. Throwing back everything they throw at us. I have to remind the freshmen to keep it clean. We don’t wanna give away any stupid penalties. We can beat these guys through tactics and perseverance.

Pawlowski wins the puck in the corner behind Dartmouth’s goal and I’m there to pick it up, lighting the lamp with a second game goal.

This only makes the target on my back bigger. I’m on a breakaway, cruising through center ice and about to shoot when something crashes into me on the bad side. I feel something. A sickening pop. Dread rushing through me. A cold sweat prickling the back of my neck.

I try to keep skating.

Dartmouth has the puck now and the center is heading towards our net. But the pain in my shoulder is so bad, I think I’m gonna throw up.

I skate over to the bench and have to lean on the boards. But when I lift my arm, the pain that shoots through my shoulder is unbearable.

No no no no no no no no. Please. Not yet. Not now. Just hold out until the end of the season. Let me have one more year before I lose hockey forever.

Coach pulls me off. The guys on the bench helping me off the ice.

Michael’s there, and the medics for the game.

“I think I’ve done something.”

“Your shoulder?” Michael asks.

I nod. Tears stinging the back of my eyes. But I can’t cry. My dad’s here. This is on TV for fucks sake. I can’t start crying in my last ever game. Fuck. Is this really my last ever game?