15. Gabe #2
Gabe had two and a half hours to work on homework before the game, and he settled in at Brandon’s desk.
Brandon had cleared off his laptop and notebooks, but he had covered the wall above his desk in the prints he’d bought from Gabe.
Gabe peeked behind them and saw the loops of masking tape hanging them up. A man after his own heart.
Seeing his art in Brandon’s space made his heart flip. He knew Brandon bought his prints, obviously, but seeing them live in his space was different.
He sent some texts to the house group chat and then tried his best to focus on his assignments.
“The chicken fingers are probably the best thing here,” Laura told him as they walked the concourse between the second and third period.
Her boyfriend was one of the goalies—Nick, with a Finnish last name that Gabe forgot directly after he heard it—but she knew everyone.
Chance Connelly, who played on the top line with Brandon, and who everyone thought would be the next guy to get called up.
Walker Riley, the undrafted kid who surprised everyone every time he got on the ice.
Danny Beckett, who everyone called Beck, the captain and one of the vets.
She explained how he had a contract that only allowed him to play in the AHL.
He couldn’t get called up. It was the kind of contract you got when the NHL stopped offering you opportunities, but you weren’t ready to stop playing yet.
The arena was small and the concourse was crowded, even if the arena stands were not. Gabe estimated the small arena couldn’t be more than thirty percent full.
Thankfully, between the decibel level of the arena, the food he’d been knocking back courtesy of a crisp one-hundred-dollar bill Brandon left for him for food and drinks at the game, and his lack of hockey knowledge that Laura took it upon herself to fill him in on, there was very little awkwardness.
He shook the hands of the other girlfriends and a couple wives, and, as he did at every sporting event, cheered when everyone else cheered.
“That was Brandon’s assist,” Laura said after a goal late in the third. The replay came up on the Jumbotron, and Gabe watched a slow-mo of Brandon passing the puck in front of the goalie to Chance, who sunk it into the back of the net.
Gabe screamed his heart out, the energy of the game getting to him, and before he knew it, the girls in his section led him down to the family room, where he waited for Brandon after the game.
That, he could happily admit, was awkward.
His name was on the list, though, so he was allowed in.
In some official capacity, he was Brandon’s boyfriend.
When Brandon came to get him from the family room, with a blinding post-game smile, he picked him up and spun him around, right in front of everyone.
“Thanks, Laura,” Brandon said as Laura watched them carefully.
“You two are cute together,” she said in appraisal.
“He looks so nice, and I didn’t think far enough in advance to plan a hockey game outfit,” Gabe said, in his worn-out jeans and bomber jacket. The WAGs were all so nicely dressed, and he showed up like he was going to spend three hours in the pottery lab.
“It isn’t about your outfit, it’s the way you two look at each other,” she said. It wasn’t the first time Gabe had heard something along those lines. “All right, boys, there’s my man. It was nice to meet you, Gabe. Good assist tonight, Brandon.”
“How did it go?” Brandon asked, like Gabe had just gotten a root canal, not eaten a bunch of good fried food at a hockey game .
“It was fun. Everyone was nice to me. I had the chicken fingers,” Gabe said.
“I can sleep on the couch,” Gabe offered, “if it’s weird.” He was referring to the last time they’d shared a bed. He wanted to spare Brandon any further discomfort.
“The couch sucks,” Brandon said, letting out a yawn. It had been comfortable when Gabe sat on it, but he’d trust Brandon.
Gabe yawned in response, the reflex taking over his body, like it was ripping its way out from the center of him. He could fall asleep at center ice with the arena lights on full blast and the entire crowd screaming.
“I’m not letting you sleep on the couch if you’re that tired.”
“I’m always this tired.” They went to bed as soon as they made it back. Gabe always had long, exhausting days, but today he’d had a plane ride and a loud social event he wasn’t used to. Brandon had done so much skating that night that Gabe could hardly believe he was still on his feet.
They climbed into bed next to each other after Gabe found an outlet for his phone charger.
“Did you get any homework done?” Brandon asked. Homework felt like a thousand years away, even though it was just earlier that day.
