The Photographer #2
The game had gone to overtime. Postgame interviews ran long. By the time I finished sending photographs to the team’s social staff, it was after one in the morning.
He had already showered at the arena.
I had not.
My clothes smelled like cold air, stale coffee and the faint rubber scent that clung to every hockey building.
“I’m showering,” I said as soon as we entered the room.
He loosened his tie.
“Thanks for the play-by-play.”
“That means don’t use all the hot water.”
“I already showered.”
I pulled a clean towel from the bathroom shelf, closed the door and began undressing.
My body ached from carrying equipment all night. My shoulders felt knotted. My feet hurt from standing behind the glass.
I turned on the shower and let the water warm.
Then I realized my clean clothes were still folded inside my suitcase.
I stared at the closed bathroom door.
Normally, I would have wrapped myself in a towel, retrieved them and returned without thinking.
There was nothing inherently strange about that.
People wore towels.
He had seen me in dresses that exposed more skin than a hotel bath towel would.
The distinction was theoretical.
My body did not care.
I wrapped the towel securely beneath my arms and opened the door.
He was sitting against the headboard of his bed with his laptop open.
His tie was gone. The first few buttons of his shirt were undone, exposing the base of his neck and a strip of chest. His sleeves were rolled to his elbows.
He looked up.
Then stopped.
I felt his attention land on me.
Not the casual glance of someone noticing movement.
A stare.
His eyes moved slowly from my bare shoulders to the towel wrapped around my body. Down my legs. Back up again.
The room seemed to contract.
I tightened one hand around the edge of the towel.
“My clothes,” I said.
He closed the laptop.
Neither of us spoke.
I walked toward my suitcase.
His gaze followed me.
I could feel it against my skin, hot and unmistakable.
I knelt and unzipped the case.
My clean clothes were directly on top.
I could have picked them up.
I should have.
Instead, I stayed crouched for an extra second, aware of the towel pulling tighter around my hips.
When I stood, he was still watching.
“You’re staring,” I said.
“I am.”
The honesty startled me.
My pulse kicked harder.
“You want to stop?”
“No.”
His voice was rougher now.
I turned toward him fully.
He sat motionless on the bed, one hand resting against his thigh, the other on the closed laptop. He looked as though he was using every ounce of control not to stand.
That affected me more than if he had.
We had spent four seasons pretending not to notice each other.
Three nights pretending this room had changed nothing.
I was suddenly tired of pretending.
My fingers loosened around the towel.
His eyes dropped to the movement.
The shower continued running behind me, water striking the tile in a steady rush.
I let one edge of the towel slip lower.
His hands curled against his thighs.
“Tell me to stop,” I said.
“I’m not going to do that.”
I released the towel.
It fell to the carpet.
For one second, he did nothing.
He simply looked at me.
The stare should have made me self-conscious.
Instead, it made heat move through every part of me.
His gaze was slow and unguarded, taking in everything the camera had always kept between us.
Then he stood.
The laptop slid forgotten onto the bed.
He crossed the space between us without rushing. When he stopped in front of me, he still didn’t touch me.
“You’re sure?” he asked.
I reached for the open collar of his shirt.
His hands settled lightly at my waist.
“Say it.”
I leaned closer until my mouth nearly touched his.
“Come into the shower with me.”
That was enough.
He kissed me.
Four years of familiarity made the first kiss feel stranger, not easier.
I knew the shape of his smile.
I knew the scar near his chin and the small crease between his eyebrows when he concentrated.
I did not know what his mouth felt like against mine.
Now I did. Warm. Firm. Less controlled than I expected.
His hands tightened around my waist as I pulled at his shirt, pushing it from his shoulders. He let it fall to the floor beside the towel.
His skin was hot beneath my palms.
The body I had photographed in locker rooms and on the ice was suddenly real in an entirely different way, muscle shifting beneath my hands as he drew me against him.
He broke the kiss long enough to look at me.
“You have any idea how many times I’ve thought about this?”
“Since the room mix-up?”
“Before.”
The admission sent a thrill through me.
“How long before?”
He kissed the corner of my mouth.
“Not answering that.”
“Why?”
“Because you’ll get arrogant.”
“I’m already arrogant.”
“That’s my thing.”
“You don’t own it.”
His mouth moved to my neck.
My head tipped back.
He lifted me suddenly.
I caught his shoulders and wrapped my legs around his waist and kissed him while he walked us into the bathroom.
The shower had filled the room with steam.
He set me carefully on the bath mat and reached into the shower to test the water.
“You made it boiling.”
“I like hot showers.”
“This is how lobsters die.”
I stepped beneath the spray.
Water ran over my hair and down my body.
He stood outside the stall, pants still on, looking at me through the steam.
I reached for the waistband of his pants. His breath changed.
“Take them off,” I said.
He obeyed.
The fact that he did sent another pulse of heat through me.
He stepped beneath the water and immediately flinched.
“This is unreasonable.”
I laughed.
He backed me gently against the tile.
The cool wall met my shoulder blades while his body shielded me from most of the spray.
His hair darkened beneath the water, falling over his forehead. Droplets gathered along his eyelashes and ran down his face.
I had photographed him wet countless times, soaked with sweat after long practices and intense games.
The camera had never captured this.
The way his chest rose against mine.
The way his hand spread across my lower back.
The way he looked at me like every boundary between us had dissolved with the steam.
“You’re doing it again,” he said.
“What?”
“Looking at me like you’re taking a picture.”
“Habit.”
“You don’t have a camera.”
“I know.”
“Good.”
He kissed me.
His mouth was slower this time as water ran between us. I slid my hands into his wet hair and pulled him closer.
His hand moved down my side, following the path of the water.
I shifted against him.
His breath caught.
“You’re going to make us fall.”
“You’re supposed to have good balance.”
“On skates.”
His hands moved with more confidence now, exploring the body he had only seen wrapped in team credentials, winter coats and layers of black work clothes.
I pressed closer.
He made a low sound against my mouth.
The sound changed everything.
The careful familiarity between us finally broke.