Chapter 7 From Dinner Rolls To Communist Literature #2
“Well he’s not, so can you two just drop it and not make things weird today?
Alex is my friend, he’s new in town, and he’s super into all that superstition and karma stuff.
That whole pizza thing was the result of a wayward thought.
The last thing he needs is you two love birds poking around where you don’t belong and throwing him off, okay? ”
I shoot a pleading glance their way, knowing that if I make myself serious, they’ll drop the whole thing.
If there’s anyone who knows about the complexity of friendship when there’s attraction on one side or the other, it's Breaker and Lennon. Their “will they, won’t they” dynamic during their first season with the Redwoods a few years ago was a dramatic scene for the ages.
Thankfully, they agree to let it go and have moved on to discussing the merits of canned cranberry sauce versus fresh by the time we enter the large industrial kitchen.
The whole place already smells like thyme, sage, and butter.
The windows are fogged from the warmth of the ovens, where turkeys have been roasting since long before I woke up this morning.
It's noisy and chaotic, already overflowing with people from every professional San Francisco sports team—some of whom I recognize, some I don’t.
Coach Mancini and James are standing by the service station, looking over an iPad with the Thunder team owner, Charlotte Gagnon, probably going over station assignments and lunch shift times.
The Redwoods offensive coach, Luke Cannon, is sitting in the cafeteria at a table covered in construction paper and safety scissors with his daughters and a bunch of other kids, watching while his husband demonstrates how to make a proper hand turkey.
A small, loud blonde woman bosses around a guy with a man bun and a flannel tied around his waist who seems to be trying to hang a banner over the door with the help of a taller man in a cardigan, while a man with grey streaked hair and a baby strapped to his chest leans against the door frame, watching her with stars in his eyes.
Someone tosses me an apron, and I catch it and tie it around my waist, ready to man whatever station needs manning.
I may not be much of a cook, but I can stir a pot of mashed potatoes like nobody’s business.
I’m about to head over to Coach so I can ask for my morning assignment when a warm palm smacks me right in the middle of the back.
“El! We’re bread buddies! They’ve got us over on rolls.
All we have to do is rotate the trays in the oven and pass them out to people.
We don’t have to like, actually bake or anything like that.
The big guy, James? The one who owns your team?
He and Charlotte said I was on rolls by myself today and I was like “woah, woah, woah, rolls are the best part of Thanksgiving. This is definitely a two man job, I don’t want to screw this up!
” And I asked if you could join me and they said yes! Isn’t that cool?”
I feel my mouth morph into the goofiest of grins as I take in Alex and all of his fast-talking glory.
He’s got on a black and grey Thunder t-shirt, covered up by a brown, red, and orange flannel apron with heart-shaped pockets and frills around the edges.
Franny, his neon green buddy, is buckled around his waist, giving his bulky frame the illusion of an hour-glass figure.
His sneakers are a similar lime green color to his bag, standing out bright and clashing against his fire-engine red skinny jeans.
On top of his head sits a child-sized pilgrim’s hat—gold buckle and all—held on to his hair on either side with two glittering, pink butterfly clips.
He looks absolutely ridiculous, and I can’t take my eyes off of him.
“Rolls are totally a two man job. Good call, Goat,” I say, patting him on the shoulder.
He hasn’t taken his hand off me—in fact, it's slid down and now he’s cradling my lower back as we stand side-by-side.
Alex groans and drops his head onto my shoulder, and a prickle of awareness skitters down my spine.
“Is calling me “Goat” going to be a thing now? See, this is why I don’t tell people my middle name.”
“Other people have nicknamed you Goat?”
“No. Usually when they hear my middle name, they start calling me ‘Comrade’ or ‘Tsar’. There was this one dick head kid in high school who always called me ‘Dirty Commie’, and I had no idea what it meant. But the joke was on him, though. I might not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but I like to learn and I’m stubborn to a fault, so now I have a degree in International Economic Theory along with my anthro minor to fall back on if hockey doesn’t work out.
So suck on that, Jimmy Berger. Have you ever read Das Kapital? ”
“I…” I trail off, scrunching my brows and wondering how we went from dinner rolls to communist literature. But that’s Alex, as I’m learning. His brain works at a million miles per hour, and the rest of us just have to try to keep up.
“Anyway, I guess Goat isn’t that bad. They might be a little stinky, but they’re cute animals, and people love them. I mean, there’s goat cheese, goat memes, goat yoga—”
“And it's also an acronym. You know, like how in our world, GOAT means "greatest of all time.”
“Exactly!” Alex yips, tapping me on the nose. “So, yeah. You can call me Goat, El. I’m cool with that. But only you. I don’t want anyone getting any ideas or asking around about the Russian words for various farm animals.”
He pats my back again, then leads me across the kitchen to the tall, standing oven we’ll be using to bake the prepared dinner rolls today. And all the while, I try not to read too much into his touch, or the fact that I got to give him a nickname that’s only for us.
Because Alex is straight. He’s straight, and he’s my friend, and even if he was queer, he doesn’t hook up during his season. So all feelings—sexual, tingly, butterfly-ish or otherwise—need to be shoved deep into the bottom of a well, never to be brought up again.