CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE #2
“Dude, you okay, Wy-Guy?” Tanner asked, worried.
Earlier this season he’d drank so much he puked and Tanner wanted to be sure he hadn’t done it again.
“Crawford is retiring?”
“What?” Tanner blinked at him, sure he’d heard him wrong. “What are you talking about? No, this is just a celebration for his thousandth game.”
“Dude, no, I heard him talking to Liam at the bar. He said he’s retiring. Liam is too. He’s gonna sell the bar to Crawford when he does.”
“No way. You—you fucking heard them wrong or something,” Tanner said, the world shifting under his feet. Shit he was a little drunker than he realized. Or something.
“No, I heard it! I swear to God.”
“Fuck!” Tanner said, furious. “Where is he? I need to find him.”
Tanner shoved through the crowd until he found Crawford. He was reaching for a drink on the bar and Tanner slapped his hand away.
“When were you gonna fucking tell me!” he shouted over the music.
“Tell you what?” Crawford asked with a scowl.
“That you’re retiring!” Tanner threw back.
“Goddamn it, will you keep your voice down?” Luke glanced around.
He grabbed Tanner by the elbow and dragged him outside onto the patio. It was mid-April, cool and a little damp, and fires burned in the firepits, although no one was out here at the moment.
Tanner shook off Crawford’s grip and glared at him. “Well?”
“How did you find out?”
So it was true then. Tanner felt sick and shaky all over again. “Someone fucking overheard you talking to Liam.”
“Goddamn it!” Crawford glanced around like he was looking for someone to punch. “Who?”
“I’m not telling you!” Tanner snapped because he wasn’t about to let Crawford go after one of the baby rookies and scare him to death. “It’s true though? You’re retiring?”
“Fuck! I don’t know, Clayton. At some point, yeah.” Crawford dragged a hand through his hair. “Maybe at the end of this season, maybe next season. I don’t know yet.”
“Why?” Tanner asked.
“Are you kidding me? Because I’m fucking old, okay? Because every goddamn day my bones hurt more and I’m tired and I want a fucking life that isn’t just hockey every day.”
“Oh.” Tanner said, deflating a little. “You weren’t going to tell me?”
“I was. I was gonna tell the whole fucking team, okay? But I wanted to do it—do it after the season was over.”
“The season is over.”
“The fucking postseason.” Crawford scowled. “Do you know far we’re going to make it? Because I sure fucking don’t. And I don’t want to fuck up what we’ve got. This team is good, you know it is.”
“Yeah, I do,” Tanner admitted.
“Really fucking good. And we’ve got a real shot.
So I didn’t want everyone planning a bunch of goodbye shit when I don’t even know if I’m done or not.
We go all the way, I can retire and rest my head at night.
We don’t, maybe I think about another year.
I don’t fucking know. But I don’t want any talk about it to fuck the team up, you hear me? ”
“I hear you.” Tanner glanced away, staring at the flames in the firepit. “It just hurts, you know? That you wouldn’t tell me. I’m your partner. I’m supposed to be your friend, but you didn’t tell me about Sebastian or this. You won’t even invite me to your fucking house.”
Tanner’s eyes watered and he hated that he always got emotional about shit. Crawford would have a fucking field day with it too.
But to his surprise, Crawford grasped his upper arms. “Fuck, I’m sorry, dude.”
“What?” Tanner turned back to look at him. “What are you sorry for?”
“I don’t—I don’t fuckin’ mean to make you feel like—like this, okay?”
“Yeah?” Tanner sucked in a breath, and it was a little wet and sniffly.
Crawford let go of him long enough to drag a piece of white fabric out of his pocket. “Here.”
Tanner took it, bewildered. “What the fuck is this?”
“A fucking handkerchief you fucking Gen Z Muppet.”
Tanner blinked at him. “What?”
“Just blow your fucking nose on it, you dipshit.”
Tanner blew his nose but when he went to hand the handkerchief back, Crawford made a face. “Uhh, you can keep it.”
Tanner shrugged and tucked it in his pocket.
“Don’t fucking take any of this shit so personally, Clayton. I like you. You’re my annoying little brother and I wouldn’t fucking trade you for anyone, okay?”
“I just want you to—to act like you like me sometimes. To tell me stuff.”
“I thought this arguing about shit was fun for you.” Crawford looked genuinely confused. “I thought it was our thing.”
“It is!” Tanner said. “I just …”
He didn’t know what he wanted. He just knew it hurt to know that Crawford never told him anything.
Crawford sighed. “I didn’t mean to make you feel shitty, okay?”
“Okay,” Tanner said in a small voice.
“Somethin’s still bothering you. What is it?”
“When you retire, I won’t see you anymore,” Tanner blurted out. “You’ll just fucking disappear. You won’t answer the group texts, and you won’t show up to stuff, and we won’t be friends anymore.”
“Ahh fuck.” Crawford grimaced. “Well, you’re wrong.”
“I am?” He wanted to be wrong.
“My boyfriend is in there”—he pointed at the back door of the pub—“becoming best friends with the entire team and all the SAPs. Pretty sure he’ll be in the group chat more than I ever was.
And he’ll make me show up to events. And if you would fucking think for two fucking seconds about why I want to buy this bar from Liam, you’ll know that I’m not going anywhere. ”
“You’re not?”
“No! Christ. I’m buying this place so I can fucking still be around the team even though my goddamn body is breaking down. You’re not my friend, Clayton, but that’s because you’re my fuckin’ family, okay?”
He pulled Tanner against him, so quickly that Tanner stumbled into him. He didn’t think he’d ever hugged Crawford outside of a celly before. His chest was hard and he smelled like nice cologne and he was family.
Tanner squeezed Crawford back until he cleared his throat and pushed him away.
“So.” Crawford crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m fuckin’ sorry, okay? I don’t mean to make you feel like you’re not important to me. I’m just … I don’t like having a lot of people over but—”
“Sebastian comes over, right?”
“Yeah.”
“And someday he’ll move in and—”
“No, actually he won’t,” Crawford said. “We’re keeping separate places.”
“Oh,” Tanner said. Well, that kinda changed things.
“But if it fucking means so much to you, you can come over sometime.”
Tanner brightened but Crawford pointed a finger at him. “You, by yourself. No bringing anyone. You’ll stay no more than an hour and if you annoy me, I’ll throw you out onto the sidewalk.”
“Deal!” Tanner said, his mood brightened by the idea of seeing inside Luke Crawford’s fortress of solitude.
“And you tell no one else about this, you hear? Especially not your little Rockets boyfriend.”
Tanner’s jaw dropped. “My what now?”
Crawford snorted. “You expect me to believe you and Rasmussen aren’t fucking?”
“Uhh,” Tanner said.
“I dunno what got his panties in a bunch tonight during the game but I’m guessing he’s the one who’s been blowing up your phone since we’ve been out here.”
Tanner blinked, patting his pocket, where yes, his phone had been buzzing on and off for a while. Fuck! He’d kinda tuned it out.