Chapter 5 #3
“I’m sure you meant me,” Bella quipped, because deflection was not her style. “I like boys. A lot. And let me just throw it out there that I won’t be eye-fucking you while you shower.”
“You don’t have to, darlin’. You’ve had the real deal.”
I thought Bella had lost that round, but she lifted one shoulder and proceeded to flatten him. “It’s good that you remind me of that from time to time. Since it only lasted ten seconds, I tend to forget.”
As she so often does, Bella cracked my deflector shields wide open, and I laughed out loud.
Facing the corner, I took a shower that lasted about three and a half seconds.
People like Big-D have it wrong. They think that the gay guy is going to be the one who’s slowly soaping up his dick, watching you shampoo.
But that’s not how it works in a varsity locker room on planet Earth.
The gay guy is the one who discreetly goes about his business, showering quickly and then getting the hell out of there.
He puts his underwear on when his skin is still damp, even though it will stick up his ass crack for the rest of the night.
He isn’t staring at you, and he’d rather eat broken glass than sport some wood in the locker room.
That way, when his life explodes in his face because he forgot to raise the deflector shields one time out of a million, you won’t be able to accuse him of being creepy.
You’ll look back on your years of showering together, and be unable to remember a single thing he said or did when you were naked.
Because he is invisible. At least he tries to be. His computer’s browser history is deleted every time he steps away from the machine. His clothes are nondescript. His face is carefully blank.
Honestly, it’s exhausting.
As I jammed my feet into my socks, I would have bet cash money that Rikker was setting a similar land speed record across the room for how quickly a guy could get out of this claustrophobic hellhole.
Though I couldn’t even settle up that bet with a glance in his direction.
Because that would violate more than one of the codes I kept.
Number one: never look around the locker room.
And number two: never, ever look at Rikker.
“Hey, Graham? I have a favor to ask you.” Bella stood beside me, her hair going frizzy from the shower steam. Ventilation hadn’t been invented when this place was built.
“Yeah? Lay it on me.”
“I’m going to give out the hotel room assignments now, and I want to put Rikker with you.”
The only blessing was that my face was inside my locker when she said it.
Because even with years of practice, no deflector shield was strong enough to withstand that kind of shock.
I mean… holy shit. I needed to give her some kind of reply.
But that’s pretty hard to do when your heart has just crawled up your throat and into your mouth.
“You’re okay with that, right?” she prodded. “I never took you for the homophobic type.”
“Right,” I mumbled. Because I was going out of my fucking mind just then. She said she didn’t take me for the homophobic type. But that was dead wrong. I was the most homophobic person alive. Because “homophobic” means “afraid of homosexuals.”
And I was pants-shitting terrified of myself.
“Graham, look at me.”
Sorry, honey. No can do. “Just a second,” I said.
“Cover me.” This conversation had just reminded me of something important: the flask in my hockey bag.
With the locker door blocking one side, and Bella the other, I yanked it out and screwed off the cap.
With my head in the locker, I took a deep pull.
Even as I swallowed, Bella yanked the flask out of my hand. “Graham!” she hissed. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Nothing,” I hissed right back. “Now give me that.”
“Not a chance.” Her fingers actually shook with fury as she tightened down the top. Then she dropped my flask into a pocket of her bag. “You skated really well tonight,” she said, her voice tight. “And I was relieved to see it. Because you are freaking me out lately.”
I managed to meet her eyes then, but it wasn’t easy. Bella was pretty good at reading people. I felt her laser gaze searching my face for clues.
She leaned in close, although nobody was going to hear us over the thump of the music and the slamming of locker doors. “Why are you drinking so much, Graham?” she asked. “What’s the matter?”
I just shrugged. Because that’s all I had to say on the subject.
“Fine,” she said, her face hardening. “Be a jackass to me, if you must.” She pushed a hotel key envelope into my hand. “But don’t be a jackass to him.”
God, how I hated hearing her say that. It killed me every time I saw Bella and Rikker talking together. Not only did I fear for my own privacy, I hated the feeling that I was losing my best friend. To him.
“My flask,” I said, hating the sound of my own voice.
“You can have it back tomorrow, after the game.” She marched off then.
