5. Novi
FIVE
Novi
It is dangerous to say this in public, but my options were to drive us to a deserted underground parking lot or here, and for some reason, Americans get edgy in dark places.
At least Mastros is loud with the tables filling up, live music, and the staff more interested in personal conversations than taking orders while it’s still so early in the afternoon. It gives us a shadow of privacy, but I still refuse to say certain things out loud.
“So you’re …” Colby shakes his head like a dog that’s crashed headfirst into a wall. “Are you trying to tell me you’re?—”
“Do not say it.” I pick up the menu, even though I always order the same thing. He looks like he has been slapped with a pancake, and if I have learned anything the last three days, it’s that if I look at Colby Kessinger, it is hard to stop.
“I’m right though, aren’t I?” He leans further over the white tablecloth between us, sucking the air from the room in the one movement. “That you’re … like me.”
I tug at the worn corner of the menu. This clammy-palm feeling is not usual for me.
At the very end of last season, I finally got the courage to talk to the Queer Collective group.
The men in the league I have been envious of for years.
There were no questions. No pushing. My presence was immediately understood, and I was able to come out to them, in my small way, without having to say words at all.
No matter how well I understand English, Russian will always be my safety.
My comfort. Which is why I always use it when I possibly can.
And in situations like this, where my usual chill, joyful persona is overridden by nerves, it’s needed more than ever.
Too bad Colby doesn’t speak Russian.
“Da.”
His whole face lights up. “I knew it. I knew it.”
His explosion makes me glance around with wide eyes, but we’re mostly ignored.
At least he takes the hint and drops his voice to an excited half whisper.
“That whole season messed with my head. I swear I was picking up on something, and then that night …” He’s the one to look around this time, and when his attention falls back on me, his gray eyes are too shiny, and his smile is too big.
“Tell me you were thinking the same things I was.”
“Nyet.”
“ Liar ,” he breathes. “All this time, I thought you wanted to kill me. But you wanted to?—”
“Steak and fries. What are you getting?”
“Steak and fries, huh?” He pumps his eyebrows. “Is that what you Russians call it?”
“You are still annoying.”
He picks up his own menu. “Funny. I remember us being friends.”
“Of course. I am delightful.”
He shows off too many teeth when he laughs. “I know you used to be. The last few days, you’ve been like a ghost.”
This happy sort of feeling bubbles in my gut. “I am like that too. Very talented at all things.”
His laugh continues for another few seconds before it slowly slides off his face. “Is this why you’ve been avoiding me?”
“I thought you knew that night. Why I really freaked out and ran away. I’ve been worried you might say something. About me. It’s not something I talk about.”
“But …” His forehead creases deepen. “Why? There’s a lot of support in the league for …” Something clicks behind his eyes. “You weren’t bullshitting with your reasons for not wearing the Pride jerseys, were you?”
“You thought I was shitting bulls?”
It takes him a second, but he cuts himself off from correcting me. Damn. I almost got to add him to my game. “Smart-ass. But yeah. Pretty much everyone thinks it’s a homophobic excuse.”
I know they do. I do not want to let down the young fans who look up to me, but I also can’t carry all that weight either. I want to be someone worth idolizing, but it’s not possible for me. I can handle people thinking I’m an asshole if it keeps my family safe.
“My sister is still there.”
“In Russia?”
“Da. I thought she would come here with the rest of my family, but she is stubborn like a fox.”
“An ox.” Boom. There it is. It’s automatic the way he corrects me, and I’m hit with a spark of glee that I got him as well. I will add his name to my list later. “So, your family is in America?”
“Canada. It was easier for them to immigrate there than the States.”
“Why didn’t she move with them?”
“She has a whole life there. It was not fair of me to ask, but after seventeen years here, I would like a whole life as well.”
For the first time since we sat down, there is sympathy lurking in his eyes. “That sucks.”
“It does. But I am a millionaire NHL star, Stanley Cup winner, and a very fun person to be around. I can’t complain.”
“Glad you’re still so humble.”
“Why humble? These are all facts. Am I supposed to say I am not a Stanley Cup winner? Twice.”
“Most people avoid talking about all their accomplishments.”
“I am not most people.”
“I know …” He lowers his menu back close to the table. “I really liked that about you.”
The soft tone takes me back. Back too far than I usually let myself go. Back to the AHL and hotel rooms, soft snoring, and hushed conversations once the lights were off. Colby’s vulnerable words.
I never fit in much in high school. I dunno. The team was always fine, but I never really felt like I was in the inner circle, you know? Like they were them and I was me. I can already feel it happening here too …
We did not talk about it again, and not too long after that was our moment and me being too scared to be around him anymore.
The guilt that I couldn’t be there for his worry always tried to pull me back to him, but I was strong.