“I did. Let me show you.” He got back out of bed and grabbed his iPad off of Brandon’s desk, opening up Procreate to the project he was working on for figure drawing.
He was working on polishing up a drawing he’d done in class that week.
His professor was cool with people working in different mediums. One of his classmates brought in acrylic paint one week.
Another had worked in clay one day. If you could justify it, Professor Bradley would let you do it.
She was fine with technology with the caveat that if she ever found out someone was taking photos of the models, it was an instant failure.
“Wow,” Brandon said, scooting closer to him on the bed. “How do you do that?”
“You just…look? That sounds flippant. Obviously, it’s years of learning how to do it, and practicing. But your brain takes such silly shortcuts when it looks at things. So much of drawing is forcing your brain to see things the way that they are.”
“That’s beautiful,” Brandon said, his voice so soft but so clear, his hot breath on the side of Gabe’s face.
“Would you ever be willing to let me draw you?”
“Like this?” Brandon asked, pointing to Gabe’s iPad and the subject of his drawing, who was nude.
“You wouldn’t have to be completely naked. I could also draw you fully clothed, though as my professor pointed out, if I was interested in the way cloth drapes over an object, I should draw a still life.”
“Yeah, maybe. Maybe not like…fully…”
“Okay,” Gabe said. He turned to face Brandon slowly, the way he’d approach a skittish dog. “Maybe tomorrow?”
Brandon nodded. “I have skate in the morning, and then I’ll be back here for the late morning and afternoon. When I invited you down here, I wasn’t thinking about how much time hockey takes up. Honestly, I hadn’t noticed, since I haven’t ever had anything else to do.”
Something about that—Brandon having no one waiting for him—broke Gabe’s heart.
Gabe closed the cover on his iPad and set it on the side table .
“Tomorrow, I’ll draw you. And even if we can’t spend every second together, this is still nice. I’m getting this break from my life that I rarely get.”
“You’d be at the grocery store tonight, right?”
“Tomorrow night.”
“Do you like it? Or do you just do it because you have to?”
“Anything that isn’t drawing is work that I do because I have to.
But it isn’t bad. I like how quiet it is at night.
I can listen to my headphones. My coworkers mostly keep to themselves, so it’s a conflict-free workplace.
At least among the night shift. And driving home in the middle of the night is so peaceful.
Like I’m the only person alive in the world. ”
“You don’t seem like the kind of person who wants to be the only person alive in the world.”
Gabe laughed as they both slid farther under the sheets.
He flipped the pillow over to the other side out of habit before resting his head on it.
“No, I’m not that kind of person. I prefer my house full of people and a campus full of students.
I like when people lean on me, and I like having someone to lean on.
But at the same time, if everyone was gone, I wouldn’t have to pay rent or tuition. ”
“Lots of people. No capitalism.”
“Exactly.”
“I’ve never been good with lots of people.”
“Hockey seems like it demands lots of people.”
“Yeah. It’s always been hard. I did it because my grandparents were so adamant that I have something of my own. So many siblings of sick kids get ignored. Not on purpose, obviously, but it happens. Hockey was an outlet, and also a way to get out of the house. I never felt like I could quit.”
“Do you want to?”
“Not now. Now it makes sense. I love it. And there’s a script to it. Every locker room, every team, is different, but it’s not complicated. Back then, it was harder. And I worked hard to justify all the effort my grandparents put into it. And it got me here.”
“You played great tonight.”
“Do you even know what that means?”
“No. But Laura said you did, and I trust her.”
“Laura is right. I had a good game. It was nice knowing you were here.”
“The next time you’re up in Minnesota, I’ll have to catch one of those too.”
“You can sit with Ryan. Have a boy WAG to talk to.”
“A boy wife and girlfriend?”
“Yeah. God I’m tired,” Brandon said.
Gabe flipped over to face away from him and he tugged Gabe in close. He’d enjoyed spooning Brandon the week before, but being the little spoon was unparalleled.
“Go to sleep,” Gabe said, his own consciousness winking out the second he closed his eyes.