Chapter 34
DEVON
“You’re supposed to be taking a nap.” Mickey eyed the bar in my room. “How much is a bottle of water?”
I pursed my lips. “I can afford it, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“I’m pretty sure the team would pay for it.” He pulled a bottle from the fridge. “Root beer? Where’s the real stuff?”
“You know I don’t really drink. I didn’t want any booze in the room.”
“In case you’re tempted?”
I chuckled. “I keep expecting Hairs to show up.”
Mickey shuddered. “Your roommate gave me the creeps.”
“Why?”
He dropped onto the other bed—with his head against the pillows.
I swatted his feet. “Bottes.”
“Calisse.” Still, he sat up and removed his boots.
“I love how you swear in French almost as much as I do.” I grabbed a cola and lay on the bed next to Mickey. “Why did he creep you out?” I cracked open the can and took a sip.
“Because he looked at you weird. Like he knew you were gay.”
“I am gay.”
“Yeah, but not out out.”
“What does that even mean?” But I knew what it meant.
It meant I hadn’t hidden the fact, that in major juniors I’d gone to bars on Church Street in Toronto.
Times have changed. Yes, I could go to a discreet kink club in Vancouver while wearing a mask…
but I couldn’t go to a bar on Davie Street in that same town. Not now.
Especially not with Jack.
“I need to talk to you.”
“So you said. You’re on a major road trip—with Vancouver headed to the playoffs. You need to play your best game tonight so you can stick it to Toronto management who traded you—their best D-man—to Abbotsford.”
“I wasn’t playing for Toronto. I was playing for Brampton.”
“Right. But you should’ve been in the big leagues. The club had you right there, and they could’ve brought you up to fix all kinds of problems.” He rolled his eyes. “All the more idiots they’ve proven to be. Don’t lecture me about using the word stupid.”
I smiled. “You used the word idiot.”
He waved me off. “Whatever. You’re still going to give me a lecture.”
“Which you deserve.”
“Oh my God.”
I put my cola on the nightstand, then turned on my side and pulled one of the many pillows against my chest. “I need you to be serious.”
“I am.” He huffed and rolled his eyes. “Toronto’s management was—” He winced. “—made an error in judgment—”
“Better.”
Another eye-roll. Under his breath—but still loud enough for me to hear—he said, “idiotes”.
Right. Like saying it in French makes it less bad.
Mom would’ve washed your mouth out with soap.
“Toronto made a bad call. Glad you feel that way.” I was expecting boos on the ice tonight from the fans—even though the higher-ups were the ones who had traded me.
I would’ve stayed forever. Hometown and all that.
The place where I’d lived with my mother.
“And Hairs is going to out you.”
I remembered how I’d considered playing gay porn in Belleville to weird him out. And how I wouldn’t have—because it would’ve put a spotlight on me. “You don’t know that. I mean, he hasn’t done it yet.”
“He’s waiting for the right moment. Like the first goal or the first playoff win. Or, hell, when Vancouver wins the Cup.”
“Cederqvist might be back on the roster by then.”
“Do you believe that?”
He’d been on the injury list for five weeks now, and the playoffs were approaching fast. “I think I can be sent down at any moment, and that’s a reason to keep my nose clean. Neither Vancouver nor Abbotsford needs the kerfuffle of me coming out.”
“Because Abbotsford already has a gay coach?”
I’m resigning at the end of the season.
In truth, I’d stared at Jack’s text for an hour. Trying to parse it out. Trying to determine the meaning. Trying to figure out my response.
You don’t have to do anything with that. It’s happening whether or not there’s any kind of future here. But I wanted you to know.
Then…
And I want you to know I’m insanely proud of how you played last night. People on high are noticing. You’re on your way to being a star, Devon. You’re doing everyone proud.
I’d read two things into that. Yes, Jack was proud of me. He wouldn’t have bullshitted me about that.
And also, that he believed my mom would’ve been proud.
One night in Tofino, near the end of the trip, I’d been brutally honest with him. He’d known the circumstances of Mom’s death, of course. That was part of the Devon Jarvis story. The myth. How I’d overcome adversity and my mother’s tragic death by becoming one of hockey’s rising stars.
“Devs?”
I blinked.
“Why am I really here? You need a nap.”