Hell.
There was nothing to do then except to go off to find some dinner. And — if there really was a God in heaven, like they taught us at my homophobic hellhole of a high school — more alcohol.
Rikker
I ate a late dinner of crab cakes and lobster roll at some fish place that Coach herded us to.
And then everyone walked back toward the hotel in plenty of time for our ten o’clock curfew.
But I dawdled, walking down the side streets, buying myself an ice cream cone in a drowsy little cafe.
I liked cities. I liked their busy sidewalks and their anonymity.
Where I grew up in western Michigan, there was only a taste of the city life.
Most everyone favored the dull suburbs. When I moved to Vermont for tenth grade, I thought I’d hate the rural atmosphere.
But it actually grew on me, because it was more honest than the aggressively tended lawns of my youth.
There were ragged meadows, with cows munching them.
There were miles of pine forest, and the outline of the Green Mountains everywhere you looked.
Still, I preferred the city. Especially a good, old one. My ex-boyfriend and I used to drive ninety minutes from Burlington into Montreal, where the drinking age (and therefore the clubbing age) was only eighteen. We had a blast finding all the gay bars and trying them out.
A group of college kids passed me on the sidewalk, laughing together. There was no denying that I was lonely, and letting it get to me tonight.
At ten o’clock on the dot, I walked into the hotel carrying my duffel bag and a heavy helping of dread. When Bella had given me my key card, she’d done it with a frown. “If you see anybody drinking before the game tomorrow, will you tell me?”
“Um, sure?” You’d have to be a pretty big idiot to want to drink before getting onto the ice with a bunch of guys who were trying to squish you like a bug.
She didn’t say anything about my rooming situation, so I was pretty sure who I’d find. Unless he’d fled, somehow.
Upstairs, the door to room 312 opened with a mechanical click, and I pushed inside.
It was so dark in there that I assumed I was alone.
In fact, when my eyes adjusted to the dimness it startled the crap out of me to see Graham sitting at the little table near the window, his chin parked on his folded hands.
I dropped my bag on the floor and fumbled for one of the bedside lamps. Even when I clicked it on, making a circle of yellow light on the rug, he didn’t move.
“Hola, Miguel,” I said, my voice low.
There was no response.
Seriously? Even if I could understand his reluctance to speak to me in a room full of people, ignoring me right now was asinine. He made me feel like I was starring in that movie where Bruce Willis is dead, but doesn’t know it.
I should have just headed into the bathroom to brush my teeth and pretend like it didn’t matter.
But it did matter. And during the next ten seconds, my anger swelled.
I was suddenly livid, with the sound of blood pounding in my ears.
Because no matter how much you might want to pretend a person doesn’t exist, you can’t do that.
Especially if that person is your teammate.
Especially if that person used to be your best friend.
Crossing the room, I stood over him. He didn’t move.
Not a muscle. So I raised a hand, hovering my palm over his forehead, where all that soft blond hair framed his face.
I used to run my fingers through it. But I didn’t do that now.
Instead, I used the heel of my hand to give his head a violent backward shove.
He moved then, because I really didn’t give him a choice. His neck snapped back until it collided with the wall, and his wild eyes met mine. But he didn’t say a word. And it made me so fucking crazy that I was close to losing it. I didn’t even plan to, but I made a fist.
“Hit me,” he whispered then. And the expression on his face held so much pain that you might think I’d already socked him.
“FUCK you,” I spat. I wanted to hit him — I really did. But the small flicker of sanity that I still possessed decided to surface, reminding me that I would only get in trouble for it. He probably wanted me to deck him so I’d get kicked off the team.
Not worth it.
Not worth it.
Just breathe.
I didn’t punch him. Instead, I reached up like a punk-ass kid and flicked him on the forehead. That’s proof right there that I was, at that moment, cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs. Hell, just then, I wished he’d hit me. Because then I’d have a good reason to feel this insane.
But that didn’t happen either. Instead, Graham reached up and caught my retreating hand by the wrist. Awkwardly, he pulled the back of my hand tight against his forehead, trapping it there. He closed his eyes, and heaved out a breath that had the weight of the world in it.