Chapter 9 #2
“I guess, but I never really feel it, y’know? I’m just a dude who plays in a band. Like, I still feel like the kid playing in some sweaty basement to fifty college students or whatever. And then we step out on stage and there’s thousands of people who know our lyrics. I’ll never get used to it.”
“Yeah, I get what you mean.” Nick still doesn’t feel like the kind of player whose face is on merchandise, whose name is on their most-sold jersey, who fans line up for hours to try and meet on publicity days. “You guys got big pretty fast, huh?”
“So fast,” Matt agrees with a half-grimace. “We never expected it. People like us, with songs like ours, actually getting big in the rock scene?” He shakes his head incredulously. “My teenage self couldn’t even imagine.”
Nick swallows hard—yeah, he knows what that’s like. “It’s really cool,” he says, wishing he could think of something more eloquent. “Was it hard? At first? Like, even when you started, you were…”
“Out and proud?” Matt finishes with a rueful grin.
Nick nods—even their first EP makes no pains to hide it.
“Yeah. Can’t say it was smooth sailing, but we wanted to make the music we wanted to hear, even if we never got out of those college basement gigs.
” He shrugs. “Honestly, even when we got a little bigger it didn’t get truly rough until Case started transitioning after we graduated.
Seems the only thing conservative rock fans hate more than gay people is women,” he adds with a bitter sort of sarcasm.
“Unfortunately for them, the scene is a whole lot fruitier than their narrow little minds could fathom—and people really love hearing songs that feel relatable in ways that straight bands just don’t cover.
” This time, when Matt smiles, it’s a small, proud thing.
“It’s a great community, and our fans have really rallied for us. We’re lucky to be part of it.”
“You’ve earned it,” Nick insists. “I can’t… What you guys have built up is really incredible. I couldn’t imagine…” He snorts a little too sharply. “Well, let’s just say I wish hockey had that kind of community.”
“Hockey’s problem isn’t community,” Matt replies.
“It’s culture. The community is there, it’s just getting forced out by the culture perpetuating toxic behaviors and stereotypes, from the top all the way down to kid leagues.
It’s—” He stops, ducking his head to take a sheepish sip of his coffee.
“Sorry, that’s not exactly chill lunch conversation.
I’ll put the soapbox away,” he jokes, bumping their knees together with a chuckle.
“But it’s probably for the best that college destroyed my NHL dreams, huh? Don’t know if I’d have survived it.”
“You wanted to go pro?” Nick isn’t going to touch the other half of the conversation. Not that Matt’s wrong, he’s just … not ready to have that kind of discussion in public.
“When I was a kid, oh yeah. When I hit bantam age I kinda knew I didn’t have the skills to make it, and that’s when music took the front seat.
I still hoped to make the AHL or something though, up until I got my wrist broken in junior year of college, had to have pins and surgery and everything. I’m just glad I can still play guitar.”
Nick tries his best not to flinch when Matt holds out his right arm, twisting it to show a set of scars half-hidden by a floral tattoo, curving across the back of his forearm and down to about two inches below the base of his thumb.
They’re pale and silvery, obviously long healed, but he’s seen scars like those on so many guys who never got back on the ice because of them, and it makes his stomach churn.
“What … what happened?” he asks softly, eyes tracing over the faint scarring. He’s surprised he hasn’t noticed them before.
Matt grins sharply. “Blocked a shot with my arm, like an idiot. Hit me right where the pads don’t cover, and man, he was not holding back. Broke both the bones in multiple places. I was pissed.”
Nick can only wince in sympathy—that kind of injury would have a guy out for a whole season, at least. He says as much, and Matt nods.
“Sure did. It was right at the start of my season, too. I spent the whole winter sulking in my room and angstily writing the lyrics to what would become Penalty Minutes.” He shrugs, smile turning lopsided.
“So, y’know, it all worked out for the best.”
Nick isn’t sure he could be quite so happy-go-lucky about an injury like that, but if it doesn’t bother Matt, he isn’t going to argue.
“I was kinda wondering how you had the time to write a whole album while playing college hockey and, like, graduating.”
A short laugh bursts out of Matt, and he pushes his hair back off his forehead. “Yeah, we had a lot on our plates.” Suddenly he looks shy, his boot-clad toes nudging up against Nick’s sneaker. “If you wanna go for a walk or whatever, I could tell you about it? If you don’t have to be anywhere.”
When Nick checks his phone, he’s amazed to see they’ve already been sitting for over an hour. Their plates are long cleared, and every time Cindy’s walked past she’s glanced at him but hasn’t approached.
“Oh, no, I’m good for another hour or so.” It might cut into his prep time, but whatever—he can do his hair and put a tux on in his sleep at this point.
“Perfect.” Matt’s teeth flash when he smiles, and then he’s raising a hand to get Cindy’s attention, trying to fish his wallet out of his pocket as if Nick has any intention of letting him pay.
It’s a battle of elbows to reach for the check, which Matt wins only by the grace of Nick rescuing their mugs before they can go flying off the table.
“Have a good rest of your day, boys,” Cindy says, smiling at their antics. “Nick, honey, you bring this one back sometime, hmm? I like him.”
Color rises on Nick’s cheeks—he knows she doesn’t mean it like it sounds, but it makes his chest squeeze with something that’s not quite anxiety.
“Only if you promise not to give away the rest of my secrets.” He dips down, kissing her cheek and tucking a twenty into her palm, pulling away with his best roguish grin. “Until next time.”
As the pair step out onto the street, walking shoulder to shoulder, Nick has to shove his hands into his pockets to once again resist the urge to hold Matt’s hand. It’s starting to become a real problem. It’s not like he’s ever even done that before.
Maybe that’s why he wants to. Just to know what it’s like.
They walk with no real destination, and Nick learns about Matt’s time at UMich, about meeting his bandmates and feeling music really click for the first time, then getting his wrist broken and throwing himself into songwriting to compensate.
In return, he tells Matt about when he knew he had a chance at making it big in hockey, and a little about his first couple of seasons at Nevada—the parts that he can talk about, anyway.
There’s a lot of lonely nights he doesn’t want to reminisce on.
Matt seems to understand that Juniors isn’t something Nick wants to talk about, either, and he doesn’t push. Short of a few anecdotes about struggling to learn French at the age of fifteen, Nick glosses over the whole experience.
His Vegas stories are much more fun anyway.
By the time the alarm goes off on Nick’s phone, telling him he really needs to get home and get ready or Kat’s going to get mad at him, they’ve been outside long enough for Nick to wish he’d brought a coat, yet he’d quite happily keep going for hours more.
They say goodbye on a street corner with a hug that lingers, and a sly grin from Matt that promises everything else when they see each other on Halloween.
It’s frustrating that there’s nowhere private, nowhere secluded to drag him into and kiss those teasing lips, but Nick knows better than to risk it.
There’s no such thing as true privacy in this town.
Later, when he’s got his hair locked into place and his second-nicest tuxedo on, he’s supposed to be thinking about charming rich socialites into donating money to youth hockey charities, but mostly he’s thinking about Matt.
Remembering the light in his eyes, the warmth of his shoulder against his, the playful lilt to his tone when he teased Nick.
He blames the fizz in his stomach on the champagne, and the spring in his step on his success rate with the donors. But at every turn, Marco is wiggling his eyebrows salaciously, and Nick knows he has no excuse for the smile on his face.