“Possibly. Probably.” I blinked again. “Because I’ve fallen in love with someone, and you’re the only one to tell. Because as much as you’re an asshole, you’d never break my trust and out me.”
“Unlike Hairs.”
This time, I rolled my eyes. “You’re obsessed with him.”
“He’s obsessed with himself. I saw an interview with him on some random clip—I don’t even know how it wound up in my feed.”
“Because you’re following Abbotsford.” I’d missed this interview, so I made a note to track it down.
“He’s jealous. That much was so damn obvious.”
“What?” I squinted. “Well, I guess. But he’s a bottom six forward. My getting called up doesn’t affect him. Like, at all.”
“Right? But he’s an asshole.” He extended each syllable, so the word strung out for almost thirty seconds. “Now, are you still in love with your coach?”
I blinked. Because words were beyond me.
“Right.” He put his bottle on his nightstand, turned to face me, and tugged one of the outrageous number of pillows against his chest, mimicking me. “Are you willing to risk your career?”
Only the question I’d asked myself a million times. “He’s out.”
“Right.” A word he was, this afternoon, apparently fond of.
“I’m not really out.”
“That’s a distinction without a difference. You either are or you’re not.” He scratched his nose. “Either the entire world knows you’re queer or they don’t. The fact that you’ve never been spotted hasn’t been relevant until now.”
“Because no one knew who I was.”
“I was going to say because they didn’t care, but you’re pretty cute.”
I swatted him with my pillow.
“Hey.” He howled in mock outrage. “You know I only sleep with pretty boys.”
Which was completely untrue. As much as Mickey enjoyed attractive men, he also liked guys with great personalities and amazing senses of humor. He tried to come off as a snob—but he totally wasn’t.
“Jack’s out and I’m not. He’s way braver than I am. He was the first one in the League to be out.”
“He also won two Cups.”
“So you think if I win a Cup in my rookie season, then I can come out?” To me, this possibility had merit.
“And what? You can still be sent down. He’d still be your coach. Best I can see, that’s still a conflict.”
I’m resigning at the end of the season.
Mickey stilled. “What? Are you going to be traded and you haven’t told me?” This time, he didn’t bop me with a pillow.
Likely because he saw the serious expression on my face.
I frowned. Then I bit my lip.
He caressed my cheek.
I sniffed. “He’s quitting as the Abbotsford coach at the end of the year.
For me.” Or at least that was how I interpreted his decision.
Because Abbotsford was on a hell of a winning streak.
When he’d made the decision, there had just been a few wins.
Now? He’d racked up a whole bunch, and although the playoffs were still likely beyond the reach of the team, he’d be heading into next season on a high note.
Yet he’s giving that all up. “What do I do?”
Mickey shrugged. “Win the Cup?”
“So I can come out?”
“So you’re bulletproof in case that Hairs dude makes trouble.”
“Nothing’s bulletproof, Mickey. You know that. I might get sent down if I’m too much hassle. I might get traded entirely.”
“Sure—”
“Or my relationship with Jack might be revealed, and we might both lose everything.”
Mickey leaned over to press a kiss to my forehead. “Can you sleep now?”
A tear slid down my cheek. My friend’s exquisite gentleness always ate away at me. When I’d felt alone in the world after Mom’s death, he’d always been there for me. He’d loved me in a way my foster parents—and coaches—just hadn’t been able to. “I love him.” A broken whisper.
Mickey shifted so he could pull me into his arms. “I know, babe. I know.”
The stream of tears fell. I hadn’t cried like this, except when missing Mom, in a really long time.
He held me until I drifted into a fitful doze.
When I awoke—very groggy—he was gone.
He’d also removed all the bottles of root beer.
I smiled at his text of fifteen emojis—including some very rude ones. He didn’t always have the right words—but he always had a heart of gold.
And as I stepped onto the ice in Toronto—to some boos and jeers—I spotted him in the audience.
He blew me a kiss.
Of course.
And I scored not one, but two points that night.
Some in the crowd definitely cheered.
I was, after all, the hometown boy.
As the team flew to Dallas, I tried not to think about how I hadn’t responded to Jack’s three-in-a-row texts all those weeks ago.
And when Wheels, our captain, handed me his phone in the dressing room that night—and my world bottomed out—I tried not to think about how I just wanted to be standing next to Jack, on the Pacific Ocean and watching the whales.