Now, meeting Colby Kessinger’s eyes and watching him watch me, I’m not feeling so strong.
Men are my weakness, so I don’t bother looking.
That was my first mistake with him.
I am sure I see it. That same curiosity I have always felt for him reflected back at me. The same curiosity that made me fall over myself to get away that first time.
“Ready to order?” The waiter appears out of nowhere.
I jump, and my eyes shoot back to the menu as my mind goes blank. “I … I, uh …”
“Sorry, he doesn’t speak English.” Colby smirks at me. “He’ll take the steak and fries. I’ll grab the burger.”
“Thanks.” The waiter grabs the menus and leaves again.
“Funny.”
Colby folds his arms over his side of the table. “Gotta keep up with you and your witty retorts.”
I copy him by crossing my arms. It was something I learned early on. Copy people and they feel more comfortable, and now that Colby knows about me, I want to make sure we’re in a comfortable, friendly place. “You cannot tell anyone about me.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“I’m serious. My sister?—”
He reaches across to place his hand on my arm, and I jerk away from him like I’ve been burned. In my defense, it felt like I had been. His hand is too warm, too rough, too … I swallow and cut off the thoughts.
I watch as Colby tucks both hands under his arms and lowers his voice. “Sorry. I just want you to know that I get it. I know.”
“Okay.”
“I wish you’d said something back then.” He isn’t looking at me. Or smiling. His face wasn’t made to be serious; it looks unnatural on him. “I was scared and lost too, you know.”
“I’m … sorry.”
“That sounded like it hurt.”
I clear my throat. “I was wrong. This is something I can admit.”
“Wow. Seventeen years later, and I finally have my answers.”
My forehead gets heavy with my frown. “But you said you knew.”
“No, I said I thought. After what happened , I convinced myself that I read it all wrong and that you hated me.”
“But I was so obvious.” My voice squeaks higher.
“Obvious?” His eyes almost shoot out. “What do you mean?”
“I …” I quickly glance around again, then lean closer. “I was always tripping over my words. Being silly idiot. My face is very expressive, it gives everything away.”
Unlike how blank his face goes now. “Novi, I’m not being dramatic when I say this, but other than that goofy smile I’d get sometimes, your face never changes.
You were impossible to read. And when we were friends, there was something called a language barrier that always made you trip over your words.
How was I supposed to know it wasn’t the Russian-to-English translation you were tripping over? ”
I don’t know which part to laugh at first. Yes, my English was basic, but that’s not what made my brain so blank around him. My mouth forms and forgets too many things to say back until it lands on “ Goofy ?”
“Super goofy. It’s okay, I think your face was in shock over doing something it had never done before.”
Never done before? Does he remember me at all? “I smile always.”
“Maybe on the inside. That doesn’t count.”
“Of course it counts.”
His eyes slide up to meet mine again, full of challenge and something else. “Maybe. But I like the goofy version anyway.”
I turn away, arms pulled in tight to my chest. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
“Are you really sulking?”
“I am ignoring your taunts.”
“It looks a lot like sulking to me.”
That earns him a sharp look. “I thought I was impossible to read.”
“I’m not a kid anymore.”
For some reason, those words trigger something in me. Something that makes my gaze drop to the way his LA polo looks tight over his chest. These tables are very much too small, and this restaurant is very much too hot.
Colby lifts an arm to run his hand back through his dark, messy hair, and when I pull my eyes back upward, he purposely flexes his bicep.
I look away. “You are fucked.”
“Just giving you what you want.”
“What I want is peace. Something I will not be given with you here.”
“Why?”
I tap my blunt, chewed-off nails against the table. “I will always be worried about it getting out.”
“I said?—”
“You won’t tell. Da. But it is accident sometimes.”
“Look … all I want is for you to stop making my job difficult. I’m here to help you. You’re here to play. I want my first season in the NHL to start right. More than anything, this is my career. My future. I can’t mess with that.”
His future. The thing I love so much is almost my past, and it’s the complete opposite for him. Who would have picked this back when we knew each other?
“I will play nice,” I promise him.
“Thank you.”
“And you will keep my secret.”
“Always.”
“Then we are okay.”
“Yeah.” He stares across the table, frozen in place for a moment. “Wow. I did not see this coming when I broke into your car.”
“Scare me like that again, and I will drive you to an abandoned parking lot.”
“Ah … come again?”
When I smile, I make sure to do it on the outside this time. “Just a promise.”
“Damn, Novi.” Colby looks over his shoulder. “I said your goofy smile, not evil villain smile. I think you made that kid cry. What is that?”
I flip him off. “There is no crying.”
“I was talking about my inner child. You just killed him.”
“Stop talking to me.”
“Nah, I know now that you liked it when I talked. So I’m going to keep doing that. For you. All for you.”
I very much hate that he’s right.